Got Me A Movie

Review: Henry's Crime

2011-01-22T22:56:00.001Z

There is a moment in Henry's Crime when Vera Farmiga is teaching Keanu Reeves how to act. He delivers a line from Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard, terribly, and after some gentle coaching from her repeats the line... with exactly the same delivery. A smile breaks out over Famigo's face as she realises that her struggling play has found it's lead. "Wow" she gasps "You're a natural" leaving Keanu smiling and the audience puzzled over what exactly happened.

This may give you an idea of why Henry's Crime doesn't work.

The premise of this baffling mess is that Henry (Reeves), having been sent to prison for a bank robbery he didn't commit, decides that if he "did the time he may as well do the crime". After discovering an old tunnel running from the bank to the next door playhouse, he enlists the help of fellow jailbird Max (James Caan) and the two decide the only way to access this tunnel is to get Henry the lead in The Cherry Orchard. I'm sure you can see the cracks in this already and the cracks start and stop with Reeves.

I hate the word apologist. It implies that you're embarrassed about liking something or someone. I'm a huge Keanu Reeves fan. He comes across as a dedicated, passionate individual and with the right material he has a very real star quality. He's not Lawrence Olivier but his work in films like The Matrix, Speed and, yes I'll say it Bill and Ted shows a very accessible on screen charisma. But something went very wrong here.

He plays Henry with an expressionless apathy that borders on unnerving. Based solely on what the other characters say about him, I can deduce that the script called for Henry to be a hapless screw up. A well meaning loser who, having been pushed around all his life finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time, but that's not what Reeves gives us. In place of hapless we are given vacant, instead of "down on his luck" we get... well, nothing. It's as if he's still playing Klaatu from The Day the Earth Stood Still.

It makes it impossible to work out who or what Henry is. The various press releases would have us believe he is dimwitted, but that's not it either. There's just simply nothing there. It's more "detached psychopath" than "loveable loser". I kept waiting for a twist to explain his bizarre demeanour or a reveal that his "crime" wasn't the bank robbery but the fact that he killed and ate the rest of the cast. It's not so much terrible acting, just a gross misjudgement of the character and the tone of the film, and when your leading man can't work out the tone of the film then no amount of Peter Stormare or James Caan is going to fix it.

The film gains a bit of energy with the arrival of Vera Farmiga. She plays Julie, a budding actress and Henry's love interest and to her credit she nails the tone of the film. The problem is, her performance, while well suited to the film, is turned up so much higher than the rest of the cast that it over powers everyone else and nearly renders Reeves invisible.

In fairness the film was never destined for greatness. The script is equally empty. Come the climax, the focus shifts from the robbery to Henry and Julie's relationship. A relationship that seemingly happens off screen because we are only treated to two bedroom encounters and a play rehearsal. The big emotional moment of the film comes towards the end when Julie (who is fully aware of Henry's scheme by the way) is horrified to learn that this ex-convict she has been courting won't be sticking around after rinsing out a major city bank. Well... yeah of course he won't be... what's that? You're in love with him? Really? When did that happen?

There is a movie here that could have worked. The premise is a screwball heist caper, (the Coens and William H. Macy could have had a lot of fun with this) but it's played as a drama. It's an intentionally silly story and had the film embraced that and pushed that tongue in cheek tone it could have come together. My wife made the point that, had Henry been played as a real oddball who just so happens to be a brilliant actor, the transformation from weirdo to Brando would have been entertaining. But again Reeves plays the whole thing one note, so not only is it rubbish, it's boring rubbish.

Keanu has done comedy before, I've seen it. If there is any justice Henry's Crime will be the last one he attempts for a while. In fact, I don't want to see Reeves near a comedy ever again unless it has the word Bill at the front of it and Ted at the end of it.

Maybe it's time I take that Speed postcard off my office cubicle wall...

Review: 127 Hours

2011-01-22T22:40:00.001Z

In May of 2003, while on a hiking trip in Canyonlands, Utah, 28 year old mountain climber Aron Ralston slipped into a canyon and found his arm stuck beneath a boulder. Ralston spent five days with his arm trapped, trying every possible way to move the giant rock. On the fifth day, when it became clear that it wasn't going anywhere Ralston made a life changing decision and amputated his arm with the blunt pocket knife he had been using to chip away at the boulder.

That a film was made of Ralston's horrific tale is a given, that it is possibly the best film of last year is utterly remarkable.

Hollywood loves a real life tale of survival. A hundred projects to produce a film of Ralston's ordeal were probably greenlit five minutes after he was rescued. Fortunately, the project that made it into production, based on Ralston's autobiography 'Between a Rock and a Hard Place' was produced and directed by Danny Boyle.

Danny Boyle hasn't made a bad film. He is a fearless director, seemingly determined to conquer every genre. See how casually he created one of the best British horrors in recent memory with 28 Days Later. See how easily he turned Sunshine (a run of the mill "let's use nukes to save the Earth" story) into a beautiful and compelling Sci-Fi thriller. Now he tries his hand at a biography, and while 127 hours may be the smallest film Boyle has tackled, from a story telling point of view it must have been the most challenging.

Happily he rose to the challenge and, once again, turned in a masterpiece. It is nothing short of staggering how much mileage Boyle was able to get from what is essentially a man wedged into a hole for two hours. Every conceivable angle or vantage point is exploited to maximum effect to accent Ralston's nightmare situation. Which is what you would expect from a director so gifted at taking art house sensibilities and cramming them it into mainstream cinema. Boyle's skill, eye for attention, and ability to see past the obvious allows him to conjure images and camera angles that you simply wouldn't think possible. A lesser director might have been satisfied with some extreme close ups and an aerial shot, whereas Boyle will literally stuff his camera into Ralston's water canteen to get the very most out of the shot. You just don't get that by throwing millions of dollars at a film.

With all that said, the talent behind the camera would have gone to waste if the man in front of it couldn't deliver.

I have to admit, I wrote James Franco off when I first became aware of him. In my defense, it was his turn in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man films that did it. Whether he was miscast or just uncomfortable in the role, his performance was just off. Uneven and awkward, Harry Osborne wasn't just annoying, he was boring, and I'm ashamed to say it, I thought that was Franco. Then Pineapple Express was released and I was proven very wrong. It doesn't matter that Pineapple Express is a buddy/action/stoner/comedy, Franco's performance as Saul Silver is incredible, breathing life and vulnerability in to what is essentially a stoned sidekick.

He brings that energy and more to his portrayal of Aron, and he does it by wisely downplaying the performance. Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of Aron Ralston and his story is how modest and matter-of-fact he is about it all. When told how courageous his actions where he shrugs them off, convinced that anyone in his position would have down the same. Franco embodies that and Ralston's spirit. His Ralston is an adventurer, even finding himself in that diabolical situation was just part of trip. An occupational hazard. For the performance to work you absolutely have to believe that Ralston won't give up. There is a moment where he whispers to himself "Don't lose it. Do not lose it" Franco nails that mind set and gives a stunning, Oscar worthy performance.

There is a twisted sense of humour to 127 hours as well. As Ralston's mental state deteriorates, Boyle and Franco get to have some fun. A chat show that Ralston finds himself in ends up being one of the funnier scenes of last year and don't be surprised to see a famous cartoon dog make an appearance. The fun and games don't last though. Boyle does an incredible job ratcheting up the tension throughout 127 hours. Even in it's lighter moments, there is a prevailing sense of dread and as the moment comes closer it's impossible not to find yourself sinking into your chair.

The amputation, (a sequence that caused two members of my audience to pass out) is absolutely one of the most harrowing things I've seen in the cinema and shot with more skill than all your Hostel and Saw directors combined. Without going into too much detail, once the knife becomes completely useless, Ralston is forced to finish the job by hand. It is a difficult watch to say the least but again, Franco's incredible performance makes it impossible to turn away.

127 hours is a simple story (walking in you know exactly how it begins and ends), but it is an incredible story. A fascinating insight into what the human being is capable of doing to survive. It's a story done justice by a incredible director and an amazing performer. It's uplifting and awful, but inspiring. By the time the credits roll and Ralston himself takes a bow you'd be forgiven for feeling emotional... if you're still conscious.

Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1

2010-11-21T08:43:00.060Z

It can't be overstated how impressive the Harry Potter Franchise has become. Yes it's made a Buhgillion dollars, and yes it's going to make more, but money aside, the series has grown in a way that is almost unheard of, collecting the finest ensemble cast ever amassed along the way and pushing the boundaries of family entertainment. Regardless of how you view them, the films haven't rested on their laurels and simply coasted by on the film's fan base, they have improved and expanded with every installment. That tradition continues in Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows Part 1. It isn't the best Potter film, (Alfonso Cuaron's Prisoner of Azkaban still holds that place) but in terms of maturity and depth it is such a huge leap forward it's frightening.

It comes from the source material. Rowling's finale to her titanic series of books stuck the landing in a way few thought possible. 'Dark' is the word of choice, and while it's an easy way to describe the story it's appropriate. The film follows the book's story rigidly. After the devastating blow of losing his mentor, Harry Potter has been left with an impossible task: Find and destroy the remaining fragments of Lord Voldemorts soul, the rub being that he doesn't know where they are, what they are or indeed, how to destroy them. The task is hopeless and without wishing to spoil it doesn't seem all that rosier come the end, an end that dumps a big fat cliffhanger on our lap to keep us excited for Part 2.

Which brings us to the obvious. Was the decision to split the book, a book which most agree contains a fair amount of, I don't want to say filler, but certainly "fat", artistically justified, or was it, as many feared, an excuse to get people to pay twice to see one movie.

It depends on your mileage. At this stage, The Boy Who Lived isn't going to be winning over any new fans, but nobody is trying to do that, this series is concentrating on it's fan base. Director David Yates and long time Potter screenwriter Steven Kloves trust that the audience knows and loves this world and it's characters. They trust that you will want to spend time with our three heroes through the tough times. The 'fat' mentioned concerns our heroes spending a sizeable chunk of the story spent camping with no clue what to do getting more and more irritable. What's actually quite impressive is that even with the splitting of the book, Kloves managed to dilute this portion of the story quite well, ringing just the right amount of tension and frustration without frustrating the audience. This is one of the successes yes, but we are still looking at half a film, and it is impossible to tell if the adaptation worked without seeing the rest of it.
But for now we can enjoy half of what Yates has accomplished and whatever you make of the film it can't be denied that The Deathly Hallows Part 1 is the most visually arresting Potter film to date. Taking the action away from Hogwarts, Yates can let loose. Glorious shots of the British countryside highlight Harry, Ron and Hermione's isolation, (the location scout deserves an award, the hills and cliffs of Blighty have never looked so beautiful) and a gorgeous animated sequence towards the end narrated by Watson brings a touch of class to the film.

There was a law imposed recently that any review of any of the Potter films must take a moment to swoon over the astonishing display of talent that fills the ensemble cast. It's now ten years later and the amount of talent crammed into one film still beggars belief. Seeing these award winning actors appear for little more than extended cameos is astonishing and creates a fantastic sense of continuity, fleshing out Rowling's world beautifully. It makes the world feel that little bit more authentic and the stakes that much higher. As fantastic as the supporting cast is though, in The Deathly Hallows, moreso than any film before it, these giants of British talent take a back seat to the three leads.

With the series nearing completion we finally get to see the full transformation of Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson. No longer playing children, these three are adults in adult roles. Radcliffe has had an increasingly difficult role to play as Harry has grown and for the most part he delivers. Of the three he remains the weakest actor but the critical mauling he receives annually is unfair. Radcliffe is a very capable actor (seemingly far more comfortable in the lighter moments), but he seems to lack belief in himself, occasionally turning in awkward, stunted delivery when the tone gets bleaker. Grint, typically the comic relief, is given room to do darker as Ron's doubts and fears grow as the situation deteriorates. It's Watson, though, who walks away with the film, her Hermione is now a grown Woman and Watson plays her with a confidence she's never shown before. It's that confidence that brings everything together and gives the infamous camping scenes the humanity they so desperately need.

The Deathly Hallows is as pleasing as it is frustrating. Like I said, it's half a film. Thematically it ends at a place that could be considered a climax but it's clear the end was decided during post production. Rather than ending elegantly and gracefully like, say, The Fellowship of the Ring this film literally stops and goes to credits ending the film with more of a muted thud than a rousing finale. You will either feel cheated and insulted or energised and excited. Personally, knowing what's to come, I am satisfied. Warner Brothers will no doubt release the two films as a complete release in the near future to be enjoyed by geeks like me in a bum numbing 6 hour stint, but until then we have Part 1 and take it from me if you do enjoy this offering, you haven't seen anything yet.

