I thought I'd wait a day or two after seeing Quantum of Solace before reviewing
it, because I was fairly certain I wasn't going to remember many details about
it. This has proved to be the case. Overall impression is that James Bond is a
bit pissed off after Casino Royale, and so embarks on a bit of a paperchase
across the world in search of the person he deems responsible. In passing, he
uncovers an international criminal conspiricy so bland that even he doesn't
really much care about them. The most interesting thing about them, I thought,
was that they were run by Jay Kay from Jamiroquai. I thought wrong, the credits
say that they were run by someone who looked a bit like Jay Kay from
Jamiroquai. In any case, all James is really looking for the whole time is five
minutes of quality alone time with Jay Kay's stunt double, in order to slap him
around a bit.
This is, effectively, Daniel Craig's remake of "Licence To Kill", in which Bond
goes off on one, in pursuit of someone basically uninteresting who's pissed him
off. And let's face it, "Licence To Kill" wins the "Most Shit Bond Film Not
Involving Roger Moore" award.
Having said that, it was kind of *alright*. I quite like the fact that these
days a Bond gadget is a mobile that does a tiny bit more than a mobile really
can; back in the heyday of Connery, the gadgets were things that they tried to
pitch a bit ahead of what's possible, but within what's plausible. The Bond
girls, I approved of, I've always liked them to be in the "Foxy Member of the
[country] Secret Service" mould. All we were really missing was an absurd plot
by a fiendish bad guy. Unfortunately, that's an element that we really can't do
without.
Views, Reviews, and Inflammatory Comments on the subject of Cinema.
Wednesday 5 November 2008
Wednesday 22 October 2008
Burn After Reading
Sooo, Coen Brothers time again.
This time round, they've decided to remake Fargo, give or take.
In that you get four of five bloody idiots, and have them all screw each other
over, misunderstand the situation until all are dead or insane. It's a pretty
standard Coen brothers trick, really, you come up with a stupid plot, (this
time two people trying to blackmail a CIA guy for the return of what they
believe is confidential information) and manage to get away with how stupid
your plot is by making it clear that everyone involved in it really is stupid.
So it really is Fargo/Big Lebowski/Raising Arizona territory.
There is a, if not serious, then at least melancholy undertone to it all. In
that practically everyone in the film is romatically unhappy, and a lot of the
misunderstandings involved stem from couples not communicating, and a lot of
the motivation for action and change in the film come from the characters
being unhappy with their lives. The only real exception to this appears to be
Brad Pitt's character Chad, who is pretty much an amiable, clueless boob.
It's a good movie, but it's an average Coen Brothers movie.
This time round, they've decided to remake Fargo, give or take.
In that you get four of five bloody idiots, and have them all screw each other
over, misunderstand the situation until all are dead or insane. It's a pretty
standard Coen brothers trick, really, you come up with a stupid plot, (this
time two people trying to blackmail a CIA guy for the return of what they
believe is confidential information) and manage to get away with how stupid
your plot is by making it clear that everyone involved in it really is stupid.
So it really is Fargo/Big Lebowski/Raising Arizona territory.
There is a, if not serious, then at least melancholy undertone to it all. In
that practically everyone in the film is romatically unhappy, and a lot of the
misunderstandings involved stem from couples not communicating, and a lot of
the motivation for action and change in the film come from the characters
being unhappy with their lives. The only real exception to this appears to be
Brad Pitt's character Chad, who is pretty much an amiable, clueless boob.
It's a good movie, but it's an average Coen Brothers movie.
Tuesday 14 October 2008
Tropic Thunder
It's the bastard lovechild of Zoolander and Rambo.
Essentially, a bunch of eejit movie stars sign up to do a Platoon/ Apocalypse
Now style war movie. The director decides he's going to do it guerilla
filmmaking style, and lets them lose in the Vietnamese jungle, where they
promptly get lost, and have a run in with some drug traffickers, who they
initially mistake for extras in their film. Hilarity, despite what I just said,
actually ensues.
It's actually a combination of low, sick humour, and a bunch of sly digs at
movie stars and moviemaking in general. Tom Cruise actually nearly steals the
show as a foulmouthed big-shot movie producer, but in the end, Robert Downey Jr
wins, with his probably-unfair piss take of Russell Crowe method acting as
Fred Williamson.
Funnier than you'd think. I think comedies generally used to be a lot funnier,
and this, basically, would have been a pretty average 80's comedy. It just
seems like that these days, what with shit like the Scary/Epic/Disaster Movie
franchises somehow getting made and into cinemas, when a stupid comedy actually
manages to be funny, it's worthy of note.
Essentially, a bunch of eejit movie stars sign up to do a Platoon/ Apocalypse
Now style war movie. The director decides he's going to do it guerilla
filmmaking style, and lets them lose in the Vietnamese jungle, where they
promptly get lost, and have a run in with some drug traffickers, who they
initially mistake for extras in their film. Hilarity, despite what I just said,
actually ensues.
It's actually a combination of low, sick humour, and a bunch of sly digs at
movie stars and moviemaking in general. Tom Cruise actually nearly steals the
show as a foulmouthed big-shot movie producer, but in the end, Robert Downey Jr
wins, with his probably-unfair piss take of Russell Crowe method acting as
Fred Williamson.
Funnier than you'd think. I think comedies generally used to be a lot funnier,
and this, basically, would have been a pretty average 80's comedy. It just
seems like that these days, what with shit like the Scary/Epic/Disaster Movie
franchises somehow getting made and into cinemas, when a stupid comedy actually
manages to be funny, it's worthy of note.
Monday 29 September 2008
Taken
The tagline on the poster pretty much sums the film up. They took his daughter.
He will hunt them. He will find them. And he will kill them. And that, in
essence, is the whole movie. Liam Neeson is this ex-CIA guy whose daughter is
kidnapped by human traffickers on holiday in Paris. He therefore goes over to
Paris and kills everyone remotely involved until he gets her back.
Liam Neeson is his usual warm, lovely sympathetic self with big soulful eyes,
as he carves a trail of mayhem and destruction through this human trafficking
operation. It's not a big anger and revenge thing, so much as a father's brutal
ruthlessness in the face of an estimate that if he doesn't locate her in four
days, he never will. Thus the good guy is unimpeachably good - he's a concerned
father fighting for his innocent daughter's life, and the bad guys are
irredeemably bad - these are scumbags who kidnap young women travelling alone,
and sell them into lives of enforced prostitution. Thus, there is absolutely no
act on Neeson's part that you couldn't condone, and boy howdy does he use that
latitude. The action runs from gunplay, snap-the-neck martial arts to offroad
vehicular homicide.
Essentially the whole thing is an cathartic justicegasm from start to finish. A
real manly man's movie. Doesn't make a lick of sense of course, but hey, it's a
Luc Besson screenplay, and since when did it matter whether he made sense? It's
a case of sit back, relax, and enjoy watching Liam Neeson break the necks of a
series of very unpleasant men. An especially satisfying film if you're getting
on in years, and want reassurance that you can be an older man, and still
badass.
He will hunt them. He will find them. And he will kill them. And that, in
essence, is the whole movie. Liam Neeson is this ex-CIA guy whose daughter is
kidnapped by human traffickers on holiday in Paris. He therefore goes over to
Paris and kills everyone remotely involved until he gets her back.
Liam Neeson is his usual warm, lovely sympathetic self with big soulful eyes,
as he carves a trail of mayhem and destruction through this human trafficking
operation. It's not a big anger and revenge thing, so much as a father's brutal
ruthlessness in the face of an estimate that if he doesn't locate her in four
days, he never will. Thus the good guy is unimpeachably good - he's a concerned
father fighting for his innocent daughter's life, and the bad guys are
irredeemably bad - these are scumbags who kidnap young women travelling alone,
and sell them into lives of enforced prostitution. Thus, there is absolutely no
act on Neeson's part that you couldn't condone, and boy howdy does he use that
latitude. The action runs from gunplay, snap-the-neck martial arts to offroad
vehicular homicide.
Essentially the whole thing is an cathartic justicegasm from start to finish. A
real manly man's movie. Doesn't make a lick of sense of course, but hey, it's a
Luc Besson screenplay, and since when did it matter whether he made sense? It's
a case of sit back, relax, and enjoy watching Liam Neeson break the necks of a
series of very unpleasant men. An especially satisfying film if you're getting
on in years, and want reassurance that you can be an older man, and still
badass.
Tuesday 23 September 2008
The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas
Brief Synopsis: A young boy's father is appointed commandant of a work camp in
Nazi Germany. The boy befriends another boy, an internee in the camp, and
slowly comes to realise the gulf between what he believes to be true, and the
harsh reality, with tragic results.
We often hear that the story of the Holocaust must be retold, that we shouldn't
be allowed to forget. I completely agree with that, and for that reason alone,
this is a worthy film, which I would encourage people to see. The reality of
that stance, however, is that not every film on the subject is going to be a
masterpiece; The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas is no Schindler's List.
It does have an interesting angle; the Germans in the film have very English
accents, and are portrayed, by and large, as classic period English people. We
are being encouraged to think of the Germans as just like us, to not see it as
something *they* did, but as something we might all have been swept up in.
Likewise, everyone in the film is a victim of the Third Reich to some extent.
Clearly, the plight of the Jews is paramount, and certainly not downplayed, but
too, there is the suffering of a mother unable to interfere as her children are
indoctrinated; a young girl swept up in Nazi propaganda because she has a crush
on a young officer; the commandant himself is clearly a good man who has sold
his soul to ensure a future for his family.
The ending, which I shan't go into detail about seems like hyperbole, making a
bad thing worse to make a point, and adding a false note to a point in the film
where truth is most important.
As a film, it's a bit slow to get going, with the ending arriving in a big
rush. The performances are universally good, I think, but there's really not
enough meat there. The majority of the power of the film, I think, comes from
what you already know going in to the film.
I'd give the film 8/10, but also say that I think films on this subject need to
be judged to a higher standard, where 8/10 maybe isn't good enough.
Nazi Germany. The boy befriends another boy, an internee in the camp, and
slowly comes to realise the gulf between what he believes to be true, and the
harsh reality, with tragic results.
We often hear that the story of the Holocaust must be retold, that we shouldn't
be allowed to forget. I completely agree with that, and for that reason alone,
this is a worthy film, which I would encourage people to see. The reality of
that stance, however, is that not every film on the subject is going to be a
masterpiece; The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas is no Schindler's List.
It does have an interesting angle; the Germans in the film have very English
accents, and are portrayed, by and large, as classic period English people. We
are being encouraged to think of the Germans as just like us, to not see it as
something *they* did, but as something we might all have been swept up in.
