Did you ever watch a zombie film and think "I would be embarrassed to be killed by that." "Stupid, slow moving zombies would never get me!" Not to be big headed but I always fancied my chances against a zombie. Now a vampire is a different matter but a zombie for god’s sake! Everyone's favourite geek Jesse Eisenberg has no problems with the shambling idiots. His problem tends to be other people. As he travels across America towards his hometown of Columbus he meets Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson) Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin). They don't go by their real names in Zombieland see!
Columbus survives Zombieland by following an ever increasing list of rules. Simple, common sense rules that seem to mock the zombie genre in a very knowing way such as 'always check the back seat' and 'double tap'. My favourite rule has to be 'limber up’; Columbus holding his gun above his head performing stretches on the side of the road is brilliant! Everything seems to be running along as smoothly as you could expect in a post-apocalyptic wasteland as Columbus lives obsessively by his rules. That is until he meets the crazy Tallahassee and scheming girls.
This is filmed like a really slick music video. The opening shot of an American flag limply flapping in front of the Whitehouse, on fire and upside down is bold and striking, like most of this film. The survival rules get written large across the screen whenever they are quoted. Perhaps best of all we have Zombie kill of the week! I won't go into any more detail on that in case I spoil it. It all adds up to a fast paced film that never gets dull. Like a music video it is very stylised and very punchy. Despite being yet another Zombie film this feels very fresh, not because of any great storyline but because of how light it feels. Perhaps not laugh out loud funny; it certainly left me with a big smile on my face.
Case in point is Woody Harrelson. His character is big, nasty and desperate to find a Twinkie. He will do anything to find the last sugary treat in the world! They have an expiry date you know! I loved the wackiness of the characters. How anyone could stay sane in a world like that is beyond me and it seems the writer felt the same way. Also this has an amazing cameo from none other than Bill Murray. OK I don't want to give away anything more about this film; it's enough to say that this has breathed life into what was becoming a very stale genre since 28 Days Later blitzed its way onto the screen.
8/10
Tuesday 27 September 2011
Friday 23 September 2011
Vampires Suck (2010)
Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit.
I laughed more during Schindler's List.
Lazy film = lazy review!
2/10
I laughed more during Schindler's List.
Lazy film = lazy review!
2/10
Thursday 22 September 2011
Knocked Up (2007)
First of all an apology for not posting a review for almost a week now. I have many excuses, none of which you will be interested in I'm sure. Fortunately I have been keeping up with my film watching! OK back to business...
Knocked up stars Seth Rogan as man-child Ben. He drinks, smokes way too much weed, hangs around with his stoner mates all day, refuses to get a job and plans to make his millions by setting up a website that shows where in movies you can see some naked flesh. All in all a fun guy to hang around with maybe, but not the kind of person you would think capable of bringing up a child. He meets Alison (Katherine Heigl) on a drunken night out. In an almost unbelievable twist he manages to get her into bed, punching so far above his weight it was akin to Jimmy Crankie fighting Andre the Giant. Weeks later he gets the dreaded phone call from Alison announcing she is carrying his child.
This film draws on elements from several different genres. We have a stoner comedy, romance and drama. What it does well is merge all three of these so that there is a little bit of something for everyone, with the biggest emphasis on the comedy. Rogan is his typical chaotic self. A man possessed of constant verbal diharrea, who bumbles through life in his own little world. Rogan is so adept at playing this part I almost believe he is like this all the time. If you were to go around his house now you might expect him to really be smoking weed with his head in a goldfish bowl or boxing with giant flaming gloves on (see the intro to this film to see what I mean)!
Aside from the usual humour from Rogan and his gang of friends we have a story about a woman struggling to come to terms with an unexpected pregnancy and a new relationship (more out of duty at first) with a man with little prospects and even less of a clue! There is always an air of inevitability with the storyline but there are enough laughs here to make that unimportant. As a bit of a film geek there was also enough film references made to keep my eyes glued to the screen. Everyone will spot the Back to the Future and Star wars references but will they notice Swingers or Taxi Driver?
I thought this was a very well made film despite the obvious story. It effortlessly rises above being a vulgar comedy (which it is in places and a bloody funny one at that) with moments of real clarity. The novelty of it is that it has people dealing with things that any parent can relate to. Not so much in the 'having a baby with someone you just met' way but in the many other hopes and fears that come along with pregnancy or simply growing up. More than once I found myself shaking my head with embarrassed recognition at Ben's antics. Rogan's immensely likeable performance and the often brilliant script really make this a film worth watching.
7/10
Knocked up stars Seth Rogan as man-child Ben. He drinks, smokes way too much weed, hangs around with his stoner mates all day, refuses to get a job and plans to make his millions by setting up a website that shows where in movies you can see some naked flesh. All in all a fun guy to hang around with maybe, but not the kind of person you would think capable of bringing up a child. He meets Alison (Katherine Heigl) on a drunken night out. In an almost unbelievable twist he manages to get her into bed, punching so far above his weight it was akin to Jimmy Crankie fighting Andre the Giant. Weeks later he gets the dreaded phone call from Alison announcing she is carrying his child.
This film draws on elements from several different genres. We have a stoner comedy, romance and drama. What it does well is merge all three of these so that there is a little bit of something for everyone, with the biggest emphasis on the comedy. Rogan is his typical chaotic self. A man possessed of constant verbal diharrea, who bumbles through life in his own little world. Rogan is so adept at playing this part I almost believe he is like this all the time. If you were to go around his house now you might expect him to really be smoking weed with his head in a goldfish bowl or boxing with giant flaming gloves on (see the intro to this film to see what I mean)!
Aside from the usual humour from Rogan and his gang of friends we have a story about a woman struggling to come to terms with an unexpected pregnancy and a new relationship (more out of duty at first) with a man with little prospects and even less of a clue! There is always an air of inevitability with the storyline but there are enough laughs here to make that unimportant. As a bit of a film geek there was also enough film references made to keep my eyes glued to the screen. Everyone will spot the Back to the Future and Star wars references but will they notice Swingers or Taxi Driver?
I thought this was a very well made film despite the obvious story. It effortlessly rises above being a vulgar comedy (which it is in places and a bloody funny one at that) with moments of real clarity. The novelty of it is that it has people dealing with things that any parent can relate to. Not so much in the 'having a baby with someone you just met' way but in the many other hopes and fears that come along with pregnancy or simply growing up. More than once I found myself shaking my head with embarrassed recognition at Ben's antics. Rogan's immensely likeable performance and the often brilliant script really make this a film worth watching.
7/10
Thursday 15 September 2011
Lost in Translation (2003)
I wish I had seen this film in the cinema. There have been some wonderful scenes in cinema history but I can think of nothing better than the opening shot of this film: Scarlett Johansson's perfect behind, 40 foot across, dominating the screen. The gentle curve of her hip, the transparent pink knickers that hide just enough to make the shot all the more alluring. The slight crease formed by subtle movement where her bum ends and leg begins. The film title rolls across the screen just below the line where her legs and cheeks meet. Seriously though this kind of lingering cinematic shot is just what makes this film such a joy to look at. Honestly it’s not just because Scarlett Johansson spends a lot of time walking around her apartment in her knickers, this is a really beautifully made film.
Lost in Translation is set amid the lonely neon cityscape of Tokyo. Charlotte (Johansson) is a newlywed, left to entertain herself as her husband is working constantly (how could he! Idiot!). She strikes up a friendship with famous actor Bob Harris (Bill Murray) who is similarly lost and lonely while filming a commercial there. Sofia Coppola (on her directing debut) captures the feelings of boredom and isolation felt by her characters magnificently through the cinematography. Many early scenes look out at Tokyo from Charlotte's lofty hotel room as she mopes around (the fact that she spends most of these scenes in her underwear helps if I'm honest) hinting that there is a whole world out there waiting to be explored. There are many symbolic moments like this where feelings are conveyed through the images rather than dialogue. The effect is a bitter-sweet film full of beauty and melancholy.
Bob and Charlotte's friendship develops to the detriment of the nakedness. They rouse each other from their coma like states and begin to enjoy the craziness of a foreign culture. I hate Bob for making Charlotte get dressed and get out of her apartment. On the plus side Tokyo makes a fantastic backdrop, taking in lots of Japanese traditions as the film progress. We see Ikebana, temples, karaoke in a glass room miles up a skyscraper, sake drinking, strip clubs, quirky night clubs and games arcades. One shot of Bob playing golf on a deserted course with the silhouette of Mount Fujiyama in the background is especially stunning.
One criticism of the film is its slightly dismissive attitude to Japan. This is really highlighted by Bob's attitude to the locals, he looks on bemused as people fuss over him and playfully mocks people as they cannot understand what he says. It might just be a case of the film showing how people react to a foreign culture. That aside Bill Murray is fantastic as the jaded star selling his soul for a big payday as he films a commercial. He wears the ravages of a tiring world on his face perfectly. Johansson too is brilliantly believable as a young woman unsure of her place in the world.
Please don't watch this film as a will they/won't they romantic drama, you will be missing the point entirely. THIS IS NOT ABOUT SEX!!! Much has been said about the enigmatic final scene but I don't want to give too much away. Suffice to say the film is more concerned with how it makes you feel rather than the dialogue. I really liked that it shows us two troubled characters and does not try to find resolutions and fix them. This film is about a fleeting moment in time where two lost souls find each other. Appreciate it for what it is or bugger off and watch something with Jennifer Lopez in!
8/10
Lost in Translation is set amid the lonely neon cityscape of Tokyo. Charlotte (Johansson) is a newlywed, left to entertain herself as her husband is working constantly (how could he! Idiot!). She strikes up a friendship with famous actor Bob Harris (Bill Murray) who is similarly lost and lonely while filming a commercial there. Sofia Coppola (on her directing debut) captures the feelings of boredom and isolation felt by her characters magnificently through the cinematography. Many early scenes look out at Tokyo from Charlotte's lofty hotel room as she mopes around (the fact that she spends most of these scenes in her underwear helps if I'm honest) hinting that there is a whole world out there waiting to be explored. There are many symbolic moments like this where feelings are conveyed through the images rather than dialogue. The effect is a bitter-sweet film full of beauty and melancholy.
Bob and Charlotte's friendship develops to the detriment of the nakedness. They rouse each other from their coma like states and begin to enjoy the craziness of a foreign culture. I hate Bob for making Charlotte get dressed and get out of her apartment. On the plus side Tokyo makes a fantastic backdrop, taking in lots of Japanese traditions as the film progress. We see Ikebana, temples, karaoke in a glass room miles up a skyscraper, sake drinking, strip clubs, quirky night clubs and games arcades. One shot of Bob playing golf on a deserted course with the silhouette of Mount Fujiyama in the background is especially stunning.
One criticism of the film is its slightly dismissive attitude to Japan. This is really highlighted by Bob's attitude to the locals, he looks on bemused as people fuss over him and playfully mocks people as they cannot understand what he says. It might just be a case of the film showing how people react to a foreign culture. That aside Bill Murray is fantastic as the jaded star selling his soul for a big payday as he films a commercial. He wears the ravages of a tiring world on his face perfectly. Johansson too is brilliantly believable as a young woman unsure of her place in the world.
Please don't watch this film as a will they/won't they romantic drama, you will be missing the point entirely. THIS IS NOT ABOUT SEX!!! Much has been said about the enigmatic final scene but I don't want to give too much away. Suffice to say the film is more concerned with how it makes you feel rather than the dialogue. I really liked that it shows us two troubled characters and does not try to find resolutions and fix them. This film is about a fleeting moment in time where two lost souls find each other. Appreciate it for what it is or bugger off and watch something with Jennifer Lopez in!
8/10
Tuesday 13 September 2011
Forrest Gump (1994)
There was a time when I was younger that going to the cinema was a real event. Maybe it was the fact that I was young, maybe it is looking back through rose tinted specs, but the early to mid nineties left me with great memories of going to the giant UCI cinema in Swansea. 10 screens, that’s right 10 screens for your viewing pleasure. Now I can't quite remember but I'm sure they weren't all playing superhero movies or rom-coms. I look back on this as a mini golden age for cinema going. In the space of a few years some truly fantastic films were released including Jurassic Park, Independence Day, Terminator 2 and Braveheart. All are pure Hollywood blockbusters to the core, and I mean that in the best possible way, no sarcasm intended for once.
It really feels that Hollywood has lost the knack for producing these movie 'events'. I especially felt this on re-watching Forrest Gump. Tom Hanks plays the unlikely hero, a man with an IQ of 75 but a heart bigger that anyone's. This is a touching and often funny tale, a life story told by Forrest as he sits waiting for a bus to take him to see Jenny (Robin Wright), the troubled girl he has always loved. This central relationship is the main focus of the film but there are also some brilliant lesser characters, none more impressive than Gary Sinise as the angry Lieutenant Dan. For a film that packs in so much story it always impresses me how much depth these characters have.
I also forgot how original this film was. It places Forrest at the scenes of countless historic events. He teaches Elvis how to dance, meets JFK, fights in Vietnam, Meets Nixon and starts the Watergate scandal, inspires John Lennon to write Imagine, the list goes on and on. Many of these meetings are cleverly achieved by putting Hanks into old film reels with effects that do not look old even today. Even if you are a cold hearted monster that has no time for Forrest you would still be caught up in the 'spot the famous person' game the film seems to play. When you add to this cultural miscellany a soundtrack of some of the best songs of the eras depicted you get a film that never feels dull or slow. Jimi Hendrix's version of All Along the Watchtower playing as they patrol in Vietnam is perfect.
It was also a film that launched a host of iconic catch phrases, none more so than 'run Forrest run!' OK it probably was used in a mean way in a playground near you but it just shows how much this film passed into the public consciousness. Other notable efforts include 'life is like a box of chocolates' and 'stupid is as stupid does'. My point is that despite being a big budget, star studded film, Forrest Gump was brave and original. Despite this it achieved the success it deserved and became a film watched by almost everyone. What does Hollywood do with big budgets these days? Makes f*$*%*g Transformers 3 of X-Men 5 that’s what! Who is going to look back on films like that in 15 years time with fond memories I wonder?
9/10
It really feels that Hollywood has lost the knack for producing these movie 'events'. I especially felt this on re-watching Forrest Gump. Tom Hanks plays the unlikely hero, a man with an IQ of 75 but a heart bigger that anyone's. This is a touching and often funny tale, a life story told by Forrest as he sits waiting for a bus to take him to see Jenny (Robin Wright), the troubled girl he has always loved. This central relationship is the main focus of the film but there are also some brilliant lesser characters, none more impressive than Gary Sinise as the angry Lieutenant Dan. For a film that packs in so much story it always impresses me how much depth these characters have.
I also forgot how original this film was. It places Forrest at the scenes of countless historic events. He teaches Elvis how to dance, meets JFK, fights in Vietnam, Meets Nixon and starts the Watergate scandal, inspires John Lennon to write Imagine, the list goes on and on. Many of these meetings are cleverly achieved by putting Hanks into old film reels with effects that do not look old even today. Even if you are a cold hearted monster that has no time for Forrest you would still be caught up in the 'spot the famous person' game the film seems to play. When you add to this cultural miscellany a soundtrack of some of the best songs of the eras depicted you get a film that never feels dull or slow. Jimi Hendrix's version of All Along the Watchtower playing as they patrol in Vietnam is perfect.
