District 9

I think it's a slightly shameful state of affairs that this is in the top rank
of scifi movies these days, but it is.

It's a wicked enough premise, having aliens as refugees, the somewhat dumb
worker bees of a civilisation whose more intelligent leadership are missing for
some reason, and who have limped their way to Earth, only to be placed in the
hands of a private security firm by the authorities who can't be bothered to
render aid to them themselves. The whole thing is a rather grim and nasty view
of humanity, which suggests our compassion is limited to the profit we gain
from rendering that compassion, and that's not a view any student of world
affairs could confidently challenge.

My problem with it is that I don't believe it. I do not believe, for one
instant, that any government is going to let an arms firm have sole
responsibility for managing a resource like an alien race with unknown
technology. The South African government would be fighting to keep control of
it in the face of the UN demanding access to the tech, rather than the whole
thing just being handed to a private concern through apathy. I think that
there's probably a rather more well thought out story to be told on this theme,
which would cast humanity in no better light, but this one is just a bit
simplistic.

I'd recommend it, but it's more like the kind of semi-intellectual low budget
scifi that you used to get in the seventies.

Mesrine: Public Enemy Number One.

See above.


No, really. As I believe I mentioned in the previous review for Mesrine: Killer
Instinct, it would appear that Jacques Mesrine was a charming, amoral, violent
twat. He robbed banks and casinos, kidnapped people for money, and treated the
women in his life pretty shabbily. Well, plus ca change. It would appear that
Mesrine pretty much behaved the same way for the rest of his life. Eventually
the French police got pissed off with him, and shot him. (No spoiler there,
happens in the first few minutes of the first film.)

Which is not to say that this film has nothing to say. Mesrine did his best to
become a celebrity, manipulating the press to cultivate a romantic outlaw
image, which they appeared only too happy to cooperate with because it sold
magazines. I also couldn't help noticing that he'd never get away with his
casual, unplanned style of crime these days, what with modern security, and
that it was people like Mesrine who made modern bank security a necessity.

I suppose it would be fairest to consider the two films as a single film. In
which case, what you'd probably think is that it was a really good film, but a
bit samey and overlong by about an hour.