Review: The Town

2010-09-28T08:41:00.148+01:00

If Gigli was the worst thing to happen to Ben Affleck's career, then The Town is the best.

The Wire by way of Heat, Affleck's second directorial offering is an astonishing film, one that absolutely confirms him as one of the most exciting new Director's working today. Gone Baby Gone, by it's very premise required a subtle hand. Here Affleck gets a chance to show off a more dynamic skill set. When people talk about his career in years to come they will talk about The Town before they talk about Good Will Hunting.

The Town is set in Charleston, Boston. After the opening text introducing the neighbourhood and it's legacy of bank robbers we are treated to a blistering raid on one such bank, which culminates in the gang, lead by Doug MacRay (Affleck), taking the bank manager Clare Keesey as a temporary hostage. With the robbery a success, and Clare free to aid FBI agent Adam Frawley, Doug decides to tail her in an attempt to suss out how much she knows about her captors.

Comparing The Town to Heat may be a little generous. The Town is no where near as dense or grand as Michael Mann's classic, but the influence is there. For a second film Affleck shows a great deal of confidence, aside from some early use of CCTV footage there are no gimmicks used, just good old fashioned strong, clear direction.

In front of the camera Affleck plays Doug as the crook with a heart of gold, which in all honesty is a little disappointing. Doug is a man who is perpetually surrounded by violence, in fact he was born into it. Seeing him portrayed as such a stand up guy is a little too neat. Giving him a darker side would have added an interesting dynamic to his courtship with Clare. Having said that, Affleck plays him with an earnest sincerity and when it comes time for him to open up (both to Clare and his jailbird father) he manages to flesh out the character successfully.

Supporting Affleck is an incredible cast of character actors. Veteran actors like Pete Posthlethwaite and Chris Cooper bring gravitas to spare with what are essentially extended cameos as Doug's boss and father respectively and Mad Men star John Hamm brings a great deal more to Agent Frawley than the script gives him.
But it's Jeremy Renner that really shines, cutting a fearsome figure as Doug's life long friend Jem Coughlin. The Pesci to Affleck's De Niro, Renner walks the line between repulsive and charismatic. Any darkness that Affleck lacks is more than made up for by Renner. Coughlin is greedy, angry and ruthless. As much a liability as an asset and it's his moments that really stand out.

Clocking in at two hours and five minutes The Town absolutely flies by, it's three main set pieces upping the ante at each turn. In fact it could have been longer. There is room here for more here, the focus on Doug and Clare's relationship means that other, just as interesting stories feel short changed. Maybe it's just the quality of the supporting actors work that made me want more. Again, maybe it was just Hamm's performance, but it feels like there was a bigger story intended for Agent Frawly that didn't make it into the cut.

The Town isn't going to leap to the top of anyone's list of crime films, but it is as solid and enjoyable a thriller as any. Affleck has been on the receiving end of some pretty harsh criticism in his career. After this, there won't be a cynic alive who won't be rooting for him to give us a hat-trick.

Review: The Last Exorcism

2010-09-02T18:21:00.159+01:00

The triumph of The Last Exorcism is in it's slight of hand. Showing you something while doing something completely unexpected and then pulling the rug out from under you for good measure.

Don't be fooled by the seen-it-all-before trailer, The Last Exorcism is an incredibly effective horror.

Louisiana born Reverend Cotton Marcus is an evangelical minister who doesn't believe in God. He is a good minister and a good man but his faith has slipped away from him. When his young son became ill, it wasn't prayer that healed him but medicine, so he turned to science and his belief in a higher power began to wane. His faith was shaken further when he read the story of young boy who died while priests performed a staged exorcism on him, an exorcism just like the ones Marcus used to perform himself. With his faith in both God and his clergy in ruins he enlists the help of a film producer to expose the bogus exorcisms by visiting the home of Nell Sweetzer an allegedly possessed teenage girl.

These days the found footage/mockumentary genre is beginning to feel old hat. Gone are the days when a film like The Blair Witch Project could explode into the mainstream and really make it's audience question what they were seeing. Even in the best examples the same cracks in the logic pop up. In addition to the typical "Why would you keep filming that?" question director Daniel Stamm doesn't really commit to the tool he has chosen. The trio only have one camera, for example, but often a conversation has multiple perspectives shot from different angles. The film uses a score which, again undercuts the idea that this is "found" footage. It would be very interesting to see this film again without the score, there are certain moments that I honestly think would have worked even better without the shrieking violin telling you to jump. It doesn't detract from the film, but it feels like a definite decision made early in pre-prodution would have yielded a stronger result.

But what The Last Exorcism does, and does brilliantly, is keep you guessing. Like all great genre films the alleged possession and the theological questions raised in The Last Exorcism are just a backdrop for a deeply personal human story. Marcus' beliefs are established early and are the crux of the film and it's his doubts that carry the narrative. Like him, you, the viewer have to decide if you are a believer or a cynic. As the story unfolds and Marcus discovers more about Nell and her family it appears that the monster she lives with may be more earthly than they thought.

Surprisingly, the film is also quite funny. Patrick Fabian is a very charismatic actor and a perfect match for the smooth talking city Pastor. Stamm, it seems, is a fan of The Office, there are a fair few talking head interviews and a scene where Marcus frantically casts out a demon as the bed shakes is intercut with him calmly preparing the room earlier, with a big grin on his face.

Mention has to go to Ashley Bell who gives a career making performance as Nell. Just as any exorcism film has a pretty big shadow over it, so too does the actor playing the possessee. Bell's performance was never going to trump Linda Blair's iconic turn, but she brings a very real pathos to Nell and makes her story all the more tragic. She can also twist her body and face in ways that will make your skin crawl.

Maybe it was my expectations walking in. This story has been done a thousand times before, but The Last Exorcism brings enough interesting ideas and twists to make it fresh again. It's certainly not the scariest film I have ever seen but I don't think that was the intention. It stands apart as something different and is one of the most interesting horrors of the last few years.

Review: Scott Pilgrim Vs The World

2010-08-27T14:57:00.007+01:00

Lord help me, I just didn't get it.

It seems that this film has been on the horizon forever and on paper it's a winner. Edgar Wright, creator of the sublime Spaced, the brilliant Shaun of the Dead and the very good Hot Fuzz, was to adapt Bryan Lee O'Malley's Scott Pilgrim series into a feature film. This is what's known as a match made in heaven.

But Scott Pilgrim just isn't quite as good as that promise and the fact that it comes so close makes it worse.

You've seen the trailers. Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) is your typical slacker twenty something. Coasting through life, he is in a go nowhere band and in a relationship with a highschooler when he meets and falls in love with Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Much to his surprise she returns his affections but there is a catch, he must defeat her seven evil exes.

First things first, the film is every bit as beautiful as those trailers promise. On a visual level, Wright has made an incredible film. No comic book adaptation has done this much to translate the aesthetic of a "funny book" to the screen. POWs, BANGS and WHIPS litter the screen, music comes to life and weaponry is summoned from thin air. At the moment the comic book movie is on the verge of shifting; Snyder's Watchmen, Vaughn's Kick-Ass and Nolan's Batman films are all pushing the genre and experimenting with what it can do. Edgar Wright has taking it a giant leap further and on that level Scott Pilgrim is a slam dunk.

As is the cast. I cannot understand the backlash against Michael Cera. I think Cera is on the cusp of showing what he is capable of. Anyone who has seen Youth in Revolt knows he is far more than Ethan from Superbad. He brings that neurotic paranoia to Scott but also a bizarre cock sure swagger. Part of my issue with the film is with Scott but it's not Cera's performance (more on that in a moment). The rest of the cast shine, Kieran Culkin gets the lion's share of the one liners as Scott's roommate and almost steals the film while Anna Kendrick is on hand as Scott's sister, occasionally popping up to remind everyone how ridiculous the situation is.

The real stars of the show though, are the exes.

Scott Pilgrim's pop culture of choice is computer games (if you don't know what a Bob-Omb is you'll miss 60% of the gags) and Scott's battles play out like every Boss Battle you've ever played, complete with "vs" and "KO's". The battles are delirious. What's most impressive is how unique they are. I was concerned watching the trailers that by Ex #4 I would be bored by the flailing fists and feet. Wright keeps things fresh giving each fight it's own twist. I don't want to spoil some of the surprises here but without hyperbole they really need to be seen to be believed, the confrontations Scott has with Ramona's Exes are worth the ticket price alone.

The problem is that the emotional core to this film plays second fiddle to the madness on screen. Scott Pilgrim obviously lives in a heightened reality (no one bats an eyelid when the someone bursts into a shower of coins) but what he goes through for Ramona is extraordinary and there just isn't enough substance to their relationship or his infatuation to justify his actions. The "why" to this film, the relationship between Scott and Ramona, needs to jump out and stand above the visual tricks but it feels hidden away beneath it. The best comparison I can give is (500) Days of Summer, a wonderful film that played out in a similar way to Scott Pilgrim. A young guy falls in love with a gorgeous (initially) unobtainable young woman and tries to woo her. That film also used quirky tricks like song and dance numbers and reality bending sequences but the difference with that film is that the majority of the runtime was spent with the two leads. Surprisingly, Scott and Ramona spend very little time together and as a result their connection isn't as strong as it should be.

Ramona isn't a bad character and with what she's given Winstead does a fine job, but we never get to know enough about her or, for that matter, Scott to understand why he is obsessed with her (apart from the fact that she is gorgeous and, initially, unobtainable). His dismissive attitude to his own ex complicates things further. I was never rooting for Scott. I didn't understand him, so I couldn't empathise. Call me a softy but I need to understand a love story to accept and fully embrace it. Bemoaning a film like this because the romance isn't strong enough sounds ridiculous but it's the crux of the film. Without it, it's all sight and sound and dare I say it, style over substance.

I wonder if I'm only this disappointed because I bought into hype. I enjoyed the film, but nowhere near as much as I thought I would. I'm looking forward to a second viewing, I want to be part of the party. I want to love the whole film and not just the crash, the bang and the wallop.

Review: Toy Story 3

2010-08-03T10:15:00.001+01:00

Toy Story 3 will make you ponder your mortality.

Yeah, I wasn't expecting that either.

Pixar studios have made their name loading their films with concepts and themes that, on paper, have no business being in family films and yet time and time again they succeed. Each film feels like a challenge to the rest of the industry to, well, challenge their audience.

Now that this trilogy is complete (and it is definitely complete) the themes it has laid down are clear. The first film was about Love, the second about abandonment and the third, death. The best thing to be said about Toy Story 3 is that this truly feels like a necessary chapter in the story and a worthy finish to the franchise. Compare this to Dreamwork's Shrek the Third and the difference is clear. Consider as well the eleven years since the first sequel, and Toy Story 3 is something to be truly admired.

Taking place eleven years after the events of the last installment, Toy Story 3 sees a 17 year old Andy ready to leave for college. After a mixup during a clearout of his room Woody, Buzz and the gang find themselves donated to Sunnyside Daycare centre a paradise for toys who have "moved on". In most cases toys accept and embrace this new life but Woody cannot let go and sets out to find his owner.

These deep themes have been present throughout but have never been quite so explicit as in this instalment and never have they been so singularly personified than in the film's antagonist, Lotso. Lotso's backstory mirrors Jessie's in Toy Story 2. Both were seemingly abandoned by the people they loved the most and left alone. But while Jessie eventually came to terms with her loss, Lotso got angry. Lotso is a villain who, unlike Sid, Al or Stinky Pete, has nothing to lose. What's interesting is that while all of the toys in the series have been aware that they are just toys, Lotso is the only who realises how disposable they are and that even the most cherished of toys are replaceable. Perhaps moreso that Jessie, his story is the most tragic.

All of which makes the film sound as thrilling as dishwater but it's incredibly exciting courtesy of some stunning setpieces. From the opening sequence which beautifully mirrors the opening scene of the first film, to the truly heart stopping scene in an industrial incinerator the action ramps up throughout the film. There is a huge scope to them, the aformentioned opening rivaling any action scene this summer while the incinerator sequence is so perfectly paced and has an emotional beat so powerful my clenched jaw began to hurt.