It was also a film that launched a host of iconic catch phrases, none more so than 'run Forrest run!' OK it probably was used in a mean way in a playground near you but it just shows how much this film passed into the public consciousness. Other notable efforts include 'life is like a box of chocolates' and 'stupid is as stupid does'. My point is that despite being a big budget, star studded film, Forrest Gump was brave and original. Despite this it achieved the success it deserved and became a film watched by almost everyone. What does Hollywood do with big budgets these days? Makes f*$*%*g Transformers 3 of X-Men 5 that’s what! Who is going to look back on films like that in 15 years time with fond memories I wonder?
9/10
Sunday 11 September 2011
Cherry Tree Lane (2010)
For some people a good horror film involves something supernatural, things going bump in the night and a bit of demonic possession thrown in. For others there is nothing scarier than a dose of reality. Cherry Tree lane plants its flag firmly in this territory. It joins the tradition of films that attempt to put you in the characters shoes in a very believable setting. Christine (Rachael Blake) and Michael (Tom Butcher) are a middle aged couple sitting down to dinner like any normal people when the doorbell rings and starts a terrifying series of events. Their son Sebastian is out at football training while three lads come calling for him. Forcing entry and holding Christine at knife point, they bind the couple and settle down to wait for the son to return.
This really is no frills film making. The opening is shot in eerie silence, the camera slowly zooming in on their front door. This is the only shot of the outside world, the rest of the gut churning events all take place within the house. There are no distractions from the very simple story here. All attention is focused sharply on the characters reactions. I really liked the bravery of it. I did find it slow at times but no doubt this was the intention as the three young lads wait for their target to come home. The effect is a very tense waiting game interspersed with action.
The acting throughout is very believable, Christine and Michael wear their fear on their faces (they have to as they spend a lot of time gagged to be fair). Much of the action is shot in extreme close up, bringing the audience as close to facing their fears as possible. It really is one of those films that makes you think what if that was me? What would I do? The attackers are also very good, carrying on the tradition of British cinema taking raw youngsters straight from stage school to the big screen. Jumayn Hunter as the leader Rian is particularly chilling. He fills the screen with his brooding presence, lurching from cold and calculating to rampant anger.
I found my heart racing as the film reached its climax which is always a sign of a good horror in my opinion. Too many big budget horrors just seem to leave me cold, with a real sense of 'seen it all before'. There is an element of that here as I found myself thinking back to The Strangers, which was a fine example of this style of claustrophobic film making. Despite its limitations I still enjoyed this but would not recommend it to anyone with a short attention span or who prefers loud explosions to subtle acting.
6/10
This really is no frills film making. The opening is shot in eerie silence, the camera slowly zooming in on their front door. This is the only shot of the outside world, the rest of the gut churning events all take place within the house. There are no distractions from the very simple story here. All attention is focused sharply on the characters reactions. I really liked the bravery of it. I did find it slow at times but no doubt this was the intention as the three young lads wait for their target to come home. The effect is a very tense waiting game interspersed with action.
The acting throughout is very believable, Christine and Michael wear their fear on their faces (they have to as they spend a lot of time gagged to be fair). Much of the action is shot in extreme close up, bringing the audience as close to facing their fears as possible. It really is one of those films that makes you think what if that was me? What would I do? The attackers are also very good, carrying on the tradition of British cinema taking raw youngsters straight from stage school to the big screen. Jumayn Hunter as the leader Rian is particularly chilling. He fills the screen with his brooding presence, lurching from cold and calculating to rampant anger.
I found my heart racing as the film reached its climax which is always a sign of a good horror in my opinion. Too many big budget horrors just seem to leave me cold, with a real sense of 'seen it all before'. There is an element of that here as I found myself thinking back to The Strangers, which was a fine example of this style of claustrophobic film making. Despite its limitations I still enjoyed this but would not recommend it to anyone with a short attention span or who prefers loud explosions to subtle acting.
6/10
Whip It (2009)
For those of you that don't know (and why the hell would anyone know this!) a roller derby is a sport. Two teams of 5 skaters move around an oval track trying to get a designated skater past the finish line first. Oh and they can hit each other apparently. In Whip It the teams are all girls, dressed in scanty outfits with dodgy wrestler style names. Ellen Page plays Juno except Juno is not pregnant but is a reluctant beauty pageant competitor forced into makeup and posh frocks by her pushy mum. She is desperate to leave her small town life behind and find her identity. On a shopping trip to the big city of Austin, Texas she is captivated by a gang of girls on roller-skates, picks up a flyer for the derby and is soon sneaking off to watch with her best friend Pash (Alia Shawkat).
This is Drew Barrymore's debut as a director and I think it is fair to say she decided to play it safe by sticking to some very established formulas. Not only do we have the cliché of a teenage coming of age drama, but we have all the regular clichés of a sport drama too! There is approximately 1 cliché every 5 minutes. Totally relentless. Juno works in a diner, is picked on by the jocks, is nagged by a pushy mum that only wants the best for her, meets a boy, falls for the boy, argues with the boy and makes up with the boy. Phew, but I'm just getting warmed up. Tries out for a team, gets in the team (worst in the league obviously!), is picked on by the best player in the league (Juliette Lewis dressed as a school girl called Iron Maven!), several musical montages later Juno is their best player (Babe Ruthless), the team of misfits come good, compete in 'nail biting' finale against the best team in the league and of course Juno has to battle with Juliette Lewis in order to win while maintaining her relationships with her parents and boyfriend.
That is just the tip of the ice-berg. I did wonder if Barrymore realised how clichéd the film was and thought, 'bollocks to it, in for a penny, in for a pound' and tried to break the Guinness world record for most clichés in a film. Her achievement should be applauded; she crams the combined clichés of 2 genres into one film while managing to include the Radiohead song 'No Surprises' on the soundtrack. To be fair I laughed my ass off when that song played. Touch of irony perhaps? I really hope so.
On the plus side this film is easy to look at. The girls are entertaining enough. Drew Barrymore casts herself as a particularly violent member of the team (Smashley Simpson), who gets herself thrown out of every game for pinning some poor wretch down and pummelling them. And despite my previous bitching I do enjoy a good sports montage set to music. Rocky IV this is not, but would you want to see Sylvester Stallone in hot pants and roller-skates? The soundtrack is decent too which adds to the feel that Juno is an 'alternative' girl in an Indie movie. But make no mistake, this is no independent film, just another formulated Hollywood movie tapping into the same audience it has successfully milked before.
5/10
This is Drew Barrymore's debut as a director and I think it is fair to say she decided to play it safe by sticking to some very established formulas. Not only do we have the cliché of a teenage coming of age drama, but we have all the regular clichés of a sport drama too! There is approximately 1 cliché every 5 minutes. Totally relentless. Juno works in a diner, is picked on by the jocks, is nagged by a pushy mum that only wants the best for her, meets a boy, falls for the boy, argues with the boy and makes up with the boy. Phew, but I'm just getting warmed up. Tries out for a team, gets in the team (worst in the league obviously!), is picked on by the best player in the league (Juliette Lewis dressed as a school girl called Iron Maven!), several musical montages later Juno is their best player (Babe Ruthless), the team of misfits come good, compete in 'nail biting' finale against the best team in the league and of course Juno has to battle with Juliette Lewis in order to win while maintaining her relationships with her parents and boyfriend.
That is just the tip of the ice-berg. I did wonder if Barrymore realised how clichéd the film was and thought, 'bollocks to it, in for a penny, in for a pound' and tried to break the Guinness world record for most clichés in a film. Her achievement should be applauded; she crams the combined clichés of 2 genres into one film while managing to include the Radiohead song 'No Surprises' on the soundtrack. To be fair I laughed my ass off when that song played. Touch of irony perhaps? I really hope so.
On the plus side this film is easy to look at. The girls are entertaining enough. Drew Barrymore casts herself as a particularly violent member of the team (Smashley Simpson), who gets herself thrown out of every game for pinning some poor wretch down and pummelling them. And despite my previous bitching I do enjoy a good sports montage set to music. Rocky IV this is not, but would you want to see Sylvester Stallone in hot pants and roller-skates? The soundtrack is decent too which adds to the feel that Juno is an 'alternative' girl in an Indie movie. But make no mistake, this is no independent film, just another formulated Hollywood movie tapping into the same audience it has successfully milked before.
5/10
Cry Baby (1990)
I said I was going to do it. I promised I would watch a musical and here it is! This film was handed to me by a very drunk Miss Jenkins, who then proceeded to bully me via the medium of Twitter until I watched it. Odd barely begins to cover this.
Any film that feels the need to erupt into song at any possible opportunity is usually enough to rile me. Why do it? Aren't words good enough? I love music in films (proper songs I mean) but I hate it when they fill every other scene with a Broadway like production of people singing average songs with smiles pinned to their smug faces! Arghh I'm getting angry just thinking about it. When one character feels the need to soil my eardrums with their bleating a whole host of random extras soon join them, full of stage school eagerness. I find myself searching for my shot gun, and then I remember I don't own one. I have seen perhaps two musicals in my life I could tolerate, The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Little Shop of Horrors.
Thankfully Cry Baby follows these into a very exclusive club. A musical that didn't make me want to move to America and join the NRA! Johnny Depp stars as Wade 'Cry Baby' Walker, a boy from the wrong side of the tracks, known in this crazy film world as a 'Drape'. He meets Allison (Amy Locane) who is the social opposite, a 'Square', so of course they want to be together despite the class divide. Sound familiar? This is very much a parody of Grease. It is set in the 50's, has two opposing gangs and even a drag race between hormonal teenagers.
Right from the opening scene this film started to surprise me with its irony. A school hall full of suspiciously old looking 'kids' queue up to get their immunisation jabs. The overacting is brilliant and is kept up throughout, really sending up the musical genre. The script is cheesy but always knowingly so. One hysterical scene sees Allison singing 'Teenage Dream' to a group of squares and imagining Cry Baby's head on all their bodies. All the typical musical conventions are mocked here, from the lusty beginnings of their relationship, to the inevitable fall out and a climax in which all their problems are solved through the power of song.
The film is full of crazy characters. Cry Baby's group of Drape friends includes a pre-diet Ricki Lake (who we see heavily pregnant and playing drums... I'm not even making this up!), porn star Traci Lords (who reacts in a horrified way when a sleazy bloke asks her to pose naked) and Hatchet-Face (a rubber faced girl with zombie eyes and a fondness for licking knives and terrifying squares). Cry Baby's family are an even stranger mix of hillbilly biker Goths. Everyone overacts as the story tumbles from one hectic scene to the next. Every shot seems full of people crashing and bumping into each other, which really adds to the sense of frenzy.
I still got a little bored with some of the songs dragging on, but that is my prejudice against musicals resurfacing and doesn’t change the fact that this made me laugh. There is a lot to take in as things rush along barely giving the viewer time to register the mental story or weirdness of some of the characters. If you doubt that Americans know what irony is then you could do a lot worse than watch this to debunk the myth.
7/10
Any film that feels the need to erupt into song at any possible opportunity is usually enough to rile me. Why do it? Aren't words good enough? I love music in films (proper songs I mean) but I hate it when they fill every other scene with a Broadway like production of people singing average songs with smiles pinned to their smug faces! Arghh I'm getting angry just thinking about it. When one character feels the need to soil my eardrums with their bleating a whole host of random extras soon join them, full of stage school eagerness. I find myself searching for my shot gun, and then I remember I don't own one. I have seen perhaps two musicals in my life I could tolerate, The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Little Shop of Horrors.
Thankfully Cry Baby follows these into a very exclusive club. A musical that didn't make me want to move to America and join the NRA! Johnny Depp stars as Wade 'Cry Baby' Walker, a boy from the wrong side of the tracks, known in this crazy film world as a 'Drape'. He meets Allison (Amy Locane) who is the social opposite, a 'Square', so of course they want to be together despite the class divide. Sound familiar? This is very much a parody of Grease. It is set in the 50's, has two opposing gangs and even a drag race between hormonal teenagers.
Right from the opening scene this film started to surprise me with its irony. A school hall full of suspiciously old looking 'kids' queue up to get their immunisation jabs. The overacting is brilliant and is kept up throughout, really sending up the musical genre. The script is cheesy but always knowingly so. One hysterical scene sees Allison singing 'Teenage Dream' to a group of squares and imagining Cry Baby's head on all their bodies. All the typical musical conventions are mocked here, from the lusty beginnings of their relationship, to the inevitable fall out and a climax in which all their problems are solved through the power of song.
The film is full of crazy characters. Cry Baby's group of Drape friends includes a pre-diet Ricki Lake (who we see heavily pregnant and playing drums... I'm not even making this up!), porn star Traci Lords (who reacts in a horrified way when a sleazy bloke asks her to pose naked) and Hatchet-Face (a rubber faced girl with zombie eyes and a fondness for licking knives and terrifying squares). Cry Baby's family are an even stranger mix of hillbilly biker Goths. Everyone overacts as the story tumbles from one hectic scene to the next. Every shot seems full of people crashing and bumping into each other, which really adds to the sense of frenzy.
I still got a little bored with some of the songs dragging on, but that is my prejudice against musicals resurfacing and doesn’t change the fact that this made me laugh. There is a lot to take in as things rush along barely giving the viewer time to register the mental story or weirdness of some of the characters. If you doubt that Americans know what irony is then you could do a lot worse than watch this to debunk the myth.
7/10
Saturday 10 September 2011
The Monster Squad (1987)
A little known fact about me is that as a child I was one of the founder members of the Monster Club. It was junior school; I had an imagination unblighted by social conformity and a group of friends (I hope they won't mind me saying!) equally as geeky. We would meet up in the playground and argue about who was the toughest monster, how we would kill them if they attacked and most importantly we made badges! Other kids might have thought they were cooler, playing football or kiss chase but we knew that our little club was the best thing in that playground.
Our inspiration came from my friend’s parent’s easy going attitude to allowing us to rent any film we wanted from the local video shop. Invariably they would be horror films. The Monster Squad was one of my absolute favourites. It acted a bit like a gateway drug, as cannabis might lead to heroin, this light film led us to Child's Play, A Nightmare on Elm Street and anything else we could scare ourselves with.
Our Monster Club was ripped straight out of this film. The story revolves around a group of friends who meet up in a tree house, the door is brilliantly marked 'no girls allowed', to discuss all things monstrous. I loved the script, even on rewatching this many years later, the cast of kids do a top job of arguing with all seriousness about monster's powers. Then Dracula begins to gather a dream team including Frankenstein's Monster, the Mummy and Wolfman in order to take over the world. Of course the job of stopping them falls to the unlikely heroes and a strange old German bloke from down the street. Why this takes place in suburban America I'm not sure but let's not let this little detail spoil the magic. The film is like a who’s-who of men in Holloween costumes! All very kitsch and very 80's.
It is this kitschness that adds real charm. Some people might find it ridiculous to see the strings on Dracula's bats as they bob up and down, or mock the zip wire just visible as he is sucked into a dodgy looking vortex. But you would be wrong to do this! Before CGI and mega budgets a film had to rely on any effects available to tell the story and needed a script capable of keeping your attention. While the story is tenuous at best the film is packed with enough nice touches (keep an eye out for the homage to the original Frankenstein film as Frankie meets the little girl) and the kids bring enough charm and likeability here to make up for the faults.
The Monster squad doesn't have quite enough charm to make it a classic but it works brilliantly as a light hearted kid’s movie. Never a rival to The Goonies or Stand by Me in the 'kids having a big adventure' film tradition, it still made me smile despite all the cynical years that have passed since I first fell in love with this. Oh and check out the rap which plays over the end credits courtesy of some genius on Youtube!
