Showing posts with label Films. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Films. Show all posts
Monday, October 15, 2012
Avengers Assemble
"Too much talking." "Dull action scenes." "Too many characters." Just some of the complaints I've heard levelled against Avengers Assemble. Seeing as how I loved the film I thought some sort of response was called for. Because there aren't enough comments about the film on the internet already.
Avengers Assemble had a lot going on, and a lot of characters, but that was the whole point of the film: getting to see all those heroes together in the same story. Yes, the film has flaws: it takes time to get all the characters in place; some of the characters don't get much to do; Thor's backstory is hand-waved away, with only one or two lines of dialogue to explain how it is even possible for him to be back on Earth. But these problems were inherent of the nature of the project. No one's ever attempted something like this before; taking four existing film franchises and joining their characters and storylines all together in one film while simultaneously blending all the separate genres from those franchises and adding in some more -- science fiction, fantasy, war movie, spy thriller. The logistics of this film were a nightmare; it could -- it should -- have all gone horribly wrong. The fact that it didn't is a testament to the skill of all the people who worked on the film.
Maybe not everything worked in the film, but even the bits that seemed underwhelming were there for a purpose, elegant solutions to impossible problems of too many characters and not enough screen-time. Hawkeye doesn't have enough time to develop as a character? Tie his character arc in with Black Widow's so that everything she goes through reflects back to Hawkeye, fleshing out his character even when he isn't on-screen. Not enough time for Loki to outline his dastardly plan and give Black Widow a character-defining moment? Make her response to his plan her character-defining moment. No one likes Tony Stark and Pepper Potts any more after Iron Man 2? Use a five minute scene to make them sexy and likeable again, while simultaneously setting up the major themes of the story. The entire screenplay is full of smart solutions to similar problems. Obviously some of them work better than others but Joss Whedon does a better job of making the film coherent and exciting than anyone had a right to expect.
Just imagine if someone else had tackled the project. James Cameron -- the film would have gone on for 3 1/2 hours and Black Widow would have been a wimp for the first half of the film before one of the male characters taught her how to be independent. George Lucas -- the dialogue would embarrass the writers of porn films, there would be "comical" sidekicks, the plot would have holes big enough to fly a Death star through. Steven Spielberg -- one of the heroes would have father/son issues, cute kids would be shoehorned into the script and for every cool scene there would be another one filled with toe-curling sentimentality. Or how about Michael Bay? Or Stephen Sommers?
We were never going to get a perfect Avengers film. Maybe we should settle for what we got: a very good one.
Monday, March 15, 2010
The Matrix
Caught a bit of The Matrix:Reloaded on telly the other night and it reminded me about this article I wrote a few years back about the Matrix series. Originally published in Prism, The British Fantasy newsletter way back in 2003.
(SPOILER ALERT! Don’t read this if you haven’t seen the entire Matrix trilogy. And don’t read this if you’ve got housework to do. The carpet won’t hoover itself you know …)
I’m confused.
The Matrix was a near-perfect action blockbuster: stylish action set-pieces, a tightly constructed plot, there’s even an attempt at depth by moulding philosophical concepts to the action. (Okay, so certain aspects of the plot don’t really stand up to close inspection and some elements of the film are highly derivative but any film that can persuade Keanu Reeves to increase his dramatic range to the point where he has two facial expressions has to be commended.)
Then came Matrix: Reloaded. The explosions were bigger but unfortunately so were the philosophical discussions. These conflicting elements sat awkwardly beside each other. And the ‘To Be Continued … ’ ending was so ineptly handled that it even used a “dramatic” musical sting of the sort outlawed in 1937 for being too corny. But although disappointed the fans remained loyal, ignoring the film’s obvious flaws whilst secretly hoping that the next instalment would see a return to former glories. (The technical name for this kind of blind loyalty on the part of SF fans is known as ‘The Phantom Menace syndrome’.)
Finally came Matrix: Revolutions. Presumably the revolutions of the title are a reference to the 180° turns in allegiance performed by most of the Matrix’s fans after watching this incredibly tedious film. Action scenes are almost entirely jettisoned for impenetrable philosophical discussions, main characters such as Morpheus are reduced to simpering sidekicks, and Keanu Reeves has by now totally misplaced his second facial expression. The film even denies the audience the consolation that this is the final instalment in The Matrix story; with the Oracle and the Architect musing on a future disruption of the newfound peace.
But is the Matrix trilogy really that bad? Perhaps it’s too soon to fully assess the films’ merits. Maybe they will repay multiple viewings. Have the Wachowski brothers produced a set of SF classics that are too sophisticated for the current audience but which will in years to come be treated with the same awed reverence as films such as Blade Runner?
Frankly, I don’t care.
The Matrix films were marketed as action blockbusters and that’s what I want damn it! The first film showed that the philosophy could be worked into the story without slowing the action scenes down so why did they mess around with things on the sequels? I’m guessing because they wanted to show off their knowledge of Baudrillard and Barthes in an attempt to silence the intellectuals who sneered that they had just copied the names from their old notes from Philosophy 101.
And they had to work in all the pompous religious and mythological symbolism. Most of the characters have Biblical names! Neo gets blinded just like Oedipus! He dies and is resurrected just like Jesus!
But all the clever intellectual games are pointless without a decent plot to go with them. The Wachowskis’ sense of pacing gradually deserted them over the course of the series, the balance between action and dialogue becoming increasingly uneven. So The Matrix opens with a kick-ass fight scene! Reloaded opens with explosions! And Revolutions opens with Neo sitting at a train station …
Meanwhile the scenes in Zion are deathly dull, turning the entire trilogy into a holo-deck episode from Star Trek. Characters like the Trainman, the Albino Twins, and the Indian family that turn up whilst Neo’s trapped in the train station, appear and then disappear as The Wachowskis realise they don’t really know what to do with them. Even The Architect, who is a pivotal character, only appears after they’ve scoured the dictionary for enough multi-syllable words with which to pepper his dialogue. In fact by Revolutions even the trilogy’s three main characters -- Neo, Trinity, and Morpheus -- are relegated to the sidelines for large chunks of the film. Instead we’re supposed to care about the geeky kid (imaginatively named Kid) and the gruff Captain Mifune. But these aren’t characters; they’re extras who have somehow managed to blag a few lines of dialogue.
The fact that elements of the plot are explained in tie-ins like The Animatrix series and the Enter the Matrix computer game doesn’t help. When I watch a film I want all the relevant information to be included in the film itself not in some spin-off product that I’ve got absolutely no interest in. (Okay, so I’ve read The Matrix graphic novel but that’s because I like comics, not because I’ve been brainwashed into buying any old rubbish that carries the Matrix brand name.) No doubt the Wachowskis think of these tie-ins as ways of allowing the fans to enjoy the Matrix in a more intense interactive manner but that only applies to the hardcore Matrix fanboy. The term that comes more readily to mind for the average filmgoer is total rip-off.
Even the lauded special effects aren’t that special. The Burly Brawl in Reloaded loses all credibility once the CGI goes into overload. Up until then it had been an exciting slice of chop socky with the only major effects being used to create the illusion of multiple Agent Smiths. But as soon as Neo goes into his kickboxing poledancer routine the fight just becomes laughable. And yet still the scene plods on, proudly displaying its blocky sub-Pacman graphics.
The attack on Zion in Revolutions also suffers from being too long. Long after the audience has figured out exactly which clichés the humans are going to use to save the day the Wachowskis feel the need to drag the scene out for a seemingly interminable length of time. For some reason they think it will make the supposedly unstoppable Sentinels scarier if they reinforce the machines’ total inability to kill unarmed and unprotected people despite the humans being weighed down by heavily laden wheelbarrows.