Likewise, everyone in the film is a victim of the Third Reich to some extent.
Clearly, the plight of the Jews is paramount, and certainly not downplayed, but
too, there is the suffering of a mother unable to interfere as her children are
indoctrinated; a young girl swept up in Nazi propaganda because she has a crush
on a young officer; the commandant himself is clearly a good man who has sold
his soul to ensure a future for his family.
The ending, which I shan't go into detail about seems like hyperbole, making a
bad thing worse to make a point, and adding a false note to a point in the film
where truth is most important.
As a film, it's a bit slow to get going, with the ending arriving in a big
rush. The performances are universally good, I think, but there's really not
enough meat there. The majority of the power of the film, I think, comes from
what you already know going in to the film.
I'd give the film 8/10, but also say that I think films on this subject need to
be judged to a higher standard, where 8/10 maybe isn't good enough.
Wednesday 17 September 2008
Pineapple Express
Vague plot: Stoner witnesses murder, runs and hides at his dealer's place,
causing them both to go on the run. They attempt to evade their pursuers, the
pursuers attempt to catch them, both sides amusingly hampered by their own
ineptitude.
It's actually pretty funny. In a way, I'd say it was a cross between your
classic Cheech and Chong movie and a Coen brothers film like Fargo. In that
it's rather funnier and classier. Some great oddball performances, and a
realisation that merely getting stoned and fucking things up isn't funny in and
of itself, and a good script helps too. If you're making a film for stoners,
it's easy to be lazy, because they'll laugh at anything. This is a rather
cleverer thing.
It gets progressively wild and woolly towards the end, with a really violent
slapstick finale which is possibly over the top, but pretty hilarious for all
that.
causing them both to go on the run. They attempt to evade their pursuers, the
pursuers attempt to catch them, both sides amusingly hampered by their own
ineptitude.
It's actually pretty funny. In a way, I'd say it was a cross between your
classic Cheech and Chong movie and a Coen brothers film like Fargo. In that
it's rather funnier and classier. Some great oddball performances, and a
realisation that merely getting stoned and fucking things up isn't funny in and
of itself, and a good script helps too. If you're making a film for stoners,
it's easy to be lazy, because they'll laugh at anything. This is a rather
cleverer thing.
It gets progressively wild and woolly towards the end, with a really violent
slapstick finale which is possibly over the top, but pretty hilarious for all
that.
Thursday 11 September 2008
Rocknrolla
So, Guy Ritchie's made his film again. We're back in the seedy, and clearly
non-existent world of East-End villains, enmeshed in capers at cross-purposes,
with every thread coincidentally tying up at the end. Is that a bad thing? I
don't think so. How many Hitchcock films are basically the same plot? I'm not
saying that Ritchie's as good as Hitchcock, but I am saying that it's no basis
to criticise him. Likewise, while Ritchie's East End may have no more basis in
fact that Middle Earth, it's similarly irrelevant to the question of whether
the film's any good. I say this because I am sick to the hind teeth of film
critics who appear to be putting the boot into Ritchie for no better reason
than he married Madonna, which annoys them for some reason.
As it goes, it's a bit messy and chaotic, but it's very amusing, exciting in
all the right places, sort of a dumbed down version of The Long Good Friday
with jokes in it. Everything's a bit contrived and coincidental, but not so
much that it bothers you.
non-existent world of East-End villains, enmeshed in capers at cross-purposes,
with every thread coincidentally tying up at the end. Is that a bad thing? I
don't think so. How many Hitchcock films are basically the same plot? I'm not
saying that Ritchie's as good as Hitchcock, but I am saying that it's no basis
to criticise him. Likewise, while Ritchie's East End may have no more basis in
fact that Middle Earth, it's similarly irrelevant to the question of whether
the film's any good. I say this because I am sick to the hind teeth of film
critics who appear to be putting the boot into Ritchie for no better reason
than he married Madonna, which annoys them for some reason.
As it goes, it's a bit messy and chaotic, but it's very amusing, exciting in
all the right places, sort of a dumbed down version of The Long Good Friday
with jokes in it. Everything's a bit contrived and coincidental, but not so
much that it bothers you.
Wednesday 3 September 2008
Babylon AD
Imagine you've seen Children of Men. And you liked the post apocalyptic
setting, and you liked the idea of this washed up, morally ambiguous man
protecting this pregnant girl, and getting her from point A to point B. But you
couldn't help thinking it was all a bit wussy. It needs more guns, you think.
It needs explosions. It needs extreme sports. It needs martial arts. It needs
car chases. What do you do?
You call Vin Diesel, of course!
So, what this is, is your standard schlocky post-Cyberpunk thriller. Dodgy
geezer is hired to do dodgy job, by dodgy people, and unexpectedly grows a
conscience somewhere along the line, and rebels at the end at the standard
"give me the baby to eat and I will let you live and give you a million
dollars" moment.
It's not a bad one, it's grim, gritty, nicely actiony, heartlessly cruel in the
right places. It's not very intelligent, and pulls the "if we don't explain the
end, it makes us look cleverer, and saves us having to think up an ending"
trick. Beyond that problem, not so bad.
setting, and you liked the idea of this washed up, morally ambiguous man
protecting this pregnant girl, and getting her from point A to point B. But you
couldn't help thinking it was all a bit wussy. It needs more guns, you think.
It needs explosions. It needs extreme sports. It needs martial arts. It needs
car chases. What do you do?
You call Vin Diesel, of course!
So, what this is, is your standard schlocky post-Cyberpunk thriller. Dodgy
geezer is hired to do dodgy job, by dodgy people, and unexpectedly grows a
conscience somewhere along the line, and rebels at the end at the standard
"give me the baby to eat and I will let you live and give you a million
dollars" moment.
It's not a bad one, it's grim, gritty, nicely actiony, heartlessly cruel in the
right places. It's not very intelligent, and pulls the "if we don't explain the
end, it makes us look cleverer, and saves us having to think up an ending"
trick. Beyond that problem, not so bad.
Monday 25 August 2008
Hellboy II: The Golden Army
Whizz-bangy fun, really. Apparently, ages ago, the massed races of fantasy folk
fought a war against humanity. They won, having employed an unstoppable
ultimate weapon, but so appalled was their king at the carnage he had wrought,
a peace was made, and the two groups took to ignoring each other, such that the
whole business faded into legend. Only now the Prince of the Elves has finally
lost his patience and is attempting to gain control of said ultimate weapon, in
order to wipe out humanity again, and set everything to rights. He's got
himself a legitimate beef in my view.
In the other corner is the BRPD and their gang of freaks and weirdos, led by
Hellboy, who aims to punch him until he stops. Fair enough. Game on.
It's very much a SFX/Creatures movie, and the action sequences are king.
There's some bits and bobs of character floating about, but really, what we
want is rampaging elementals flattening New York, and being shot to death with
absurdly large guns. And that's what we get. And it's very nice.
The thing I find somewhat surprising is that a) Mike Mignola, Hellboy's creator
is heavily involved in it and b) that the film is way less talky and thinky
than the comic. Sure, in the comic, Hellboy does fall down a lot, and his
indestructability is used for the same kind of comic effect, but he's also
quite the occult investigator, whereas in the film, he's more like The Thing
out of the Fantastic Four - short on smarts, but long on "It's Clobberin'
Time!"
Anyroad, it's a good little grotesque action movie, lots of fun, but not a
whole lot to take home and think about later.
fought a war against humanity. They won, having employed an unstoppable
ultimate weapon, but so appalled was their king at the carnage he had wrought,
a peace was made, and the two groups took to ignoring each other, such that the
whole business faded into legend. Only now the Prince of the Elves has finally
lost his patience and is attempting to gain control of said ultimate weapon, in
order to wipe out humanity again, and set everything to rights. He's got
himself a legitimate beef in my view.
In the other corner is the BRPD and their gang of freaks and weirdos, led by
Hellboy, who aims to punch him until he stops. Fair enough. Game on.
It's very much a SFX/Creatures movie, and the action sequences are king.
There's some bits and bobs of character floating about, but really, what we
want is rampaging elementals flattening New York, and being shot to death with
absurdly large guns. And that's what we get. And it's very nice.
The thing I find somewhat surprising is that a) Mike Mignola, Hellboy's creator
is heavily involved in it and b) that the film is way less talky and thinky
than the comic. Sure, in the comic, Hellboy does fall down a lot, and his
indestructability is used for the same kind of comic effect, but he's also
quite the occult investigator, whereas in the film, he's more like The Thing
out of the Fantastic Four - short on smarts, but long on "It's Clobberin'
Time!"
Anyroad, it's a good little grotesque action movie, lots of fun, but not a
whole lot to take home and think about later.
Monday 18 August 2008
Man On Wire
There's two ways you can view this film. In part, it is certainly a very
interesting documentary about the occasion when a maverick French wirewalker,
and his mates, broke into the World Trade Center, slung a cable between the two
towers, and had him walk across it.
On another level, it's a documentary about some fantastically smug and
self-satified people who did the above in 1974, and have been dining out on the
story every since. I'd hate to actually know Philippe Petit, he's probably a
dreadful person to be stuck next to at a dinner party, Mastermind specialist
subject: Myself and How Clever I Am.
Essentially, it's not an uninteresting tale by any means, but there's two
problems. One, it's overlong. A bit of judicious editing would make this a
bloody good 45 minute BBC documentary. At double that, it begins to pall. Two,
there's not enough source material. Part of the reason for this is obvious;
there is, tragically, no way of revisiting the scene, and saying "yes, this is
where we attached the cables" or similar. Fortunately, taste prevails and we
don't travel to NY to mawkishly paw over ground zero, but that leaves us
essentially with archive footage and talking heads, and the archive material
really isn't that good. It would seem that their exploits were filmed at the
time with a few cine cameras and still cameras, but not with anything like the
professionalism you'd like. There's a lot of distant blurs of what might be a
man, on what is possibly a wire. Likewise, there's just too much of Petit and
his team banging on about their recollections of the event, and that's what
makes them look smug; if they'd said how clever they were just the once, you'd
have accepted it.
With more material to work from, this might have been worth 90 minutes of our
time. Cutting their coat according to their cloth, they'd have ended up with a
45 minute documentary. What we end up with, to quote Bilbo Baggins, is butter
scraped across too much bread.
interesting documentary about the occasion when a maverick French wirewalker,
and his mates, broke into the World Trade Center, slung a cable between the two
towers, and had him walk across it.