Of course it wouldn't be a Pixar film if wasn't uproariously funny and bringing the laughs are the film's secret weapons. The first is "Spanish" Buzz which I won't spoil here and the second is Michael Keaton. Keaton plays Ken, yes that Ken, the surpisingly metrosexual doll (sorry Ken, Action figure) and instantly becomes one of Pixar's funniest characters. From his wardrobe to his insistence that he isn't a girl's toy he is a riot and Keaton easily steals the show.

Once again, in the grand Pixar tradition, all these elements come together effortlessly. Taking over Director duties from John Lasseter, Lee Unkrich balances the humour, action and emotion masterfully. The film does threaten to descend into schmaltz toward the end but it is earned. The last ten minutes are both the ending to a one hour, forty minute film and a four and a half hour long trilogy. In fact it's the ending to a story that has spanned fifteen years. I'm of the generation that grew up with these characters. To see their story come to an end is not only satisfying but in a way quite personal.

Toy Story 3 isn't the best Pixar film and if I'm honest it's not even the best Toy Story film (Jessie's Song from Toy Story 2 remains the absolute peak of the series) but it is an immensely entertaining film and maintains the standard and quality that this incredible studio live by. Some people are cynical about the crop of sequels on Pixar's horizon. Nonsense. This studio is showing no sign of fatigue. At this stage it's easy to become jaded by Pixar's string of hits but it should never be forgotten just how important the studio is and their output shouldn't be taken for granted. If Toy Story is what a Pixar franchise looks like then sign me up for the rest.

Review: Inception

2010-07-22T22:55:00.003+01:00

While watching Inception I realised I haven't been genuinely wowed by a film in years.

In fact, I can't think of the last time I watched something and felt like I was seeing something I really hadn't seen before. Last year's big hitter Avatar certainly promised to be that film. It wasn't. Sure, it provided some admittedly dazzling spectacle, but in terms of story, in terms of ideas, it was disappointingly familiar.

Enter Chris Nolan who, with Inception, is playing in a world all of his own. The imagination and creativity on display here is nothing short of astounding and it is the work of an auteur at the absolute top of his game. Films as rich and huge as this just don't get made anymore and they're rarely, if ever, tackled this well.

In terms of plot I'm reluctant to go into detail. Leonardo Di Caprio plays Dominic Cobb, the world's best "extractor". His, highly illegal, talent involves him and his team entering a target's mind and stealing their ideas while they sleep. A very lucrative offer comes along to attempt the impossible; Inception. Planting an idea inside someone's mind as they dream. If Cobb can pull this off the past that is haunting him may just go away.

Moreso than any film in recent memory the less you know about this film the better, not because of any potential twists, but simply because me outlining the plot would rob you of the way Nolan presents it. It's an amazing feat of story telling. Inception could have been a expositional nightmare but Nolan presents the concept and explains the rules quickly and clearly. To be fair he cheats a little, (new recruit Ariadne played by Ellen Page is the stand in for the audience asking questions she should probably already know) but Nolan is confident enough not hold your hand through the film. To watch a mainstream summer blockbuster this big that allows and trusts you to think for yourself is such a refreshing experience and doesn't happen nearly enough.

The Internet became a flurry of excitement when Di Caprio said he based Cobb on Nolan himself and that adds an incredible new layer to the film. People talk about films being personal, here Nolan is showing us how he dreams or at least an approximation of it. Perhaps disappointingly there is restraint shown within the dream world presented. It's far more logical than any I've ever had and you have to wonder whether Nolan tried to push the surreal but was reigned in by Warner Brothers. Whatever the case he manages to craft some incredible imagery, the city folding itself in half, a freight train appearing in a busy street and even MC Esher's Infinite Staircase brought to life by some crafty special effects.

Mr Nolan would also like to announce that he can shoot action. One of the main criticisms of his two Batman films was the rather pedestrian action sequences. Not here. Inception is bursting at the seams with some incredibly realised set pieces, the stand out being a zero gravity fist fight in a spinning hotel room. Tense, exciting, inventive and beautifully choreographed the entire scene is utterly mesmerising and is instantly one of the most stunningly realised action scenes since Neo ordered all those guns.

But as with all of Nolan's films the concept revolves around the human. DiCaprio is the heart and soul of Inception and it's difficult to go into how well he portrays his character without revealing some of the film's mystery. Cobb has a secret, one that could jeopardise everything for the team he has assembled. In fact, this new job offer could be the answer he is looking for. Many have compared Cobb to Teddy Daniels, DiCaprio's US Marshal in Shutter Island. The comparison is apt, both men have a darkness eating them alive as they try desperately to unravel something. DiCaprio has always played desperate well, he can build that anger and despair in such a subtle way that when he does inevitably snap he is electric.

If there is one criticism of Inception it's that it's overlong. There is enough content here for a trilogy of films. The film is crammed full of ideas and concepts that can barely be contained in the almost two and a half hour runtime. What's worse is that the third act contains an extended action sequence that just isn't necessary, in fact it distracts from what's actually happening. The Dark Knight suffered from some excess bloat and unfortunately the same applies here keeping the film shy of perfect. Sometimes there can be too much of a good thing.

But this is a minor criticism of an incredible film. After Inception I have no reservations calling Nolan one of the most important Directors working today. Not only has he made a cerebral brain bender but he manged to smuggle it into a mainstream blockbuster. If he had only done that I would be impressed, the fact that it's this is good is staggering.

Nolan has said he wanted to make a Bond film. You hear that MGM? Give him the next film, give him the whole franchise.

Review: Predators

2010-07-19T22:02:00.000+01:00

Wouldn't it be nice if Predator 2 hadn't happened?

The law of diminishing returns hasn't been kind to our dreadlocked friends. Predator 2 had a seriously hard time matching the first film's visceral punch and if we're being honest Danny Glover is a poor replacement of Arnold Schwarzenegger in anyone's book. Then, of course, there are the Alien vs Predator films that not only failed on just about every level but also managed the impressive feat of running two franchises into the ground. Naturally, any attempt to resurrect this saga would be met with a cynical eye. As far as expectations go mine were rock bottom.

So colour me surprised that Predators is good. In fact it is almost a perfect template for a sequel. It's flawed so it's in no way a perfect movie, but in the traditional sense it does exactly what a sequel should do. Producer Robert Rodriguez and Director Nimrod Antal have taken what worked with Predator and added to it. It's effectively a retread of the original but it manages to create an identity of it's own, successfully honouring the original whilst taking the franchise forward.

The result is a throwback so pleasing I couldn't stop grinning the entire time.

From the first moments the film grabs you by the face. The opening shot sees Adrian Brody waking up in free fall thousands of feet in the air. In a panic he punches wildly at the parachute he is wearing which opens automatically moments before impact. When he comes to he soon finds others in the same situation. It soon becomes apparent this group of strangers are not alone in the jungle and that something maybe hunting them (spoiler: It's the Predators).

I can't figure out what Adrian Brody is doing in this film but it's some kind of genius. He is either playing it completely straight or he is sending up an entire legion of action movie stars. Either way he completely sells the tight lipped badass mercenary in a way I wouldn't have thought possible. "Where are you going?" someone asks him. "To see who threw me out of a f**king airplane!" he barks. Roman Polanski never asked him to deliver lines like that and Brody relishes every moment. In fact I think Brody's performance is what sold me on the film.

The rest of the cast fair well enough. Danny Trejo makes his obligatory Rodriguz cameo, Oleg Taktarov is on screen seemingly just to carry a Gatling gun (see: nods to the original), Topher Grace is Topher Grace and the admittedly lovely Alice Braga is on hand as hard as nails femme fatale. Bringing the crazy is Walter Goggins and Lawrence Fishburne both trying to eat as much scenery as possible. The truth is they are a rather weak trade in for the original cast but in all honesty there will never be a cast as impossibly macho as the first Predator film. This isn't a cast of fully realised characters but they are interesting and crucially they are never treated as fodder. This is the most important distinction between this film and the turgid sequels, while these characters aren't particularly deep they are likeable in the (in some cases very) short term. It's actually a good 45 minutes before the Predators appear but you don't notice it. You're happy enough to watch these misfits interact with each other and while the audience is always five steps ahead of them it's fun watching them piece together the situation.

That's another mark in this film's favour. Antal shows a steady hand. I think a lesser team would have made this a balls to wall action movie throwing the monsters in in the first five minutes but Antal is confident enough to be more subtle and build up tension gradually. Granted this may be due in part to the film's modest budget, but there is definitely a sense that from inception to execution this was always a horror film. Predators, against all odds, has made the franchise and the Predators scary again.

But it does more than that, it actually reminded me of why I love the first film. This is a B - Movie make no mistake, but so was Predator. A glorious semi-ridiculous monster movie. This doesn't come near the original but it is the sequel that it deserves.

Predators is a defibrillator to the chest of the Predator franchise. The sequel has already been greenlit and I'm onboard to see where it's headed.

Review: loudQUIETloud - A film about The Pixies

2010-07-15T23:43:00.001+01:00

In 2004, Boston born rock band The Pixies reformed after 11 years apart. The Pixies are the Vincent Van Goch of Alternative Rock music. Achieving modest success when they were together their legacy grew and grew in the years since they split. Kurt Cobain famously stated that "Smells Like Teen Spirit" was his attempt to write a Pixies song, and David Bowie has since called them "the band of the eighties" (maybe you could have said it at the time, Dave?). Various tensions in the band, mainly between lead singer Frank Black and bass player Kim Deal caused a schism in the band and they parted on pretty unfriendly terms in 1993.

loudQUIETloud - A film about The Pixies follows the band on their reunion tour, documents the initial split and explores the decision to reunite and tour again. For a fan of the band, and of music in general, it's fascinating seeing where these people have ended up, both in terms of careers and their personal lives.

If the film has a narrator it's Black himself. The film is intercut with him candidly recounting the reasons for the split and the decision to reform. Black seems to have taken a huge helping of humble pie in the years away from the band. In the band's heyday, he was notoriously controlling to the point of narcisism. He famously banned Deal from fronting any more songs after Gigantic, a song she wrote and sang lead on, became popular. Here he seems far more subdued and accomodating but at the same time quite aware of that reputation. When asked who made the first call to get back together he shouts "Well it was MY band so it was MY decision, right?" then chuckles to himself.

The crux of the film is about the people rather than the pixies and that focus highlights not the relationship between Black and Deal but rather the erratic behaviour of the band's drummer Dave Lovering. When Lovering describes how he felt when he got the news that The Pixies were reforming the look on his face is heartbreaking and he wears his child like grin for the whole film. It's clear the split hit him the hardest and in the wake of some very difficult personal issues Lovering slipped into substance abuse. After a particular episode on stage Black confronts him, advising he seek help and Deal gently warns him that valium is a very hard drug to come down from, "Well I'd better switch to heroin then!" he jokes. Nobody laughs.

Deal herself is talking from experience. By 2004 she was on the end of a stint in rehab combating alcoholism. She is on the other side of the addiction and that's where the heart of this story lies. In the past such personal issues sank the band, but this new model is a closer unit. Rather than call the reunion a failed experiment the band get behind each other. Director Steven Cantor wisely shifts the focus away from the music to concentrate on the relationships within this rather disfunctional family unit.

There is a peculiar enjoyment to be had watching these pioneers of rock going about their, now, less than rock and roll routines; Black takes his son to the aquarium, Lovering performs his magic and lead guitarist Joey Santiago attends his wife's ultrasound. But of course that's the point, these four people have moved on but passion and nostalgia brought them back together.

loudQUIETloud is a fascinating glimpse into the lives of four musicians who simply remembered what they loved doing. It isn't a film about the music or even the band, it's a film about the the individuals... who just so happened to change rock music.

Review: Get Him to the Greek

2010-07-06T23:06:00.002+01:00

I made a prediction a few years ago that Russell Brand would successfully make the jump to feature films and surprise a lot of people. The Essex born Hellraiser isn't just a hairdo. He is a legitimate entertainer and a very intelligent, talented performer. And while his performance in Get Him to the Greek isn't going to have his critics singing from the rooftops it is a giant leap in the right direction.

Brand reprises his role as Aldous Snow, the last of the great British rockstars. Snow was introduced in the not terrible Forgetting Sarah Marshall, where he stole every scene that Paul Rudd hadn't already walked off with. The difference here is that that Aldous was seven years sober. This Aldous is not, having leapt spectacularly off the wagon. In an attempt to get him back on track, record label intern Aaron Green, played by Jonah Hill, is given the unenviable task of getting Snow from London to LA in 72 hours to play what could be a career reviving gig.