The fact that the Wachowskis expect people to dissect the films, searching for all the clever references they’ve made, also means that people start to find all the bits of the story that don’t seem to make sense. Like, how comes Neo can use his computer-generated powers in the real world? If the computers can’t create a perfect version of the Matrix because human minds reject it why don’t they just clone braindead humans who wouldn’t be able to reject the perfect Matrix? If Neo and Agent Smith are supposed to be so radically different from all the other computer programs in The Matrix, blessing them with unpredictability, then how comes The Oracle can always predict what they’re going to do?
Maybe all this stuff makes sense and maybe it doesn’t. But if it does the Wachowskis haven’t done themselves any favours by making it such a tangled mess. They should’ve stuck to the formula of producing a slick action movie that touches upon the metaphysical stuff just enough that the audience could delve deeper into the references if they were interested. By keeping everything moving quickly they could gloss over the story’s inconsistencies.
Because even in some of the smaller details the films fall apart. One of the great things about the first film was that the Agents were so unstoppable that even the super-cool Morpheus and Trinity legged it as soon as they appeared on the scene. Yet in Reloaded despite the Agents having upgrades that allow them to go toe-to-toe with Neo suddenly Morpheus and Trinity start duking it out with anyone they can find who’s wearing a black suit and shades. Worse, if the upgrades mean that a mere handful of Agents can hold their own (albeit briefly) against Neo then how come he isn’t totally overwhelmed when battling a hundred or so copies of Agent Smith? And why does Neo keep forgetting he has superpowers whenever the Wachowskis want to prolong an action scene? I just wanted to scream at him, “You can fly, you moron! You can halt bullets in mid-flight! You can enter into Agents and unravel their very being! Why are you standing there letting them punch you?”
Although for me the biggest problem of the films is the way that the heroes quite happily blast away at innocent people. It’s clearly stated that if you die in The Matrix you also die in the real world. Therefore when Neo and Co. shoot at the Agents, causing them to vacate the bodies they’d hijacked, leaving them as bullet-ridden corpses, the good guys have effectively just killed innocent people. Now, fair enough, when faced with certain death at the hands of an implacable killer who makes the original Terminator look cuddly you’re not going to be too bothered about how you stop him so long as it works. In that sort of situation self-preservation rules. But there’s not even the slightest hint of remorse following these regrettable slayings. The only time I recall this dilemma even being mentioned in the films is in the training sequence with the woman in the red dress where Morpheus tells Neo, “If you are not one of us, you are one of them.”
Well, that’s all right then. Why bother displaying genuine human emotion over a truly horrible situation when you can just hide behind rhetoric and a pair of shades?
Not that I’m condoning “The Matrix Defence” that has sprung up in America where teenagers claim to have been driven to kill people because of the messages of violence in the Matrix films. No doubt these kids have also seen Disney films, with blatant messages of love and tolerance, but did that make them go out and start acting like saints? No. The teenagers’ violence came from mental problems and sociological strife. If these issues had been dealt with then the question of whether the Matrix films could ever have driven them to commit murder would never even have arisen.
And yeah, I know there’s a whole looking glass reflection aspect to the human/machine relationship in the Matrix films. We can’t live without the machines and they can’t live without us so we’re locked in an endless cycle of mutual dependency and hatred. So showing the heroes as being capable of an icy ruthlessness that matches that of the machines may well have been intentional. Maybe it’s to remind the audience that okay, humans are the good guys but we can still act like right bastards when the occasion demands. Although if this was the Wachowskis’ purpose I think they fumbled the ball badly.
This lack of compassion is something that I feel mars the series as a whole. The first two films are, on one level, love stories, with Trinity’s love bringing Neo back from the dead in The Matrix and then him returning the favour in Reloaded. And Revolutions has them both so filled with love for humanity that they sacrifice their lives so that their comrades might have a better future. Yet frankly I found these scenes didn’t touch me at all on an emotional level. In fact Trinity’s death scene was so badly handled, with the camera panning down ever so solemnly to reveal that she had been skewered by umpteen sharp objects (but she hadn’t told Neo this because she didn’t want to upset the poor dear), that it totally avoids pathos and instead jumps straight into black comedy.
Even the other romantic elements that were brought in after someone noticed that Neo and Trinity had absolutely zilch chemistry together fail to elicit audience sympathy. Link and Zee’s romance is never given enough screentime to engage the viewer whilst the romantic triangle between Morpheus, Niobe, and Commander Lock that started in Reloaded is conveniently forgotten in Revolutions when the Wachowskis realise they don’t actually know what to do with the subplot.
With no emotion at the heart of the story the trilogy becomes empty, soulless.
The kind of story that might have been written by a machine.
(SPOILER ALERT! Don’t read this if you haven’t seen the entire Matrix trilogy. And don’t read this if you’ve got housework to do. The carpet won’t hoover itself you know …)
I’m confused.
The Matrix was a near-perfect action blockbuster: stylish action set-pieces, a tightly constructed plot, there’s even an attempt at depth by moulding philosophical concepts to the action. (Okay, so certain aspects of the plot don’t really stand up to close inspection and some elements of the film are highly derivative but any film that can persuade Keanu Reeves to increase his dramatic range to the point where he has two facial expressions has to be commended.)
Then came Matrix: Reloaded. The explosions were bigger but unfortunately so were the philosophical discussions. These conflicting elements sat awkwardly beside each other. And the ‘To Be Continued … ’ ending was so ineptly handled that it even used a “dramatic” musical sting of the sort outlawed in 1937 for being too corny. But although disappointed the fans remained loyal, ignoring the film’s obvious flaws whilst secretly hoping that the next instalment would see a return to former glories. (The technical name for this kind of blind loyalty on the part of SF fans is known as ‘The Phantom Menace syndrome’.)
Finally came Matrix: Revolutions. Presumably the revolutions of the title are a reference to the 180° turns in allegiance performed by most of the Matrix’s fans after watching this incredibly tedious film. Action scenes are almost entirely jettisoned for impenetrable philosophical discussions, main characters such as Morpheus are reduced to simpering sidekicks, and Keanu Reeves has by now totally misplaced his second facial expression. The film even denies the audience the consolation that this is the final instalment in The Matrix story; with the Oracle and the Architect musing on a future disruption of the newfound peace.
But is the Matrix trilogy really that bad? Perhaps it’s too soon to fully assess the films’ merits. Maybe they will repay multiple viewings. Have the Wachowski brothers produced a set of SF classics that are too sophisticated for the current audience but which will in years to come be treated with the same awed reverence as films such as Blade Runner?
Frankly, I don’t care.
The Matrix films were marketed as action blockbusters and that’s what I want damn it! The first film showed that the philosophy could be worked into the story without slowing the action scenes down so why did they mess around with things on the sequels? I’m guessing because they wanted to show off their knowledge of Baudrillard and Barthes in an attempt to silence the intellectuals who sneered that they had just copied the names from their old notes from Philosophy 101.
And they had to work in all the pompous religious and mythological symbolism. Most of the characters have Biblical names! Neo gets blinded just like Oedipus! He dies and is resurrected just like Jesus!