On another level, it's a documentary about some fantastically smug and
self-satified people who did the above in 1974, and have been dining out on the
story every since. I'd hate to actually know Philippe Petit, he's probably a
dreadful person to be stuck next to at a dinner party, Mastermind specialist
subject: Myself and How Clever I Am.
Essentially, it's not an uninteresting tale by any means, but there's two
problems. One, it's overlong. A bit of judicious editing would make this a
bloody good 45 minute BBC documentary. At double that, it begins to pall. Two,
there's not enough source material. Part of the reason for this is obvious;
there is, tragically, no way of revisiting the scene, and saying "yes, this is
where we attached the cables" or similar. Fortunately, taste prevails and we
don't travel to NY to mawkishly paw over ground zero, but that leaves us
essentially with archive footage and talking heads, and the archive material
really isn't that good. It would seem that their exploits were filmed at the
time with a few cine cameras and still cameras, but not with anything like the
professionalism you'd like. There's a lot of distant blurs of what might be a
man, on what is possibly a wire. Likewise, there's just too much of Petit and
his team banging on about their recollections of the event, and that's what
makes them look smug; if they'd said how clever they were just the once, you'd
have accepted it.
With more material to work from, this might have been worth 90 minutes of our
time. Cutting their coat according to their cloth, they'd have ended up with a
45 minute documentary. What we end up with, to quote Bilbo Baggins, is butter
scraped across too much bread.
Wednesday 6 August 2008
A Complete History Of My Sexual Failures.
Independent Filmmaker Chris Waitt, in light of the fact he's just been dumped
yet again, decides to make a documentary, going back over his life,
interviewing his exes, in an attempt to work out what is wrong with him, and
why they all dumped him. And this isn't the premise for a fictional film, this
is a documentary. Albeit one where some of the scenes are of dubious veracity.
I don't think I'm giving anything away by saying that you'll know what's wrong
with him and why they dumped him in the first five or so minutes. The next 85
minutes or so, however, chronicle his own gradual discovery of his own
shortcomings, in frank, embarrassing detail.
Essentially, it's 100% pure bottled schadenfreude. The guy's hopeless, and
frankly, I think he's edited the film to make himself appear more so for comic
effect. The real mystery is not why 10-15 perfectly lovely seeming girls dumped
him, it's why 10-15 perfectly lovely seeming girls went out with him in the
first place.
Anyway, it's a whistle-stop tour of the guy's misery, lingering uncomfortably
long on the issue of his erectile dysfunction, including a visit to a
dominatrix who seems to feel that whipping his gonads will help in some way,
though whether it's intended to help him, or get vengeance on behalf of the
women of the world is not clear. I mention this episode in particular, as it
contains actual footage of his privates being whipped, and I think anyone
seeing it should be thus far forewarned.
I'll give it 8/10. Riveting, in the sense of "I want to look away, but can't."
People with a low tolerance for embarrassment and humiliation may wish to look
elsewhere.
yet again, decides to make a documentary, going back over his life,
interviewing his exes, in an attempt to work out what is wrong with him, and
why they all dumped him. And this isn't the premise for a fictional film, this
is a documentary. Albeit one where some of the scenes are of dubious veracity.
I don't think I'm giving anything away by saying that you'll know what's wrong
with him and why they dumped him in the first five or so minutes. The next 85
minutes or so, however, chronicle his own gradual discovery of his own
shortcomings, in frank, embarrassing detail.
Essentially, it's 100% pure bottled schadenfreude. The guy's hopeless, and
frankly, I think he's edited the film to make himself appear more so for comic
effect. The real mystery is not why 10-15 perfectly lovely seeming girls dumped
him, it's why 10-15 perfectly lovely seeming girls went out with him in the
first place.
Anyway, it's a whistle-stop tour of the guy's misery, lingering uncomfortably
long on the issue of his erectile dysfunction, including a visit to a
dominatrix who seems to feel that whipping his gonads will help in some way,
though whether it's intended to help him, or get vengeance on behalf of the
women of the world is not clear. I mention this episode in particular, as it
contains actual footage of his privates being whipped, and I think anyone
seeing it should be thus far forewarned.
I'll give it 8/10. Riveting, in the sense of "I want to look away, but can't."
People with a low tolerance for embarrassment and humiliation may wish to look
elsewhere.
Friday 25 July 2008
The Dark Knight
Weeeeell.
This was always going to be a tough one, wasn't it? The hype has been building.
First you've got the hype that you're going to get just because it's a Batman
movie. Then there was the added hype that Heath Ledger was going to be in it,
and the ensuing doubt over his ability to deliver. And then he goes and tops
himself, and the hype rises to fever pitch, as overnight he gets built into
this James Dean figure, and The Dark Knight is going to be the last great work
of a tortured genius. I don't know that any film could live up to that. I don't
think it has. It could have lived up to the hype before his death, I think, but
it just isn't the kind of masterwork that every newspaper and magazine seems to
think it is.
First off though, Heath Ledger is bloody brilliant. His Joker is the kind of
grade A terrifying psychopath on which film careers are built. It's the
skin-crawling equal of Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs. 12A rating be
damned, there are going to be millions of 8-11 year olds waking up screaming
after clown nightmares after this.
Plot-wise, having gone and called it The Dark Knight, they've actually gone and
made something that's a close parallel to The Killing Joke. In that what we see
here is a psychopathic criminal whose only motive is to prove that the world is
just as demented and savage as him, if only you scratch the surface a little
bit. It's an exercise in confusion. Twists, tricks, and turns are pulled out
every moment. You don't know what's going on most of the time, everyone
concerned is sort of dragged along in the Joker's wake, barely able to work out
what he's done after he's done it, never mind before. And while that chaos is
exactly what he should be, it does make the film seem messy and convoluted.
Christian Bale, meanwhile, kinda sucks. I'm sorry, but there it is. I actually
like his Bruce Wayne a lot, but his Batman voice sounds bloody stupid in my
view. The script also kinda fails to capture what Batman should be. This is a
Batman without conviction, without finesse, without the spark of genius. He
comes across as a sullen thug hiding behind his body armour. This is especially
bad in a film where it should be a case of a duel of minds between two equal
but opposite adversaries. Batman just doesn't seem to be the Joker's equal
here, and it's hard to see why Batman would interest the Joker at all.
Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent is actually The Joker's real adversary in this
film, and anyone who's vaguely aware of who Harvey Dent is knows how that's
going to turn out. What's turned out there is actually one of the better
versions of Harvey Dent's story, and it's one of the successes of the film
that they've managed to change and reinvent the character, and come up with one
of the more intelligent and interesting interpretations.
Overall, it's too messy, and Batman himself is reduced to the role of a
bit-player in his own legend. This is The Joker's film, and with such a huge
performance on one side, and such a lacklustre one on the other, the film feels
kind of asymmetrical and lopsided.
I'm going to say 8/10, as it's a film with a performance you really must see,
but it's too full of flaws to rate higher.
This was always going to be a tough one, wasn't it? The hype has been building.
First you've got the hype that you're going to get just because it's a Batman
movie. Then there was the added hype that Heath Ledger was going to be in it,
and the ensuing doubt over his ability to deliver. And then he goes and tops
himself, and the hype rises to fever pitch, as overnight he gets built into
this James Dean figure, and The Dark Knight is going to be the last great work
of a tortured genius. I don't know that any film could live up to that. I don't
think it has. It could have lived up to the hype before his death, I think, but
it just isn't the kind of masterwork that every newspaper and magazine seems to
think it is.
First off though, Heath Ledger is bloody brilliant. His Joker is the kind of
grade A terrifying psychopath on which film careers are built. It's the
skin-crawling equal of Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs. 12A rating be
damned, there are going to be millions of 8-11 year olds waking up screaming
after clown nightmares after this.
Plot-wise, having gone and called it The Dark Knight, they've actually gone and
made something that's a close parallel to The Killing Joke. In that what we see
here is a psychopathic criminal whose only motive is to prove that the world is
just as demented and savage as him, if only you scratch the surface a little
bit. It's an exercise in confusion. Twists, tricks, and turns are pulled out
every moment. You don't know what's going on most of the time, everyone
concerned is sort of dragged along in the Joker's wake, barely able to work out
what he's done after he's done it, never mind before. And while that chaos is
exactly what he should be, it does make the film seem messy and convoluted.
Christian Bale, meanwhile, kinda sucks. I'm sorry, but there it is. I actually
like his Bruce Wayne a lot, but his Batman voice sounds bloody stupid in my
view. The script also kinda fails to capture what Batman should be. This is a
Batman without conviction, without finesse, without the spark of genius. He
comes across as a sullen thug hiding behind his body armour. This is especially
bad in a film where it should be a case of a duel of minds between two equal
but opposite adversaries. Batman just doesn't seem to be the Joker's equal
here, and it's hard to see why Batman would interest the Joker at all.
Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent is actually The Joker's real adversary in this
film, and anyone who's vaguely aware of who Harvey Dent is knows how that's
going to turn out. What's turned out there is actually one of the better
versions of Harvey Dent's story, and it's one of the successes of the film
that they've managed to change and reinvent the character, and come up with one
of the more intelligent and interesting interpretations.
Overall, it's too messy, and Batman himself is reduced to the role of a
bit-player in his own legend. This is The Joker's film, and with such a huge
performance on one side, and such a lacklustre one on the other, the film feels
kind of asymmetrical and lopsided.
I'm going to say 8/10, as it's a film with a performance you really must see,
but it's too full of flaws to rate higher.
Wednesday 23 July 2008
WALL-E
Well, it's another wonderful showing for Pixar, really, not a lot more to say,
somehow. Two cute robots meet and fall in love against the backdrop of the
death and prospect of eventual rebirth of the planet. For a cute love affair
between a pair of binoculars and an iMac, it's pretty epic stuff.
The animation is, of course, excellent, whether you're talking about the way
that storms and dust clouds are rendered, or the way inanimate objects are
shown to have recognisable feelings. The film is very light on dialogue, with
the two leads saying very little but each others' names, and this essentially
puts all the acting talent on the animators. In the likes of Shrek, Mike Myers
and Eddie Murphy are providing the personalities, in WALL-E, it's all in the
animation. So even if you haven't a cute-appreciating bone in your body, this
is a film you could watch purely to enjoy the craftsmanship. If, however,
you're the kind of person who names their laptop, then this is doubly the movie
for you.
I would also like to take a moment to applaud the short at the start, "Presto",
another 3D animation, about a fight between a magician and his rabbit. It's
kind of Warner Brothers in style, and could easily sit amongst the great Looney
Tunes cartoons. I'd have paid my five quid for this alone.