6/10
Our inspiration came from my friend’s parent’s easy going attitude to allowing us to rent any film we wanted from the local video shop. Invariably they would be horror films. The Monster Squad was one of my absolute favourites. It acted a bit like a gateway drug, as cannabis might lead to heroin, this light film led us to Child's Play, A Nightmare on Elm Street and anything else we could scare ourselves with.
Our Monster Club was ripped straight out of this film. The story revolves around a group of friends who meet up in a tree house, the door is brilliantly marked 'no girls allowed', to discuss all things monstrous. I loved the script, even on rewatching this many years later, the cast of kids do a top job of arguing with all seriousness about monster's powers. Then Dracula begins to gather a dream team including Frankenstein's Monster, the Mummy and Wolfman in order to take over the world. Of course the job of stopping them falls to the unlikely heroes and a strange old German bloke from down the street. Why this takes place in suburban America I'm not sure but let's not let this little detail spoil the magic. The film is like a who’s-who of men in Holloween costumes! All very kitsch and very 80's.
It is this kitschness that adds real charm. Some people might find it ridiculous to see the strings on Dracula's bats as they bob up and down, or mock the zip wire just visible as he is sucked into a dodgy looking vortex. But you would be wrong to do this! Before CGI and mega budgets a film had to rely on any effects available to tell the story and needed a script capable of keeping your attention. While the story is tenuous at best the film is packed with enough nice touches (keep an eye out for the homage to the original Frankenstein film as Frankie meets the little girl) and the kids bring enough charm and likeability here to make up for the faults.
The Monster squad doesn't have quite enough charm to make it a classic but it works brilliantly as a light hearted kid’s movie. Never a rival to The Goonies or Stand by Me in the 'kids having a big adventure' film tradition, it still made me smile despite all the cynical years that have passed since I first fell in love with this. Oh and check out the rap which plays over the end credits courtesy of some genius on Youtube!
6/10
Thursday 8 September 2011
The Scouting Book for Boys (2009)
Emily (Holly Grainger) and David (Thomas Turgoose) seem like two of the luckiest kids in the world. They live in a caravan park in Norfolk, free to run riot as their parents are caught up in their own lives. Following a run of glossy American films, this came as a nice change for me during my one year mission to watch a film every day. This starts off as a feel good British film, a beautiful opening scene shows off the excellent camera work that continues throughout (thanks to director Tom Harper). The young pair leap across caravan roofs, silhouettes against the sunset. It captures the innocence and mischievousness of youth delightfully. Noah and The Whales song '5 Years Time' plays to compliment the images of cartwheels on the beach, kite flying and ice-cream cones. It really made me reminisce to those glorious summer holidays at the seaside.
David and Emily have an oddly touching relationship that really drives the story. He is clearly besotted with his slightly older and reckless friend. They constantly jostle and tease each other, their playful banter adds to the charm. Grainger and Turgoose are fantastic as two friends treading the fine line between innocence and adulthood. The real world intrudes on their happy bubble as Emily is told she needs to leave their world to go and live with her father. She hatches a plot to hide in a small cave on the seafront while things settle down. David, ever the love struck boy enables the deception by lying to her mother, the police and the older man she seems to be having a fling with.
I love how British films never allow themselves to get too sugary sweet as it would have been all too easy to do here. Infact this film goes down a very different path. The main characters have an air of tragedy about them from the start and from these hints the film soon begins to twist in some very strange ways. The huge emotions they deal with as their innocence slips away delivered some very surprising and shocking moments. As Emily's disappearance drags on we see David begin to crack under the strain of keeping up the deception. His feelings for Emily also come to a head as she comes to rely on him more and more.
This film contained more truthful emotion than any Hollywood film I have seen in a long time. From a distraught mum turning to drink to cope with her daughter’s disappearance, to David realising how much his friend means to him as he speaks at a police press conference, there are some very convincing observations made. Big emotions are explained in simple words, plain speaking tongues explore their problems as they leave youthful innocence behind and begin to tread dark paths.
Several pretty big twists do keep you guessing as to where this story will end up. Proving to me again that you have to leave the mainstream of film making to find something capable of surprising you. Whether you will enjoy this journey is hard to say as the charm of the early scenes subsides as things begin to turn serious. Its ability to captivate does diminish but there is still a lot here to keep you interested until the very end.
7/10
David and Emily have an oddly touching relationship that really drives the story. He is clearly besotted with his slightly older and reckless friend. They constantly jostle and tease each other, their playful banter adds to the charm. Grainger and Turgoose are fantastic as two friends treading the fine line between innocence and adulthood. The real world intrudes on their happy bubble as Emily is told she needs to leave their world to go and live with her father. She hatches a plot to hide in a small cave on the seafront while things settle down. David, ever the love struck boy enables the deception by lying to her mother, the police and the older man she seems to be having a fling with.
I love how British films never allow themselves to get too sugary sweet as it would have been all too easy to do here. Infact this film goes down a very different path. The main characters have an air of tragedy about them from the start and from these hints the film soon begins to twist in some very strange ways. The huge emotions they deal with as their innocence slips away delivered some very surprising and shocking moments. As Emily's disappearance drags on we see David begin to crack under the strain of keeping up the deception. His feelings for Emily also come to a head as she comes to rely on him more and more.
This film contained more truthful emotion than any Hollywood film I have seen in a long time. From a distraught mum turning to drink to cope with her daughter’s disappearance, to David realising how much his friend means to him as he speaks at a police press conference, there are some very convincing observations made. Big emotions are explained in simple words, plain speaking tongues explore their problems as they leave youthful innocence behind and begin to tread dark paths.
Several pretty big twists do keep you guessing as to where this story will end up. Proving to me again that you have to leave the mainstream of film making to find something capable of surprising you. Whether you will enjoy this journey is hard to say as the charm of the early scenes subsides as things begin to turn serious. Its ability to captivate does diminish but there is still a lot here to keep you interested until the very end.
7/10
Wednesday 7 September 2011
The Other Guys (2010)
Watching Step Brothers the previous night got me in the mood for another Will Ferrell film. The Other Guys is his fourth collaboration with director Adam McKay so I had high hopes for this. Also I never thought I would see the day my partner sat down to watch a film with Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson in it but here we are!
The Other Guys is a parody of the tired genre of buddy cop movies, you know the type: Lethal Weapon, 48 Hours, Beverly Hills Cop. All the clichés are here ready to be ripped into. The Rock and Samuel L Jackson play two hero cops. An all action intro throws them into a car chase that sees their car lodged in the side of a bus then catapulted from it, flying at the bad guys, Jackson blasting away. This brilliantly sends up the over the top nature of action films. The macho jock characters they play provide some of the best moments in their knowingly dumb action scenes.
Allen Gamble (Ferrell) and Terry Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg) are the polar opposites or the 'other guys'. A police pairing so bad that they are the joke of their force. Events conspire to put them on a huge case that could salvage their reputations. They constantly bicker throughout, providing Ferrell the opportunity to indulge in his usual random style, never more so that an argument over who would win in a fight between a lion and a tuna fish! My main gripe with this is Wahlberg's acting. Is there a worse actor than him in the mainstream? This is a man so wooden I did begin to think his style was intentional, part of the parody maybe. Then I remembered watching him in The Happening and realised that this is as good as it gets from him. That aside he does have some good lines but I think they could have been so much better delivered by someone else.
There are some fantastic scenes where this film mocks the genre, like the good cop/bad cop routine where Ferrell fluffs his part as the good cop and plays the mental cop. However after a good start it deteriorates into a fairly dull police investigation starting with scaffolding regulations and moving onto some embezzlement. The laughs do thankfully continue throughout, with some good supporting performances from Michael Keaton as the police chief and Eva Mendez as Ferrell’s impossibly hot wife.
I did feel that this film tries too hard to be random. It never quite has the magic of previous films by the pairing of Ferrell and McKay. Some scenes felt very unnecessary as they try to stick to the pattern of cop movies laid down by this genre. Yet it does deliver a good parody overall and has some fantastic one liners. Ferrell seduces his wife at one point by shouting "I'm gonna do you grandpa style" and "I'm gonna break your hip!" Well worth a watch but sadly not quite up to the standard of what has come before in my mind. I hope this does not mark a decline in Ferrell's career as he starts to get a bit 'old for this shit'.
6/10
The Other Guys is a parody of the tired genre of buddy cop movies, you know the type: Lethal Weapon, 48 Hours, Beverly Hills Cop. All the clichés are here ready to be ripped into. The Rock and Samuel L Jackson play two hero cops. An all action intro throws them into a car chase that sees their car lodged in the side of a bus then catapulted from it, flying at the bad guys, Jackson blasting away. This brilliantly sends up the over the top nature of action films. The macho jock characters they play provide some of the best moments in their knowingly dumb action scenes.
Allen Gamble (Ferrell) and Terry Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg) are the polar opposites or the 'other guys'. A police pairing so bad that they are the joke of their force. Events conspire to put them on a huge case that could salvage their reputations. They constantly bicker throughout, providing Ferrell the opportunity to indulge in his usual random style, never more so that an argument over who would win in a fight between a lion and a tuna fish! My main gripe with this is Wahlberg's acting. Is there a worse actor than him in the mainstream? This is a man so wooden I did begin to think his style was intentional, part of the parody maybe. Then I remembered watching him in The Happening and realised that this is as good as it gets from him. That aside he does have some good lines but I think they could have been so much better delivered by someone else.
There are some fantastic scenes where this film mocks the genre, like the good cop/bad cop routine where Ferrell fluffs his part as the good cop and plays the mental cop. However after a good start it deteriorates into a fairly dull police investigation starting with scaffolding regulations and moving onto some embezzlement. The laughs do thankfully continue throughout, with some good supporting performances from Michael Keaton as the police chief and Eva Mendez as Ferrell’s impossibly hot wife.
I did feel that this film tries too hard to be random. It never quite has the magic of previous films by the pairing of Ferrell and McKay. Some scenes felt very unnecessary as they try to stick to the pattern of cop movies laid down by this genre. Yet it does deliver a good parody overall and has some fantastic one liners. Ferrell seduces his wife at one point by shouting "I'm gonna do you grandpa style" and "I'm gonna break your hip!" Well worth a watch but sadly not quite up to the standard of what has come before in my mind. I hope this does not mark a decline in Ferrell's career as he starts to get a bit 'old for this shit'.
6/10
Tuesday 6 September 2011
Step Brothers (2008)
I suppose I should just say I am a bit of a Will Ferrell fan before getting in to this review. If like me you thought Anchor Man was one of the funniest films you had seen in ages then you should stop reading and go watch Step Brothers now. NOW! If you like random comedy involving grown men acting like angry teenagers then you will find this funny. Ferrell has teamed up with director Adam McKay for the third time here (previous films were Anchorman and Talladega Nights). Anyone who has seen their other efforts will know just what to expect.
Step Brothers is a story of two 40 year old men, Brennan (Ferrell) and Dale (John C Reilly) who live with their parents. They sit around in their fantasy worlds, indulged by parents that cannot say no to them. That is until these parents get married to each other and move in together, forcing Dale and Brennan to share a room. Yes the plot is stupid, yes the main characters are idiots, and yes the humour is puerile. The plot does wander down some fairly pointless parts that take away from the laughs, but the madness of Ferrell and Reilly more than carry the shortcomings.
Imagine two teenage boys forced into this situation, hating each other at first but eventually realising that they have lots in common, including some of the following: doing karate in the garage, building bunk beds, reading porn mags and hating Dale's younger brother Derek. Ferrell and Reilly throw themselves into the parts worryingly well; their bickering and one-upmanship alone make this film worth watching. Derek (Adam Scott) is fantastic as the over achieving ego maniac, so sadistic he makes his family sing an A Cappella version of Sweet Child 'O Mine in their car! The madness of these characters is given perspective by their sane parents who try in vain to turn them into responsible adults.
The story does fall flat in places where the story tries to play itself out. However this film is so filled with the random one-liners and toilet humour of the previous McKay/Ferrell collaborations that I was more than happy to put up with it.
7/10
Step Brothers is a story of two 40 year old men, Brennan (Ferrell) and Dale (John C Reilly) who live with their parents. They sit around in their fantasy worlds, indulged by parents that cannot say no to them. That is until these parents get married to each other and move in together, forcing Dale and Brennan to share a room. Yes the plot is stupid, yes the main characters are idiots, and yes the humour is puerile. The plot does wander down some fairly pointless parts that take away from the laughs, but the madness of Ferrell and Reilly more than carry the shortcomings.
Imagine two teenage boys forced into this situation, hating each other at first but eventually realising that they have lots in common, including some of the following: doing karate in the garage, building bunk beds, reading porn mags and hating Dale's younger brother Derek. Ferrell and Reilly throw themselves into the parts worryingly well; their bickering and one-upmanship alone make this film worth watching. Derek (Adam Scott) is fantastic as the over achieving ego maniac, so sadistic he makes his family sing an A Cappella version of Sweet Child 'O Mine in their car! The madness of these characters is given perspective by their sane parents who try in vain to turn them into responsible adults.
The story does fall flat in places where the story tries to play itself out. However this film is so filled with the random one-liners and toilet humour of the previous McKay/Ferrell collaborations that I was more than happy to put up with it.
7/10
Sunday 4 September 2011
The Adjustment Bureau (2011)
Have you ever wondered if there is such a thing as free will? Do you believe that every decision you make is your own and that your destiny is yours to shape. Or do you feel that no matter what you do you will end up following a path through life that has been chosen for you? Deep eh? The Adjustment Bureau explores this idea intriguingly as Matt Damon plays David Norris, a politician who falls in love on the eve of his possible election into the US Senate. He meets crazy British girl Elise (Emily Blunt) in the men's room as he prepares a gracious speech accepting his defeat. A simple meeting of two strangers allows this film to begin exploring the idea of free will.
David is soon visited by four mysterious men in suits. We first see them looking down on New York from the top of a sky scraper like Greek Gods on Mount Olympus. Their job is to ensure that humans do not deviate from the 'plan'. I loved the idea of such a divine task being carried out by civil servants. Angels with pay grades perhaps. The agents turn out to be men with flaws and weaknesses just like the people they watch over. The film does a good job of questioning the idea of a divine plan and how it could be enforced without being too over the top. Much of this must go down to the book the story was taken from, "Adjustment Team" by the genius sci-fi author Philip K. Dick. You might not know the name but you have definitely seen his stories adapted by the film world. Blade Runner, Total Recall, Minority Report and Next among others is not a bad achievement.
Aside from the fascinating story there is also a top performance by Matt Damon. He is at his best in this film with a great confidence and easy charm that make you wish he was a real politician. It made me think that if screen writers can create such likeable public figures then they are really wasted writing films. Why didn't Gordon Brown have 15 of them kidnapped and locked away in Downing Street writing him a personality? Why didn't George Bush have a team of writers, producers and directors dedicated to stopping him looking witless? Emily Blunt provides a believable partner to Damon and despite some questionable scenes towards the end I found myself hoping they could overcome the odds stacked against them. I was a little frustrated that such great idea was reduced to a romance but I found myself happy to forgive its flaws.