As far as premises go it's not the most complex, in fact the plot is nothing more than an excuse to capitalise on the chemistry found between Brand and Hill in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Get Him to the Greek in concept is just a road movie tying a handful of sketches together, but while it's lite on plot what it does, it does very well. One of the problems some of the Apatow films have had (Sarah Marshall included) is the tendency to cram the gags into the beginning of the film and spend the last act getting a bit po faced. Get Him to the Greek keeps things balanced, the jokes come thick and fast from start to end but it weaves a touching (if very familiar) tale of redemption throughout.

Jonah Hill surprised me here, he has made his name playing vulgar, obnoxious losers in the past, but Aaron is a far sweeter character than we have seen from him. What starts as the opportunity of a lifetime slowly descends into a nightmare of drugs and debauchery as Aaron has to get this maniac to the Greek theatre while keeping him completely placated. Hill does a fine job portraying the normal, sweet natured guy who gradually gets driven mad by the lunacy surrounding him. He wisely downplays Aaron from the start making his eventual freakout that much funnier.

Like I said, Brand is brilliant in this, and while it may seem like stunt casting it really isn't. The wacky, out of control rock star is a a tired cliché but Brand adds another layer to the character and brings a level of honesty to Snow that I really don't think anyone else could have. Brand has always been very honest and open regarding his past, cheerfully recounting the dark places his addictions took him and he gamely puts that all out there to flesh out Snow. A particular scene where Snow finds himself without his heroin suddenly takes a very dark, quite frightening turn. It's a credit to Brand that he can make Snow a pretty unpleasant individual but still have you rooting for him at the end. It helps that he is hysterical, he's a natural comic performer and the interplay between himself and Hill provides some serious laughs.

But you knew Jonah Hill and Russell Brand were funny, right? Did you also know that Sean "P Diddy" Combs is funny? As in, absolutely the funniest performance of the year, funny? No you didn't. Trumping Tom Cruise's Les Grossman in the "What the hell am I watching?" category. Combs picks up the film, slips it into his jacket and sneaks out of the room. Even without the surprise element it's a masterclass in comic performance. Whether it was a happy accident or inspired casting is unclear but it works, You'd swear he'd been doing this for years, he's a natural. Combs delivers the most ludicrous dialogue completely straight faced. He's absolutely the film's secret weapon and if there is any justice will now get his own spinoff. Two please.

Get Him to the Greek is a delight. It's not a comedy for the ages (a subplot involving Aaron's girlfriend doesn't really go anywhere or have any emotional payoff), but it offers plenty of belly laughs, isn't afraid to get a bit dark and, most importantly, does both at the same time.

Mikey's Musings: M. Night Shyamalan and the Amazing Backwards Career

2010-07-01T17:39:00.015+01:00

As of the third of July The Last Airbender, M Night Shyamalan's latest film, has an 8% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 109 reviews and opened to $16 million in the US.

What the hell happened? Eleven years ago Shyamalan gave us the Oscar nominated The Sixth Sense, a film which instantly became a global phenomenon and went on to earn just over $670 million worldwide. Has there ever been a career trajectory quite like this before? In 1999 Shyamalan was being called the next Hitchcock, eleven years later and some people are arguing he doesn't even have a career left. It's an astonishing notion and it's desperately disappointing to see this once exciting filmaker's work decline so rapidly.

Here's the thing though. The Sixth Sense wasn't a fluke. It is a tremendous film and remains a powerfully effective thriller and a showcase for a director with a serious understanding of cinema and film making. The film is so much more than that twist, it's a beautiful film, perfectly paced and to this day terrifying. A film as well crafted as that doesn't happen by accident. It fully deserves it's place in cinematic history. And it's not like Shyamalan is a one hit wonder either, his second film, while not as well received as it's predecessor was a success. In fact, Unbreakable suffered only from being released too soon. Had it been released during the current superhero boom maybe it would have had a far warmer reception. It's an intriguing film, a superhero movie disguised as a psychological thriller. Unbreakable is a fascinating alternative look at the mythology of superheroes and a wonderful example of the now stale "origin" movie.

His next films, Signs and The Village, both come agonisingly close to being perfect but are sabotaged by their climaxes. Each film relies on and delivers a building sense of danger and dread. Signs, in particular, cranks up the tension at a masterful pace, slowly ratcheting up the fear and paranoia (I swear, in the cinema, the birthday party scene scared me witless). The Village too is a gorgeous film, a haunting period piece that teases something dark and sinister in the night, it's more unsettling than scary but delivers the chills. The problem both have is they almost completely fall down at the end. Signs throws in a plot device so convenient it makes Indy's nuke proof fridge look clever and The Village contains a twist so awful it neuters the film completely on subsequent viewings. Even so, despite those almost crippling script issues there was no denying Shyamalan's talent as a director, it was his writing that was the problem.

Lady in the Water is where the knives started to come out. "The Emperor has no clothes" some critics gleeful declared. Across the board the film was rejected. Understandably rejected, Lady in the Water is a very tough film to sell. It's a fairytale for adults, I get that, in fact I love that idea. To take something innocent and make it frightening is a hallmark of good horror. My problem with Lady in the Water is not what it tried to do, it's that it didn't do it well enough. Again, the film certainly looks the part and while it sets up it's premise well Shyamalan over indulges himself to a maddening degree. He cast himself as a man whose "writing would save the world" and included a scene where a mean old film critic is mauled to death by a monster. The film would have to be transcendent for that kind of nonsense to fly, it wasn't. But while I wasn't a huge fan of Lady in Water I at least admired it as a labour of love and I remained firmly on board with the Director.

Then The Happening happened and I gave up completely. If in years to come Shyamalan admits that he intentionally made a terrible film as a middle finger to his critics I would believe him. From top to bottom The Happening is a disaster. At least Lady in the Water had conviction and passion, a sense that the director was involved in some way, The Happening showed us a director who was barely treading water. Gone were the meticulously framed shots, the subtlety and the palpable tension, instead we have hideous dialogue, career worst acting from just about everyone involved and Mark Wahlberg running from the wind.

And now we have The Last Airbender a film universally panned, not for it's forced twist or being over indulgent, but simply for being a very badly made film.

Where does Shyamalan go from here? He has a project in development at the moment but what then? The Media Man is convinced that he will churn out the long rumoured Unbreakable sequel and I think he's absolutely right, he needs to remind people where he came from. It was clear years ago that Shyamalan is a far stronger Director than he is writer, but with The Last Airbender it would seem he isn't comfortable directing something he didn't create. Shyamalan needs to be very, very careful about where he goes from here. He needs to evaluate his own skill set and figure out what is going wrong because his films aren't working anymore. I do think that his name still has some cache, it was plastered all over The Last Airbender and I think it will be all over his next, but another flop will sink him. I'm not writing him off just yet, but being an M. Night Shyamalan apologist is getting incredibly difficult.

Spoilerific Review: Moon

2010-06-28T07:56:00.013+01:00

Stop. What follows is a spoiler filled review of Duncan Jones' Moon

There is no twist in Moon. Well, not in the traditional sense anyway. There is, though, a plot development about twenty minutes in that, if revealed beforehand, would rob the film of some of it's secrets. It's almost impossible to discuss how well the film works without addressing, in some detail, that change in direction.

Sam Rockwell plays Sam Bell. An astronaut at the end of a three year assignment on an isolated Moon base harvesting Helium 3, a new, very efficient energy source, and sending it back to Earth. Even though he receives messages from his wife and two year old daughter the last three years of solitude have taken their tole on him. He is lonely, disconnected and suffering hallucinations.

After an accident on the surface, Sam wakes up in the base infirmary and journeys back out to the crash site where he finds (here be spoilers) himself.

To say anymore would be unfair. Is it a twist if it happens in the first twenty minutes? No, but Moon plays with some wonderful misdirection in the opening scenes, misdirection that pays off in spades once all the cards on the table. The biggest part of that has to be Gerty, the base computer voiced with an eerie monotone drawl by Kevin Spacey. I never realised this before but Kevin Spacey actually sounds like a computer. More specifically he sounds like a dangerous computer. It had to have been intentional, Moon wears it's influences on it's sleeve and it's impossible to not to think of HAL from 2001 whenever Gerty speaks to Sam. Spacey is evidently playing up to that and that extra element of uncertainty adds to the ever growing paranoia.

A paranoia that begins to eat away at Sam. Rockwell is incredible in this. It's one of those performances that washes over you as you watch it but on reflection is something truly special. Without revealing more than I should, Rockwell plays two quite different versions of the same man, one who has been alone for a very long time and one who hasn't. Seeing these two characters play off each is both surreal and wonderful, towards the climax one Sam begins to lose control and the other has to take it. Watching Rockwell react to one situation in such different ways is fascinating and, come the moment when he begs to go home, utterly heartbreaking.

Watching Moon, I was reminded how scarce hard science fiction is these days. Jones' film feels like a celebration of the great sci fi films of yesteryear. I've already mentioned 2001, but Moon owes just as much to Silent Running with a pinch of Blade Runner for good measure. The film looks stunning, all wide open shots and sparse empty moonscapes. The set design shys away from claustrophobic dark corridors, instead flooding the huge base with light enhancing the feeling of Sam's loneliness and isolation. On top of that Jones does remarkable work with such a small budget, the scenes with the two Sams in particular work simply through clever editing. Special mention must also go to Clint Mansell's score which is, as you would expect, perfect.

Moon is a great film, and a pretty astonishing debut from Jones. It's a film that stays with you and gets better the more you think about it. It raises ethical questions but lets you do the thinking, and it is the star making vehicle Rockwell so richly deserves.

Another spoiler: Duncan Jones is David Bowie's son. Armed with that knowledge I defy anyone to sit through the film without humming Space Oddity.

Mikey's Musings: A suggestion for the BBFC

2010-06-23T22:59:00.006+01:00

This should be a review of Shutter Island. Unfortunately I'm not going to be able to review Shutter Island.

I've been trying and I really want to, I saw the film on release and loved it. I'm a huge fan of Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio and I love nothing more than a dark, creepy thriller.

I can't review Shutter Island, however, because the film was utterly decimated by the two mouth breathers to the immediate left of me.

There is nothing wrong with chatting once and a while through a film. I've done it myself. Discretely commenting on a particular moment to your viewing partner is relatively inoffensive. However, discretion wasn't the name of the game for these chaps. Each announcement was preceded by that weird noise idiots make, you know the one, it sounds like a lobotomised fog horn, "aaaahhhwwww, this is weird". I suppose it's a valid critique of the film, Shutter Island is weird. Wonderfully so. It begins as a seeming homage to the noir films of old, all moody lighting and shrieking violins, but as the story unfolds it becomes clear there may be something else at work. The story follows US Marshall Teddy Daniels, played by Leonardo DiCaprio at his twitchy, paranoid best. Daniels has been sent to the titular Shutter Island, home to the Ashcliffe hospital for the criminally insane to investigate a missing patient. Digging deeply into the Island's past he begins to realise that there is secret that the patients and staff are keeping from him. A secret that may be better left alone.

The film relies heavily on atmosphere and tension, something Scorsese proves once again to be a master of and here he ramps it up to incredible effect, but thanks to Thing 1 and Thing 2 the effect was wasted on me. A particularly eerie scene between Daniels and a nurse was annihilated as Thing 2 suggested that instead of interviewing the nurse he should just... well you know. Cue guffaws and cackles all round. It sounded like a riot had broken out on Dappledown Farm.

They were bored. The way an infant gets bored if you stop jangling your keys in its face. The film was trying to engage them on a cerebral level and they just gave up. What's frustrating is that Shutter Island is a great example of a slow but perfectly paced film that rewards attention. A film that makes you think you are watching one thing and slowly reveals something else. I imagine if the idiots in question had known they were supposed to concentrate on the film they might have stayed at home.

If only there was a way to warn people before hand that a film might make you think, a way to gently suggest that if you opened your mind just a crack you may find something special.

I submit the above rating system. Rather than a rule, it's a guideline. Think of it like the health warnings presented before a rollercoaster. You can ride, but if you have back problems, heart conditions or the attention span of a particularly forgetful fish you might want to sit it out or maybe wait for the DVD release.

That way at least if you get bored the disc is nice and shiny, you can just play with that instead.