If there's a criticism about this film at all, it's that it might possibly
start a little slow for some kids. Now me, I'll watch Sergio Leone movies, I
can watch dust blow around for hours. Kids sitting around me started to get a
bit fidgety. That's a tiny criticism, however, and not really one that affected
my enjoyment of the film at all.
somehow. Two cute robots meet and fall in love against the backdrop of the
death and prospect of eventual rebirth of the planet. For a cute love affair
between a pair of binoculars and an iMac, it's pretty epic stuff.
The animation is, of course, excellent, whether you're talking about the way
that storms and dust clouds are rendered, or the way inanimate objects are
shown to have recognisable feelings. The film is very light on dialogue, with
the two leads saying very little but each others' names, and this essentially
puts all the acting talent on the animators. In the likes of Shrek, Mike Myers
and Eddie Murphy are providing the personalities, in WALL-E, it's all in the
animation. So even if you haven't a cute-appreciating bone in your body, this
is a film you could watch purely to enjoy the craftsmanship. If, however,
you're the kind of person who names their laptop, then this is doubly the movie
for you.
I would also like to take a moment to applaud the short at the start, "Presto",
another 3D animation, about a fight between a magician and his rabbit. It's
kind of Warner Brothers in style, and could easily sit amongst the great Looney
Tunes cartoons. I'd have paid my five quid for this alone.
If there's a criticism about this film at all, it's that it might possibly
start a little slow for some kids. Now me, I'll watch Sergio Leone movies, I
can watch dust blow around for hours. Kids sitting around me started to get a
bit fidgety. That's a tiny criticism, however, and not really one that affected
my enjoyment of the film at all.
Wednesday 9 July 2008
The Forbidden Kingdom
Huh. Another fantasy martial arts adventure. Must be the season for it.
It starts out looking like it's going to be a cross between The Neverending
Story and The Karate Kid. New kid in town is bullied, and in the course of that
finds himself cast through time and space into Legendary China(tm) where he
finds he has to go on a quest to return a mystical staff to its rightful owner.
He's joined in this by three misfits, and it's at that point you realise that
you're actually watching a martial arts reworking of The Wizard of Oz. Only
given that the Scarecrow is a drunken-kung-fu-master Jackie Chan, and the Tin
Man is Ninja-monk Jet Li, a lot more awesome. Basically, whenever The Wizard of
Oz would have thrown you a song and dance number, The Forbidden Kingdom throws
you a kick-ass martial arts sequence.
It's not without its flaws; basically when the fight scenes aren't happening,
it's not so good. I'd say the worst of it was the direction and editing. Lots
of overlong scenes and really abrupt cuts, almost as if it was thrown together
at the last minute for release.
Overall, it's well worth a watch, if only to see Jet Li and Jackie Chan kick
hell out each other for a good five minutes. The final battle scene is also
pretty storming. Just be prepared to sit through some stuff.
7/10, but probably could have been edited better into an 8/10.
It starts out looking like it's going to be a cross between The Neverending
Story and The Karate Kid. New kid in town is bullied, and in the course of that
finds himself cast through time and space into Legendary China(tm) where he
finds he has to go on a quest to return a mystical staff to its rightful owner.
He's joined in this by three misfits, and it's at that point you realise that
you're actually watching a martial arts reworking of The Wizard of Oz. Only
given that the Scarecrow is a drunken-kung-fu-master Jackie Chan, and the Tin
Man is Ninja-monk Jet Li, a lot more awesome. Basically, whenever The Wizard of
Oz would have thrown you a song and dance number, The Forbidden Kingdom throws
you a kick-ass martial arts sequence.
It's not without its flaws; basically when the fight scenes aren't happening,
it's not so good. I'd say the worst of it was the direction and editing. Lots
of overlong scenes and really abrupt cuts, almost as if it was thrown together
at the last minute for release.
Overall, it's well worth a watch, if only to see Jet Li and Jackie Chan kick
hell out each other for a good five minutes. The final battle scene is also
pretty storming. Just be prepared to sit through some stuff.
7/10, but probably could have been edited better into an 8/10.
Kung Fu Panda
Pretty easy; this is basically exactly the movie you're expecting it to be.
It's a Dreamworks animation, which means it's 80% as good as the Pixar
equivalent. Which is no mean feat, when you think about it. It's Jack Black
being Po, the enthusiastic but inept panda who is selected to be trained as the
Dragon Warrior to take on the evil Shi-Fu, bad ass kung-fu Snow Leopard.
It's all very cute and simplistic, beautifully done, funny, everything you'd
expect. It's a kids movie that an adult can enjoy as well. The art is
wonderful, the martial arts scenes pretty exciting.
Beyond that, there's not a lot a lot to say. It's a film about a Kung Fu Panda.
It's a Dreamworks animation, which means it's 80% as good as the Pixar
equivalent. Which is no mean feat, when you think about it. It's Jack Black
being Po, the enthusiastic but inept panda who is selected to be trained as the
Dragon Warrior to take on the evil Shi-Fu, bad ass kung-fu Snow Leopard.
It's all very cute and simplistic, beautifully done, funny, everything you'd
expect. It's a kids movie that an adult can enjoy as well. The art is
wonderful, the martial arts scenes pretty exciting.
Beyond that, there's not a lot a lot to say. It's a film about a Kung Fu Panda.
Wednesday 2 July 2008
Hancock
Just think how bad this could have been. It could have been The Fresh Prince
with superpowers. It could have been all hip and street, and play on the fact
Will Smith, unlike most superheroes, is black. So it's rather a relief that
it's actually a very good film.
So, Hancock is, in effect, Superman. No laser vision in evidence, but other
than that, that's the skillset. As we find him, he's washed up, he's a drunk,
he's depressed. He's still trying to be a hero, but he's sloppy and careless,
so he makes mistakes, causes a lot of damage, so everyone hates him, and
reckons the city would be better off without him. Which makes him more
depressed, and as a consequence, more drunk.
He saves the life of a PR guy (who's actually a nice guy, and trying to do
charitable stuff), who in return decides he's going to save Hancock, help him
get back his good name, and put things to right.
Will Smith's got his acting head on for this one. Hancock isn't the kind of
smartmouthed character Will Smith does on spec, he's surly, he's brooding, and
he's visibly hurting. You feel for him, and you want him to turn his life
around. Jason Bateman's a bit closer to his Arrested Development type, but
that's not exactly a bad thing.
This is a good thing for a lot of the things it doesn't do. It doesn't spoof on
any existing superhero movie, this is as an original a take on the Superman
idea as you'll see. It doesn't poke fun at the superhero concept, while at the
same time doesn't let it pass unexamined. It's not a deep movie by any means,
it's a summer blockbuster, but on the other hand, it's not a cartoon either.
I feel, somehow, I've got more out of it than a lot of people; it's getting a
lot of "average" reviews, and I think it deserves a lot better than that.
with superpowers. It could have been all hip and street, and play on the fact
Will Smith, unlike most superheroes, is black. So it's rather a relief that
it's actually a very good film.
So, Hancock is, in effect, Superman. No laser vision in evidence, but other
than that, that's the skillset. As we find him, he's washed up, he's a drunk,
he's depressed. He's still trying to be a hero, but he's sloppy and careless,
so he makes mistakes, causes a lot of damage, so everyone hates him, and
reckons the city would be better off without him. Which makes him more
depressed, and as a consequence, more drunk.
He saves the life of a PR guy (who's actually a nice guy, and trying to do
charitable stuff), who in return decides he's going to save Hancock, help him
get back his good name, and put things to right.
Will Smith's got his acting head on for this one. Hancock isn't the kind of
smartmouthed character Will Smith does on spec, he's surly, he's brooding, and
he's visibly hurting. You feel for him, and you want him to turn his life
around. Jason Bateman's a bit closer to his Arrested Development type, but
that's not exactly a bad thing.
This is a good thing for a lot of the things it doesn't do. It doesn't spoof on
any existing superhero movie, this is as an original a take on the Superman
idea as you'll see. It doesn't poke fun at the superhero concept, while at the
same time doesn't let it pass unexamined. It's not a deep movie by any means,
it's a summer blockbuster, but on the other hand, it's not a cartoon either.
I feel, somehow, I've got more out of it than a lot of people; it's getting a
lot of "average" reviews, and I think it deserves a lot better than that.
Thursday 26 June 2008
Wanted
Funny story. In 2003, there was this comic series called Wanted by Mark Millar
and J.G. Jones. And it was pretty brilliant, actually.
So, by the end of issue 2, someone or other has decided they've got to film it.
So scriptwriters are hired, treatments are done, etc, and the project gets
greenlit. Unfortunately, Mark Millar's day job is to manage the Ultimate line at
Marvel, and so Wanted got put on the back burner for a while. Long story short,
the script for this movie got written without the writer having read 2/3 of the
story. So when the movie diverges from the book 1/3 of the way in, that's why.
So, Wanted, the comic book, is this mean-spirited riff on superheroes and
supervillains; sometime in the mid eighties, the supervillians won, setting off
a device that altered reality, such that no-one remembers that superheroes ever
existed, including the superheroes. The supervillains then go underground, rule
the world, and make the world the shitty place you see around you today.
The scriptwriter didn't know any of that, it seems. All he knew was the
protagonist, Wesley Gibson, is plucked out of his depressing life, and inducted
into a shadowy organisation called The Fraternity, on the basis of his having
super-abilities like his father's. Now, in the book, these abilities are
basically Matrix style gun-fu, as they are in the film. However, in the book,
there's the whole range of supervillains you see in the comics, whereas the
film takes the view that everyone is a Matrix-gun-fu assassin, working for this
order of assassins called The Fraternity, and the plot takes a left into the
video game Assassin's Creed.
Is it any good? No, sadly. It's got its moments, of course, most films do, most
of which come in the first half hour. After that, it's just portentous gabble.
At one point, I suddenly realised that they'd managed to make shooting people,
driving fast cars and snogging Angelina Jolie boring. How do you do that? The
plot then drives relentlessly though the basic revenge, betrayal and blah blah
blah.
Flat direction, flat performances, and a pretty limp script add up to an
only-just watchable movie, with a couple of scenes that manage to buck the
trend and be genuinely entertaining.
Buy the book, though, that's really funny, and warped.
and J.G. Jones. And it was pretty brilliant, actually.
So, by the end of issue 2, someone or other has decided they've got to film it.
So scriptwriters are hired, treatments are done, etc, and the project gets
greenlit. Unfortunately, Mark Millar's day job is to manage the Ultimate line at
Marvel, and so Wanted got put on the back burner for a while. Long story short,
the script for this movie got written without the writer having read 2/3 of the
story. So when the movie diverges from the book 1/3 of the way in, that's why.