7/10
David is soon visited by four mysterious men in suits. We first see them looking down on New York from the top of a sky scraper like Greek Gods on Mount Olympus. Their job is to ensure that humans do not deviate from the 'plan'. I loved the idea of such a divine task being carried out by civil servants. Angels with pay grades perhaps. The agents turn out to be men with flaws and weaknesses just like the people they watch over. The film does a good job of questioning the idea of a divine plan and how it could be enforced without being too over the top. Much of this must go down to the book the story was taken from, "Adjustment Team" by the genius sci-fi author Philip K. Dick. You might not know the name but you have definitely seen his stories adapted by the film world. Blade Runner, Total Recall, Minority Report and Next among others is not a bad achievement.
Aside from the fascinating story there is also a top performance by Matt Damon. He is at his best in this film with a great confidence and easy charm that make you wish he was a real politician. It made me think that if screen writers can create such likeable public figures then they are really wasted writing films. Why didn't Gordon Brown have 15 of them kidnapped and locked away in Downing Street writing him a personality? Why didn't George Bush have a team of writers, producers and directors dedicated to stopping him looking witless? Emily Blunt provides a believable partner to Damon and despite some questionable scenes towards the end I found myself hoping they could overcome the odds stacked against them. I was a little frustrated that such great idea was reduced to a romance but I found myself happy to forgive its flaws.
7/10
Saturday 3 September 2011
Predators (2010)
I sat down to watch this film with a mixture of dread and curiosity. I loved the first Predator film, where Arnie and a team of commandos (including WWF's Jesse 'The Body' Ventura!) are hunted through a jungle by a menacing alien foe. It was loud, dumb and fun. The film introduced us to the mythology of the Predators, giant animalistic hunters with laser guns mounted on their hulking shoulders and enough gadgets to make Batman feel inadequate. For a kid watching films with his mates this was a genius idea! Many years later this franchise is on its 5th incarnation, so I was really worried this might be another lazy money spinner, a film with nothing to say and no new ideas. Can a franchise that has lived so long produce any magic or will it end up being a sad parody of itself?
While I'm on the subject there is no word I hate more in the movie world than franchise. It translates to: Greedy attempt to cash in on a good idea by producing endless amounts of films of decreasing quality that will continue to be churned out until they do not make any profit. There are some exceptions of course (The Dark Knight maybe?) but in general a film which just revisits the original with new actors and one or two additions to the source story is just f***ing lazy. It’s like genetics; if nothing new is introduced into the gene pool then you end up with the hideous results of years of inbreeding like some of the European royal families.
So is this film as disturbing as a 10th generation monarch parading his idiocy around trying to grab everyone’s attention, or can it add to the Predator mythology with some style and new ideas? The plot is hardy groundbreaking, a collection of seasoned killers from Earth's various warzones are deposited on an alien planet used as a hunting ground by the Predators. The mob struggle to make sense of where they are and what is happening as they are killed off one by one. No surprises there then. I found this to be little more than a remake of the 1987 film, but instead of having Arnold Schwarzenegger and a collection of likeable but stereotypical jocks we have Adrien Brody as the group’s leader! That’s right, Adrien Brody. I didn't believe it myself and I'm not sure Brody ever quite believes it either. It seems as realistic as casting me as the hot female lead in a chick flick. One of the highlights of this film had to be Brody's gruff commando voice!
Another unintended positive had to come from the good ethnic mix of the characters. Most creeds and colours are represented in the Predator's prey, which fills me with hope that discrimination is a thing of the past among alien cultures. The main problem with this group however is that there are no likeable characters among them. I couldn't wait for our hero (yes I am now referring to the murderous monsters as heroes) to point his laser at someone’s head and make it explode all over my HD TV! There is a surprise cameo from a perfectly crazy Laurence Fishburn which was the only real highlight for me.
I also failed to understand what this film wanted to be. It takes an eternity for the action to begin, making me think it wanted to play on suspense like Ridley Scott's Alien. Yet it is clearly an action film as there is no mystery to the plot. So why give the pretence of suspense when you can go straight into some balls out action scenes and grip the audience from the start? Why bore me for 30 minutes before anything of note happens? Life is far too short!
There are some positives to be found for fans of the Predator mythology as a little more is revealed about their culture but is it worth enduring a dull rehash of the original film to discover perhaps 2 new pieces of info? Not for me I'm afraid.
4/10
While I'm on the subject there is no word I hate more in the movie world than franchise. It translates to: Greedy attempt to cash in on a good idea by producing endless amounts of films of decreasing quality that will continue to be churned out until they do not make any profit. There are some exceptions of course (The Dark Knight maybe?) but in general a film which just revisits the original with new actors and one or two additions to the source story is just f***ing lazy. It’s like genetics; if nothing new is introduced into the gene pool then you end up with the hideous results of years of inbreeding like some of the European royal families.
So is this film as disturbing as a 10th generation monarch parading his idiocy around trying to grab everyone’s attention, or can it add to the Predator mythology with some style and new ideas? The plot is hardy groundbreaking, a collection of seasoned killers from Earth's various warzones are deposited on an alien planet used as a hunting ground by the Predators. The mob struggle to make sense of where they are and what is happening as they are killed off one by one. No surprises there then. I found this to be little more than a remake of the 1987 film, but instead of having Arnold Schwarzenegger and a collection of likeable but stereotypical jocks we have Adrien Brody as the group’s leader! That’s right, Adrien Brody. I didn't believe it myself and I'm not sure Brody ever quite believes it either. It seems as realistic as casting me as the hot female lead in a chick flick. One of the highlights of this film had to be Brody's gruff commando voice!
Another unintended positive had to come from the good ethnic mix of the characters. Most creeds and colours are represented in the Predator's prey, which fills me with hope that discrimination is a thing of the past among alien cultures. The main problem with this group however is that there are no likeable characters among them. I couldn't wait for our hero (yes I am now referring to the murderous monsters as heroes) to point his laser at someone’s head and make it explode all over my HD TV! There is a surprise cameo from a perfectly crazy Laurence Fishburn which was the only real highlight for me.
I also failed to understand what this film wanted to be. It takes an eternity for the action to begin, making me think it wanted to play on suspense like Ridley Scott's Alien. Yet it is clearly an action film as there is no mystery to the plot. So why give the pretence of suspense when you can go straight into some balls out action scenes and grip the audience from the start? Why bore me for 30 minutes before anything of note happens? Life is far too short!
There are some positives to be found for fans of the Predator mythology as a little more is revealed about their culture but is it worth enduring a dull rehash of the original film to discover perhaps 2 new pieces of info? Not for me I'm afraid.
4/10
Friday 2 September 2011
North by Northwest (1959)
My second Alfred Hitchcock film of the year is North by Northwest. Cary Grant plays Roger Thornhill, a suave advertising man caught up in a case of mistaken identity. His normal life is thrown into turmoil when he is kidnapped by two men working for the mysterious Vandamm (not the muscles from Brussels unfortunately). The thugs think he is a government agent called George Caplan and he is soon plunged into a cross country chase as he tries to prove his identity and save himself from his pursuers. Hitchcock is normally a director famed for horror and suspense, but this film is far more similar to a modern spy or action movie.
At its heart this is a chase movie, with Grant as the undoubted star. He strides about in a sharp suit as the film sprints across some of America’s most famous locations. New York is a great backdrop for much of the film, taking in the UN Building, the Plaza Hotel and Grand Central Station. But most famously of all, the climax takes place on Mount Rushmore. If this film had no script at all it would still be fantastic to look at. Fortunately it has a script full of wit and humour, really putting most modern thrillers to shame (see my review of Knight and Day!).
Right from the beginning this film surprises and delights the viewer with its playfulness. The opening credits see the director make a sneaky cameo as he tries to catch a bus only to have the door slam in his face. All throughout there are little moments of light humour that cut the perfect tension that builds up as Roger's situation becomes ever more perilous. Grant meets every obstacle with charm and sophistication, the classic gentleman. At one point he reports on his treatment by his abductors, "They poured a bottle of bourbon down my throat... no they didn't give me a chaser!"
The laughs are never at the expense of the story however. We have secret meetings, murdered diplomats, decoy agents and even a femme fatale crammed into the 2 hour run time. Despite it being among the longest of Hitchcock's films this never drags. There is always something to keep the viewer's attention whether it be the script, the chase or the mystery. Perhaps best of all are the little mistakes which left me struggling to decide if they were intentionally left in or not. Keep an eye out for a police man that misses his cue only for Grant to give him a gentle reminder!
Aside for a few scenes, especially in cars where the characters are clearly being filmed infront of a green screen, this feels as if it was made yesterday. It also contains some of the most iconic scenes in cinema history, with the above mentioned Mount Rushmore Scene but also the crop duster chase. One scene in particular epitomises all the good things in this film, as Roger tries to escape his pursuers when he is cornered in an auction room. This really has the feel of a film made by a director at the top of his game, a thriller that has definitely stood the test of time.
9/10
At its heart this is a chase movie, with Grant as the undoubted star. He strides about in a sharp suit as the film sprints across some of America’s most famous locations. New York is a great backdrop for much of the film, taking in the UN Building, the Plaza Hotel and Grand Central Station. But most famously of all, the climax takes place on Mount Rushmore. If this film had no script at all it would still be fantastic to look at. Fortunately it has a script full of wit and humour, really putting most modern thrillers to shame (see my review of Knight and Day!).
Right from the beginning this film surprises and delights the viewer with its playfulness. The opening credits see the director make a sneaky cameo as he tries to catch a bus only to have the door slam in his face. All throughout there are little moments of light humour that cut the perfect tension that builds up as Roger's situation becomes ever more perilous. Grant meets every obstacle with charm and sophistication, the classic gentleman. At one point he reports on his treatment by his abductors, "They poured a bottle of bourbon down my throat... no they didn't give me a chaser!"
The laughs are never at the expense of the story however. We have secret meetings, murdered diplomats, decoy agents and even a femme fatale crammed into the 2 hour run time. Despite it being among the longest of Hitchcock's films this never drags. There is always something to keep the viewer's attention whether it be the script, the chase or the mystery. Perhaps best of all are the little mistakes which left me struggling to decide if they were intentionally left in or not. Keep an eye out for a police man that misses his cue only for Grant to give him a gentle reminder!
Aside for a few scenes, especially in cars where the characters are clearly being filmed infront of a green screen, this feels as if it was made yesterday. It also contains some of the most iconic scenes in cinema history, with the above mentioned Mount Rushmore Scene but also the crop duster chase. One scene in particular epitomises all the good things in this film, as Roger tries to escape his pursuers when he is cornered in an auction room. This really has the feel of a film made by a director at the top of his game, a thriller that has definitely stood the test of time.
9/10
Wednesday 31 August 2011
Uncle Buck (1989)
Once upon a time there was a writer and director named John Hughes. You might not recognise the name but you have certainly seen his films, especially if you grew up in the 80's. This was an era when family films meant something other than Spy Kids 15 or another animated movie. This meant cleverly observed, witty and touching films that had something for everyone. If you haven't seen Home Alone, Beethoven or Curly Sue then where have you been? If you were a little older the maybe you have seen his classic coming of age films such as Pretty in Pink, The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Uncle Buck combines some of the best elements of both these type of films to give us another John Hughes classic.
John Candy plays Buck. He drinks, smokes, gambles, and avoids all responsibility. He is the last man you would want to leave in charge of your 3 kids, but that’s just what brother Bob must do when his father in-law has a heart attack. This is your typical fish out of water comedy with an edge. The edge being John Candy's fantastic performance as a bull of a man, charging into the lives of teenage daughter Tia (Jean Louisa Kelly) and kindergarten munchkins Maizy (Gaby Hoffman) and Miles (Macaulay Culkin). Candy brings Buck to life with his charisma, so much that I think every kid that saw this really wanted a babysitter like Buck! Who wouldn't want to have birthday pancakes so big they have to be flipped by a snow shovel?
I fell in love with this film all over again. Hughes allows just the right amount of adult humour in as Buck struggles to come to terms with his new responsibility. He reassures his stuffy sister-in law "I've given up smoking up cigarettes, I'm onto cigars now" and struggles with the washing machine "I'm gonna stuff my load into you!" Much of the humour comes from Buck trying to find his feet in world so alien to a serial bachelor, but there is some great support from the kids.
Tia is the sulky teenager who could have been the role model for so many high school girls who thought their parents had no other purpose but to ruin their lives. Let’s just say Tia's brooding angst got a wry smile or two of recognition from my fiancé! Macaulay Culkin is also at his cutest here, grilling Buck with 20 questions in a scene which could have been his audition for Home Alone.
It really got me thinking that family movies like this are a thing of the past. The crazy outfits worn by Tia's friends, berets and huge sunglasses, waistcoats and spray on jeans remind us that this film was certainly made in a time long gone. The humour and truth found in films like Uncle Buck is sadly missing from a lot of the bland modern money spinners made today. Just as Buck breezes in and brings a little cheer to his in-laws lives so did Hughes' films to a lot of people in their day. Will we ever see the likes of John Hughes and John Candy again?
7/10
John Candy plays Buck. He drinks, smokes, gambles, and avoids all responsibility. He is the last man you would want to leave in charge of your 3 kids, but that’s just what brother Bob must do when his father in-law has a heart attack. This is your typical fish out of water comedy with an edge. The edge being John Candy's fantastic performance as a bull of a man, charging into the lives of teenage daughter Tia (Jean Louisa Kelly) and kindergarten munchkins Maizy (Gaby Hoffman) and Miles (Macaulay Culkin). Candy brings Buck to life with his charisma, so much that I think every kid that saw this really wanted a babysitter like Buck! Who wouldn't want to have birthday pancakes so big they have to be flipped by a snow shovel?
I fell in love with this film all over again. Hughes allows just the right amount of adult humour in as Buck struggles to come to terms with his new responsibility. He reassures his stuffy sister-in law "I've given up smoking up cigarettes, I'm onto cigars now" and struggles with the washing machine "I'm gonna stuff my load into you!" Much of the humour comes from Buck trying to find his feet in world so alien to a serial bachelor, but there is some great support from the kids.
Tia is the sulky teenager who could have been the role model for so many high school girls who thought their parents had no other purpose but to ruin their lives. Let’s just say Tia's brooding angst got a wry smile or two of recognition from my fiancé! Macaulay Culkin is also at his cutest here, grilling Buck with 20 questions in a scene which could have been his audition for Home Alone.
It really got me thinking that family movies like this are a thing of the past. The crazy outfits worn by Tia's friends, berets and huge sunglasses, waistcoats and spray on jeans remind us that this film was certainly made in a time long gone. The humour and truth found in films like Uncle Buck is sadly missing from a lot of the bland modern money spinners made today. Just as Buck breezes in and brings a little cheer to his in-laws lives so did Hughes' films to a lot of people in their day. Will we ever see the likes of John Hughes and John Candy again?
7/10
Monday 29 August 2011
Hot Fuzz (2007)
I'm not going to beat about the bush here. I loved this film. I am Nick Frost's character Danny Butterman you see, well maybe a small part of him. The bored film geek who sits about waiting for something to happen. Sorry, I'm getting a bit ahead of myself here. Hot Fuzz is a comedy starring Simon Pegg as super cop Nick Angel who is reassigned from the Met where he single handedly decimates London's criminal population with his hardcore determination and all round greatness as a crime fighting machine. He is promoted to sergeant and sent to his new patch, sleepy Gloucestershire village Sandford.
Here he meets up with some fantastically stereotyped locals and best of all, his hapless new partner Danny. Hot Fuzz is basically a satire of glossy Hollywood action movies. It fuses the high octane style so often used in big budget movies with a brilliantly British tale of shady goings on in a sleepy country village. The director (Edgar Wright) often plays on the contrast, using many staples straight out of the action movie handbook, such as loud explosions, screaming sirens and shotgun cutting to unfold the action. As Angel is deployed to the village for example his journey from the Met to a rainy train station is punctuated with this shotgun style of scene cutting, ending with him dripping wet at the station clutching his pot plant. As a bit of a film geek this kind of playfulness couldn't fail to make me smile.