Round Table Review: Watchmen

2010-06-19T18:47:00.007+01:00

Welcome to Got Me A Movie's first Round Table review (a concept shamelessly stolen from other, better sites).

In the coming months I hope to invite a myriad of intelligent, witty and attractive guest contributors to the site to discuss and review some of the big upcoming summer releases. Expect Iron Man 2, certainly expect Toy Story 3, don't hold your breath for Eclipse.

We've decided to start with last years most anticipated (alright, second most anticipated) release: Watchmen.

Note: We welcome Dan Nicholls for our first review. We've decided to review the Director's Cut of Watchmen rather than the Theatrical or "Ultimate" cut. Zack Snyder has stated that this is his preferred version. He has a point, this cut gives the film a stronger narrative, fleshes characters out and vastly improves some of the pacing issues from the Theatrical Cut. If you haven't seen the Director's Cut yet Devin Faraci at CHUD.com posted a comprehensive breakdown of the additional scenes which can be found here.

Mike: Zack Snyder famously said that the reason he agreed to direct Watchmen was because he felt that it was imperative that a fan of the novel adapt it stating, "it ought to be someone who knows and loves the material. And if I didn't do it, someone else would." Brave move considering he received death threats for remaking Romero's Dawn of the Dead. He was right on the money though, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' epic graphic novel is so dense and so layered that only a long time fan could hope to strike any kind of balance to do it justice. Watchmen was considered by many to be completely unfilmable, so the question is did Snyder succeed? Was he able to balance the numerous elements of the novel and does it work as a stand alone piece?

DAN: If nothing else, Snyder proved that Watchmen is filmable. There were so many sequences that he so spectacularly got right (the opening, the titles, the Dr. Manhattan sequence). The only question is whether or not anyone else could produce the glue that Snyder couldn't, the glue that would hold all of those great sequences together. As a huge fan of WATCHMEN, I loved watching some of the sequences being so brilliantly realised yet I was so crushingly disappointed when the film ended with such a poor third act and the big mish-mash of characters back stories became somewhat unimportant. It devolved into everything Watchmen has always been about deconstructing and in many ways, mocking. I think Snyder proved that it CAN be filmed but he isn't the guy to produce the version of this novel that will be remembered. Instead, he'll be remembered for taking a great first shot at it.

Mike: I think Snyder put himself in a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" position, stay too faithful to the material and it's slavish, stray too far and you're taking liberties. The thing is, as everyone knows, to transfer anything across mediums a certain amount of adaptation is required. Just because the book works so well, doesn't mean that simply shooting a live action version will be perfect. Changes need to be made and I think Snyder, for the most part, judged it well. However there are times when his obvious enthusiasm impairs that judgement. I remember loving the film when I first saw it but later realising that most of that excitement came from simply seeing these characters that I love on screen and at times it seems that that was Snyder's focus too. You can almost imagine a checklist of fan favourite moments and easter eggs that HAD to make it in. When you focus on those details it's easy to lose sight of the bigger picture, which is why when the film needed to resolve the central plot the engine stalls. Having said that I do feel that the lacklustre climax only stings so much because of how well everything else worked. To be honest that's an understatement, the first two thirds of Watchmen are sublime.

Dan: I couldn't agree more about that. It's amazing how the memory of tasting something so bitter can overpower those serene moments. Part of me wonders what kind of film would have come from Watchmen if it didn't have the fan following. Would the alleviated pressure have made it better? Would the studio (Warner Bros) have been so willing to support such a project? Maybe the next filmic incarnation of the story will answer those questions for me? One thing keeps coming back up with me though. Surely the huge support of Dave Gibbons should have been a little love letter to Alan Moore to watch the film? I really wonder if he did avoid any viewing or trailer? It's not his baby as he imagined it (he always said it was 'unfilmable') but then, he has always been one of the more intelligent writers out there, understanding that a different medium brings different requirements/qualities. As you touched on, Snyder judged that adaptation process well. Proof of that is in the Dr. Manhattan origin story sequence. Little things are different but the same feeling of lonliness through godliness is there. It would be a hell of a thing to miss out on for Moore. It could even help certain aspects of his writing. I've always said that a piece of bad feedback on your work is infinitely more valuable than someone saying 'oh, that was great'.

Mike: I think pressure from the fans certainly had a lot to do with the end result, but I think that if Watchmen wasn't as wildly popular as it is the film would have been churned out years ago, to it's detriment. The film was languishing in Development Hell for over twenty years. Certainly a desire to please the core fanbase was partly to blame for the delay but I honestly believe that Fox just had no idea how to get it off the ground. Part of the reason I champion this film so much is because of how awful some of the previous attempts to adapt the book were, the most infamous being Sam Hamm's face meltingly terrible script. If Watchmen had just been some obscure comic from the eighties it would have been cobbled together and we'd be enjoying Adrian trying to travel back in time and Rorshach hissing like a cat. To their eternal credit Warner Bros. didn't seem content to just greenlight the film on the back of the Watchmen brand, but to try and assemble a team that could do it justice. That's part of the reason I think Moore was being a tad unfair publicly denouncing the film everytime it was mentioned. I understand where he's coming from, (nobody has been screwed over by Hollywood more than him) but if he had given it a chance or even taken Dave Gibbons' word for it he would have seen that the project was moving in a far better direction. I would love to know what kind of correspondence he and Gibbons had. I wonder if Gibbons tried to push it on him or whether he just knew him enough to leave well enough alone. It's a great shame because, say what you want about the film, it "gets" the book and Snyder understands what so many before didn't; that Watchmen is not about Superheroes at all, it's about uncertainty, fear and above all else characters. For proof, look no further than the fantastic cast Snyder assembled.

Dan: So I guess we can say that the intense fandom had both good and bad effects on the film. That said, it was up to Snyder to jettison things he felt were wrong and he did so. It takes a very brave person to change the ending to such a loved property. As we touched on before, the worst part of the film is the moment that Synder takes the reigns on the story to attach his own take on the ending. Would the squid have worked? I think so. It would have been hammy but surely that's the point? It's a commentary on pop culture and how we're lead by it to believe so many idiotic things. For the most part (two thirds in fact!) Synder proves that he "gets" the book and the proof is in the film-making. Though I would still love to see what Directors such as Aronofsky would have done with the material. Half of the past approaches have been fundamentally flawed and, minus character names, could probably be made with under a different title! You're right though, Snyder's choices for his actors are the biggest sign that he understood Watchmen and the performances given (minus Malin "i got this part because no one else would get their kit off!" Ackermans performance!) are second to none. My favourites you ask? The oh-so perfectly cast Billy Crudup (Dr. Manhattan), Jackie Earle Haley (Rorschach), Jeffrey Dean Morgan (The Comedian) and Patrick Wilson (Night Owl II). These guys pulled off dialogue and character beats that other actors would have floundered with (case in point, Malin Ackerman). They so completely and utterly owned the characters they were playing in a way that is usually reserved for 'Method Actors'. Had these guys been 'Method', the set of Watchmen would have been a war zone! Jeffrey Dean Morgan put humanity behind such a violent character that many of his actions had me understanding his logic for doing them (craziness aside!). Snyder and Morgan created a Comedian that is, in my eyes, richer than Moore's. That may anger some people to hear me say that but it is true and it should be applauded. Crudup's Dr. Manhattan did the same thing in many ways, putting a kind humanity behind that neutral, unnervingly calm persona. I think this could actually be argued of all the actors/characters I called out (Crudup, Haley, Morgan and Wilson) - they all added a new depth to their characters that made us understand them a little better than their comic...sorry, graphic novel counterparts.

Mike: I'm glad you singled out Cudrup's performance there because I think the technical achievement of realising Dr. Manhatten on screen often overshadowed the work he did. It's an astonishing portrayal of an almost impossible character. Dr. Manahatten, once a man now a near omnipotant being who no longer perceives time in a linear fashion all the while losing the last shreds of his humanity. How on earth do you play that? The decision to play him with a quiet reflectiveness surprised and delighted me, he found the necessary middle ground. Not a man, but not a booming voiced all powerful deity. The effect is, for lack of a better word, creepy, which is exactly as it should be. Coupled with the incredible effects work it's a dazzling thing to watch. But as much as I loved Cudrup the stand out performance for me was Patrick Wilson as Dan Dreiberg. Although narration in Watchmen came courtesy of ol' squidgey face, I always thought that it was Dan with whom the audience was meant to identify with and respond to. He is a spectator caught up in events beyond his control. He is the most human character, weak, self doubting yet with something just beneath the surface. Wilson strikes this perfectly, he plays Dan as the ultimate underdog, a guy who borders on pathetic but you love nonetheless. You're quite right Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Jackie Earle Haley give career making performances as The Comedian and Rorschach, but they are "showy" roles. They are about rage and violence, whereas Dan is about something deeper. Wilson brings the pathos to the film, just as Dan brought it to the book.There is, ahem, a noticeable exclusion to your rundown of characters, which I think takes us quite nicely to the climax of the film. Take it away.

Dan: We seem to agree on the performances in every way except I think that Morgan deserves more credit than you give him. The Comedian is a showy role for sure, but Morgan manages to take it beyond what it originally was. Rorschach/Haley is just the graphic novel Rorschach on screen but with Morgan there is definitely something more going on. In general though, we both left out that one person we'll now come to discussing. Drum roll please...Matthew Goode and his portrayal of Ozymandias/Adrian Veidt. Goode actually does just fine with what he's given, it's what he is given that is the problem. Anyone who has read the graphic novel (and really, anyone who saw the film) will notice that Veidt is the only character that doesn't have his own 'origins' segment, so to speak. In the novel, that segment comes just as he explains his masterplan to his workers before mercilessly killing them. He insists his plan is for the greater good (though that plan is different in the film, it meets the same outcome). After fending off the heroes that inevitably come to stop him, he chillingly states "all you failed to do was stop me saving the world". By this point, we understand Veidts motivations, harsh though they may be. The importance to that understanding lays in his origin segment. By leaving it out of the film, the whole plan seems to come from nowhere and the motivations of Veidt have to be explained in a way that only serves to render us confused and treated as 'dumb moviegoers' when the rest of the film treated us so well! What I don't understand though is why Snyder chose to do this when there is a glaringly obvious place to put Veidts origin. The war room scenes hardly fit at all and regularly jarred me out of the film. But, and you may call me crazy, if the smartest people in office couldn't come up with a solution to their problems, don't you think that they may have called the 'smartest man on the planet'? Veidt could have been injected into those war room scenes giving advice to the big shot advisors, and when questioned, could have told them why the hell they should listen to him. In case my point isn't coming across, that 'you should listen to me because...' could have simply been his origin and thus, the film would flow nicely. However, Veidt ends up being the one character that suffers in both the theatrical and directors cut versions of the film, simply because he's not given any back story. Half of his brilliance is very hastily mumbled away in telling a reporter what he and his company does (all whilst Snyder strangely chose to show us Dan playing with figurines) and the relevant half is left out of the film completely!

Mike: I couldn't agree more. Goode isn't really the problem, he brings the required arrogance (although perhaps not enough of the Tom Cruise charm Adrian had in book) but he is given a woefully underwritten character and until the end barely registers as a cameo. Whether this was to try and help preserve the twist or simply disinterest on the part of Snyder is unclear but it renders Adrian, and by proxy the climax, very dull. The ending as presented in the book is nightmarish. In the wake of an unthinkable atrocity our heroes are put in an impossible position: If they talk the world will resume its race toward destruction, if they keep quiet there is a chance the World may be saved but the villain will get away with genocide (a villain who the reader understands psychologically and who is making a worrying amount of sense). In the film that connection with Adrian is lost and he becomes just another villain, almost an afterthought. Even the attack itself is oddly neutered. Snyder made a very violent film; limbs are severed and bones snapped, so when we are shown the aftermath of the attack (presented in the book as four splash pages of death and destruction) as a CGI hole in the ground the effect just isn't nearly shocking enough to lend the climax the required gravitas. The war room scenes are utterly hideous and you're quite right, adding Adrian would kill two birds with one stone, it gives his character purpose and displays how influential he is.

But again, this misstep only stands out because of what came before it. It's a important to step back and look at the film as a whole. Snyder created a visually stunning adaptation of a beloved book. It doesn't touch Moore and Gibbons' original work but it comes close enough. Watchmen is a flawed triumph, one that delivers in so many ways but stumbles slightly come the end. Twenty years is a long time in Hollywood, but I think it was worth the wait.