But all the clever intellectual games are pointless without a decent plot to go with them. The Wachowskis’ sense of pacing gradually deserted them over the course of the series, the balance between action and dialogue becoming increasingly uneven. So The Matrix opens with a kick-ass fight scene! Reloaded opens with explosions! And Revolutions opens with Neo sitting at a train station …
Meanwhile the scenes in Zion are deathly dull, turning the entire trilogy into a holo-deck episode from Star Trek. Characters like the Trainman, the Albino Twins, and the Indian family that turn up whilst Neo’s trapped in the train station, appear and then disappear as The Wachowskis realise they don’t really know what to do with them. Even The Architect, who is a pivotal character, only appears after they’ve scoured the dictionary for enough multi-syllable words with which to pepper his dialogue. In fact by Revolutions even the trilogy’s three main characters -- Neo, Trinity, and Morpheus -- are relegated to the sidelines for large chunks of the film. Instead we’re supposed to care about the geeky kid (imaginatively named Kid) and the gruff Captain Mifune. But these aren’t characters; they’re extras who have somehow managed to blag a few lines of dialogue.
The fact that elements of the plot are explained in tie-ins like The Animatrix series and the Enter the Matrix computer game doesn’t help. When I watch a film I want all the relevant information to be included in the film itself not in some spin-off product that I’ve got absolutely no interest in. (Okay, so I’ve read The Matrix graphic novel but that’s because I like comics, not because I’ve been brainwashed into buying any old rubbish that carries the Matrix brand name.) No doubt the Wachowskis think of these tie-ins as ways of allowing the fans to enjoy the Matrix in a more intense interactive manner but that only applies to the hardcore Matrix fanboy. The term that comes more readily to mind for the average filmgoer is total rip-off.
Even the lauded special effects aren’t that special. The Burly Brawl in Reloaded loses all credibility once the CGI goes into overload. Up until then it had been an exciting slice of chop socky with the only major effects being used to create the illusion of multiple Agent Smiths. But as soon as Neo goes into his kickboxing poledancer routine the fight just becomes laughable. And yet still the scene plods on, proudly displaying its blocky sub-Pacman graphics.
The attack on Zion in Revolutions also suffers from being too long. Long after the audience has figured out exactly which clichés the humans are going to use to save the day the Wachowskis feel the need to drag the scene out for a seemingly interminable length of time. For some reason they think it will make the supposedly unstoppable Sentinels scarier if they reinforce the machines’ total inability to kill unarmed and unprotected people despite the humans being weighed down by heavily laden wheelbarrows.
The fact that the Wachowskis expect people to dissect the films, searching for all the clever references they’ve made, also means that people start to find all the bits of the story that don’t seem to make sense. Like, how comes Neo can use his computer-generated powers in the real world? If the computers can’t create a perfect version of the Matrix because human minds reject it why don’t they just clone braindead humans who wouldn’t be able to reject the perfect Matrix? If Neo and Agent Smith are supposed to be so radically different from all the other computer programs in The Matrix, blessing them with unpredictability, then how comes The Oracle can always predict what they’re going to do?
Maybe all this stuff makes sense and maybe it doesn’t. But if it does the Wachowskis haven’t done themselves any favours by making it such a tangled mess. They should’ve stuck to the formula of producing a slick action movie that touches upon the metaphysical stuff just enough that the audience could delve deeper into the references if they were interested. By keeping everything moving quickly they could gloss over the story’s inconsistencies.
Because even in some of the smaller details the films fall apart. One of the great things about the first film was that the Agents were so unstoppable that even the super-cool Morpheus and Trinity legged it as soon as they appeared on the scene. Yet in Reloaded despite the Agents having upgrades that allow them to go toe-to-toe with Neo suddenly Morpheus and Trinity start duking it out with anyone they can find who’s wearing a black suit and shades. Worse, if the upgrades mean that a mere handful of Agents can hold their own (albeit briefly) against Neo then how come he isn’t totally overwhelmed when battling a hundred or so copies of Agent Smith? And why does Neo keep forgetting he has superpowers whenever the Wachowskis want to prolong an action scene? I just wanted to scream at him, “You can fly, you moron! You can halt bullets in mid-flight! You can enter into Agents and unravel their very being! Why are you standing there letting them punch you?”
Although for me the biggest problem of the films is the way that the heroes quite happily blast away at innocent people. It’s clearly stated that if you die in The Matrix you also die in the real world. Therefore when Neo and Co. shoot at the Agents, causing them to vacate the bodies they’d hijacked, leaving them as bullet-ridden corpses, the good guys have effectively just killed innocent people. Now, fair enough, when faced with certain death at the hands of an implacable killer who makes the original Terminator look cuddly you’re not going to be too bothered about how you stop him so long as it works. In that sort of situation self-preservation rules. But there’s not even the slightest hint of remorse following these regrettable slayings. The only time I recall this dilemma even being mentioned in the films is in the training sequence with the woman in the red dress where Morpheus tells Neo, “If you are not one of us, you are one of them.”
Well, that’s all right then. Why bother displaying genuine human emotion over a truly horrible situation when you can just hide behind rhetoric and a pair of shades?
Not that I’m condoning “The Matrix Defence” that has sprung up in America where teenagers claim to have been driven to kill people because of the messages of violence in the Matrix films. No doubt these kids have also seen Disney films, with blatant messages of love and tolerance, but did that make them go out and start acting like saints? No. The teenagers’ violence came from mental problems and sociological strife. If these issues had been dealt with then the question of whether the Matrix films could ever have driven them to commit murder would never even have arisen.
And yeah, I know there’s a whole looking glass reflection aspect to the human/machine relationship in the Matrix films. We can’t live without the machines and they can’t live without us so we’re locked in an endless cycle of mutual dependency and hatred. So showing the heroes as being capable of an icy ruthlessness that matches that of the machines may well have been intentional. Maybe it’s to remind the audience that okay, humans are the good guys but we can still act like right bastards when the occasion demands. Although if this was the Wachowskis’ purpose I think they fumbled the ball badly.
This lack of compassion is something that I feel mars the series as a whole. The first two films are, on one level, love stories, with Trinity’s love bringing Neo back from the dead in The Matrix and then him returning the favour in Reloaded. And Revolutions has them both so filled with love for humanity that they sacrifice their lives so that their comrades might have a better future. Yet frankly I found these scenes didn’t touch me at all on an emotional level. In fact Trinity’s death scene was so badly handled, with the camera panning down ever so solemnly to reveal that she had been skewered by umpteen sharp objects (but she hadn’t told Neo this because she didn’t want to upset the poor dear), that it totally avoids pathos and instead jumps straight into black comedy.
Even the other romantic elements that were brought in after someone noticed that Neo and Trinity had absolutely zilch chemistry together fail to elicit audience sympathy. Link and Zee’s romance is never given enough screentime to engage the viewer whilst the romantic triangle between Morpheus, Niobe, and Commander Lock that started in Reloaded is conveniently forgotten in Revolutions when the Wachowskis realise they don’t actually know what to do with the subplot.
With no emotion at the heart of the story the trilogy becomes empty, soulless.
The kind of story that might have been written by a machine.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Redbelt
Trying to decide if I like David Mamet's Redbelt or not. It's well-acted (even Tim Allen puts in a decent performance) but the plot makes less and less sense as it goes along. Plus, the film's about Brazilian ju-jitsu but half the hero's moves that so impress the media types in the film are stick and knife techniques from the Filipino martial arts.
Still, it was fun to play spot the famous martial artist with the cast -- "Look, it's John Machado. And Randy Couture. And there's Dan Inosanto -- so that's where all the Filipino stuff came from."
Still, it was fun to play spot the famous martial artist with the cast -- "Look, it's John Machado. And Randy Couture. And there's Dan Inosanto -- so that's where all the Filipino stuff came from."
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
No Comic Book Role Shall Escape My Sight
Okay, so Ryan Reynolds is going to play Hal Jordan in the upcoming Green Lantern film. This after already playing Hannibal King and Deadpool. Meanwhile his missus Scarlett Johannson is due to play the Black Widow after already playing Silken Floss in The Spirit and Rebecca in Ghost World. Are they in a tie for the actor who's played the most comic book characters on the big screen or has someone else got them beat?