The village's often surreal characters also really add to the likeableness. We have, among too many to recount in full, a pompous thespian, drunken tycoon, zealous neighbourhood watch members and a station full of useless police men. Perhaps most notable of all is Timothy Dalton's (yes James Bond!) slimy convenience store owner. Aside from Danny this is probably my favourite character as he often turns up at just the right time with a Cheshire cat grin and a cheesy one liner (Arrest me I'm a slasher... of prices!). And then we have Danny. Nick Frost is often hysterical as the heavy drinking, lazy, daydreaming foil to Simon Pegg's straight man.
The action film world is cleverly explored through Danny's constant questioning of his partner. "Have you ever jumped through the air while firing two guns? Have you ever jumped through the air while firing one gun?" As the story progresses our two heroes finally get a chance to perform all these testosterone filled sequences that Danny has fantasised over. Perhaps most notably is one scene from Point Break that is surely the closest Keanu Reeves has ever been to acting! The genius of Hot Fuzz is to contrast the big budget action movie stereotypes with the sleepy English village stereotypes, giving us a really enjoyable and cleverly observed satire of both worlds.
My only real criticism is that this perhaps drags on for about 20 minutes too long. I felt like Pegg and Frost were the film geeks indulging in their chance to be action heroes more so than their actual characters would have done. But I have to forgive them for that; I would have done exactly the same thing given the chance!
8/10
Here he meets up with some fantastically stereotyped locals and best of all, his hapless new partner Danny. Hot Fuzz is basically a satire of glossy Hollywood action movies. It fuses the high octane style so often used in big budget movies with a brilliantly British tale of shady goings on in a sleepy country village. The director (Edgar Wright) often plays on the contrast, using many staples straight out of the action movie handbook, such as loud explosions, screaming sirens and shotgun cutting to unfold the action. As Angel is deployed to the village for example his journey from the Met to a rainy train station is punctuated with this shotgun style of scene cutting, ending with him dripping wet at the station clutching his pot plant. As a bit of a film geek this kind of playfulness couldn't fail to make me smile.
The village's often surreal characters also really add to the likeableness. We have, among too many to recount in full, a pompous thespian, drunken tycoon, zealous neighbourhood watch members and a station full of useless police men. Perhaps most notable of all is Timothy Dalton's (yes James Bond!) slimy convenience store owner. Aside from Danny this is probably my favourite character as he often turns up at just the right time with a Cheshire cat grin and a cheesy one liner (Arrest me I'm a slasher... of prices!). And then we have Danny. Nick Frost is often hysterical as the heavy drinking, lazy, daydreaming foil to Simon Pegg's straight man.
The action film world is cleverly explored through Danny's constant questioning of his partner. "Have you ever jumped through the air while firing two guns? Have you ever jumped through the air while firing one gun?" As the story progresses our two heroes finally get a chance to perform all these testosterone filled sequences that Danny has fantasised over. Perhaps most notably is one scene from Point Break that is surely the closest Keanu Reeves has ever been to acting! The genius of Hot Fuzz is to contrast the big budget action movie stereotypes with the sleepy English village stereotypes, giving us a really enjoyable and cleverly observed satire of both worlds.
My only real criticism is that this perhaps drags on for about 20 minutes too long. I felt like Pegg and Frost were the film geeks indulging in their chance to be action heroes more so than their actual characters would have done. But I have to forgive them for that; I would have done exactly the same thing given the chance!
8/10
Bad Education (2004)
Have you ever watched a film based on the three sentence description written in a TV guide? If you have then maybe you know just how misleading they can be. I seem to remember reading that this was a tale of two characters troubled school days. That, in conjunction with the name made me think I was in for a kind of Spanish language version of Boyz in the Hood (yes it is another subtitled film). How wrong could I be! Maybe I should have known more about the director, Pedro Almodovar and his fondness for exploring taboo subjects and sexual identity. Maybe I should have not just been an assumptive ass. Regardless, this film surprised me on several occasions.
The plot is almost as confusing as the main characters themselves. Struggling actor Angel (Gael Garcia Bernal) visits childhood friend and successful director Enrique (Fele Martinez) looking for work. Angel leaves him with a script that tells the story of two young boy’s love affair at a repressive Catholic boarding school, an abusive priest and their strange reunion many years later. This script touches a nerve with Enrique and life seems to imitate the script as the actor and director’s stories also begin to unfold.
I found the story oddly gripping as it cuts from the present day to the script of Angel's story, which is itself split over two time periods. Essentially we have 3 narratives to negotiate, which are clouded more by the question mark that emerges over Angel's true identity. Also did I mention that Angel was a transsexual? The film constantly plays with identity, whether it is sexual or literal, it all builds to an engrossing tale made vivid by the beautiful cinematography of Almodovar. Despite there being some very dark themes, mainly involving the church, the film is shot in dazzling colour. It skips seamlessly between the reality and the fictitious, keeping the viewers attention as you try to unravel the threads.
I should probably point out here that if you are put off by a bit of male nudity then you should probably skip this one. If you are going to be offended by a transvestite giving head to a nearly unconscious man while her partner in crime is about to steal his motorbike then stay away! If you are not bothered by such things then there is a lot to enjoy about this film. There is a lot more here than originally meets the eye. Layered, dark, melancholy, beautiful and tragic all at once this could leave you as confused as the main characters but exhilarated nonetheless.
7/10
The plot is almost as confusing as the main characters themselves. Struggling actor Angel (Gael Garcia Bernal) visits childhood friend and successful director Enrique (Fele Martinez) looking for work. Angel leaves him with a script that tells the story of two young boy’s love affair at a repressive Catholic boarding school, an abusive priest and their strange reunion many years later. This script touches a nerve with Enrique and life seems to imitate the script as the actor and director’s stories also begin to unfold.
I found the story oddly gripping as it cuts from the present day to the script of Angel's story, which is itself split over two time periods. Essentially we have 3 narratives to negotiate, which are clouded more by the question mark that emerges over Angel's true identity. Also did I mention that Angel was a transsexual? The film constantly plays with identity, whether it is sexual or literal, it all builds to an engrossing tale made vivid by the beautiful cinematography of Almodovar. Despite there being some very dark themes, mainly involving the church, the film is shot in dazzling colour. It skips seamlessly between the reality and the fictitious, keeping the viewers attention as you try to unravel the threads.
I should probably point out here that if you are put off by a bit of male nudity then you should probably skip this one. If you are going to be offended by a transvestite giving head to a nearly unconscious man while her partner in crime is about to steal his motorbike then stay away! If you are not bothered by such things then there is a lot to enjoy about this film. There is a lot more here than originally meets the eye. Layered, dark, melancholy, beautiful and tragic all at once this could leave you as confused as the main characters but exhilarated nonetheless.
7/10
The Birds (1963)
The Birds is one of Alfred Hitchcock's more famous films. Not perhaps as well known as Psycho or Vertigo, but its basic plot is known by most people it seems. Crazy birds attack people. Hitchcock is famous for being the master of suspense and horror and this is another of those films. I feel that I have to watch a lot of 'classic' films during my one year mission to watch a film a day, and it would be wrong to neglect one of the most famous directors in history.
There is a bit more to the plot than just some lunatic birds to be fair. Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) is a rich and mischievous socialite who has a seemingly chance encounter with lawyer Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor). They meet in a bird shop and soon Melanie is driving up the coast to surprise Mitch in his hometown of Bodega Bay. Everything seems quite normal until Melanie is suddenly attacked by a swooping bird. Soon psychotic birds are attacking everything in sight.
If you had no idea what film you were sitting down to watch you could be forgiven for thinking it was an Audrey Hepburn type romantic film. A playful flirtation between the two leads dominated the first half of the film. Tippi Hedren is very good as the spoiled rich girl who decides to follow a whim and basically stalk her new acquaintance. There is a surreal feel to things however which paves the way for the oddness that is to follow. As soon as the birds, seemingly randomly start to attack, things spiral very quickly into a full scale panic as the entire town begins to panic. The change in direction reminded me of From Dusk 'Till Dawn, or perhaps more appropriately Psycho. Some viewers might feel they are getting two films for the price of one where others might feel disappointed at the change.
As I have said Hitchcock is regarded as the master of suspense and horror. This provides much more suspense than horror for me. The birds of varying species begin to gather before attacks and the film really captures this well. Melanie look on worriedly in one scene as huge numbers of crows land outside a school full of children, angry squawks and nervous looks mingle creating a very tense mood. Where modern audiences will feel let down is the actual attacks. Unfortunately the effects have not aged well, despite the fact that they must have been a fantastic achievement in 1963. I found myself laughing for the wrong reasons in some places, as you can see that some of the birds are made of cardboard.
The surreal feel to the film and the odd characters really made this worthwhile for me. Perhaps this was intended because when the birds start attacking for no apparent reason it doesn't seem much stranger than Melanie following Mitch like a nut job might follow Brittney Spears. Another thing I enjoyed was the fact that no real explanation is offered. There is a great scene where residents of the town are speculating on why the attacks are happening while having their lunch in a diner. No conclusion is reached but everyone has a different theory. Much like the film itself it will divide opinion as it is purposely vague and open to interpretation.
Well worth a watch if you are not too put off by the dated effects.
6/10
There is a bit more to the plot than just some lunatic birds to be fair. Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) is a rich and mischievous socialite who has a seemingly chance encounter with lawyer Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor). They meet in a bird shop and soon Melanie is driving up the coast to surprise Mitch in his hometown of Bodega Bay. Everything seems quite normal until Melanie is suddenly attacked by a swooping bird. Soon psychotic birds are attacking everything in sight.
If you had no idea what film you were sitting down to watch you could be forgiven for thinking it was an Audrey Hepburn type romantic film. A playful flirtation between the two leads dominated the first half of the film. Tippi Hedren is very good as the spoiled rich girl who decides to follow a whim and basically stalk her new acquaintance. There is a surreal feel to things however which paves the way for the oddness that is to follow. As soon as the birds, seemingly randomly start to attack, things spiral very quickly into a full scale panic as the entire town begins to panic. The change in direction reminded me of From Dusk 'Till Dawn, or perhaps more appropriately Psycho. Some viewers might feel they are getting two films for the price of one where others might feel disappointed at the change.
As I have said Hitchcock is regarded as the master of suspense and horror. This provides much more suspense than horror for me. The birds of varying species begin to gather before attacks and the film really captures this well. Melanie look on worriedly in one scene as huge numbers of crows land outside a school full of children, angry squawks and nervous looks mingle creating a very tense mood. Where modern audiences will feel let down is the actual attacks. Unfortunately the effects have not aged well, despite the fact that they must have been a fantastic achievement in 1963. I found myself laughing for the wrong reasons in some places, as you can see that some of the birds are made of cardboard.
The surreal feel to the film and the odd characters really made this worthwhile for me. Perhaps this was intended because when the birds start attacking for no apparent reason it doesn't seem much stranger than Melanie following Mitch like a nut job might follow Brittney Spears. Another thing I enjoyed was the fact that no real explanation is offered. There is a great scene where residents of the town are speculating on why the attacks are happening while having their lunch in a diner. No conclusion is reached but everyone has a different theory. Much like the film itself it will divide opinion as it is purposely vague and open to interpretation.
Well worth a watch if you are not too put off by the dated effects.
6/10
Sunday 28 August 2011
A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)
Robert Englund, scarred face, stripy jumper dragging razor blade fingers maliciously across a wall is still one of the scariest images of my childhood. If you grew up in the 80's then the sight of Freddie Krueger could well be enough to send you scurrying into a corner to curl up into a ball and gibber something about dreams not being real. A Nightmare on Elm Street is, let’s face it a proper horror classic. I was so scared the first time I watched it that I woke my brother up, terrified for his life, when he was twitching in his sleep (turns out he was not being stalked by a disfigured psycho in case anyone is interested). I'm not ashamed to say that I heard that haunting song in my head for months afterwards (one two Freddie's coming for you, three four better lock your door...)
The original film, released in 1984 told the story of a group of high school kids being stalked and murdered in their sleep by a mysterious stranger with a burned face and razor blades for fingers. The only way the kids could avoid a grim death was to stay awake so that the dream monster could not get to them. 26 years later and a whole new set of pretty by dim teens must struggle to stay awake.
The first thing I noticed about this film, along with any other released in living memory is that the characters are very good looking. If America was even 10% as attractive as movies make out then no one needs to go on a diet there! Where are all the normal looking people? Even the pointless extras sitting in the diner at the beginning would look like Greek gods if they walked down the street in any British city. People would fall at their feet and weep at the beauty of the average Hollywood extra in any part of the British Isles. Also, as with many new films this has a certain slickness, a quality of production that tells us money has been spent here. This does more harm than good to most horror films for me. Especially so to a film such as this where our memories are filled with fear from the original, but clouded with doubt over the remake.
Freddie is introduced to us in a good opening scene. He appears behind his first would be victim twitching that iconic razor gloved hand, dragging out a haunting sound as metal caresses metal. Then he opens his mouth. Much like a hot woman in Hollyoaks that starts to talk and sounds like an alcoholic truck driver, the illusion is ruined. Too much of this film feels like a smooth imitation of the original. Several scenes try to copy/pay homage to scenes of pure creepiness that would have stuck in your mind as a child watching this for the first time. Yet all they succeed in doing is making the source material feel childish and really diminish the impact you would have felt first time around.
One particular scene that really stuck with me involved a girl being dragged around the ceiling, Freddy’s claw through her stomach, leaving a bloody trail in her wake. This version tries to recreate it when one of the characters is thrown about her bedroom by the monster as her horrified bloke looks on. The result is a poor copy of a scene far more terrifying, achieved with a fraction of the budget and none of the technology. Any chills the audience might feel are created by the story and images of Freddie, none of which are exactly new or even great interpretations of the original material.
It is no horror classic but it is a decent remake because it is based on good material. As the saying goes you can't reinvent the wheel, but you would be a bloody idiot to not be able to copy it. The biggest question that entered my mind as I watched this was how much money will it make? During an hour and a half where no effort is made add to the original that is one of the few things I had to think about. Why bother to make a film with something new to show us when you could just copy one that has already been done and achieve the same result? Have I already something very similar during this blog, repeating my thoughts on this topic in a very familiar way to what I have said before?? F**k it, if you can't beat 'em you might as well join 'em!
4/10
The original film, released in 1984 told the story of a group of high school kids being stalked and murdered in their sleep by a mysterious stranger with a burned face and razor blades for fingers. The only way the kids could avoid a grim death was to stay awake so that the dream monster could not get to them. 26 years later and a whole new set of pretty by dim teens must struggle to stay awake.
The first thing I noticed about this film, along with any other released in living memory is that the characters are very good looking. If America was even 10% as attractive as movies make out then no one needs to go on a diet there! Where are all the normal looking people? Even the pointless extras sitting in the diner at the beginning would look like Greek gods if they walked down the street in any British city. People would fall at their feet and weep at the beauty of the average Hollywood extra in any part of the British Isles. Also, as with many new films this has a certain slickness, a quality of production that tells us money has been spent here. This does more harm than good to most horror films for me. Especially so to a film such as this where our memories are filled with fear from the original, but clouded with doubt over the remake.