So, Wanted, the comic book, is this mean-spirited riff on superheroes and
supervillains; sometime in the mid eighties, the supervillians won, setting off
a device that altered reality, such that no-one remembers that superheroes ever
existed, including the superheroes. The supervillains then go underground, rule
the world, and make the world the shitty place you see around you today.
The scriptwriter didn't know any of that, it seems. All he knew was the
protagonist, Wesley Gibson, is plucked out of his depressing life, and inducted
into a shadowy organisation called The Fraternity, on the basis of his having
super-abilities like his father's. Now, in the book, these abilities are
basically Matrix style gun-fu, as they are in the film. However, in the book,
there's the whole range of supervillains you see in the comics, whereas the
film takes the view that everyone is a Matrix-gun-fu assassin, working for this
order of assassins called The Fraternity, and the plot takes a left into the
video game Assassin's Creed.
Is it any good? No, sadly. It's got its moments, of course, most films do, most
of which come in the first half hour. After that, it's just portentous gabble.
At one point, I suddenly realised that they'd managed to make shooting people,
driving fast cars and snogging Angelina Jolie boring. How do you do that? The
plot then drives relentlessly though the basic revenge, betrayal and blah blah
blah.
Flat direction, flat performances, and a pretty limp script add up to an
only-just watchable movie, with a couple of scenes that manage to buck the
trend and be genuinely entertaining.
Buy the book, though, that's really funny, and warped.
Monday 16 June 2008
The Incredible Hulk
Two things you must know about The Incredible Hulk. First - he is Incredible.
Second - he is a Hulk.
I really enjoyed The Incredible Hulk. Here's how to build this movie. Start
with the TV Series. I was as surprised as anyone that this was the case, and
confidently predicted otherwise, but it's at its heart quite a lot like the
show, in that it focuses on Banner, on the run from the authorities, trying to
keep a low profile. Also, he's attempting to find a cure on the internet.
Presumably he gets a lot of spam about the size of his hulk that way.
Anyway, long story short, the military go after him, Tim Roth tries to even the
odds by injecting himself with the same Super Soldier Serum that made Captain
America; this proves to be not enough, he injects himself with Banner's blood,
and turns into something utterly huger than The Hulk. Carnage ensues.
This is where it diverges from the TV series, and in a serious way. The TV
Hulk, well, god bless Lou Feringo (who cameos. Stan Lee also cameos. Robert
Downey Jr cameos too. By 2011, Marvel hope to release an film solely consisting
of cameos) - god bless him, but he was only a big muscly guy painted green.
This is proper comic book hulk - eight foot tall, fists bigger than his head,
immune to small arms fire, mildly annoyed by anti-tank weapons, who casually
throws cars at people.
And this is all great stuff, to be honest. It's smart enough for a summer
superhero blockbuster, doesn't spend too much time waffling, and finishes on a
bloody good street brawl between The Hulk and The Abomination. Marvel have
essentially done what they did with Iron Man, which is present a fun, by the
numbers film which delivers what you *want* it to deliver, without making any
great attempt at great art.
Second - he is a Hulk.
I really enjoyed The Incredible Hulk. Here's how to build this movie. Start
with the TV Series. I was as surprised as anyone that this was the case, and
confidently predicted otherwise, but it's at its heart quite a lot like the
show, in that it focuses on Banner, on the run from the authorities, trying to
keep a low profile. Also, he's attempting to find a cure on the internet.
Presumably he gets a lot of spam about the size of his hulk that way.
Anyway, long story short, the military go after him, Tim Roth tries to even the
odds by injecting himself with the same Super Soldier Serum that made Captain
America; this proves to be not enough, he injects himself with Banner's blood,
and turns into something utterly huger than The Hulk. Carnage ensues.
This is where it diverges from the TV series, and in a serious way. The TV
Hulk, well, god bless Lou Feringo (who cameos. Stan Lee also cameos. Robert
Downey Jr cameos too. By 2011, Marvel hope to release an film solely consisting
of cameos) - god bless him, but he was only a big muscly guy painted green.
This is proper comic book hulk - eight foot tall, fists bigger than his head,
immune to small arms fire, mildly annoyed by anti-tank weapons, who casually
throws cars at people.
And this is all great stuff, to be honest. It's smart enough for a summer
superhero blockbuster, doesn't spend too much time waffling, and finishes on a
bloody good street brawl between The Hulk and The Abomination. Marvel have
essentially done what they did with Iron Man, which is present a fun, by the
numbers film which delivers what you *want* it to deliver, without making any
great attempt at great art.
Wednesday 11 June 2008
Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan
Or Mongol: The Unremittingly Unpleasant Childhood of Genghis Khan, in some
territories.
Basically, we follow the early life of Genghis Khan as he is serially captured,
enslaved, betrayed, has his wife kidnapped, betrayed again, enslaved again,
etc, etc. All of which seems to come to a head at the point where he realises
just how much it sucks to be a mongol, and decides to take over the entire
country and impose some laws. Which he does, in the last five minutes, in
spectacularly little detail. One minute he's one lone man saying "goodbye wife
I'm going to go unite the Mongols" and the next he's at the head of a thousands
strong army. Essentially, if you're interested in the early campaigns of
Genghis Khan, or how he united the tribes into a shiny big horde, you're out of
luck. The film is basically not about that, it's about the crap in his life
that led him to believe that was necessary.
So, how's that side of the film? Well, it's pretty good. It's very well shot -
beautifully so. If you've got any interest in seeing someone ride a horse
across the strange, varied and beautiful landscape of the steppes, then you're
in luck, because there's a lot of that. The leads, playing Temudjin, his wife,
his father, his brother, all give very powerful performances. It's very well
written; when all these betrayals come in, it's very sympathetic; no-one's seen
as particularly evil, it's just how life is when you live in primitive society
of lawless warriors.
There's a big "but", however, and that is, I am afraid to say, that the life of
a Mongol is not that interesting. They didn't have a lot of culture to speak
of, so really, we see a lot of sitting in yurts drinking out of wooden bowls.
That's what they did. That and riding horses around and nicking stuff off each
other. Whilst Temudjin's early life was undoubtedly tumultuous, it wasn't
actually very varied. His life isn't a story with a beginning, middle and end,
it's more a series of unfortunate events, where he's regularly knocked back
down into the mud.
So, in all, beautiful, well-performed, but not a little repetitious, and often
lacking in drama.
territories.
Basically, we follow the early life of Genghis Khan as he is serially captured,
enslaved, betrayed, has his wife kidnapped, betrayed again, enslaved again,
etc, etc. All of which seems to come to a head at the point where he realises
just how much it sucks to be a mongol, and decides to take over the entire
country and impose some laws. Which he does, in the last five minutes, in
spectacularly little detail. One minute he's one lone man saying "goodbye wife
I'm going to go unite the Mongols" and the next he's at the head of a thousands
strong army. Essentially, if you're interested in the early campaigns of
Genghis Khan, or how he united the tribes into a shiny big horde, you're out of
luck. The film is basically not about that, it's about the crap in his life
that led him to believe that was necessary.
So, how's that side of the film? Well, it's pretty good. It's very well shot -
beautifully so. If you've got any interest in seeing someone ride a horse
across the strange, varied and beautiful landscape of the steppes, then you're
in luck, because there's a lot of that. The leads, playing Temudjin, his wife,
his father, his brother, all give very powerful performances. It's very well
written; when all these betrayals come in, it's very sympathetic; no-one's seen
as particularly evil, it's just how life is when you live in primitive society
of lawless warriors.
There's a big "but", however, and that is, I am afraid to say, that the life of
a Mongol is not that interesting. They didn't have a lot of culture to speak
of, so really, we see a lot of sitting in yurts drinking out of wooden bowls.
That's what they did. That and riding horses around and nicking stuff off each
other. Whilst Temudjin's early life was undoubtedly tumultuous, it wasn't
actually very varied. His life isn't a story with a beginning, middle and end,
it's more a series of unfortunate events, where he's regularly knocked back
down into the mud.
So, in all, beautiful, well-performed, but not a little repetitious, and often
lacking in drama.
Thursday 29 May 2008
Speed Racer
Ok, it's a live action remake of an old cartoon from Japan, that a lot of
Americans appear to have grown up on, and which we've barely heard of. So
they're all up in arms about their childhoods being desecrated, while we don't
give a toss and can just enjoy it for what it is.
So there's this family whose second name is Racer, who call their kid Speed. No
prizes for guessing that he's not going into chartered accountancy then. His
dad, whose name is Pops apparently, builds cars, and his sons race them for
him. Oldest son dies in a crash, so obviously Number 2 son is next up. The
third son is largely ignored and given to a chimpanzee to raise, because as a
kid with no obvious racing talent, his family clearly view him as an oxygen
thief, and hope he'll die. By the end of the movie, you will too. In fact,
let's not be coy about it, the moment you clap eyes on him, you'll hope he
catches something fatal from the doubtless copious amounts of chimpanzee shit
there must be lying around the Racer house.
So, everyone else in racing is Evil and Corrupt. Speed and his family are Good.
Game on. Basically, it's Mario Kart To The Death. OK, that's not fair. It's
F-Zero To The Death. It's a cross between Ben Hur and Charlie And The Chocolate
Factory.
Does it work? Yeah, it does actually, for basically the same reasons F-Zero
works. Driving brightly coloured cars at 500 miles an hour until all but one of
them has exploded is fun. Added into the mix is Racer X who is the mysterious
badass guy that all anime must have, and basically he and Speed belt the shit
out of everyone else until Good Prevails.
I really liked it, because it's everything *I* think car racing should be about
- i.e. driving the other bastard off the track and down a cliff. Everyone
cheats, to the point of equipping their cars with bloody great big maces and
catapults that fire beehives at their foes.
There are some crappy bits, mostly the bits where one or other of Speed's
parents buttonhole him and tell him, at length, how proud they are of him, how
much they love him, et fucking cetera. Yeah, yeah, mom. More smashy.
Christina Ricci, incidentally, is way too old to be Speed's girlfriend. But
hey, you're making a manga, the first casting consideration is REALLY REALLY
HUGE EYES.
All in all, I think this may be one of those films that kids watching it today
will still give a fuck about ten years from now. As I sat watching the credits,
a couple of kids ran past me wearing popcorn buckets for helmets going "vroom
vroom". That pretty much says it all.