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Everybody Knows Everything
Bit disappointed with The South Bank Show profile of William Goldman. Yeah, they showed great clips from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ("Guns or knives, Butch?") and some of his other films but they skipped A Bridge Too Far and The Princess Bride.
Not to mention the fact that any Goldman fan will have heard all the anecdotes he trotted out about a million times before. I was sitting there guessing which bit of gossip he was going to supply about each clip before he even opened his mouth.
Still an enjoyable programme of course. I just wish it hadn't been so predictable.
Not to mention the fact that any Goldman fan will have heard all the anecdotes he trotted out about a million times before. I was sitting there guessing which bit of gossip he was going to supply about each clip before he even opened his mouth.
Still an enjoyable programme of course. I just wish it hadn't been so predictable.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Who Just Watched the Watchmen?
Attended the press screening of Watchmen last night. I've been waiting twenty years for this film so I deliberately kept my expectations low in order to prevent myself going beserk with an automatic weapon if the film turned out to be rubbish.
Good news. I didn't kill anyone.
The film's pretty faithful to the comic. Yeah, they've had to ditch subplots and secondary characters which in turn means they've had to tinker with the main plot slightly to accomodate these changes but it's still Watchmen. A streamlined, or diluted if one were being unkind, version of Moore's story to be sure but at least Hollywood didn't turn it into Batman and Robin.
Of course it's also very obviously a Zack Snyder film. There's lots of slo-mo and both the action and the gore have been amped up just to remind people that he directed 300 and The Dawn of the Dead remake. The fight scenes are full of wire-fu and at one point become so OTT they make The Matrix look like cinema verite. Whilst the graphic nature of the many maimings and killings had the audience alternating between wincing and applauding. And my friend who blagged me my ticket for the screening was practically traumatised by a gruesome setpiece during the prison scenes.
There's about a million other points I could make about the film but the short version is that while the film isn't perfect it's about as good a Hollywood adap as we could expect. And as such it's well worth a look.
Good news. I didn't kill anyone.
The film's pretty faithful to the comic. Yeah, they've had to ditch subplots and secondary characters which in turn means they've had to tinker with the main plot slightly to accomodate these changes but it's still Watchmen. A streamlined, or diluted if one were being unkind, version of Moore's story to be sure but at least Hollywood didn't turn it into Batman and Robin.
Of course it's also very obviously a Zack Snyder film. There's lots of slo-mo and both the action and the gore have been amped up just to remind people that he directed 300 and The Dawn of the Dead remake. The fight scenes are full of wire-fu and at one point become so OTT they make The Matrix look like cinema verite. Whilst the graphic nature of the many maimings and killings had the audience alternating between wincing and applauding. And my friend who blagged me my ticket for the screening was practically traumatised by a gruesome setpiece during the prison scenes.
There's about a million other points I could make about the film but the short version is that while the film isn't perfect it's about as good a Hollywood adap as we could expect. And as such it's well worth a look.
Friday, April 25, 2008
The Spirit
Trailer for Frank Miller's adap of The Spirit at http://www.mycityscreams.com/ Not sure about this one. I'm not a huge fan of the Eisner comic (although I appreciate its seminal status) but judging by the trailer Miller seems to have totally ignored the er, spirit of The Spirit and just done a Sin City retread.
Friday, January 11, 2008
Random Ramblings
Watched the beginning of Shadow Man starring Steven Seagal the other day. Just one of those masochistic things I do every now and again just to see how bad his films are these days. His current fare makes his old films look like cinematic masterpieces. Especially the fight scenes.
At least in the old days he used to do all the fights himself now he just waves his arms around while the camera does a closeup of his face and then the person he's fighting will fall down for no reason. Or more likely Seagal will just use a stunt double for the fights. Because the more bloated he becomes the more OTT his fights are. Full of dodgy wire-fu performed by stunt doubles. Except Seagal really expects people to believe that it's him doing all the stunts. Come on, look at the size of him, there isn't a wire in the world strong enough to lift that amount of blubber.
But bizarrely the fights weren't actually the funniest thing about Shadow Man. 'Cos believe it or not one of the other stars was Imelda Staunton. That's right, Vera Drake was co-starrring in a Seagal film! I didn't watch the film all the way through but I'm hoping she had a fight scene with Seagal and gave him a right good slapping.
And the surreal casting didn't stop there. Also appearing was Eva Pope from Waterloo Road (you know, that school drama with Neil Morrisey; basically it's the BBC trying to fob us off with Grange Hill as primetime telly 'cos it's got a different name and has proper "stars"). And there was also Trevor from Eastenders who used to beat up Little Mo. Unfortunately Seagal didn't pay homage to this by beating him up with an iron but I like to think this idea was put forward in an earlier draft of the script.
Of course the really exciting thing about this is that now Seagal has a potential "in" with Eastenders. The soap has a fascination with gangsters and ex-coppers (which probably explains why they have an exchange scheme going on with the cast of The Bill) so Seagal would be perfect. He could play an ex-NYPD detective who's trying to trace his East End heritage. He could even run the aikido school that used to get mentioned in every single bloody episode until the writers realised they didn't actually have any ideas how to work stories around it and quietly dropped it.
And the best thing woud be that Seagal could go up against Phil Mitchell. Just think about it, they make perfect foils for each other: they're both fat, bald has-beens trying to act like hard men.
If Seagal can't persuade any of his Hollywood stunt doubles to do the fight scenes for Eastenders I have the perfect solution. Westlife. Now this isn't just 'cos I want to see the Irish crooners get beaten to death (although that does hold a certain appeal). It comes from seeing their dancing in the video for their cover of 'Home'. Whenever they get all emotional during the song they start pulling faces and clenching their fists. One of them even stands on one leg and wobbles about wildly as he tries to maintain his balance. It looks like he's tried to walk off only to discover that someone has superglued one of his feet to the floor. Or that he's doing an un-PC impression of a special needs kid playing hopscotch. Whatever, he still obviously has greater athletic ability than Seagal.
The problem with Westlife is that these days the blonde one is a dead ringer for Boris Johnson. I keep expecting him to campaign to become the Mayor of London. But that's not as big as the other problem Westlife have. That they're shit.
Out of all the 90s pop comebacks the only group that have managed to impress me is Take That. Not that I like their music but at least they seem to have a suitably humble attitude. They appear genuinely grateful that people are buying their new records. To be honest they probably can't believe their luck. They know it's a miracle that anyone bought their stuff the first time round so having a successful comeback is something to be grateful for. Such humility is refreshing. Plus, their success will hopefully piss off Robbie Williams.
At least in the old days he used to do all the fights himself now he just waves his arms around while the camera does a closeup of his face and then the person he's fighting will fall down for no reason. Or more likely Seagal will just use a stunt double for the fights. Because the more bloated he becomes the more OTT his fights are. Full of dodgy wire-fu performed by stunt doubles. Except Seagal really expects people to believe that it's him doing all the stunts. Come on, look at the size of him, there isn't a wire in the world strong enough to lift that amount of blubber.
But bizarrely the fights weren't actually the funniest thing about Shadow Man. 'Cos believe it or not one of the other stars was Imelda Staunton. That's right, Vera Drake was co-starrring in a Seagal film! I didn't watch the film all the way through but I'm hoping she had a fight scene with Seagal and gave him a right good slapping.