Review: Sex and the City 2

2010-06-10T22:26:00.003+01:00

Where to begin? Sex and the City 2 is eye-wateringly awful.

I can not stress strongly enough though, that this is not a knee jerk reaction to the franchise. While I wouldn't call myself a fan of the series, only a fool could deny how groundbreaking it was both as a statement of female empowerment and as a piece of entertainment. And while the first cinematic entry didn't quite have the spark of the series it was an entertaining enough romp and a serviceable adaptation.

The sequel however, is not. Seemingly content to do away with anything that made the show relevant or intelligent, Sex and the City 2 instead opts to hammer it's audience about the head with a slew of childish innuendo, toilet humour and some simply jaw dropping political incorrectness for good measure, but more on that in a moment.

Perhaps the biggest issue that Sex and the City 2 has initially is that it's lead character Carrie Bradshaw is perhaps the least likeable central character in recent memory. Her trials and tribulations have always been trite but they were offset by some real drama, smart writing and when else failed more interesting characters. Here with all that stripped away Carrie is vacuous, boring, short tempered and monstrously self centred. Her worries and concerns so trivial that it eventually becomes insulting.

For example, at around the 45 minute mark Carrie and her husband John are exchanging anniversary gifts. John leads her into the bedroom to show her the brand new plasma television he had installed for them to watch romantic films in bed. Carrie recoils in horror at this, "A piece of jewellry would have been nice!" she moans before shuffling out of the room. This is our protagonist! Our hero! In what sane universe are we as an audience supposed to emphasise with this character? And this isn't even a throwaway moment, this is the conflict that puts the whole story into motion. Carrie begins to have second thoughts about married life (two years later I might add). She is bored of her million dollar apartment and annoyed that John is too busy to accompany her to the latest movie premieres, so we are treated to scene after scene of her looking bored accompanied by scenes of her explaining how bored she is. Riveting.

I must point out, my disdain for Carrie is no reflection on Sarah Jessica Parker. She gets an awful lot of very cruel flack and it is wholly undeserved. She has proven in the past that she is a capable and charming actor, but try as she might she just cannot redeem or bring any of that charm to what the script has given her.

The other girls fare slightly better but they are all but relegated to the sidelines. Cynthia Nixon is given nothing to do, a shame as her character Miranda is the only one of the four who had any real issues to deal with. Kristin Davis continues to bring a sweet charm to the prim and proper Charlotte but again is given nothing to work with. In this outing Charlotte is worried that her new Irish nanny might prove a distraction to her husband (get this, the nanny is called Erin and she doesn't wear a bra. My Sides!) In the films single highpoint Miranda and Charlotte discuss the difficulties of motherhood and just as it threatens to become enjoyable we are whisked back to Carrie as she agonises over whether or not to cheat on her husband. Finally, the always reliable Kim Catrell is on hand to inject some life into proceedings. Catrell at this point seems to have given up playing Samantha as anything other than a cartoon character. Strutting around like a particularly foul mouthed panto dame she may as well be winking at the audience. It's ridiculous but to her credit Catrell is more than aware and more than happy to throw herself into it.

For 90 minutes Sex and the City 2 is a film about nothing. Four incredibly fortunate women spend money and attend premieres. If this was all that was wrong with it, it would have simply bored me, but the second act sees the girls travel to Abu Dhabi and then the real nightmare starts.

There is comedy in the idea of four New York socialites travelling to the Middle East and trying to adapt to that culture. With the greatest of care some real humour could have been extracted. The problem is that writer/director Michael Patrick King approaches this idea with all the subtlety of an charging Elephant. The girls sit and stare slack jawed at a woman in a burqa eating chips. One of the girls comments that the whole idea of the burqa freaks her out and the scene ends. How insightful. In another scene (that I genuinely couldn't decide was meant to be scary or funny) Samantha taunts a group of men, proclaiming that she has sex and begins miming said sex. She and the girls are rescued by a group of women and taken indoors. When the women learn that the girls are New Yorkers they shed their own clothes and excitedly reveal the Spring fashion line they all secretly wear underneath and explain how they all long to live in New York. That's when my eyes started watering.

Reading that back I must come across as some PC nut and I'm really not, I'm not averse to a bit of controversy. As far as I'm concerned no topic should be off limits, but if you decide to attack or make comment on something as sensitive as this you need to be damn sure you have something valid to say. Sex and the City 2 is quite happy to leave it at "I don't know it just freaks me out".

This is the one of the most offensive films I have seen in a long time, A film that, like it's main character, is mind numbingly ignorant, boring and vacant. Get out while you John, take the TV and run.

Review: Iron Man 2

2010-05-01T12:37:00.001+01:00

Balance.

Balance is the reason this jam packed Superhero sequel succeeds where others have failed.

By and large a sequel's job is to outdo the original in anyway it can. The easiest and most obvious way to do this often seems to be the "more is more" approach, whereby studios throw as much as they can at the screen often not realising what made the previous film so successful. Some times it tries to cram numerous new characters in, sometimes it's just action overload, but in most cases this strategy backfires. When you can't quite manage the characters you've added into a coherent narrative you get Spider-Man 3, if you eschew any notion of plot in favour of upping the 'splosions and sparks you get Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. But if you can find the balance, that sweet spot in the middle, that beautiful alchemic reaction, you get Iron Man 2.

Six months after revealing to the world that he is Iron Man, Tony Stark's ego has inflated beyond all proportion. He has declared himself a "nuclear deterrent" and the world's protector having "privatised world peace". Naturally the U.S. government is unimpressed and demand that he turn the weapon over to the American people lest it fall into the wrong hands. Stark's response is that his suit is so advanced that it would take at least twenty years for the world to catch up, "America is safe". What Stark isn't telling anyone is that the Iron Man suit and the technology that is keeping him alive may also be killing him, and what Stark doesn't know is that he may be overestimating how far behind his competitors are.

I'm probably not the best person to review this film. I am this movie's target demographic; steeped (if I do say so myself) in comic book lore, massively fond of action adventure and with an almost worrying Man-Crush on it's lead, I am predisposed to love it, and love it I did. Director Jon Favreau once again proves that with care and attention you can successfully adapt a property without compromising the source material. There is a love and knowledge of the comics that bleeds through the screen. What's interesting is that Favreau also pushes the more "comic booky" elements to the forefront. While nobody believed that Iron Man was literally feasible in the real world, the first film did go out of it's way to remain as realistic possible. Here we take a dive straight into hard science fiction, and it works. We believe the unbelievable because, just like last time we believe the characters. In a world where Christopher Nolan is bending over backwards to make Batman as realistic and real life as possible, it's refreshing and deeply satisfying to see a film hold it's comic book origins aloft with pride.

The film is jam packed with nods and winks for the fans, some overt (a certain iconic weapon is present) some more direct (a subplot sees a mysterious government agency called SHIELD attempt to enlist Stark). It's far more prominent than in the first film but for the most part it doesn't distract from the story. Just like its predecessor Iron Man 2 works as a treat for the fans and as a hugely enjoyable mainstream blockbuster.

That's not to say it's perfect. In fact the film is overlong, suffering from some fairly serious pacing issues in the middle. After a blistering first act which sees Stark attacked at the Monaco Grand Prix, the film settles down to address it's numerous plots. It's here where the film sags and it becomes apparent that in their enthusiasm, Favreau and new screenwriter Justin Theroux weren't willing to trim away any of the subplots. As well as having to deal with his deteriorating condition and the threat of a deranged would be assassin joining forces with his business rival, the script throws in the aforementioned SHIELD subplot and a mystery regarding Stark's father. To their credit the balance which I was singing about earlier is maintained and Favreau manages to keep the story coherent. Individually these elements work wonderfully but at times it can feel like too much and the film threatens to lose focus. The first film was lean and streamlined and a tweak of this script or even some further editing could have produced a similarly paced movie. It's a minor quibble and fortunately, the film's main attraction is on hand to make you forget all about it, but we'll talk about him later.

The most noticeable improvement is just how much better the action is this time around. One of the main issues people had the first film was the slightly stunted action. In the best way possible Favreau has over compensated here. The two main setpieces, the Monaco Grand Prix and the final all out slugfest are stunning. Animation legend Genndy Tartakovsky helped storyboard the action sequences and the collaboration works. There is a dizzying, frenetic energy to the action which absolutely eclipses anything in the first. It's actually impressive how unique and original the sequences are when they basically boil down to men in robot suits fighting robots.

As entertaining as those setpieces are though, the action plays second fiddle to the characters. Once again Favreau has assembled an astonishing cast and everybody brings their A game. The biggest addition to the roster is Mickey Rourke as Ivan Vanko. Vanko is a lunatic harbouring a grudge. The son of disgraced scientist Anton Vanko, he blames the Stark family for his father's descent and is out for revenge. Rourke is positively terrifying, his attempt on Stark's life, aided by a pair a powerful electrical whips, is ferocious. Vanko comes at Stark like a man possessed, and Rourke brings the fire.

Sam Rockwell brings a delightfully ridiculous take to rival arms dealer Justin Hammer. A Stark wannabe in every way, Hammer is jealous of every aspect of Tony's life. Rockwell plays him as a slimy, almost pathetic pretender to the throne but plays it with enough anger to make him a credible threat. There is a great comic interplay between him and Rourke as the two conspire to take Stark down.

But once again though, the film is utterly dominated by Robert Downey Jnr. Playing Stark like the love child of Steve Jobs and Mick Jagger he is even more confident in the role this time. Having Stark go public at the end of the last film gives him a brand new dynamic and a whole new set of problems. The real genius is that Downey Jnr makes you love Stark in spite of his lengthy list of character defects. On paper Stark is arrogant, pretentious and irritating, but brought to life he is a rock star. Just like in the comics Stark is infinitely more interesting than Iron Man. The rest of the cast is good but Downey Jnr carries the film on his shoulders. In fact those moments that threaten to bog the film down are carried by the sheer force of his charisma, there is a very real chance that without him that midsection could have sunk the film.

Like I said, Iron Man 2 isn't perfect, but it is the most fun I have had in the cinema in a long time. Jon Favreau and his team know how to make these films work. It's funny, exciting, dynamic and AC/DC provided the soundtrack.

What more could you want?

Review: Dear John

2010-04-20T07:52:00.009+01:00

There is a moment, a third of the way into Dear John, where Sgt. John Tyree, having recently fallen in love while on shore leave and yearning for the end of his tour of duty, walks into a bar in the German town where he is stationed and watches the World Trade Centre collapse.

I thought that this would be a turning point for the film. Up until that point Dear John, based on the Nicholas Sparks novel, was a perfectly acceptable tale of two young people falling in love one summer. It wasn't changing my life but I wasn't longing for the credits. The film plods along in a formulaic fashion, happily throwing out clichés with gay abandon.

And then, out of nowhere, it decides to tackle 9/11, and for the briefest of time it does an admirable job of it. Immediately after the attack John returns to the base and without hesitation requests to extend his tour. His decision isn't rational or thought out and its not presented as a gung ho call to arms. It's born out of fear, doubt, confusion and at the same time a powerful need to do something. He finds the rest of his squad have done the same. Their Commander has no idea what will happen but accepts their wishes. Seeing these young men desperately trying to react to something utterly unthinkable is fascinating and, I am ashamed to admit, something I hadn't really thought about before. I know how I felt as an observer, I can't even begin to imagine what it must have been like in New York that day, but for the men and women in service the days following the attack must have been horrendous. Remarkably, Dear John does a very good job addressing these themes and for about fifteen minutes the film becomes very engaging.

But then the film reverts back to Romantic Drama 101 as if nothing happened. This would be fine if the effect of that day were felt for the rest of the film, but the attacks are literally never mentioned again. Sure, John is seen in Afghanistan but the political and social after effects of that day are completely absent. I wasn't expecting the film to suddenly become a commentary on the War on Terror but I did expect it to at least follow up on the very questions it raises. It's peculiar because, as I said, for the brief time its addressed the film deals with the subject with a degree of intelligence and respect. It doesn't come across as exploitative, it never feels like its using it to manipulate your emotions so why include it in the film at all?

The rest of the film is serviceable enough, kept mainly afloat by it's two leads. Channing Tatum does well enough as John. Tatum has, in the past, floundered in roles too big for him, here though he is likeable as the quiet, stoic young Sergeant. A subplot involving John and his Father develops into something quite touching and Tatum manages to sell a key scene successfully. The centre of the film though is Amanda Seyfried who I find myself liking more and more with each film. She has an effortless charm that makes her an instantly likeable leading woman. She is actually a lot better than the string of generic chick flicks she is popping up in recently. It would be interesting to see her try something a bit more challenging. The two of them have a great chemistry and manage to elevate above the standard "Star-crossed Lovers" film.