Freddie is introduced to us in a good opening scene. He appears behind his first would be victim twitching that iconic razor gloved hand, dragging out a haunting sound as metal caresses metal. Then he opens his mouth. Much like a hot woman in Hollyoaks that starts to talk and sounds like an alcoholic truck driver, the illusion is ruined. Too much of this film feels like a smooth imitation of the original. Several scenes try to copy/pay homage to scenes of pure creepiness that would have stuck in your mind as a child watching this for the first time. Yet all they succeed in doing is making the source material feel childish and really diminish the impact you would have felt first time around.
One particular scene that really stuck with me involved a girl being dragged around the ceiling, Freddy’s claw through her stomach, leaving a bloody trail in her wake. This version tries to recreate it when one of the characters is thrown about her bedroom by the monster as her horrified bloke looks on. The result is a poor copy of a scene far more terrifying, achieved with a fraction of the budget and none of the technology. Any chills the audience might feel are created by the story and images of Freddie, none of which are exactly new or even great interpretations of the original material.
It is no horror classic but it is a decent remake because it is based on good material. As the saying goes you can't reinvent the wheel, but you would be a bloody idiot to not be able to copy it. The biggest question that entered my mind as I watched this was how much money will it make? During an hour and a half where no effort is made add to the original that is one of the few things I had to think about. Why bother to make a film with something new to show us when you could just copy one that has already been done and achieve the same result? Have I already something very similar during this blog, repeating my thoughts on this topic in a very familiar way to what I have said before?? F**k it, if you can't beat 'em you might as well join 'em!
4/10
Friday 26 August 2011
The Inbetweeners (2011)
Like a kid waiting for Christmas I got a bit excited by the release of the Inbetweeners movie. When I ordered my ticket a little bit of wee might have actually come out. It seems I wasn't alone as this became the UK's number 1 film on its opening night. But is this another Kevin and Perry or can it live up to the hype?
Like Kevin and Perry Goes Large it is a film version of a successful TV show (OK I know K&P were characters from a sketch on the Harry Enfield Show but it’s almost the same thing right?). The Inbetweeners was a painfully funny insight into the lives of four teenage boys struggling through the usual trials of school. Narrated by speccy oddball and briefcase carrying geek Will (Simon Bird) it also featured serial bulshitter and wannabe ladies man Jay (James Buckley), gullible but loyal Neil (Blake Harrison) and the love struck everyman Simon (Joe Thomas).
For those of you that have never seen the series I suggest you watch it! But only if you find the following things funny: public humiliation, knob jokes, poo jokes, masturbation jokes, anything to do with anything smutty or puerile or disgusting basically! Where the series really succeeds is showing likeable characters struggling with the everyday ordeal of wanting to be popular in school. The movie picks up where the series left off. The four friends leave school, still unpopular, still socially awkward, but about to go on a lad’s holiday.
The storyline is minimal which in my mind turned out to be a good thing. Too often I have watched comedies and thought the laughs dried up at the expense of the writers feeling the need to tell us some kind of story. I couldn't give a crap what happens to the main character's uncle’s bloody window cleaner! I don't care if their story arc comes to a happy ending! I just want to see them say/do/be the victim of something funny. Thankfully the Inbetweeners doesn't waste much time with such pointless endeavours, except for a very convenient ending which did seem like too much of a crowd pleaser. It gets straight into the expected toilet humour and thankfully stays right down there in the gutter for the duration.
I hope I have made it clear that this is not the film to watch if you are looking for subtle humour. For example the first time we see Jay he is settling down for a good time with his laptop, a glove, a pack of ham and a snorkel! Need I say more? There were a couple of scenes that some of my fellow cinema goers found a little close to the bone, producing more groans that laughs. If you are easily offended then you should stay away from this! If however you want to be thoroughly entertained by a film that rarely lets up in the gags from start to finish then you don't need me to tell you to watch this, you have probably seen it a few times already.
One final thing, Neil doing shots almost made me cry!
8/10
Like Kevin and Perry Goes Large it is a film version of a successful TV show (OK I know K&P were characters from a sketch on the Harry Enfield Show but it’s almost the same thing right?). The Inbetweeners was a painfully funny insight into the lives of four teenage boys struggling through the usual trials of school. Narrated by speccy oddball and briefcase carrying geek Will (Simon Bird) it also featured serial bulshitter and wannabe ladies man Jay (James Buckley), gullible but loyal Neil (Blake Harrison) and the love struck everyman Simon (Joe Thomas).
For those of you that have never seen the series I suggest you watch it! But only if you find the following things funny: public humiliation, knob jokes, poo jokes, masturbation jokes, anything to do with anything smutty or puerile or disgusting basically! Where the series really succeeds is showing likeable characters struggling with the everyday ordeal of wanting to be popular in school. The movie picks up where the series left off. The four friends leave school, still unpopular, still socially awkward, but about to go on a lad’s holiday.
The storyline is minimal which in my mind turned out to be a good thing. Too often I have watched comedies and thought the laughs dried up at the expense of the writers feeling the need to tell us some kind of story. I couldn't give a crap what happens to the main character's uncle’s bloody window cleaner! I don't care if their story arc comes to a happy ending! I just want to see them say/do/be the victim of something funny. Thankfully the Inbetweeners doesn't waste much time with such pointless endeavours, except for a very convenient ending which did seem like too much of a crowd pleaser. It gets straight into the expected toilet humour and thankfully stays right down there in the gutter for the duration.
I hope I have made it clear that this is not the film to watch if you are looking for subtle humour. For example the first time we see Jay he is settling down for a good time with his laptop, a glove, a pack of ham and a snorkel! Need I say more? There were a couple of scenes that some of my fellow cinema goers found a little close to the bone, producing more groans that laughs. If you are easily offended then you should stay away from this! If however you want to be thoroughly entertained by a film that rarely lets up in the gags from start to finish then you don't need me to tell you to watch this, you have probably seen it a few times already.
One final thing, Neil doing shots almost made me cry!
8/10
Wednesday 24 August 2011
Infernal Affairs (2002)
Infernal Affairs is a tale of cops and criminals set in Hong Kong. I found it hard to imagine a film set there without thinking of Jackie Chan and martial arts. Frantic fight scenes with the man himself tumbling through the streets being chased by a huge gang of over acting lunatics. What I found here was nothing of the sort.
It tells the tale of two very different men. Firstly we have Lau Kin-Ming (Andy Lau) who is a triad gang member who is sent by his boss, along with several other members, to enrol in the police academy as moles. Similarly Chan Wing-Yan played by Tony Leung is a top candidate at the same academy. We see him get expelled but in reality he has been selected because of his great potential. He is sent to work undercover with the triad gangs. Sound familiar yet? The Departed with Matt Damon and Leonardo Di Caprio is a remake of this.
What develops is a tense story of the police department and a gang trying frantically to uncover the moles they suspect are operating among their ranks. Everything hinges on the performances of the two leads. Tony Leung in particular is brilliant as a man weighed down by the burden of duty. However Hon Sam (Eric Tsang) steals a lot of scenes as the manic triad boss who seems to love the cat and mouse games he plays with the police.
The introduction was a little hard to follow as it takes off at a fast pace. It is filmed in Mandarin with English subtitles. However any difficulty felt at following the intricate storyline is more than made up for with the quality of the story. If you struggle with the subtitles then I have some advice. Get some glasses or maybe go back to school and learn to read again! It will be worth the effort! Infact you will be doing yourself a favour as there is a huge amount of brilliant films out there not made in English.
I did expect a bit more Eastern mysticism or philosophy from this. Especially as the film starts with a quote relating to unending hell, which is the lowest level of hell in Buddhism. The Chinese title actually translates to "the non-stop path". The theme is reflected more with the lead characters struggles with maintaining their cover as well as their identities than any heavy use of religious imagery. The story really benefits from always remaining contemporary in its setting. It feels like a very slick production that Hollywood would be proud of. There is one scene shot in the 10,000 Buddha’s temple that plays to the theme. Other than that we see the action through crowded streets, police stations and seedy gang hangouts, showing Hong Kong as a great modern metropolis. Several scenes take place on the roof of a skyscraper with a stunning backdrop of Victoria Harbour with Hong Kong Island in view behind.
The story really grips from start to finish, with many surprises along the way. As I have mentioned the two leads really hold things together to such an extent that you might not be sure who to root for as the film rushes towards its climax.
8/10
It tells the tale of two very different men. Firstly we have Lau Kin-Ming (Andy Lau) who is a triad gang member who is sent by his boss, along with several other members, to enrol in the police academy as moles. Similarly Chan Wing-Yan played by Tony Leung is a top candidate at the same academy. We see him get expelled but in reality he has been selected because of his great potential. He is sent to work undercover with the triad gangs. Sound familiar yet? The Departed with Matt Damon and Leonardo Di Caprio is a remake of this.
What develops is a tense story of the police department and a gang trying frantically to uncover the moles they suspect are operating among their ranks. Everything hinges on the performances of the two leads. Tony Leung in particular is brilliant as a man weighed down by the burden of duty. However Hon Sam (Eric Tsang) steals a lot of scenes as the manic triad boss who seems to love the cat and mouse games he plays with the police.
The introduction was a little hard to follow as it takes off at a fast pace. It is filmed in Mandarin with English subtitles. However any difficulty felt at following the intricate storyline is more than made up for with the quality of the story. If you struggle with the subtitles then I have some advice. Get some glasses or maybe go back to school and learn to read again! It will be worth the effort! Infact you will be doing yourself a favour as there is a huge amount of brilliant films out there not made in English.
I did expect a bit more Eastern mysticism or philosophy from this. Especially as the film starts with a quote relating to unending hell, which is the lowest level of hell in Buddhism. The Chinese title actually translates to "the non-stop path". The theme is reflected more with the lead characters struggles with maintaining their cover as well as their identities than any heavy use of religious imagery. The story really benefits from always remaining contemporary in its setting. It feels like a very slick production that Hollywood would be proud of. There is one scene shot in the 10,000 Buddha’s temple that plays to the theme. Other than that we see the action through crowded streets, police stations and seedy gang hangouts, showing Hong Kong as a great modern metropolis. Several scenes take place on the roof of a skyscraper with a stunning backdrop of Victoria Harbour with Hong Kong Island in view behind.
The story really grips from start to finish, with many surprises along the way. As I have mentioned the two leads really hold things together to such an extent that you might not be sure who to root for as the film rushes towards its climax.
8/10
Tuesday 23 August 2011
Saw 6 (2009)
How many times can you flog a dead donkey? SIX times apparently! The first Saw film was released in 2004, a shocking, gory, visceral horror that really made an impact on first viewing. Now here we are on number 6, just a few short years later. I have to be honest I stopped caring after the third instalment. When you first heard the serial killer Jigsaw's distorted voice say "Hello I want to play a game" you were taken on a really intense trip into what quickly became a new genre in horror, 'torture-porn'. Now if you haven't seen any of the films don't be alarmed, there is no actual nudity but there is a lot of torture, all in the name of cinema obviously. Saw jarred our senses with graphic scenes of mutilation and its ability to put the viewer into an impossible situation (could you really contemplate cutting off your own foot to save your life?). By the time Saw 6 arrived I really wondered if there would be anything to keep my attention or would it be a case of same shit different toilet?
To steal another cliché, familiarity breeds contempt. The film starts with two money lenders who prey on the weakness of others in a race against time and each other. They must cut off one pound of flesh in exchange for their lives, but only the first one to manage it will be spared. A hallmark of the Saw franchise and the Jigsaw killer's signature is to teach immoral characters the harshest lesson in order to make them see the error of their ways. The intro is so familiar it loses any impact it should have. When would a person cutting flesh from their own stomach seem utterly run of the mill? When you have seen it all lots of times before!
The immoral character in this film is an insurance company executive who makes his money denying peoples medical claims. He is thrown into a game that forms the centrepiece of the film. There is some plot going on involving a detective who is carrying on Jigsaw's work, some police who are trying to catch the killer and Jigsaw's ex wife. They are all blended together in the same formula as any of the other increasingly poor sequels. The effect is much like a soft porn film where there is some pointless dialogue you have to sit through before the 'action' starts.
Adding to the familiar feel is the direction and the sound track. Jagged camera work with fast zooms in and out accompanied by very real sounding screams, snaps and crunches were genuinely unnerving in the original. By the sixth time around it feels like watching a magician after he has explained the trick away. I have mentioned previously that it seems that most films these days are remakes or sequels with nothing new to say. Saw 6 is a prime example of this. It feels like an attempt to cash in on earlier success by just repeating the same idea with a slight update on the Jigsaw killer’s legacy.
If you are a big fan of the franchise this will probably be a welcome addition. Lots of it is told in flashback so it will fill some holes in the back story for the die-hard fans. For those who stopped caring long ago however there is nothing new here to warrant a viewing.
3/10
To steal another cliché, familiarity breeds contempt. The film starts with two money lenders who prey on the weakness of others in a race against time and each other. They must cut off one pound of flesh in exchange for their lives, but only the first one to manage it will be spared. A hallmark of the Saw franchise and the Jigsaw killer's signature is to teach immoral characters the harshest lesson in order to make them see the error of their ways. The intro is so familiar it loses any impact it should have. When would a person cutting flesh from their own stomach seem utterly run of the mill? When you have seen it all lots of times before!
The immoral character in this film is an insurance company executive who makes his money denying peoples medical claims. He is thrown into a game that forms the centrepiece of the film. There is some plot going on involving a detective who is carrying on Jigsaw's work, some police who are trying to catch the killer and Jigsaw's ex wife. They are all blended together in the same formula as any of the other increasingly poor sequels. The effect is much like a soft porn film where there is some pointless dialogue you have to sit through before the 'action' starts.
Adding to the familiar feel is the direction and the sound track. Jagged camera work with fast zooms in and out accompanied by very real sounding screams, snaps and crunches were genuinely unnerving in the original. By the sixth time around it feels like watching a magician after he has explained the trick away. I have mentioned previously that it seems that most films these days are remakes or sequels with nothing new to say. Saw 6 is a prime example of this. It feels like an attempt to cash in on earlier success by just repeating the same idea with a slight update on the Jigsaw killer’s legacy.
If you are a big fan of the franchise this will probably be a welcome addition. Lots of it is told in flashback so it will fill some holes in the back story for the die-hard fans. For those who stopped caring long ago however there is nothing new here to warrant a viewing.
3/10
Monday 22 August 2011
Sex and the City (2008)
I’m not going to apologise for watching this. I refuse to make this situation worse by trying to make up some justifying excuse as to why I sat through almost two and a half hours of the most girlie film in all creation. I watched the Sex and the City movie. I've seen the TV series in full. There I said it (you are now free to abuse me at will).
1. Why doesn’t Sarah Jessica Parker get that mole on her chin fixed?
2. How rich is Mr Big to be able to spend as much as he does on Just for Men? Or the rest of them on Botox?
3. Do the writers really think their puns are funny? “Carrie got carried away”!!
4. How can anyone spend 5 minutes with Anthhhhhony without punching him? He is the stereotypically bitchy queen in case you were wondering.
5. At what age does Samantha stop being sexy and start becoming creepy like Doris from Gavin and Stacey?
Sadly these questions remain unanswered as the film closes without any real surprises. Although I did begin to suspect that none of Carrie’s friends actually exist. They are all manifestations of her fractured personality-Miranda is the career driven queen of ice and logic. Charlotte is the homemaking princess of all that is prim and proper. Samantha is the sexually aggressive man-eater, free to hunt its prey at will. I suppose it is no great revelation that these are personality strands of the ‘every woman’ that Carrie has to reconcile in order to find her perfect ending. I just found this film more amusing as I imagined Carrie hallucinating the whole thing while sedated on a hospital bed following one bad break up too many.