And the surreal casting didn't stop there. Also appearing was Eva Pope from Waterloo Road (you know, that school drama with Neil Morrisey; basically it's the BBC trying to fob us off with Grange Hill as primetime telly 'cos it's got a different name and has proper "stars"). And there was also Trevor from Eastenders who used to beat up Little Mo. Unfortunately Seagal didn't pay homage to this by beating him up with an iron but I like to think this idea was put forward in an earlier draft of the script.
Of course the really exciting thing about this is that now Seagal has a potential "in" with Eastenders. The soap has a fascination with gangsters and ex-coppers (which probably explains why they have an exchange scheme going on with the cast of The Bill) so Seagal would be perfect. He could play an ex-NYPD detective who's trying to trace his East End heritage. He could even run the aikido school that used to get mentioned in every single bloody episode until the writers realised they didn't actually have any ideas how to work stories around it and quietly dropped it.
And the best thing woud be that Seagal could go up against Phil Mitchell. Just think about it, they make perfect foils for each other: they're both fat, bald has-beens trying to act like hard men.
If Seagal can't persuade any of his Hollywood stunt doubles to do the fight scenes for Eastenders I have the perfect solution. Westlife. Now this isn't just 'cos I want to see the Irish crooners get beaten to death (although that does hold a certain appeal). It comes from seeing their dancing in the video for their cover of 'Home'. Whenever they get all emotional during the song they start pulling faces and clenching their fists. One of them even stands on one leg and wobbles about wildly as he tries to maintain his balance. It looks like he's tried to walk off only to discover that someone has superglued one of his feet to the floor. Or that he's doing an un-PC impression of a special needs kid playing hopscotch. Whatever, he still obviously has greater athletic ability than Seagal.
The problem with Westlife is that these days the blonde one is a dead ringer for Boris Johnson. I keep expecting him to campaign to become the Mayor of London. But that's not as big as the other problem Westlife have. That they're shit.
Out of all the 90s pop comebacks the only group that have managed to impress me is Take That. Not that I like their music but at least they seem to have a suitably humble attitude. They appear genuinely grateful that people are buying their new records. To be honest they probably can't believe their luck. They know it's a miracle that anyone bought their stuff the first time round so having a successful comeback is something to be grateful for. Such humility is refreshing. Plus, their success will hopefully piss off Robbie Williams.
Friday, December 28, 2007
I Am Omega
Just found this trailer for I Am Legend rip-off I Am Omega at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qwF3JV8kR0
I've got a soft spot for Mark Dacascos but this does make the Will Smith film look like the greatest film ever made.
I've got a soft spot for Mark Dacascos but this does make the Will Smith film look like the greatest film ever made.
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
I Am Legend
I saw the press screening of I Am Legend recently. It's not bad. They've taken some liberties with the plot, the vampires (or dark-seekers as they are here) are composed of some of the worst CGI ever committed to celluloid and there's some drippily sentimental scenes but overall it's okay.
Will Smith is pretty good as Robbie Neville, showing his mental state gradually deteriorating due to his isolation -- in some respects the film is Castaway with vampires. The problem is the film tries so hard with the quiet scenes that they start to drag on and then the filmmakers overcompensate with the action scenes with bullets flying everywhere and explosions that engulf entire city blocks. (Admittedly it's only at the end of the film that this tendency gets completely out of control.)
The vampires themselves seem inconsistent in terms of intelligence and their physical abilities. And as I said the CGI is bloody awful.
The worst thing though is the ending. I won't give it away but be prepared for it to be nothing like the novel.
The people I saw it with all hated the film much more than I did saying that it had been turned into a typical Will Smith vehicle. But I think there's a simple antidote to that attitude. Whenever you think the film is getting a little too glib or is focusing too much on the action in order to make Smith look good just think how much worse it would have been if it had been made with the original choice of star. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Will Smith is pretty good as Robbie Neville, showing his mental state gradually deteriorating due to his isolation -- in some respects the film is Castaway with vampires. The problem is the film tries so hard with the quiet scenes that they start to drag on and then the filmmakers overcompensate with the action scenes with bullets flying everywhere and explosions that engulf entire city blocks. (Admittedly it's only at the end of the film that this tendency gets completely out of control.)
The vampires themselves seem inconsistent in terms of intelligence and their physical abilities. And as I said the CGI is bloody awful.
The worst thing though is the ending. I won't give it away but be prepared for it to be nothing like the novel.
The people I saw it with all hated the film much more than I did saying that it had been turned into a typical Will Smith vehicle. But I think there's a simple antidote to that attitude. Whenever you think the film is getting a little too glib or is focusing too much on the action in order to make Smith look good just think how much worse it would have been if it had been made with the original choice of star. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Popcorn
Quick thoughts on some films I watched recently:
Die Hard 4.0. Okay, I'm of the school of thought that says they should have stopped making Die Hard films after the first one as they're never going to improve upon it. So I tried to view this less as a Die Hard sequel and more as the continuing adventures of John McClane. That way I'm not constantly judging it against one of my all-time favourite action films. (Yes, I'm aware that this is a bullshit rationalization that only makes sense inside my own mind but it's my mind so I can do what I like in there.)
Anyway...
Good things about the film: Justin Long is a likeable sidekick, and his presence isn't just shoehorned into the film like Samuel L Jackson in the previous film. The FBI chief isn't a complete moron like most authority figures in action films; he actually comes across as good at his job, it's not his fault that the villain is even better at his. And, most importantly, Maggie Q looks great in her slinky black outfits.
Bad things about the film: Kevin Smith's dire cameo. The increasingly ludicrous action scenes -- I'd be watching them thinking, "Yeah, that's great, just stop there and that'll be a pretty cool scene. No, seriously, stop 'cos if it goes on any longer ... okay, they've ruined it." And Bruce Willis's invulnerability -- there's one bit where Willis and one of the bad guys receive almost identical injuries yet the villain dies and Willis just gets a flesh wound.
Hot Fuzz. To be fair I was a bit tired when I watched this but my initial reation is that it's nowhere near as good as Shaun of the Dead. Too much stunt casting. Not enough decent jokes. All the supporting characters are caricatures. The hero is too uptight to actually do anything to get the audience to sympathise with him -- and if he's such a wonderful supercop why does it take him so long to unravel such a simple case? The references to action movies are blatantly signposted and are used as a substitute for characterization. The shift in tone from Heartbeat to Midsomer Murders to generic action flick never really convinces. I could go on but I can't be bothered. Now that my hopes have been dashed I might watch it again and enjoy it on its own terms but right now I can't help but feel that Pegg, Frost and Wright just pissed about while making this film, relying on the good will from Shaun to produce good box office.
X-Men: The Last Stand. After the panning this film got from the critics I'm surprised how much I enjoyed it. Granted, it's no masterpiece and it's riddled with plotholes and bad acting but it never seemed to become truly awful. Yes, Cyclops is criminally underused yet again. Yes, Vinnie Jones cannot act to save his life. Yes, Magneto's characterization veers inconsistently from one scene to the next. Yes, the film has not one but two cop-out endings (watch right to the end of the final credits). Yes, it expects you to care about characters who have bugger all screentime (the Beast, Angel, Kitty Pryde, Collossus and a cast of what seems like thousands). But somehow it captures the spirit of the comics better than Singer's efforts. While Singer made the better films they felt more like SF films than X-Men films. X3 feels more like the comics. Not the best of the comics to be sure but it did capture that sense of leading inexorably to a massive super-battle that is pretty much the cornerstone of superhero comics -- "We're dealing with complex ethical issues here which should be discussed in a mature and rational ... oh, sod this. FIGHT!!!"