Dear John isn't a bad film by any means, in fact it ends up being a good film with 15 minutes of a potentially excellent film in the middle. For a moment the film wants to be more but then loses that confidence. A bit of a shame really.

Review: Kick-Ass

2010-04-01T09:15:00.001+01:00

When I began this blog I decided that I would try to post real reviews. Reviews that would be as professional and well thought out as possible. They would be considered, thorough and above all else would not descend into crass, nonsensical hyperbole.

With Kick-Ass such restraint isn't possible. It will literally melt your face.

Just as Mark Millar's already classic comic book series was a giant love letter to comic books, Matthew Vaughn's adaptation is an ode to comic book movies. It is a comedy but it is never a parody, never a spoof. It is a bonefide superhero movie, homaging, borrowing from and celebrating what came before it.

And it Kicks Ass.

The story (gleefully aware of how familiar it is) is your typical superhero origin story, but it begins with everyteen Dave Lizewski asking a question; Why aren't there superheroes in real life? It's a good question. So good in fact that Dave directly challenges the audience, demanding that you admit you've either thought about it or indeed fantasised about it. Tired of waiting Dave tries it himself and after quickly and painfully finding out EXACTLY why people don't fight crime in spandex, simply carries on and discovers that he may not be the first to try it after all.

In a perfect alternate world Aaron Johnson would have been cast as Peter Parker in Spiderman. Dave openly admits that he is Peter Parker without "the radioactive spider" and Johnson is hilarious in the role. Dave is as typical a geeky teen as you can find, awkward, uncertain, invisible to girls but he has conviction and determination. What starts as just fantasy soon becomes an addiction. When he takes on a trio of gang bangers beating somebody, and furiously tells them he would rather die than walk away you believe him, and in that moment he stops pretending. It's Uncle Ben dying, it's Tony Stark getting captured, it's Thomas and Martha Wayne getting shot. Johnson pulls off the transition and crucially keeps the balance throughout the film.

Director Matthew Vaughn does the same. Kick-Ass was a labour of love for Vaughn, after every studio he pitched to demanded the violence be toned down he raised the money himself. The film is uncompromising and the enthusiam shining through the screen is almost tangible. Kick-Ass plays as if John Woo directed a Judd Apatow movie. The film is hysterical but at the same time Vaughn proves himself a formidable action director. Some of the set pieces in this film need to be seen to be believed; bullets fly as do kitchen utensils, legs are severed and heads explode. What is remarkable is how he ably ramps up the action throughout the film. Far too often with films like this they race through the third act having delivered the big set piece at the end of the second typically leading to a disappointing anticlimax. Not so with Kick-Ass, Vaughn sets the pace expertly with each action beat eclipsing the last right until the closing minutes, leaving you salivating for the next installment.

Of course the main attraction is a foul mouthed, blood thirsty eleven year old named Hit-Girl. Played with astonishing gusto by Chloe Moretz, Hit Girl (or Mindy Macready) lands like a hydrogen bomb, instantly becoming one of the most iconic film characters in recent memory. One part Uma Thurman in Kill Bill, one part Abigail Breslin in Little Miss Sunshine she is a five foot whirlwind in a purple wig. Certain, more conservative organisations have already voiced their outrage at the violence and profanities circling her (and make no mistake, there are profanities. I'm even convinced a decision was made to reign back everyone else's language to make hers all the more noticeable) but that's the point. Hit Girl is meant to shock, she's supposed to be controversial. When people take the bait like that it makes a character like Hit Girl all the more entertaining. What annoys me so much is that such a controversy might over-shadow Moretz's incredible performance. I would imagine that John Morrisey of The Australian Family Association hasn't seen Kick-Ass, if he had he would see that Moretz is a mature, intelligent young actress fully aware of the role she is playing and the darkly comic tone of her character. Nobody is laughing at Hit Girl because she is a sweary eleven year old, we're laughing because Chloe Moretz is very funny and remarkable in the role.

And welcome back Nic Cage. Where the hell have you been? Looking back over his filmography these days could reduce you to tears but dry those eyes, because he's returned with avengeance. He plays Hit-Girl's superhero father Darren Macready and it is absolutely his best performance in years. Darren and Mindy have, to say the least, an odd relationship, when we first meet them he puts her in body armour and shoots her in the chest, then he takes her bowling. The dynamic is adorable and as their backstory is revealed, heartbreaking. Macready is quite clearly insane but he loves his daughter dearly and will do anything to protect her. As Macready, Cage turns in a soft gentle performance, when he dons his costume and becomes Big Daddy however he takes it to another level completely. Everybit as entertaining as Hit Girl, Cage plays Big Daddy like Adam West if he was playing the Punisher. It's an astonishing dual performance both eye wateringly funny and yet fearsome, perfectly in keeping with the tone of the film.

This film is just about perfect. Are there any downsides? Yes, having seen Kick-Ass the knowledge that Matthew Vaughn didn't direct X-Men 3 now physically pains me rather than just irks me. I love this film unreservedly. When I finished watching it I would have happily walked straight into another screening. I can't remember the last time I came out of a film everybit as excited as when I went in.

Never has a movie's title been so apt.

Review: I Love You, Phillip Morris

2010-03-20T08:01:00.001Z

The first thing I did after watching I Love You, Phillip Morris was race to my computer to research the life of Steven Jay Russel, the real life con man/jail bird on whom this film was based. His story is incredible, something that, if you weren't told was true, you would write off as pure fantasy. His exploits read like a one man Ocean's Eleven and it's no wonder Hollywood snapped up the rights to Steve McVickers book of the same name. Russel, or King Con as he is also known, created fourteen known aliases, managed to embezzle $800,000 from the company where he worked and escaped from Texas' Harris County Jail four times.

How do you cast a character like that? You call Jim Carrey.

Jim Carrey isn't given nearly enough credit. When he takes on more serious roles nobody pays attention, if he plays it broad suddenly he's pandering to the mainstream again. In Steven Russel Carrey has found the perfect role to display his strengths. He plays Russell broadly but never loses sight of the man. Its a tough balancing act and if misjudged could have been a disaster, had he gone over board the more emotional elements wouldn't have worked. Carrey walks the line expertly and come the quieter moments delivers his best work in years. It's difficult to sell a criminal, especially one who is (initially at least) motivated by greed but Carrey's natural charm shines through.

Ewan McGregor plays the the titular Phillip Morris and isn't granted as full a character. As Russell's lover, Morris is just as much a spectator as the audience. It'd be easy to get blown off the screen by Jim Carrey but Ewan is far more reliable than that. He brings a sweet vulnerability to Morris, playing the character with coy shyness and softness but still manages to pack a punch during an emotional scene towards the climax. Just like Russel you believe in Morris.

Most impotantly though, you believe in the relationship, which is vital. Without it this would be little more than a screwball comedy, but the connection at the heart of the film elevates it beyond that. That sounds redundant i know, of course a romantic comedy needs to have a believeable relationship at it's centre, but there is something more at work here. The film is smart and witty and sweet, a delightful romp sure but one that is determined to dig deeper and that comes from the script by John Requa and Glenn Ficarra and solidified by the chemistry between the leads. I'm aware the word sweet keeps cropping up but it perfectly describes the feeling while watching I Love You Philip Morris, I'm not ready to call it the gay Annie Hall but it has a similar charm.

What irritates me is the way this film is being sold. "The Con Man Who Won't Go Straight!" Screams the tagline. Hilarious. Apparently the film had a hard time finding a distributor and while Consolidated Pictures eventually picked it up the marketing clearly shows some trepidation. The promotional material wants to attract the crowd that made the turgid I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry a hit, but in all likelyhood it may turn away a more intelligent audience, which would be a great shame.

But that's the marketing, the film itself is a delight. It's actually a very old fashioned comedy, albeit an at times shocking one. It's funny, touching, and (there's that word again) very sweet.

Review: Alice in Wonderland

2010-03-14T09:15:00.001Z

I was bored to tears watching Alice in Wonderland.

Actually no, I was bored two years ago when it was announced that Tim Burton was directing Alice in Wonderland and that it would star Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter. It's just so obvious and so maddeningly predictable that you wonder why bother? As early artwork found it's way onto the internet it landed with a dull thud, looking exactly what you might expect; pretty, quirky and gothic, neither moving you nor turning you off. Then as Disney's marketing machine began it became apparent that there was no Ace up the sleeve, that this would indeed be exactly what it looked like. Plenty of Johnny Depp mugging, Danny Elfman's score and the aforemenioned quirkyness.

It physically pains me to think that plenty of Johnny Depp and Tim Burton is a negative these days, but so help me it's true. It's difficult to remember a time when the thought of these two on a new project was something to celebrate. What was once a sure fire recipe for innovation and originality is now so repetitive it's just irritating. Anyone thinking Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was just an unfortunate hiccup will be disappointed. As much as that film was a failure it doesn't come close to depths that Alice sinks. The film is a complete mess. From conception to execution it stumbles on almost every level, starting with the bizarre to decision to make this a sequel, with Alice returning to Wonderland as an adult.

The film opens with a young Alice suffering recurring nightmares of odd worlds and grinning cats. Seven years later and a grown Alice has been thrust into high society awaiting a proposal from a quaffed beurk. Breaking free she spots a waistcoated White Rabbit and pursues it down the fateful rabbit hole where she finds a table with a key and a mysterious bottle of liquid labeled "Drink Me".

Sound familiar? It should, because while the film would have you believe this is a sequel of sorts, once Alice is in Wonderland the film plays out exactly as the original story did with characters doing and saying what they did in the original. Add to that the fact that Alice can't remember being in Wonderland (or Underland as it is known here) and has to be reintroduced and you may find yourself scratching your head wondering what the thought process was. It's an utterly baffling descision and it backfires enormously. A lot of the dialogue in the early scenes are taken directly from Lewis Carrol's own prose but for the rest of the film screenwriter Linda Woolverton's just cannot match Carrol's words. Even for someone unfamiliar with the original books it is painfully clear where Carrol ends and Woolverton begins. The effect is just distracting and I'm astonished nobody in production noticed it.

As perculiar as the first hour of Alice is though, it is in the third act that the wheels fall off completely.

Tim Burton and Linda Woolverton clearly enjoyed The Chronicles of Narnia and decided that what was missing from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland was an epic battle. After all the introductions are complete Alice learns that "Underland" needs a champion to defeat the Red Queen and slay The Jabberwocky. The famous nonsense poem that Carrol wrote as a parody designed to show how not to write a poem has been taken completely literally and it's the final nail in coffin. The whole sequence is the antithesis of what Alice in Wonderland is about. It's the punchline to a joke about how Hollywood murders literary works. It's the laziest possible way to create a climax and all it serves to do is highlight the creative brickwall that Burton and Woolverton ran into.

Performances vary, ironically the best work comes from the smaller roles. Stephen Fry and Alan Rickman giving brilliant voice work as the Cheshire Cat and The Caterpillar respectively, but they are little more than cameos, characters inserted into this "sequel" because people would expect to see them in an Alice in Wonderland film. Anne Hathaway does good work bringing a welcome otherworldliness to The White Queen. Helena Bonham Carter apes Miranda Richardson's Queenie from Blackadder as the Red Queen (or is that Queen of Hearts, the film seems to think they are the same character) the effect is comical but robs the film of a villain and so the already weak third act has no threat.

Of course the focus is on Depp and disappointingly the marketing wasn't misleading, the Mad Hatter has indeed been thrust to the forefront of the story. Depp isn't bad in the role, it's just a terrible role and a ghastly interpretation of the character. He and Burton decided that The Hatter needed an origin story, a sword fight and a breakdancing scene. I'll repeat that last bit for you, a breakdancing sequence. It just further cements the feeling that no one involved understood Wonderland or it's characters, either that or nobody cared.

As a long time fan of Tim Burton the most frustrating part about Alice is that at times you will be reminded of what the director is capable of. On a purely aesthetic level Wonderland is impressive but an over abundance of CGI dulls the effect. I've never thought that Burton's style was well suited to CGI. His imagery looks far more impressive when acheived practically. Take for example the Red Queen's mansion; a grand sweeping shot pans over the enormous CGI Castle and through a garden filled with CGI hedge sculptures, compare it to an almost identical shot from Burton's beautiful Edward Scissorhands. In Edward Scissorhands the sequence is haunting and dazzling, in Alice it is dull and soulless keeping you detached, much like the rest of the film.