Americans appear to have grown up on, and which we've barely heard of. So
they're all up in arms about their childhoods being desecrated, while we don't
give a toss and can just enjoy it for what it is.
So there's this family whose second name is Racer, who call their kid Speed. No
prizes for guessing that he's not going into chartered accountancy then. His
dad, whose name is Pops apparently, builds cars, and his sons race them for
him. Oldest son dies in a crash, so obviously Number 2 son is next up. The
third son is largely ignored and given to a chimpanzee to raise, because as a
kid with no obvious racing talent, his family clearly view him as an oxygen
thief, and hope he'll die. By the end of the movie, you will too. In fact,
let's not be coy about it, the moment you clap eyes on him, you'll hope he
catches something fatal from the doubtless copious amounts of chimpanzee shit
there must be lying around the Racer house.
So, everyone else in racing is Evil and Corrupt. Speed and his family are Good.
Game on. Basically, it's Mario Kart To The Death. OK, that's not fair. It's
F-Zero To The Death. It's a cross between Ben Hur and Charlie And The Chocolate
Factory.
Does it work? Yeah, it does actually, for basically the same reasons F-Zero
works. Driving brightly coloured cars at 500 miles an hour until all but one of
them has exploded is fun. Added into the mix is Racer X who is the mysterious
badass guy that all anime must have, and basically he and Speed belt the shit
out of everyone else until Good Prevails.
I really liked it, because it's everything *I* think car racing should be about
- i.e. driving the other bastard off the track and down a cliff. Everyone
cheats, to the point of equipping their cars with bloody great big maces and
catapults that fire beehives at their foes.
There are some crappy bits, mostly the bits where one or other of Speed's
parents buttonhole him and tell him, at length, how proud they are of him, how
much they love him, et fucking cetera. Yeah, yeah, mom. More smashy.
Christina Ricci, incidentally, is way too old to be Speed's girlfriend. But
hey, you're making a manga, the first casting consideration is REALLY REALLY
HUGE EYES.
All in all, I think this may be one of those films that kids watching it today
will still give a fuck about ten years from now. As I sat watching the credits,
a couple of kids ran past me wearing popcorn buckets for helmets going "vroom
vroom". That pretty much says it all.
Friday 23 May 2008
Indiana Jones And The Order Of The Phoenix
Or whatever it was called.
Imagine this. You bump into an old friend somewhere, and you're glad to see
them. So you arrange to go out for a drink with them. And you do. And you
reminisce, and you catch up, and you have a perfectly pleasant time. And then
at the end of the evening, you both say "we really must do this again", and
then neither of you ever bothers calling the other one again.
This film is like that kind of evening. Essentially, we have a perfectly
pleasant couple of hours going over all the times we've had with Indy in the
past, catching up with what he's been up to since we last saw him, have a few
laughs, and then we're done.
This is pretty much Indy by the numbers. Essentially, there's a lot of people
getting thrown out of lorries, mysterious artifacts you don't want to be in the
same room as when they go off, Nazis (albeit actually much less satisfying to
shoot commies these days) and some of the greatest pre-industrial engineering
ever made, mostly involving stone slabs and counterbalances.
It's practically a remake of Raiders, with very little indeed added or
subtracted from the formula. Spielburg and Lucas clearly thought that if it
ain't broke, don't fix it, which I must say is a refreshing departure for
Lucas. What it doesn't do is advance or even change the plot at all. As such, I
just don't see the need for it.
In defence of the movie, as effectively an adequate re-run of Raiders of the
Lost Ark, it's a pretty diverting use of two hours, and it really is nice to
see Indy back in action again. Not too much is made of the fact he's got older,
and rather than doing the creaky "ooh, I'm not as young as I used to be" crap
all the time, we're given the impression that he's just getting better at
kicking the shit out of people and throwing them out of trucks as time goes on.
Kind of like Cohen the Barbarian in the Discworld novels.
Ultimately, it's an idle pleasure, a pointless diversion, albeit quite an
entertaining one.
Imagine this. You bump into an old friend somewhere, and you're glad to see
them. So you arrange to go out for a drink with them. And you do. And you
reminisce, and you catch up, and you have a perfectly pleasant time. And then
at the end of the evening, you both say "we really must do this again", and
then neither of you ever bothers calling the other one again.
This film is like that kind of evening. Essentially, we have a perfectly
pleasant couple of hours going over all the times we've had with Indy in the
past, catching up with what he's been up to since we last saw him, have a few
laughs, and then we're done.
This is pretty much Indy by the numbers. Essentially, there's a lot of people
getting thrown out of lorries, mysterious artifacts you don't want to be in the
same room as when they go off, Nazis (albeit actually much less satisfying to
shoot commies these days) and some of the greatest pre-industrial engineering
ever made, mostly involving stone slabs and counterbalances.
It's practically a remake of Raiders, with very little indeed added or
subtracted from the formula. Spielburg and Lucas clearly thought that if it
ain't broke, don't fix it, which I must say is a refreshing departure for
Lucas. What it doesn't do is advance or even change the plot at all. As such, I
just don't see the need for it.
In defence of the movie, as effectively an adequate re-run of Raiders of the
Lost Ark, it's a pretty diverting use of two hours, and it really is nice to
see Indy back in action again. Not too much is made of the fact he's got older,
and rather than doing the creaky "ooh, I'm not as young as I used to be" crap
all the time, we're given the impression that he's just getting better at
kicking the shit out of people and throwing them out of trucks as time goes on.
Kind of like Cohen the Barbarian in the Discworld novels.
Ultimately, it's an idle pleasure, a pointless diversion, albeit quite an
entertaining one.
Thursday 15 May 2008
In Bruges
Marvellous film.
Clever little film, indeed. If you've seen the trailers, you'll have seen that
it's a jet-black comedy about two hitmen exiled to Bruges after a botched job.
And that much is true. Half the time. The other half, it's this desperately sad
study of guilt, loneliness, depression, loyalty, consequences, and I don't know
what else. And quite cleverly, it turns the comedy on and off, so one moment
you're chuckling, the next you're really quite melancholy. I had no idea that
Colin Farrell was *any* good, never mind this good. Brendan Gleeson's also a
lot better than his Harry Potter panto turns suggest, and the two of them play
off each other brilliantly. Fellow Potter-alumnus Ralph Fiennes turns up at the
end and has a go at stealing the show as their demented East-end gangster boss,
and very nearly pulls it off, switching neatly between a scary-as-you-like
villain, and a parody of same.
Go see it, you'll laugh, you'll cry.
Clever little film, indeed. If you've seen the trailers, you'll have seen that
it's a jet-black comedy about two hitmen exiled to Bruges after a botched job.
And that much is true. Half the time. The other half, it's this desperately sad
study of guilt, loneliness, depression, loyalty, consequences, and I don't know
what else. And quite cleverly, it turns the comedy on and off, so one moment
you're chuckling, the next you're really quite melancholy. I had no idea that
Colin Farrell was *any* good, never mind this good. Brendan Gleeson's also a
lot better than his Harry Potter panto turns suggest, and the two of them play
off each other brilliantly. Fellow Potter-alumnus Ralph Fiennes turns up at the
end and has a go at stealing the show as their demented East-end gangster boss,
and very nearly pulls it off, switching neatly between a scary-as-you-like
villain, and a parody of same.
Go see it, you'll laugh, you'll cry.
Thursday 1 May 2008
Iron Man
I've always loved Iron Man. He has a purity of design about him. Whereas Bruce
Wayne decided he needed to teach criminals a lesson, and spent years training
himself to physical perfection, then seeking a method to strike fear into the
hearts of the superstitious, dresses as a bat, Tony Stark sees a shortcut.
Instead, he just builds himself a humanoid engine of carnage and destruction,
which takes care of both the beating people up angle, and the fear angle. Thus,
he can do all that cool superhero stuff, and still drink martinis and date
supermodels. You've got to hand it to him.
So, I was pretty damned pleased when I heard Jon Favereau was in charge, and
Robert Downey Jr was starring. These are men who know their martinis and
supermodels.
So, the plot.
Tony Stark is captured by evil Middle-Eastern types and forced to make WMDs.
Instead, he makes a suit of powered armor, kicks their asses, and escapes.
Later, having learned the hard way that being an arms dealer is wrong, he seeks
to improve the suit, become a hero, and help out the people who he's been
putting in harm's way.
Meanwhile, unrepentantly bad elements in his company get hold of his Mark I
suit, design a competing one for military use, and generally try to screw him
over. Eventually, it comes down to a duel between the super-suits.
It's good. I very much enjoyed it. Cool effects, nice performances, and in
general, satisfying for a fan to see up on the big screen, and enough
explosions and mayhem to wow the newcomer.
Downsides... well, there are three as far as I can see. First, Tony Stark is a
loner. So while he's with his supporting cast, he's a fun guy, and the
dialogue's great. He spends a lot of time in his basement talking to himself,
though. Hence, it can seem a bit sterile at times. Second, it's First
Installment Of A Superhero Franchise time. We're barely out of the genesis of
the character, and it's That's All Folks! Same problem as with X-Men 1. X-Men 2
was a much better film because the players were in place. Third - well, it
sticks its oar into the murky waters of international arms trade, and trouble
in the Middle East, but really, the whole thing seems a bit trite. Our middle
Eastern warlord is all "muhahaha, with this I can take over the world, like
Alexander the Great before me", and you kind of feel that it's all a bit cheap.
This kind of crap was getting old back in the eighties.
But taking into account that this is a) a superhero movie intended for kids and
b) we've really not got more time, then these shortcomings are forgivable.
Hopefully, we'll be getting a sequel real soon now that'll be as good as X-Men
2. The groundwork is certainly there.
7.5/10, but please, have another go.
Wayne decided he needed to teach criminals a lesson, and spent years training
himself to physical perfection, then seeking a method to strike fear into the
hearts of the superstitious, dresses as a bat, Tony Stark sees a shortcut.
Instead, he just builds himself a humanoid engine of carnage and destruction,
which takes care of both the beating people up angle, and the fear angle. Thus,
he can do all that cool superhero stuff, and still drink martinis and date
supermodels. You've got to hand it to him.
So, I was pretty damned pleased when I heard Jon Favereau was in charge, and
Robert Downey Jr was starring. These are men who know their martinis and
supermodels.
So, the plot.
Tony Stark is captured by evil Middle-Eastern types and forced to make WMDs.
Instead, he makes a suit of powered armor, kicks their asses, and escapes.
Later, having learned the hard way that being an arms dealer is wrong, he seeks
to improve the suit, become a hero, and help out the people who he's been
putting in harm's way.