Admittedly, from what I understand Singer was planning to take X3 in a similar direction anyway and he probably would have made a much better job of it than Brett Ratner. And I'm pretty sure X3 won't stand up to repeated viewing (I've already had someone point out a major plothole that I hadn't spotted) but it was kind of fun at the time.
Die Hard 4.0. Okay, I'm of the school of thought that says they should have stopped making Die Hard films after the first one as they're never going to improve upon it. So I tried to view this less as a Die Hard sequel and more as the continuing adventures of John McClane. That way I'm not constantly judging it against one of my all-time favourite action films. (Yes, I'm aware that this is a bullshit rationalization that only makes sense inside my own mind but it's my mind so I can do what I like in there.)
Anyway...
Good things about the film: Justin Long is a likeable sidekick, and his presence isn't just shoehorned into the film like Samuel L Jackson in the previous film. The FBI chief isn't a complete moron like most authority figures in action films; he actually comes across as good at his job, it's not his fault that the villain is even better at his. And, most importantly, Maggie Q looks great in her slinky black outfits.
Bad things about the film: Kevin Smith's dire cameo. The increasingly ludicrous action scenes -- I'd be watching them thinking, "Yeah, that's great, just stop there and that'll be a pretty cool scene. No, seriously, stop 'cos if it goes on any longer ... okay, they've ruined it." And Bruce Willis's invulnerability -- there's one bit where Willis and one of the bad guys receive almost identical injuries yet the villain dies and Willis just gets a flesh wound.
Hot Fuzz. To be fair I was a bit tired when I watched this but my initial reation is that it's nowhere near as good as Shaun of the Dead. Too much stunt casting. Not enough decent jokes. All the supporting characters are caricatures. The hero is too uptight to actually do anything to get the audience to sympathise with him -- and if he's such a wonderful supercop why does it take him so long to unravel such a simple case? The references to action movies are blatantly signposted and are used as a substitute for characterization. The shift in tone from Heartbeat to Midsomer Murders to generic action flick never really convinces. I could go on but I can't be bothered. Now that my hopes have been dashed I might watch it again and enjoy it on its own terms but right now I can't help but feel that Pegg, Frost and Wright just pissed about while making this film, relying on the good will from Shaun to produce good box office.
X-Men: The Last Stand. After the panning this film got from the critics I'm surprised how much I enjoyed it. Granted, it's no masterpiece and it's riddled with plotholes and bad acting but it never seemed to become truly awful. Yes, Cyclops is criminally underused yet again. Yes, Vinnie Jones cannot act to save his life. Yes, Magneto's characterization veers inconsistently from one scene to the next. Yes, the film has not one but two cop-out endings (watch right to the end of the final credits). Yes, it expects you to care about characters who have bugger all screentime (the Beast, Angel, Kitty Pryde, Collossus and a cast of what seems like thousands). But somehow it captures the spirit of the comics better than Singer's efforts. While Singer made the better films they felt more like SF films than X-Men films. X3 feels more like the comics. Not the best of the comics to be sure but it did capture that sense of leading inexorably to a massive super-battle that is pretty much the cornerstone of superhero comics -- "We're dealing with complex ethical issues here which should be discussed in a mature and rational ... oh, sod this. FIGHT!!!"
Admittedly, from what I understand Singer was planning to take X3 in a similar direction anyway and he probably would have made a much better job of it than Brett Ratner. And I'm pretty sure X3 won't stand up to repeated viewing (I've already had someone point out a major plothole that I hadn't spotted) but it was kind of fun at the time.
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Flash Point
Hong Kong legend Donnie Yen's new film FLASH POINT features UFC style grappling amongst his usual chop socky stuff. Although he still manages to make it incredibly acrobatic.
Trailer 1
Trailer 2
Shooting Diary
Trailer 1
Trailer 2
Shooting Diary
Monday, May 14, 2007
Cagney
I've got fond memories of watching old James Cagney films when I was a kid. Channel 4 did a season of his films and it was a revelation. He played heroes and he played villains. He did comedy and he did drama. And he did it all wonderfully.
Here's a quick selection of scenes from his films:
Cagney acting hard http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqt1kGRsbt0&mode=related&search=
Cagney pioneering martial arts fight scenes http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMJixq-LbgI&mode=related&search=
Cagney in dance mode http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6RrnsZjoYw&mode=related&search=
Here's a quick selection of scenes from his films:
Cagney acting hard http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqt1kGRsbt0&mode=related&search=
Cagney pioneering martial arts fight scenes http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMJixq-LbgI&mode=related&search=
Cagney in dance mode http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6RrnsZjoYw&mode=related&search=
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Shooter/Point of Impact
Saw Shooter recently -- you remember, the Mark Wahlberg film based on Stephen Hunter's Point of Impact?
Turned out to be an okayish action film. Obviously wants to set itself up as a franchise to rival Matt Damon's Bourne series. Does its best to emulate the more realistic lowkey action style of the Bourne flicks but can't resist turning every explosion into a gigantic Hollywood fireball -- "He only threw a hand grenade; should it have been able to destroy half a continent?"
Various changes had been made to the plot and afterwards I amused myself by trying to figure out which changes had been made in order to streamline the plot into a 2 hour film and which had been necessitated by the changes they had already made -- "We've got to keep that great setpiece but we've already written out the main character for that scene due to pacing reasons, which of the remaining characters can we use to replace them?"
The hero's sidekick Nick Memphis benefits from this streamlining insofar that he is less bumbling than his counterpart in the novel. On the downside he loses the tragic backstory that shows beneath his dithery exterior he possesses balls of steel.
On a more worrying note the potential franchise may have shot itself in the foot by excising a lot of material from POI that comes into play in the later novels. Either they're not planning to be too faithful to the novels or they're hoping cinema audiences have the attention span of an amnesiac goldfish.
The politics angle of the story had been brought to the fore which I think was largely so the director could push his political agenda -- apparently the people who sponsor and carry out assassinations and other black ops aren't very nice and shouldn't be trusted. Yes, I was shocked by this revelation too.
And being a Hollywood action film they couldn't end with the courtroom drama that concluded the novel, they had to tag on another action scene just so they could end on a bang. Which kind of backfired on them as the finale was pretty dull. Plus I'm not entirley sure but I suspect the loose ends they left to be tied up by the final shooutout actually made nonsense of the hero's actions at the end of the previous action scene.
On top of this the film made Bob Lee Swagger more brutal than in the novel. In Hunter's version he has to be coaxed back into killing, in the film he pretty much revels in it from the word go. At the end of the novel it is pointed out that during the course of this little adventure he only killed in self defence, in the film he is turned into judge, jury and executioner.
And now for the really petty irritations:
Everyone refers to Bob as Bob Lee even though it is specifically stated in POI that he doesn't like that.
No one refers to Bob by his sniper nickname, Bob the Nailer. Although to be fair in the film he's a super-secret black ops sniper not a 'Nam vet so he's not supposed to have a famous nickname.
Bob never gets to use his sniping catchphrase, "Time to hunt."
They didn't use my favourite line of dialogue from the novel where, upon learning how many kills Bob can rack up in a single mission, one of the villains comments, "Cocksucker can shoot a little."
Anyway, even though I didn't think the film was as good as the book you're probably better of watching the film first. The friend I saw the film with thought it was okay but he hadn't read the book so he didn't have anything to compare it to. So yeah, watch the film and if you like it read the book afterwards. Unless of course you have a burning desire to read Hunter's prose wihtout it being filtered through the memory of Hollywood's halfhearted adap.
Turned out to be an okayish action film. Obviously wants to set itself up as a franchise to rival Matt Damon's Bourne series. Does its best to emulate the more realistic lowkey action style of the Bourne flicks but can't resist turning every explosion into a gigantic Hollywood fireball -- "He only threw a hand grenade; should it have been able to destroy half a continent?"