That being said, once I understood this is a film that values style above substance it is not difficult to see why it was such a huge success. It is a no brainer that fans of the TV series will leave the film happy. If you are new to the SATC girls you could be drawn in by the easy narration, constant emphasis on style and fashion and frank discussions between friends where no topic is out of bounds. Or you could be appalled by the constant shower of girlie gooiness, dodgy puns and rapidly aging cast behaving like hormonal teenagers with credit cards.
I’m sure that this film will be loved by fans, praised by newcomers and hated by others in equal measure. To be fair it is a pretty perfect version of what it is, much like the plague was! Just don’t go into this expecting it to be anything other than what it claims to be in the opening 5 minutes.
5/10
For those of you who have been living in a cave for the last 15 years a brief explanation might be needed. This film is a follow on from the TV series of the same name. Carrie Bradshaw, a sex columnist and her terminally single ‘gal pals’ strut around New York draped in designer gear, drinking designer cocktails and obsessing over men and more specifically sex. The film is an extended episode of the show basically. In a nutshell it’s about some old bird that may or may not marry her boyfriend. So is this one for the fans only, or is it capable of bringing in a new audience and not driving thousands of men to throw themselves out of the nearest window in horror?
Within the first 5 minutes of the film starting, its stall is firmly set out. Carrie, through her continuous and slightly smug narration tells us the three most important things in life are labels, love and some other bloody l I can’t be bothered to remember. The bar is set high; for this is clearly a film devoted to probing deep into the innermost workings of the human heart. Certainly no inch of our enigmatic psyche will be left unexamined. Some of the greatest questions ever asked by the human race will be answered during the ensuing journey of discovery through the full gamut of human emotions. Questions such as: Which designer’s dress will Carrie wear at her wedding? What outfits will she throw out of her wardrobe? And what will Samantha do without her daily dose of dick?
As the plot shuffles along I find myself asking some very important questions of my own.Within the first 5 minutes of the film starting, its stall is firmly set out. Carrie, through her continuous and slightly smug narration tells us the three most important things in life are labels, love and some other bloody l I can’t be bothered to remember. The bar is set high; for this is clearly a film devoted to probing deep into the innermost workings of the human heart. Certainly no inch of our enigmatic psyche will be left unexamined. Some of the greatest questions ever asked by the human race will be answered during the ensuing journey of discovery through the full gamut of human emotions. Questions such as: Which designer’s dress will Carrie wear at her wedding? What outfits will she throw out of her wardrobe? And what will Samantha do without her daily dose of dick?
1. Why doesn’t Sarah Jessica Parker get that mole on her chin fixed?
2. How rich is Mr Big to be able to spend as much as he does on Just for Men? Or the rest of them on Botox?
3. Do the writers really think their puns are funny? “Carrie got carried away”!!
4. How can anyone spend 5 minutes with Anthhhhhony without punching him? He is the stereotypically bitchy queen in case you were wondering.
5. At what age does Samantha stop being sexy and start becoming creepy like Doris from Gavin and Stacey?
Sadly these questions remain unanswered as the film closes without any real surprises. Although I did begin to suspect that none of Carrie’s friends actually exist. They are all manifestations of her fractured personality-Miranda is the career driven queen of ice and logic. Charlotte is the homemaking princess of all that is prim and proper. Samantha is the sexually aggressive man-eater, free to hunt its prey at will. I suppose it is no great revelation that these are personality strands of the ‘every woman’ that Carrie has to reconcile in order to find her perfect ending. I just found this film more amusing as I imagined Carrie hallucinating the whole thing while sedated on a hospital bed following one bad break up too many.
That being said, once I understood this is a film that values style above substance it is not difficult to see why it was such a huge success. It is a no brainer that fans of the TV series will leave the film happy. If you are new to the SATC girls you could be drawn in by the easy narration, constant emphasis on style and fashion and frank discussions between friends where no topic is out of bounds. Or you could be appalled by the constant shower of girlie gooiness, dodgy puns and rapidly aging cast behaving like hormonal teenagers with credit cards.
I’m sure that this film will be loved by fans, praised by newcomers and hated by others in equal measure. To be fair it is a pretty perfect version of what it is, much like the plague was! Just don’t go into this expecting it to be anything other than what it claims to be in the opening 5 minutes.
5/10
Saturday 20 August 2011
Frankenstein (1931)
It's about time I got around to watching this film. The classic black and white horror starring Boris Karloff. It seems almost as famous to me as Gone with The Wind (another I have not seen but will attempt to at some point) or Casablanca (seen that one!). I went into this having watched a few very modern films recently so I was looking forward to a change of pace. Yet I feel conflicted. As I was watching I couldn't decide whether to review this as if it was made yesterday or to take into account the fact that it is 80 years old. Then I thought sod it. This is my blog; I can do both if I want.
Just a quick preface first though: You all know the story of a man's rebellion against God, where science challenges the supreme by creating life where there should be none. In this interpretation of Shelley's novel Dr Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) is the mad scientist. His obsession leads to the birth of Frankenstein's Monster (Boris Karloff). The creator is horrified by his creation and things go a bit pear shaped etc...
Review 1. Aww it’s so old!
The curtain rises on a stormy, oppressive scene where Henry and his creepy hunchbacked assistant rob a freshly laid grave. Crooked gravestones, squawking crows and distraught mourners fill the viewer with a sense of unease. The lack of a proper musical score is offset by the mood created by the sounds of the elements as the wind howls, lightning cracks and people shriek. The director does a fine job of capturing the gothic theme of the original story. The lab where the monster is born is particularly good and has clearly been copied a thousand times since. Karloff is eerie as the monster (and brilliantly he is not named in the credits, appearing only as...?)
Some scenes would clearly have been disturbing to an audience not accustomed to the shock tactics that lots of modern films seem to revel in. A particularly haunting scene that shows the monster as both a thing to be pitied and feared begins with him finding a young girl playing alone by the side of a lake (it was actually left out of the original release because it was thought too shocking). The moral ambiguity that Karloff brings to the role really hits home here and as the film sweeps to its inevitable conclusion you do feel sympathy. A very atmospheric retelling of the famous story.
Review 2. I don't care if it’s old. It shouldn't have pissed the bed.
Before the film begins an actor steps out from behind a curtain to warn the audience that what they are about to see could shock and horrify them. He invites us to leave now if we are of a faint disposition. By the end of the film I thought what a big fat liar that bloke turned out to be. Billed as a horror film, this will fail miserably to affect the modern viewer. It makes me wonder if people in the 1930's would walk down the street only to fill their pants when they cross their own shadow. Could they be found shaking like Courtney Love without her 'medication' every time the sun went down? At one point the monster is laid on an autopsy table, heavily sedated, as some scientist type is about to cut into him. The monsters hand starts to creep up in readiness to strangle the unsuspecting man. The whole thing is ruined by the monsters eyes opening every time the scientist turns his back. Any sense of surprise or tension is wrecked by the obviousness of the scene.
Also there is some seriously dodgy acting throughout (age is no excuse for bad acting I'm afraid). But perhaps most annoying is the fact that the characters are all referred to as Herr or Frauline but sound like they are all characters from the Wizard of Oz (to be fair this is still something that appears in films, Sean Connery as a Russian submarine captain in Hunt for red October is just funny!). There are too many things that ruin the atmosphere and the story for this to be a true classic in my opinion.
Conclusion: Perhaps shocking in its day but sadly dated and riddled with too many imperfections. This is a decent film but could have been so much better if the overall production value was improved. It feels like so much time was spent creating the gothic atmosphere that they forgot to get much decent acting done.
5/10
Just a quick preface first though: You all know the story of a man's rebellion against God, where science challenges the supreme by creating life where there should be none. In this interpretation of Shelley's novel Dr Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) is the mad scientist. His obsession leads to the birth of Frankenstein's Monster (Boris Karloff). The creator is horrified by his creation and things go a bit pear shaped etc...
Review 1. Aww it’s so old!
The curtain rises on a stormy, oppressive scene where Henry and his creepy hunchbacked assistant rob a freshly laid grave. Crooked gravestones, squawking crows and distraught mourners fill the viewer with a sense of unease. The lack of a proper musical score is offset by the mood created by the sounds of the elements as the wind howls, lightning cracks and people shriek. The director does a fine job of capturing the gothic theme of the original story. The lab where the monster is born is particularly good and has clearly been copied a thousand times since. Karloff is eerie as the monster (and brilliantly he is not named in the credits, appearing only as...?)
Some scenes would clearly have been disturbing to an audience not accustomed to the shock tactics that lots of modern films seem to revel in. A particularly haunting scene that shows the monster as both a thing to be pitied and feared begins with him finding a young girl playing alone by the side of a lake (it was actually left out of the original release because it was thought too shocking). The moral ambiguity that Karloff brings to the role really hits home here and as the film sweeps to its inevitable conclusion you do feel sympathy. A very atmospheric retelling of the famous story.
Review 2. I don't care if it’s old. It shouldn't have pissed the bed.
Before the film begins an actor steps out from behind a curtain to warn the audience that what they are about to see could shock and horrify them. He invites us to leave now if we are of a faint disposition. By the end of the film I thought what a big fat liar that bloke turned out to be. Billed as a horror film, this will fail miserably to affect the modern viewer. It makes me wonder if people in the 1930's would walk down the street only to fill their pants when they cross their own shadow. Could they be found shaking like Courtney Love without her 'medication' every time the sun went down? At one point the monster is laid on an autopsy table, heavily sedated, as some scientist type is about to cut into him. The monsters hand starts to creep up in readiness to strangle the unsuspecting man. The whole thing is ruined by the monsters eyes opening every time the scientist turns his back. Any sense of surprise or tension is wrecked by the obviousness of the scene.
Also there is some seriously dodgy acting throughout (age is no excuse for bad acting I'm afraid). But perhaps most annoying is the fact that the characters are all referred to as Herr or Frauline but sound like they are all characters from the Wizard of Oz (to be fair this is still something that appears in films, Sean Connery as a Russian submarine captain in Hunt for red October is just funny!). There are too many things that ruin the atmosphere and the story for this to be a true classic in my opinion.
Conclusion: Perhaps shocking in its day but sadly dated and riddled with too many imperfections. This is a decent film but could have been so much better if the overall production value was improved. It feels like so much time was spent creating the gothic atmosphere that they forgot to get much decent acting done.
5/10
Friday 19 August 2011
Source Code (2011)
When people hear the words sci-fi, action thriller and time travel one of two things seem to happen. The geek in you thinks ohhh sounds like my kind of film. Or the defences go up and you think I'm not watching that nonsense. I belong in the huge geek camp so it took no persuading to make me watch this film. If you are one of those who would rather watch a film about real characters in real situations then I must beg you! Please do not dismiss this film as one you will never be interested in!
Source Code is the latest effort by Moon Director Duncan Jones. It stars Jake Gyllenhaal as Colter Stevens, a soldier who is sent to relive the last 8 minutes of someone else's life through a clever little thing called the Source Code. The person whose life he briefly shares is about to die in a terrorist attack on a packed commuter train. Colter must keep reliving this brief moment in time until he is able to discover who the attacker is so that he can stop any further attacks. The film cuts between Colter's time in the Source Code and his time in the present where he must report his discoveries to his commanding officers before being thrown back into his mission.
The core of this film really revolves around the two relationships that Colter develops. Firstly with Christina (Michelle Monaghan), a doomed commuter on the train. Secondly with Colleen Goodwin (Vera Farmiga), his commander on the mission. Despite the sci-fi story line there is a very human element to this film. Gyllenhaal is brilliant as his character journeys through more emotions than I could count. Confused, angry, elated, distraught, scared and horny are but a few! I found more believable emotion here than some films that spend their entire running time trying to manipulate your heart strings (see one particular earlier review!).
Source Code never really gets too bogged down by the technical stuff that sometimes stifles sci-fi films. The idea of the Source Code is a device that allows the drama to unfold and the characters to develop. Add to that the stunning cinematography that seems to be a hallmark of the director's style and you get a film that really works. Gyllenhaal carries the film throughout with tons of charisma as he explores the possibilities of being able to do things over and over. It will bring comparisons with 12 Monkeys and Groundhog Day due to its main premise, so if you enjoyed either then you could do a lot worse than give this a go.
On a side note the train they are on is AMAZING! It’s a double decker! And it has a donut shop. It also looks far cleaner than any NHS hospital I have ever seen.
My only real gripe with this film is what I've come to think of as the 'Hollywood Ending'. If this film had ended a few minutes before it did I would be thinking 9/10. As it was I can't bring myself to give so lofty a score. I don't want to give any more away about the ending except to say there is a definite moment when things 'slow down' a little that would have been the perfect place to wrap things up.
8/10
Source Code is the latest effort by Moon Director Duncan Jones. It stars Jake Gyllenhaal as Colter Stevens, a soldier who is sent to relive the last 8 minutes of someone else's life through a clever little thing called the Source Code. The person whose life he briefly shares is about to die in a terrorist attack on a packed commuter train. Colter must keep reliving this brief moment in time until he is able to discover who the attacker is so that he can stop any further attacks. The film cuts between Colter's time in the Source Code and his time in the present where he must report his discoveries to his commanding officers before being thrown back into his mission.
The core of this film really revolves around the two relationships that Colter develops. Firstly with Christina (Michelle Monaghan), a doomed commuter on the train. Secondly with Colleen Goodwin (Vera Farmiga), his commander on the mission. Despite the sci-fi story line there is a very human element to this film. Gyllenhaal is brilliant as his character journeys through more emotions than I could count. Confused, angry, elated, distraught, scared and horny are but a few! I found more believable emotion here than some films that spend their entire running time trying to manipulate your heart strings (see one particular earlier review!).
Source Code never really gets too bogged down by the technical stuff that sometimes stifles sci-fi films. The idea of the Source Code is a device that allows the drama to unfold and the characters to develop. Add to that the stunning cinematography that seems to be a hallmark of the director's style and you get a film that really works. Gyllenhaal carries the film throughout with tons of charisma as he explores the possibilities of being able to do things over and over. It will bring comparisons with 12 Monkeys and Groundhog Day due to its main premise, so if you enjoyed either then you could do a lot worse than give this a go.
On a side note the train they are on is AMAZING! It’s a double decker! And it has a donut shop. It also looks far cleaner than any NHS hospital I have ever seen.
My only real gripe with this film is what I've come to think of as the 'Hollywood Ending'. If this film had ended a few minutes before it did I would be thinking 9/10. As it was I can't bring myself to give so lofty a score. I don't want to give any more away about the ending except to say there is a definite moment when things 'slow down' a little that would have been the perfect place to wrap things up.
8/10
Thursday 18 August 2011
Super (2010)
You just can't get away from superhero films these days. Superman and then Batman (the originals) were huge in their day. It seems that ever since the box office success of these films people have tried to emulate them. There have been some great ones and some absolute stinkers. Did anyone actually like Daredevil or Catwoman? Thought not. The cinema seems to be drowning in a constant flood of comic book cash-ins now. I couldn't have been less excited when Captain America was advertised. Another two hours of CGI as good battles evil... again.