Meanwhile, unrepentantly bad elements in his company get hold of his Mark I
suit, design a competing one for military use, and generally try to screw him
over. Eventually, it comes down to a duel between the super-suits.
It's good. I very much enjoyed it. Cool effects, nice performances, and in
general, satisfying for a fan to see up on the big screen, and enough
explosions and mayhem to wow the newcomer.
Downsides... well, there are three as far as I can see. First, Tony Stark is a
loner. So while he's with his supporting cast, he's a fun guy, and the
dialogue's great. He spends a lot of time in his basement talking to himself,
though. Hence, it can seem a bit sterile at times. Second, it's First
Installment Of A Superhero Franchise time. We're barely out of the genesis of
the character, and it's That's All Folks! Same problem as with X-Men 1. X-Men 2
was a much better film because the players were in place. Third - well, it
sticks its oar into the murky waters of international arms trade, and trouble
in the Middle East, but really, the whole thing seems a bit trite. Our middle
Eastern warlord is all "muhahaha, with this I can take over the world, like
Alexander the Great before me", and you kind of feel that it's all a bit cheap.
This kind of crap was getting old back in the eighties.
But taking into account that this is a) a superhero movie intended for kids and
b) we've really not got more time, then these shortcomings are forgivable.
Hopefully, we'll be getting a sequel real soon now that'll be as good as X-Men
2. The groundwork is certainly there.
7.5/10, but please, have another go.
Sunday 20 April 2008
Shoot Em Up
Precious little worth watching at the cinema, so I thought I'd watch something
I didn't get round to watching last year.
This is an offensively stupid film. By which I mean, it's frickin' awesome. The
plot, such as it is, is that some bad guys want to kill a baby, and a down-on-
his-luck good guy happens to be in the way, and decides he's not going to let
them. But that's by the by. It's an excuse for an extended sequence of
gunfights, each more implausible than the last. And that's ok, because they're
plainly meant to be implausible.
So, this film is aimed at people who find stupid, bloody gunfights funny.
That'd be me then. And they are stupid, they are bloody, and they are very
funny.
Interspersed between the gunfights, the good guy and the bad guy crack bad
jokes at each other, and there's a romantic plot involving Monica Belluci.
That's mostly an excuse to have a gunfight that's also a sex scene, though,
which is funny.
I don't know who this Michael Davis guy is who wrote and directed it is, but
he's obviously a huge fan of Robert Rodriguez, and a lot of it owes obvious
debts to both Sin City and Desperado. He obviously had a real fun time making
it, and good luck to him on that. I had a lot of fun watching it too.
I didn't get round to watching last year.
This is an offensively stupid film. By which I mean, it's frickin' awesome. The
plot, such as it is, is that some bad guys want to kill a baby, and a down-on-
his-luck good guy happens to be in the way, and decides he's not going to let
them. But that's by the by. It's an excuse for an extended sequence of
gunfights, each more implausible than the last. And that's ok, because they're
plainly meant to be implausible.
So, this film is aimed at people who find stupid, bloody gunfights funny.
That'd be me then. And they are stupid, they are bloody, and they are very
funny.
Interspersed between the gunfights, the good guy and the bad guy crack bad
jokes at each other, and there's a romantic plot involving Monica Belluci.
That's mostly an excuse to have a gunfight that's also a sex scene, though,
which is funny.
I don't know who this Michael Davis guy is who wrote and directed it is, but
he's obviously a huge fan of Robert Rodriguez, and a lot of it owes obvious
debts to both Sin City and Desperado. He obviously had a real fun time making
it, and good luck to him on that. I had a lot of fun watching it too.
Friday 11 April 2008
Son Of Rambow
So, you wait years for a slightly surreal film about amateur film-making then
a bunch come along at once. And it its way, this is sort of a British Be Kind
Rewind.
It's the eighties, rural Hertfordshire. There's a kid, who's a bit of a
tearaway, who's got his hands on his brother's video camera, and has decided
he's going to make a film and submit it to Screen Test's Young Filmmaker of the
Year award. He also uses it to sneak into cinemas and pirate films. He ropes
this other unworldly kid whose family are Plymouth Bretheren, into being his
stuntman. Over time, after the pair of them watch First Blood, the project
evolves into a sort of sequel, which is surprising similar in plot to Rambo,
given that neither kid has seen the film, and it hasn't even been made yet. But
hey.
Meanwhile, their school is host to a bunch of French exchange students, and
everyone is in awe of this (allegedly) cool French kid. This kid finds out
about the film, decides it's cool, and wants to be in it, and because he thinks
it's cool, the whole rest of the school does too. Power struggles for control
of the creative process ensue.
It's an amusing take on film-making and Hollywood, with the whole struggle
serving as an allegory for creative control and integrity being compromised
when stars and the studio system get involved.
It's not perfect, and some of the children's acting is pretty stagey, in a
"early Harry Potter movie" kind of way. It is highly amusing, if not laugh out
loud funny, and if you grew up in the eighties, and ever watched a dodgy pirate
copy of First Blood, the film will spark off a lot of happy memories.
a bunch come along at once. And it its way, this is sort of a British Be Kind
Rewind.
It's the eighties, rural Hertfordshire. There's a kid, who's a bit of a
tearaway, who's got his hands on his brother's video camera, and has decided
he's going to make a film and submit it to Screen Test's Young Filmmaker of the
Year award. He also uses it to sneak into cinemas and pirate films. He ropes
this other unworldly kid whose family are Plymouth Bretheren, into being his
stuntman. Over time, after the pair of them watch First Blood, the project
evolves into a sort of sequel, which is surprising similar in plot to Rambo,
given that neither kid has seen the film, and it hasn't even been made yet. But
hey.
Meanwhile, their school is host to a bunch of French exchange students, and
everyone is in awe of this (allegedly) cool French kid. This kid finds out
about the film, decides it's cool, and wants to be in it, and because he thinks
it's cool, the whole rest of the school does too. Power struggles for control
of the creative process ensue.
It's an amusing take on film-making and Hollywood, with the whole struggle
serving as an allegory for creative control and integrity being compromised
when stars and the studio system get involved.
It's not perfect, and some of the children's acting is pretty stagey, in a
"early Harry Potter movie" kind of way. It is highly amusing, if not laugh out
loud funny, and if you grew up in the eighties, and ever watched a dodgy pirate
copy of First Blood, the film will spark off a lot of happy memories.
Wednesday 26 March 2008
Vantage Point
Basically, take In The Line Of Fire. Add Groundhog Day.
US President is making a speech in Spain. He's assassinated. A bomb goes off.
Cue investigation.
We see this from a range of viewpoints, all of which show us a little more of
what happened, from a different angle, which finally builds into the big reveal
of what *really* happened.
It's not bad, but I wouldn't go further than that. Its major flaw is that the
plot, once revealed, isn't actually that good. The first few viewpoints are
really well done, and leave you wanting more answers, but inevitably, those
answers come, and they're silly. Eventually, the viewpoint structure sort of
breaks down towards the end, and we're in carchase and climactic faceoff with
guns kind of territory.
Ultimately, the structure's quite interesting, and make the film worth watching
- told linearly, this wouldn't be worth anyone's time. I'd give it 7/10, but
it's really a pretty average thriller overall.
US President is making a speech in Spain. He's assassinated. A bomb goes off.
Cue investigation.
We see this from a range of viewpoints, all of which show us a little more of
what happened, from a different angle, which finally builds into the big reveal
of what *really* happened.
It's not bad, but I wouldn't go further than that. Its major flaw is that the
plot, once revealed, isn't actually that good. The first few viewpoints are
really well done, and leave you wanting more answers, but inevitably, those
answers come, and they're silly. Eventually, the viewpoint structure sort of
breaks down towards the end, and we're in carchase and climactic faceoff with
guns kind of territory.
Ultimately, the structure's quite interesting, and make the film worth watching
- told linearly, this wouldn't be worth anyone's time. I'd give it 7/10, but
it's really a pretty average thriller overall.
Tuesday 18 March 2008
Juno
Now, this was a lovely film. Basic synopsis: Teen Girl gets pregnant, decides
to keep it and put it up for adoption, and we go from there. It's a comedy
drama in the best sense of the term. In that it's a drama, funny things happen,
and the characters are well written and witty. Lots of "it's funny because its
true" stuff.
If the film has flaws, and I don't see why it has to have, but if it does, it's
these: First, everyone in it is about 200% wittier than their real life
counterpart. This makes it entertaining to watch, but somewhat unbelievable.
Second, there's not that much dramatic tension here. Will her parents hit the
roof? No, they're really lovely and supportive. Will she get a hard time at
school about it? No, not really. I genuinely spent one section of the film
dreading the arrival of some hideous and horrific occurrence, because everything
was going so well, and my inner dramatist started anticipating that the
dramatic twist was round the corner. And it wasn't, really.
So, it's gentle, it's funny, there's no nasty surprises, Essentially, an
eminently enjoyable film. Just don't expect to be on the edge of your seat at
any point. Unless like me you have a tendency to slouch.
to keep it and put it up for adoption, and we go from there. It's a comedy
drama in the best sense of the term. In that it's a drama, funny things happen,
and the characters are well written and witty. Lots of "it's funny because its
true" stuff.
If the film has flaws, and I don't see why it has to have, but if it does, it's
these: First, everyone in it is about 200% wittier than their real life
counterpart. This makes it entertaining to watch, but somewhat unbelievable.
Second, there's not that much dramatic tension here. Will her parents hit the
roof? No, they're really lovely and supportive. Will she get a hard time at
school about it? No, not really. I genuinely spent one section of the film
dreading the arrival of some hideous and horrific occurrence, because everything
was going so well, and my inner dramatist started anticipating that the
dramatic twist was round the corner. And it wasn't, really.
So, it's gentle, it's funny, there's no nasty surprises, Essentially, an
eminently enjoyable film. Just don't expect to be on the edge of your seat at
any point. Unless like me you have a tendency to slouch.
Tuesday 11 March 2008
The Bank Job
Of all the films I've seen this year, this was certainly among them.
Plot: An underworld miscreant has some naughty photos of one of the royals,
presumably Princess Anne. These would be very embarassing, and he's using them
as blackmail material in order to get out of jail free. MI5 would quite like
them back, so they recruit some amateurs to rob the bank the photos are being
held in. Which they do.
Said robbers having got away with the photos and a few equally hot pieces of
blackmail material, and everyone involved basically knowing all about it, they
are then trapped in a dangerous situation of several serious and ruthless
people willing to kill them all to get their hands on it.