Various changes had been made to the plot and afterwards I amused myself by trying to figure out which changes had been made in order to streamline the plot into a 2 hour film and which had been necessitated by the changes they had already made -- "We've got to keep that great setpiece but we've already written out the main character for that scene due to pacing reasons, which of the remaining characters can we use to replace them?"
The hero's sidekick Nick Memphis benefits from this streamlining insofar that he is less bumbling than his counterpart in the novel. On the downside he loses the tragic backstory that shows beneath his dithery exterior he possesses balls of steel.
On a more worrying note the potential franchise may have shot itself in the foot by excising a lot of material from POI that comes into play in the later novels. Either they're not planning to be too faithful to the novels or they're hoping cinema audiences have the attention span of an amnesiac goldfish.
The politics angle of the story had been brought to the fore which I think was largely so the director could push his political agenda -- apparently the people who sponsor and carry out assassinations and other black ops aren't very nice and shouldn't be trusted. Yes, I was shocked by this revelation too.
And being a Hollywood action film they couldn't end with the courtroom drama that concluded the novel, they had to tag on another action scene just so they could end on a bang. Which kind of backfired on them as the finale was pretty dull. Plus I'm not entirley sure but I suspect the loose ends they left to be tied up by the final shooutout actually made nonsense of the hero's actions at the end of the previous action scene.
On top of this the film made Bob Lee Swagger more brutal than in the novel. In Hunter's version he has to be coaxed back into killing, in the film he pretty much revels in it from the word go. At the end of the novel it is pointed out that during the course of this little adventure he only killed in self defence, in the film he is turned into judge, jury and executioner.
And now for the really petty irritations:
Everyone refers to Bob as Bob Lee even though it is specifically stated in POI that he doesn't like that.
No one refers to Bob by his sniper nickname, Bob the Nailer. Although to be fair in the film he's a super-secret black ops sniper not a 'Nam vet so he's not supposed to have a famous nickname.
Bob never gets to use his sniping catchphrase, "Time to hunt."
They didn't use my favourite line of dialogue from the novel where, upon learning how many kills Bob can rack up in a single mission, one of the villains comments, "Cocksucker can shoot a little."
Anyway, even though I didn't think the film was as good as the book you're probably better of watching the film first. The friend I saw the film with thought it was okay but he hadn't read the book so he didn't have anything to compare it to. So yeah, watch the film and if you like it read the book afterwards. Unless of course you have a burning desire to read Hunter's prose wihtout it being filtered through the memory of Hollywood's halfhearted adap.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
Hard Bastards
Was chatting to one of my mates about actors who don't mind being unsympathetic when playing heroes. The ones who don't need to have at least one key scene where their character is shown to be a wonderful, sensitive human being. The ones who are prepared to play hard, unlikeable, even misanthropic characters. The ones who are prepared to play real bastards.
Obviously John Wayne came up. As Ethan Edwards in The Searchers -- possibly his most famous role -- he is a bitter, racist, vengeance-driven bastard. In fact I would argue that he's not even the hero of the film. Yes, he gets the most screentime and has his name over the credits but the real hero of the story is Jeffrey Hunter. Even if you don't agree that Hunter is the film's hero he is at least its conscience. He is the moral centre of the film, Wayne is just there to act hard. The same is true of Red River. Wayne starts off in his typical firm but fair persona but about halfway through the film he crosses the line and it becomes clear that he is the villain of the piece and Montgomery Clift is the real hero. Perhaps not coincidentally The Searchers and Red River are considered to contain two of Wayne's best performances.
And James Cagney. Yes, he played heroes. He even played jolly romantic leads when he was in song and dance mode. But he is best remembered for playing villains. White Heat, The Public Enemy -- he was '30s cinema's favourite psychotic gangster. Even later on in his career he could still play bastards. His portrayal of Captain Morton in Mister Roberts is hissably evil and the film's a comedy!
Humphrey Bogart also played his fair share of villains before getting a shot at a heroic role. And then he played Sam Spade; a hard, cynical, virtually amoral bastard. Not exactly role model material. Yes, he played softer roles such as in The African Queen but he still retained his hard edge. The Caine Mutiny shows him going into meltdown, his portrayal of Captain Queeg the dramtic flipside to Cagney's comedic martinet in Mr Roberts.
Other actors come to mind. Michael Caine in Get Carter. Clint Eastwood in White Hunter, Black Heart or High Plains Drifter or the original Dirty Harry.
Wayne. Cagney. Bogart. Caine. Eastwood. And then we added another name to this illustrious list ...
Richard Briers.
Yes, I know he was the voice of Roobarb and Custard. And I know he was Tom Good in The Good Life. But let's face it, Tom was a bit of a bastard. He jacked in his job and decided to basically start a farm in his Surbiton home, subjecting his wife Barbara to a life of hardship and toil and financial destituiton and he expects her to happily go along with it. And while he continually takes potshots at his next door neighbour Jerry for continuing to take part in the rat race Jerry's the one Tom goes crawling to when he needs money. Plus there's the fact that Tom obviously fancies his chances with Jerry's wife, Margo. He sees how worked up she gets when he teases her and he suspects that this passion extends to other areas.
And in Ever Decreasing Circles Briers's character Martin is basically a little Hitler. His obsession with rules and regulations and always doing everything by the book is annoying enough but he has hardly any warmth to him, any humanity. Yes, the occasional episode would show the softer side to his character but mainly he was there to be unlikeable, his desperation to cling to his ordered little world no matter what sometimes shifting from comedy to darker, more unsettling territory.
So here's to Richard Briers. One of acting's best bastards!
Obviously John Wayne came up. As Ethan Edwards in The Searchers -- possibly his most famous role -- he is a bitter, racist, vengeance-driven bastard. In fact I would argue that he's not even the hero of the film. Yes, he gets the most screentime and has his name over the credits but the real hero of the story is Jeffrey Hunter. Even if you don't agree that Hunter is the film's hero he is at least its conscience. He is the moral centre of the film, Wayne is just there to act hard. The same is true of Red River. Wayne starts off in his typical firm but fair persona but about halfway through the film he crosses the line and it becomes clear that he is the villain of the piece and Montgomery Clift is the real hero. Perhaps not coincidentally The Searchers and Red River are considered to contain two of Wayne's best performances.
And James Cagney. Yes, he played heroes. He even played jolly romantic leads when he was in song and dance mode. But he is best remembered for playing villains. White Heat, The Public Enemy -- he was '30s cinema's favourite psychotic gangster. Even later on in his career he could still play bastards. His portrayal of Captain Morton in Mister Roberts is hissably evil and the film's a comedy!
Humphrey Bogart also played his fair share of villains before getting a shot at a heroic role. And then he played Sam Spade; a hard, cynical, virtually amoral bastard. Not exactly role model material. Yes, he played softer roles such as in The African Queen but he still retained his hard edge. The Caine Mutiny shows him going into meltdown, his portrayal of Captain Queeg the dramtic flipside to Cagney's comedic martinet in Mr Roberts.
Other actors come to mind. Michael Caine in Get Carter. Clint Eastwood in White Hunter, Black Heart or High Plains Drifter or the original Dirty Harry.
Wayne. Cagney. Bogart. Caine. Eastwood. And then we added another name to this illustrious list ...
Richard Briers.