So when Kickass came to our screens it blew me away. It felt like that most rare of events, an original film! Super seems to want to take up that mantle of a superhero movie with a difference. Rainn Wilson plays our hero Frank D'Arbo, average looking, shy and neurotic. He is thrown from his dull existence into a world of increasing insanity when his wife, former junkie Liv Tyler leaves him for a drug dealer named Jock (Kevin Bacon).
All the elements of the typical superhero movie are here. We have a traumatic event that shapes our hero, the creation of his alter ego and his early attempts at crime fighting. But Super is different. Dark and irreverent, with some very graphic violence. I was expecting to see a comedy like Napoleon Dynamite in a Spiderman outfit. Although this is very funny at times (think awkward, random humour not American Pie or The Hangover type set pieces), it is also very disturbing in places. I would not recommend this for the squeamish or easily offended.
Wilson is excellent as poor Frank, ranging from love sick puppy to raging psychopath. Kevin Bacon also puts in a top performance but for pure craziness Ellen Page (Juno) steals the show. F*****g mental is all I can say!
I loved this film in places but did feel it lost its way a little. It starts as a dark comedy but threatens to become a little too serious at times. At the heart of the film we have a tragic love story between two broken characters. Then we have the super hero parody. Then we have the over the top violence of a film that sets out to shock. I suppose I should be grateful that it does not just sit easily into one genre. A big strength of this film is its ability to surprise. I just don't think that it will surprise some people in a good way.
If you find yourself laughing at unnecessary violence or grown men wearing red spandex then this might well be the film for you. A superhero movie for the Family Guy generation.
8/10
So when Kickass came to our screens it blew me away. It felt like that most rare of events, an original film! Super seems to want to take up that mantle of a superhero movie with a difference. Rainn Wilson plays our hero Frank D'Arbo, average looking, shy and neurotic. He is thrown from his dull existence into a world of increasing insanity when his wife, former junkie Liv Tyler leaves him for a drug dealer named Jock (Kevin Bacon).
All the elements of the typical superhero movie are here. We have a traumatic event that shapes our hero, the creation of his alter ego and his early attempts at crime fighting. But Super is different. Dark and irreverent, with some very graphic violence. I was expecting to see a comedy like Napoleon Dynamite in a Spiderman outfit. Although this is very funny at times (think awkward, random humour not American Pie or The Hangover type set pieces), it is also very disturbing in places. I would not recommend this for the squeamish or easily offended.
Wilson is excellent as poor Frank, ranging from love sick puppy to raging psychopath. Kevin Bacon also puts in a top performance but for pure craziness Ellen Page (Juno) steals the show. F*****g mental is all I can say!
I loved this film in places but did feel it lost its way a little. It starts as a dark comedy but threatens to become a little too serious at times. At the heart of the film we have a tragic love story between two broken characters. Then we have the super hero parody. Then we have the over the top violence of a film that sets out to shock. I suppose I should be grateful that it does not just sit easily into one genre. A big strength of this film is its ability to surprise. I just don't think that it will surprise some people in a good way.
If you find yourself laughing at unnecessary violence or grown men wearing red spandex then this might well be the film for you. A superhero movie for the Family Guy generation.
8/10
The Lost Valentine (2011)
I knew there would come a time during this year I would be backed into a corner. I knew that I was not going to get away with watching the one thing men fear above all else... a chick flick! Let’s face it, every man likes to pretend that he is in charge. But all pretence must be left aside here. The fact that I have watched this film makes all idle manly boasts about being in charge completely irrelevant. I would rather go on a 10 mile run wearing my fiancé’s highest heels screaming I am a big fat sissy whore all the way than watch this film... yet here I am writing a review on it.
Jennifer Love Hewitt is a modern day reporter for a TV show or something (already I'm realising I may not have been paying this film my full attention). She stumbles upon a story about a lady who goes to the train station every Valentine's Day to wait for her husband to return from World War 2. Hewitt has the perfect life, with the perfect boyfriend etc... Then she starts the interview of a lifetime and meets the hunky grandson of the widow as the director cuts between past and present to tell both stories...
Phew I think that is basically the whole plot in one small paragraph. I don't need to go on do I? Really? Look, if you need me to go on you have probably never seen a film before. You might be the kind of person who winds a jack-in-the-box and jumps every time it pops. Maybe you watched Titanic and were shocked when it sank.
I found myself wondering who would enjoy this film. All insults aside it is a straight up romance with some attempt at comedy and shameless illusions of being a weepy. My fiancé assures me it was a decent film and would be enjoyed by girls on a sleep over. I on the other hand find it much more fun to be mean about it!
I did laugh out loud at one point. The handsome love interest tells our panting love struck puppy J. Hew that he gave up a great job because he saw the type of men who did that job: " divorced, unhappy, don't see their kids" as some soppy music plays in the background. OMG how perfect is this man, with his good looks and family values. This guy gives all the rest of us a bad name. This is a scene of breathtakingly obvious proportions that gets replicated across an entire genre. You know the moment in any chick flick where the girl falls for the guy over a tender moment. Her eyes drink him in, her lip quivers ever so slightly as he gazes off into the distance telling a little anecdote to illustrate how perfect he is! Sorry I just sicked a little in my mouth.
I understand that people will watch this film and I can't blame them because it will deliver what it says on the tin. I suppose I can't even blame the film makers because they have delivered what they set out to do and made some money in the process. What really bothers me is that I hate myself for agreeing to watch this. The story of an elderly woman's long lost love and the tribute it pays to the armed forces are trivialised by the attempt to fit it into the chick flick genre. The shallow contrived rubbish of the modern day romance lays waste to anything good that might have been here.
2/10
Jennifer Love Hewitt is a modern day reporter for a TV show or something (already I'm realising I may not have been paying this film my full attention). She stumbles upon a story about a lady who goes to the train station every Valentine's Day to wait for her husband to return from World War 2. Hewitt has the perfect life, with the perfect boyfriend etc... Then she starts the interview of a lifetime and meets the hunky grandson of the widow as the director cuts between past and present to tell both stories...
Phew I think that is basically the whole plot in one small paragraph. I don't need to go on do I? Really? Look, if you need me to go on you have probably never seen a film before. You might be the kind of person who winds a jack-in-the-box and jumps every time it pops. Maybe you watched Titanic and were shocked when it sank.
I found myself wondering who would enjoy this film. All insults aside it is a straight up romance with some attempt at comedy and shameless illusions of being a weepy. My fiancé assures me it was a decent film and would be enjoyed by girls on a sleep over. I on the other hand find it much more fun to be mean about it!
I did laugh out loud at one point. The handsome love interest tells our panting love struck puppy J. Hew that he gave up a great job because he saw the type of men who did that job: " divorced, unhappy, don't see their kids" as some soppy music plays in the background. OMG how perfect is this man, with his good looks and family values. This guy gives all the rest of us a bad name. This is a scene of breathtakingly obvious proportions that gets replicated across an entire genre. You know the moment in any chick flick where the girl falls for the guy over a tender moment. Her eyes drink him in, her lip quivers ever so slightly as he gazes off into the distance telling a little anecdote to illustrate how perfect he is! Sorry I just sicked a little in my mouth.
I understand that people will watch this film and I can't blame them because it will deliver what it says on the tin. I suppose I can't even blame the film makers because they have delivered what they set out to do and made some money in the process. What really bothers me is that I hate myself for agreeing to watch this. The story of an elderly woman's long lost love and the tribute it pays to the armed forces are trivialised by the attempt to fit it into the chick flick genre. The shallow contrived rubbish of the modern day romance lays waste to anything good that might have been here.
2/10
Wednesday 17 August 2011
The A-Team (2010)
Duuuuh duh duh duh.... duh duh duuuuuh.
d..d.. duh duh duh duh.
Duh d..d..d..duuuuuuh!
Are you humming along yet?
The A-Team was always a favourite of mine as a kid. What was not to like? From the amazing theme tune to the brilliant voice over intro and that awesome looking truck. A rogues gallery of military misfits (mad Murdoch often stole the show) helping out the good guys by waging war on the bad guys, using any old junk they could find laying around. Always ending with that classic line, "I love it when a plan comes together!" Is there a bloke in this country that hasn't muttered that line while drunkenly smoking a cigar at someone’s birthday or wedding?
I was really hoping this would be a stylish re-imagining, bringing Hannibal, Face, B.A. and Murdoch back to life, and not a soulless 'reboot' like a few others that have been released lately (Planet of the Apes was so bad Tim Burton but I forgive you.xx) It does make me wonder if film makers prefer to just take an old idea and try to squeeze a few extra quid out of it rather than risk an original story (but that is a rant for another day).
I loved the opening to this film. Hannibal, played by a resurgent Liam Neeson kicks some ass and quickly lights a cigar! We are treated to a fast paced opening 20 or so minutes where the main characters are introduced. B.A (Bosco apparently) is played surprisingly well by UFC hard man Quinton 'Rampage' Jackson, Face is Bradley Cooper and Murdoch is Sharlto Copley. It does start as a warm homage and a slick update but then it skips forward 8 years so the main storyline can begin...
This is where my problems really begin. A main plot involving some army woman type that Face had a fling with, a cocky CIA agent, a corrupt defence contractor and something about a money press... YAWN. I was bored. There seemed to be a fixed pattern by this point, some plot talk, a few wise cracks by Face (was he always this annoying in the original or is that just Cooper?) and I would start falling asleep. Then a huge BANG as some action kicks off and I'm awake again.
There are some good moments but they get lost as the director tries to make things look too clever. Hannibal starts describing a plan as the action cuts to the actual execution of it. It all seemed too much like Ocean's 11 and not enough like the original DIY man's dream of saving the day using 3 rubber bands, a tin of chicken soup and the help of a local boy named Paco. I could relate to the original, running round my mates back garden building booby traps with anything we could find and urging his little brother to "just step on that plank, it won't hurt honest." Sadly this is a reboot, meaning everything has to be so over the top it has lost most of the charm of the 80's TV series.
Face is far too annoying. Did I mention this before? He annoyed me so much I think I have subconsciously blocked all memory of his one liners. The group is saved by the banter between B.A. and Murdoch, who provide the best moments of the film for my money. Jackson seems to have a really good time cursing his way through almost every scene and shouting threats at everyone.
Overall it is a fairly decent dumb ass action movie made better by playing to our fond childhood memories of the original show. What could make a scene involving a parachuting tank any better? B.A. shouting "you can't fly a tank fool!" of course.
4/10
Tuesday 16 August 2011
Knight and Day (2010)
During the course of this year I am determined to watch a wide variety of films. Some old, some new and some I ordinarily wouldn’t touch with a stinky tramp's bargepole. I knew I was going to have to take the rough with the smooth, sort the wheat from the chaff and trawl through the good the bad and the ugly... So with this torrent of clichés in mind I came to watch Knight and Day.
Within minutes of the start you are told to see Tom Cruise as the unflappable, ultra cool, wise cracking action hero. Cameron Diaz is the sexy but dipsy and ultimately resourceful foil to Tom 'Superman' Cruise. I was already wondering if I will see a more cliché ridden film all year. Could this movie be any more formulated?
Can't you just hear the voiceover guy that seems to do the trailers for all these films? You know the one, impossibly deep and urgent tones... "Cruise and Diaz in an action packed comedy... A high octane thriller... Taking you on a rollercoaster ride..." I can picture the film producers sipping mojitos during their power lunch in an overpriced LA 'hip' spot throwing around phrases like: Star vehicle, quirky comedy, on-screen chemistry.
Which basically translates to: let’s take a weak idea, pay two huge stars to go through the motions and make some money at the box office. Whatever happened to making films to tell a story or even just to try to engage the audience on an emotional level just for the briefest of times? Instead we are treated to 90 minutes of another Hollywood studio making a film with nothing but profit in mind. Self pleasure from the money men is all I can see here, like a dog licking its own bits just because it can!!
I do feel obliged to talk about the plot a little as this is meant to be a film review. Blah blah secret agent. Blah blah framed. Blah blah clears name. That’s about it really.
The two main characters are so obvious it is patronising. Cruise tries hard to be the man all women want and all men want to be. Diaz is the gorgeous girl who happens to love classic cars and can even restore them! See what they did there? Back to those Hollywood producers on their fifth mojito by now, "it's the perfect date movie; it will appeal to both sexes."
Sticking with the obvious theme there was one scene that annoyed me more than most. Diaz has been captured by bad guys and has been given some 'truth serum' so she will give them some info about something I stopped paying attention to eons before. Cruise rescues her. Do you need me to go on? F**k it, I'm going to anyway! "Miller you excite me" she blurts out. "I feel like having sex now." "We could have really great sex." Hmmm didn't see those jokes coming.
I'm probably being too harsh. I knew what I was sitting down to watch and it wasn't far from what I expected. I wouldn't go to a Cheryl Cole gig expecting Mozart and I wouldn't watch Eastenders expecting to have my mood uplifted. Yet I kept thinking that True Lies with Arnie and Jamie Lee Curtis was everything this film wanted to be and never came close to achieving.
The best thing I can say about Knight and Day is that it is fast paced and Diaz looks good in a bikini. Oh and in the end credits there is a 'Marine coordinator' named Captain Troy Waters.
2/10
Within minutes of the start you are told to see Tom Cruise as the unflappable, ultra cool, wise cracking action hero. Cameron Diaz is the sexy but dipsy and ultimately resourceful foil to Tom 'Superman' Cruise. I was already wondering if I will see a more cliché ridden film all year. Could this movie be any more formulated?
Can't you just hear the voiceover guy that seems to do the trailers for all these films? You know the one, impossibly deep and urgent tones... "Cruise and Diaz in an action packed comedy... A high octane thriller... Taking you on a rollercoaster ride..." I can picture the film producers sipping mojitos during their power lunch in an overpriced LA 'hip' spot throwing around phrases like: Star vehicle, quirky comedy, on-screen chemistry.
Which basically translates to: let’s take a weak idea, pay two huge stars to go through the motions and make some money at the box office. Whatever happened to making films to tell a story or even just to try to engage the audience on an emotional level just for the briefest of times? Instead we are treated to 90 minutes of another Hollywood studio making a film with nothing but profit in mind. Self pleasure from the money men is all I can see here, like a dog licking its own bits just because it can!!
I do feel obliged to talk about the plot a little as this is meant to be a film review. Blah blah secret agent. Blah blah framed. Blah blah clears name. That’s about it really.
The two main characters are so obvious it is patronising. Cruise tries hard to be the man all women want and all men want to be. Diaz is the gorgeous girl who happens to love classic cars and can even restore them! See what they did there? Back to those Hollywood producers on their fifth mojito by now, "it's the perfect date movie; it will appeal to both sexes."
Sticking with the obvious theme there was one scene that annoyed me more than most. Diaz has been captured by bad guys and has been given some 'truth serum' so she will give them some info about something I stopped paying attention to eons before. Cruise rescues her. Do you need me to go on? F**k it, I'm going to anyway! "Miller you excite me" she blurts out. "I feel like having sex now." "We could have really great sex." Hmmm didn't see those jokes coming.
I'm probably being too harsh. I knew what I was sitting down to watch and it wasn't far from what I expected. I wouldn't go to a Cheryl Cole gig expecting Mozart and I wouldn't watch Eastenders expecting to have my mood uplifted. Yet I kept thinking that True Lies with Arnie and Jamie Lee Curtis was everything this film wanted to be and never came close to achieving.
The best thing I can say about Knight and Day is that it is fast paced and Diaz looks good in a bikini. Oh and in the end credits there is a 'Marine coordinator' named Captain Troy Waters.
2/10
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