It runs along quite entertainingly, without really making any great claims to
being great cinema, which is good, because it's not. It's the kind of thing
that if you found yourself at a loose end you could watch and be entertained,
but needn't feel you missed out on anything.
Most amusing is a scene near the end where Jason Statham apparentlysuddenly
realises "Hang on, why am I putting up with this crap? I'm The Transporter!"
and kicks the shit out of a bunch of guys, having apparently been a mild-
mannered car mechanic and amateur villain up until that point.
7/10. Amusing and fun, but not *that* amusing or fun.
Plot: An underworld miscreant has some naughty photos of one of the royals,
presumably Princess Anne. These would be very embarassing, and he's using them
as blackmail material in order to get out of jail free. MI5 would quite like
them back, so they recruit some amateurs to rob the bank the photos are being
held in. Which they do.
Said robbers having got away with the photos and a few equally hot pieces of
blackmail material, and everyone involved basically knowing all about it, they
are then trapped in a dangerous situation of several serious and ruthless
people willing to kill them all to get their hands on it.
It runs along quite entertainingly, without really making any great claims to
being great cinema, which is good, because it's not. It's the kind of thing
that if you found yourself at a loose end you could watch and be entertained,
but needn't feel you missed out on anything.
Most amusing is a scene near the end where Jason Statham apparentlysuddenly
realises "Hang on, why am I putting up with this crap? I'm The Transporter!"
and kicks the shit out of a bunch of guys, having apparently been a mild-
mannered car mechanic and amateur villain up until that point.
7/10. Amusing and fun, but not *that* amusing or fun.
Tuesday 4 March 2008
Semi Pro
Stop me if you've heard this one before.
An amateur basketball team is in a league that's being merged into the NBA.
Best four teams get added to the NBA, the rest are dissolved. This particular
team are a gang of idiots and wasters led by Will Ferrell. They want to survive
as a team, and set their sights on fourth place.
So, it's a Will Ferrell Underdog Sports Movie. If I were to say to you "Will
Ferrell Underdog Sports Movie" then what immediately springs to mind will
probably be pretty much exactly it. Is it any good? Well, it's not bad. It's
pretty broad comedy, not a lot of subtlety in the same way as the moon's not
got a lot of oxygen. Within those bounds, I laughed often, and occasionally I
laughed pretty hard.
My advice is this: Go see Dodgeball, because that's a very good underdog sports
movie spoof. Then, go and see Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,
which is a funnier Will Ferrell Sport Comedy. If you enjoyed both, then next
time you're in the mood for more of the same, see Semi-Pro. If either film
struck you as too dumb to be bothered with, Semi-Pro certainly is. If you've
already seen them, you already knew what Semi-Pro is going to be like, before
I started writing.
7/10. Delivered what it promised, no more, no less.
An amateur basketball team is in a league that's being merged into the NBA.
Best four teams get added to the NBA, the rest are dissolved. This particular
team are a gang of idiots and wasters led by Will Ferrell. They want to survive
as a team, and set their sights on fourth place.
So, it's a Will Ferrell Underdog Sports Movie. If I were to say to you "Will
Ferrell Underdog Sports Movie" then what immediately springs to mind will
probably be pretty much exactly it. Is it any good? Well, it's not bad. It's
pretty broad comedy, not a lot of subtlety in the same way as the moon's not
got a lot of oxygen. Within those bounds, I laughed often, and occasionally I
laughed pretty hard.
My advice is this: Go see Dodgeball, because that's a very good underdog sports
movie spoof. Then, go and see Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,
which is a funnier Will Ferrell Sport Comedy. If you enjoyed both, then next
time you're in the mood for more of the same, see Semi-Pro. If either film
struck you as too dumb to be bothered with, Semi-Pro certainly is. If you've
already seen them, you already knew what Semi-Pro is going to be like, before
I started writing.
7/10. Delivered what it promised, no more, no less.
Thursday 28 February 2008
Be Kind Rewind
Odd little comedy from the director of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
and The Science of Sleep, Michel Gondry. The hallmarks are there, an odd little
film with a tenuous connection to reality.
You've probably heard the plot; an assistant in a video store (Mos Def)and his
idiot mate (Jack Black) inadvertently wipe all the tapes in the store. In a
panicky attempt to hide what they've done, they remake the movie that one of
the store's customers, who knows the owner, wants (Ghostbusters.) The tape gets
into the hands of her nephew, who thinks it's great, and insists that they make
more. A cottage industry of custom made remakes ensues.
Now, so far, and from what the trailers will tell you, this is a screwball
comedy in which Jack Black gets to ham it up something rotten. And it is, in
many ways, but there's a lot more to it than that. It's also an affectionate
piece which likens the demise independent cinema to the demise of small
neighbourhoods. Somehow, standard plot #12 (team of oddballs much raise cash to
fend off the bulldozers and save the school/shop/bar/whatever) gets involved,
and it all gets very It's A Wonderful Life by the end.
It's very entertaining, has a little message to deliver, which it does without
making too much of a big fuss about it, before going on its merry way. There's
nothing startlingly original here, but it does revisit quite a lot of familiar
ground in a fresh, offbeat way.
and The Science of Sleep, Michel Gondry. The hallmarks are there, an odd little
film with a tenuous connection to reality.
You've probably heard the plot; an assistant in a video store (Mos Def)and his
idiot mate (Jack Black) inadvertently wipe all the tapes in the store. In a
panicky attempt to hide what they've done, they remake the movie that one of
the store's customers, who knows the owner, wants (Ghostbusters.) The tape gets
into the hands of her nephew, who thinks it's great, and insists that they make
more. A cottage industry of custom made remakes ensues.
Now, so far, and from what the trailers will tell you, this is a screwball
comedy in which Jack Black gets to ham it up something rotten. And it is, in
many ways, but there's a lot more to it than that. It's also an affectionate
piece which likens the demise independent cinema to the demise of small
neighbourhoods. Somehow, standard plot #12 (team of oddballs much raise cash to
fend off the bulldozers and save the school/shop/bar/whatever) gets involved,
and it all gets very It's A Wonderful Life by the end.
It's very entertaining, has a little message to deliver, which it does without
making too much of a big fuss about it, before going on its merry way. There's
nothing startlingly original here, but it does revisit quite a lot of familiar
ground in a fresh, offbeat way.
Wednesday 20 February 2008
There Will Be Blood
My epic quest to see more movies continuums.
This is, in effect, a two and a half hour character study. Daniel Day Lewis
plays Daniel Plainview, a prospecter turned oil driller, and tells the tale of
his life and struggle to make it big in the oil business in the late nineteenth
and early twentieth century. Starts in 1898 when he's a poor silver prospector,
and takes us up to about 1927.
Essentially, we're watching Daniel Day Lewis the whole time. Other characters
come and they go, but it's his show with no challengers. You could see it
working on stage as a one man show.
It's ambitious, it's long, it's weak in places because of this ambition, but
Daniel Day Lewis carries it through. It's him we're here to see, and he
delivers.
Cinematically, it reminds me a lot of Once Upon A Time In The West. There's a
lot of long, still shots, in which nothing much happens but the desert dust
blowing around. The thing has a hypnotic quality, and you can just sit back and
let it flow over you.
I usually feel that if a film's going to go over 120 minutes, it has to be
something special. This is. Recommended.
This is, in effect, a two and a half hour character study. Daniel Day Lewis
plays Daniel Plainview, a prospecter turned oil driller, and tells the tale of
his life and struggle to make it big in the oil business in the late nineteenth
and early twentieth century. Starts in 1898 when he's a poor silver prospector,
and takes us up to about 1927.
Essentially, we're watching Daniel Day Lewis the whole time. Other characters
come and they go, but it's his show with no challengers. You could see it
working on stage as a one man show.
It's ambitious, it's long, it's weak in places because of this ambition, but
Daniel Day Lewis carries it through. It's him we're here to see, and he
delivers.
Cinematically, it reminds me a lot of Once Upon A Time In The West. There's a
lot of long, still shots, in which nothing much happens but the desert dust
blowing around. The thing has a hypnotic quality, and you can just sit back and
let it flow over you.
I usually feel that if a film's going to go over 120 minutes, it has to be
something special. This is. Recommended.
Saturday 16 February 2008
No Country For Old Men
This is one hell of a film. Premise: Man goes out hunting one day, and finds a
drug deal gone wrong. Two million dollars is just lying there, and the guy
takes it. He flees. The world's scariest man pursues. A sheriff close to
retirement follows the trail mopping up the bits.
So far, so "every film you've ever seen". It is, yes, a classic, some would say
done to death plot. The difference is the quality of the thing. Javier Bardem
has been nominated for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of Anton
Chighur, the world's scariest man, and if he doesn't win it, I am going to go
round and slap the life out of everyone in the Academy who didn't vote for him.
The directing, at times, just makes you pause and think "my god, this is a well
made film." Coen brothers at their very best. Suspense of the like that only
people like Hitchcock can produce. It is So Very Good.
The plot, other than the synopsis above, I will not go into, except to say that
it is all about how terribly cruel and unfair life and the world are. The end
will leave you sort of scratching your head and saying "huh?", and if you're
like me, you'll spend the next while thinking long and hard about what it
meant.
I didn't go to the cinema at all last year, and just recently made a late New
Year's Resolution to go to the cinema more, weekly if possible. This was the
first I went to see this year, and I'm partly very glad that I did, and partly
slightly frustrated knowing I'm not going to see a better one this year no
matter how many times I go.
drug deal gone wrong. Two million dollars is just lying there, and the guy
takes it. He flees. The world's scariest man pursues. A sheriff close to
retirement follows the trail mopping up the bits.
So far, so "every film you've ever seen". It is, yes, a classic, some would say
done to death plot. The difference is the quality of the thing. Javier Bardem
has been nominated for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of Anton
Chighur, the world's scariest man, and if he doesn't win it, I am going to go
round and slap the life out of everyone in the Academy who didn't vote for him.
The directing, at times, just makes you pause and think "my god, this is a well
made film." Coen brothers at their very best. Suspense of the like that only
people like Hitchcock can produce. It is So Very Good.
The plot, other than the synopsis above, I will not go into, except to say that
it is all about how terribly cruel and unfair life and the world are. The end
will leave you sort of scratching your head and saying "huh?", and if you're
like me, you'll spend the next while thinking long and hard about what it
meant.
I didn't go to the cinema at all last year, and just recently made a late New
Year's Resolution to go to the cinema more, weekly if possible. This was the
first I went to see this year, and I'm partly very glad that I did, and partly
slightly frustrated knowing I'm not going to see a better one this year no
matter how many times I go.
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