Yes, I know he was the voice of Roobarb and Custard. And I know he was Tom Good in The Good Life. But let's face it, Tom was a bit of a bastard. He jacked in his job and decided to basically start a farm in his Surbiton home, subjecting his wife Barbara to a life of hardship and toil and financial destituiton and he expects her to happily go along with it. And while he continually takes potshots at his next door neighbour Jerry for continuing to take part in the rat race Jerry's the one Tom goes crawling to when he needs money. Plus there's the fact that Tom obviously fancies his chances with Jerry's wife, Margo. He sees how worked up she gets when he teases her and he suspects that this passion extends to other areas.
And in Ever Decreasing Circles Briers's character Martin is basically a little Hitler. His obsession with rules and regulations and always doing everything by the book is annoying enough but he has hardly any warmth to him, any humanity. Yes, the occasional episode would show the softer side to his character but mainly he was there to be unlikeable, his desperation to cling to his ordered little world no matter what sometimes shifting from comedy to darker, more unsettling territory.
So here's to Richard Briers. One of acting's best bastards!
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Shooter
Stephen Hunter's novel Point of Impact has been made into a film called Shooter.
The novel features reclusive 'Nam veteran and former marine sniper Bob Lee Swagger. He's reluctantly dragged out of his self-imposed exile in order to help the US government in a matter of national security. Of course it all goes tits-up and Bob finds himself caught up in a web of lies and assassins. Cue betrayal, gun battles, and meditations on the meaning of honour.
Mark Wahlberg doesn't look anything like Bob and I'm assuming they've changed his origin so that he served in a more recent conflict. Also, the character played by Danny Glover has a different name from the character in the novel. More worryingly, going by the synopsis I read off the internet the plot has been altered slightly. The trailer also suggests changes, although trailers often show scenes out of context so I'm hoping that this is the case here and the film makers have actually been reasonably faithful.
Point of Impact isn't my favourite Hunter novel (that would be Black Light, or possibly Dirty White Boys, depending on my mood) but it's still good fun and I want to see its film adap done properly. Especially as the success or failure of Shooter will probably dictate whether any more of Hunter's books make it to the big screen.
The novel features reclusive 'Nam veteran and former marine sniper Bob Lee Swagger. He's reluctantly dragged out of his self-imposed exile in order to help the US government in a matter of national security. Of course it all goes tits-up and Bob finds himself caught up in a web of lies and assassins. Cue betrayal, gun battles, and meditations on the meaning of honour.
Mark Wahlberg doesn't look anything like Bob and I'm assuming they've changed his origin so that he served in a more recent conflict. Also, the character played by Danny Glover has a different name from the character in the novel. More worryingly, going by the synopsis I read off the internet the plot has been altered slightly. The trailer also suggests changes, although trailers often show scenes out of context so I'm hoping that this is the case here and the film makers have actually been reasonably faithful.
Point of Impact isn't my favourite Hunter novel (that would be Black Light, or possibly Dirty White Boys, depending on my mood) but it's still good fun and I want to see its film adap done properly. Especially as the success or failure of Shooter will probably dictate whether any more of Hunter's books make it to the big screen.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Barry Norman
Received various DVDs as Xmas presents and then bought some more in the sales. Here's some quick thoughts on the ones I've watched so far.
Assault on Precinct 13 -- Never seen the original but I'd heard that this remake was pretty good. I'd heard wrong. Glossy rather than gritty, with paper-thin characterization, awful dialogue and boring action scenes. Even managed to bungle the seemingly foolproof notion of updating Rio Bravo to the present day by introducing some pointless plot twists. Only good point was the unexpected killing of one of the characters who seemed guaranteed to survive.
Ong-Bak -- Tony Jaa kicks, punches, knees and elbows his way through a bunch of thugs for two hours or so. Very little plot or character development but who cares when the action looks like this? That said, it would be nice if Jaa could work on his acting range a little. Jet Li and Jackie Chan will never be called great actors but at least they have more than one facial expression.
A History of Violence -- A little disappointed with this one. Yes, the acting and writing is much better than in the above films but it still didn't live up to the hype. Viggo Mortensen is fine as the mild-mannered hero but less convincing as his vicious alter ego. I never really understood why the character turned his back on his old life. Also, Mortensen's fight scenes look too martial arts-ified. Okay, he's not leaping around like Tony Jaa but he's all palm heels, armlocks and spearhands to the throat. Would have been more fitting for his character to bite off ears, gouge eyeballs and beat people to death with chairlegs. Overall the film felt a lot more simplistic than I was expecting. Cronenberg seemed too pleased with his modern-day Western's "subversion" of the ethics of the classical Western to notice that the themes he's exploring -- the bad man trying to escape his former life, the dilemma of violence versus a peaceful existence -- are in fact staples of the genre. Not a bad film then but not as good as it thinks it is.
Assault on Precinct 13 -- Never seen the original but I'd heard that this remake was pretty good. I'd heard wrong. Glossy rather than gritty, with paper-thin characterization, awful dialogue and boring action scenes. Even managed to bungle the seemingly foolproof notion of updating Rio Bravo to the present day by introducing some pointless plot twists. Only good point was the unexpected killing of one of the characters who seemed guaranteed to survive.
Ong-Bak -- Tony Jaa kicks, punches, knees and elbows his way through a bunch of thugs for two hours or so. Very little plot or character development but who cares when the action looks like this? That said, it would be nice if Jaa could work on his acting range a little. Jet Li and Jackie Chan will never be called great actors but at least they have more than one facial expression.
A History of Violence -- A little disappointed with this one. Yes, the acting and writing is much better than in the above films but it still didn't live up to the hype. Viggo Mortensen is fine as the mild-mannered hero but less convincing as his vicious alter ego. I never really understood why the character turned his back on his old life. Also, Mortensen's fight scenes look too martial arts-ified. Okay, he's not leaping around like Tony Jaa but he's all palm heels, armlocks and spearhands to the throat. Would have been more fitting for his character to bite off ears, gouge eyeballs and beat people to death with chairlegs. Overall the film felt a lot more simplistic than I was expecting. Cronenberg seemed too pleased with his modern-day Western's "subversion" of the ethics of the classical Western to notice that the themes he's exploring -- the bad man trying to escape his former life, the dilemma of violence versus a peaceful existence -- are in fact staples of the genre. Not a bad film then but not as good as it thinks it is.
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Oink, oink!
Now that my previous post has everyone convinced that I'm a complete psycho I'd just like to point out that I saw Babe for the first time the other day and found it utterly charming.
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
The Law and Jake Wade
There's an old Western that gets shown on the telly every now and again called The Law and Jake Wade. Reformed outlaw gets kidnapped by his old partner and forced to show where he hid the loot from the last job they pulled together. Just to make things difficult the ex-partner not only has a whole gang of thugs backing him up but has also kidnapped Wade's girlfriend and is threatening to do nasty things to her if Wade doesn't co-operate.
Lots of twists and turns as Wade and his ex-partner battle to outwit each other. Dialogue's pretty sharp too from what I remember. Robert Taylor as Wade. Richard Widmark as the ex-partner. And Dr McCoy from Star Trek as one of the thugs.
Only problem is I always miss the beginning. Never seen the film all the way through.
It was on yesterday. Got all excited when the opening credits began to roll. Then about five minutes into it I got called away and by the time I got back the film had finished.
Maybe next time ...
Lots of twists and turns as Wade and his ex-partner battle to outwit each other. Dialogue's pretty sharp too from what I remember. Robert Taylor as Wade. Richard Widmark as the ex-partner. And Dr McCoy from Star Trek as one of the thugs.
Only problem is I always miss the beginning. Never seen the film all the way through.
It was on yesterday. Got all excited when the opening credits began to roll. Then about five minutes into it I got called away and by the time I got back the film had finished.
Maybe next time ...
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