All in all, there is very little to recommend here and the film feels like a wasted opportunity. I think Burton is capable of making a very worthy straightforward adaptation of Alice in Wonderland. There is a curious moment when Alice realises that she had been to Wonderland and we are treated to a flashback of sorts to Alice as a young girl in Wonderland, I found myself yearning to see that film, if some restraint had been shown maybe that would have a been a superior film. On the other hand perhaps if Burton had thrown caution completely to the wind and indulged his twisted imagination to create something akin to American McGee's Alice we may have had something special. As it stands we have a weak hybrid of the two. A film not content to be a straightforward adaptation but not confident enough to breakaway and do something unique.

It will take more than this for me to write off Burton completely, he is still a man with a brilliant imagination, but I do think he has lost his way. These adaptations are just not working and with each film released his earlier work seems further and further away. With any luck it's out of his system and his next project will see him return with something original and more intimate.

I'll leave you with his award winning short Vincent which I think perfectly encompasses what makes him such a unique talent.

Mikey's Musings: The Happy Gilmore Effect

2010-03-12T17:05:00.001Z

Years ago two brilliant, yet criminally overlooked media scholars devised a theory. They theorised that all films, regardless of genre, should, at their most base level not only engage but entertain the audience. They called it The Happy Gilmore Effect.

For those of you who don't know, Happy Gilmore is a cinematic masterpiece. A warm and touching character piece that deftly charts a man over coming personal and professional obstacles to achieve an insurmountable goal whilst also examining the fickle nature of celebrity and the psychological impact of losing a father.

It also includes the following exchange...

A film will obviously fail entirely if it doesn't engage, but only a handful of pictures achieve that alchemic reaction that Happy Gilmore accomplishes and truly entertain. It doesn't just have to be a comedy. A thriller should thrill, a documentary should inform and a romantic comedy should, well, do whatever it is they do. Happy Gilmore was used as a yardstick to measure if a film succeeded in this regard. There were some successes, some noble attempts and some failures. As they recorded their findings they made a startling discovery, The Happy Gilmore Effect led them indirectly to an earlier theory they called The Emperors New Clothes Syndrome.

As you would expect films suffering The Emperors New Clothes Syndrome are typically films that people THINK are brilliant. Early reviews will heap token accolades onto the film in an attempt to perhaps preempt the swell of critical gushing lest they be in the minority. Films with TENCS are typically released by well respected directors "returning to form" or perhaps deal with a touching subject "that will melt your heart and reaffirm your love for life".

It takes a real hero to stand up and say "Actually, it was a bit crap."

When it became apparent that there may be a connection between The Happy Gilmore Effect and TENCS the research was combined and the results were staggering.

The above graph displays quite clearly the incredible correlation between the Token Accolades given and the rating on the Gilmometer, and yet when these two unsung heroes presented their findings, they were ignored by the masses and shunned by their peers.

Well, they are shunned no longer! I intend to honour these brave souls who refused to be quiet and swallow spoon fed opinions. To celebrate their controversial yet vital work I will be applying their patented Gilmometer to my reviews, each film will be granted "Happy's out of ten".

I invite you to do the same. Rewatch a favourite of yours, a film you consider perfect, with this new theory in mind. If it still places high on this new yardstick, well then, you are watching a true masterwork.

Review: Sherlock Holmes

2010-03-07T14:50:00.001Z

I could watch Robert Downey Jnr. paint his house.

It's been wonderful charting the Renaissance of Robert. The man is the definition of charisma. He has enough charm and wit for five leading men. Imagine a film you may have seen recently where the headline actor hasn't kept your attention and it's probably because Downey Jnr was on set somewhere usurping everyone else's talent.

In Sherlock Holmes he brings that magic in spades, dominating every scene and imbuing Holmes with the perfect blend of eccentricity, pomposity and humour but with enough sincerity so as not to turn Holmes into a walking punchline. This new Holmes is every bit the Victorian genius from Arthur Conan Doyle's novels, but he has been given an injection of modern sensibility. That's not to say we get a slew of wink wink pop culture references, rather the film plays out like a modern film set 100 years ago. There is a playfulness about the film that Downey Jnr absolutely understands and plays the character accordingly.

Which didn't surprise me to be honest, what surprised me was how right Director Guy Ritchie got the tone of this movie to begin with. Ritchie has been stuck in his own rut for years. He makes "Guy Ritchie" movies and for the last twelve years he has been trying to live up to the hype put on him after Lock, Stock and two Smoking Barrels. Here, the focus isn't on him but on "Sherlock Holmes" freeing him of that pressure and that really shines through. There is a freedom here that is tangible, and Ritchie is clearly delighted to be able to flex a whole new set of muscles. The film exists in a heightened reality (London looks like a matte painting) allowing some very stylised film making. Some elaborate sweeping shots here, some speed ramping borrowed from Zack Snyder there, visually it all adds up to a very kinetic experience but never overwhelms the film. In theory, updating Sherlock Holmes could have been a disaster, a shallow attempt to market a property to the mainstream. Yet here, it's done with such care that the setpieces never betray the spirit of character. That's the balance that Ritchie has struck.

Equally surprising is just how good Jude Law is in this. Law is a solid actor and can deliver terrific performances (Road to Perdition) but he is capable of turning in some really pedestrian work. Here he is visibly having fun, Watson and Holmes have a wonderful relationship and he and Downey Jnr have terrific chemistry, bouncing off each like an old time double act.

The problems arise when you realise that the film is so enjoying its two leading men and devotes so much attention to them that it starts to overlook everything else. Rachel McAdams does her best as "Feisty-potential love-interest" but it's a poorly written character, all flirt and pout and not much else. At times it seems she was inserted just to remind the audience that Holmes and Watson aren't a couple. Equally disappointing is how little Mark Strong is given to do as the film's antagonist Lord Blackwood. Strong is a terrific character actor and deserved a far meatier role. He ably makes Blackwood creepy and unnerving but he is still a disappointingly shallow nemesis. The underdeveloped villain actually takes us to the films real issue: the fumbled third act.

The buzzword in Hollywood these days is reboot and with each new "reimagining" far too much focus is put on trying to create franchises. This is fine if the property can sustain multiple films but too often it is at the expense of the film. The result is a growing number of films that barely even work as standalone stories, films more interested in setting up a potential sequel than resolving their own plot. So too with Sherlock Holmes. After the film takes great care in setting up an intriguing mystery, the third act squanders it all for a by-the-numbers action scene followed by a by-the-numbers fight scene concluded with Holmes explaining away the plot. It all descends into throwaway exposition.It's been noted before that the film plays like a Scooby Doo episode and in terms of the climax that's true.

But like I said, it's Rob's show and depending on how much you like him you will either like this film or love it. The third act doesn't burst the film, just deflates it a bit. Let's hope England's greatest detective get's a more engaging mystery next time.

Review: The Wrestler

2010-02-21T21:50:00.002Z

Sweet is not the word I thought would best describe The Wrestler.

Darren Aronofsky's latest film treads very familiar ground. The Wrestler is the riches to rags tale of once champion wrestler Randy "The Ram" Ramzinsky trying to find a place in the world outside the ring when he realises his glory days are long passed.

In terms of tone this a seismic shift from Aronofsky's last movie "The Fountain", a film which divided viewers straight down the middle. To say The Fountain was ambitious is an understatement, but whereas that film pondered the nature of death and life on a grand scale, The Wrestler focuses on the smaller and more intimate aspects of real life. Here the director chooses to pull everything back, shooting the film in minimalist docu syle to let the story shine through.

Casting Mickey Rourke as a onetime star turned forgotten washout is almost cheating. Rourke brings that personal baggage to the role in a way that no one else could have done. Anyone who knows and has loved Rourke gets an emotional shortcut to Randy. The performance is staggering yet subtle and nuaced, but crucially, its restrained. With the slightest of glances or a soft sigh Rourke projects twenty years of Randy's suffering and hardship. The down and out underdog is a role we are all familiar with to the point of being jaded by it, but Rourke masters it. The is a softness and yes, sweetness, to Randy and only the most cynical viewer will be unmoved and I daresay everyone else will fall in love with him. It's become a cliche to say this but no other actor could have played the Ram the way Mickey Rourke does. Tour de Force, powerhouse performance whatever you want to call it, Rourke brings it here.

He also brings it physically. The Wrestler can be a very brutal movie. Aronofsky deliberately highlights every cut and every blow. A scene showing a post match Randy having his injuries seen to intercut with quick flashbacks of him receiving them is as unpleasant as it is unflinching. The physical punishment however is balanced by the thrill of the ring. Never for a moment do you wonder why Randy takes these beatings time and again. As he explains it "The only place I get hurt is out there", when he is in the ring he remembers who he is, and that's where the sweetness of this story shines through.

Randy's story is about reflection. In what becomes a signature shot for the film, the camera often follows close behind Randy echoing his long walks from locker room to the ring. In one instance he prepares for his first shift on the deli counter of the local supermarket. As he makes his way from the locker room to the counter a swell of crowd chanting can be heard building and building then instantly silences as he steps onto the shop floor.

Comparisons have been made to the Rocky films, and yes, you could argue there are parallels but that's only on the surface. The Wrestler dares to go deeper, deeper maybe than any sporting bipoic before it. There is a heart and soul to this movie that elevates it above everything else.

This is Aronofsky's best film to date. It's a compelling and fascinating film that features one of the best leading performances I've seen in a while.

Review: The Road

2010-02-10T23:23:00.001Z

The Road is a very difficult film to watch. It's a film about struggle, despair, hunger and fear. Aesthetically and tonally it's very very grey.

The effect can be exhausting, but in the best way possible. The film is about exhaustion, both physical and mental. The effect brings you closer to the story, as the characters become more and more weary, a sense of fatigue engulfs the film which draws the viewer in even further.

Based on Cormac McCarthy's critically lauded novel, The Road is remarkably faithful to the source material. Unsurprising really considering the book is actually very low on plot, instead opting to focus solely on the relationship between a man and his son struggling to survive an unnamed apocalypse.

When adapting a story like this it must be very tempting to pull the camera back and reveal more of the ravaged world and attempt to fill in the blanks. Director John Hillcoat wisely avoids this, realising that the tension comes from the unknown. McCarthy went out of his way to reveal as little as possible about what happened to humanity. It's what made the book so horrifying and it keeps the tension high in the film.

It's that uncertainty and mystery that makes all the unpleasantness that much more unpleasant. As the father and the son (and the audience) wander blindly across a devastated North America they stumble, often quite suddenly, across some very distressing scenes. Make no mistake, there is some incredibly unpleasant imagery in this film. The book was determined to display humanity at it's worst and while the film doesn't go quite as far there are still some genuinely nauseating moments presented.

As the film revolves around just two characters the performances are key. Casting the always reliable Viggo Mortenson was a genius move. Mortenson can play world weary in his sleep, but here he takes it to a completely new level. His weight loss for the role rivals Christian Bale in shock factor. His ribs and cheekbones protrude noticeably through his skin and his eyes are sunken deep into his skull. He looks positively wretched. Mortenson plays the unnamed man with a successful duality, his primary goal is obviously to keep his son alive, but a small part of him simply wants to give up. It's the boy and his relationship with him that keeps him alive.

I've seen some negative comments regarding the performance of Kodi Smit-McPhee as the man's son. I think this is unfair, he has a far bigger task than you might think. The son isn't a typical child. He is a child born into an apocalyptic world. His father even jokes that he may as well be an alien. Smit-McPhee does a fine job in a difficult role. The boy has been taught the difference between right and wrong, good and evil but he is so surrounded by darkness that he desperate to experience the light, to find and meet the other "good guys". Smit-McPhee also succeeds in portraying a child who is on the cusp of becoming a young man. When the two find a barn filled with hanging bodies the boy asks his father why they committed suicide, his father simply replies "You know why". The boy is at an age where he is beginning to understand how this world works.

The two actors have strong chemistry, which is of course what the film hinges on. The interplay between the two ranges from heart warming to heart breaking. By the end of the film you realise the film could have been about a single father struggling to pay the rent and it wouldn't have made a difference, the heart and soul of the story is the love between and man and his son. The apocalyptic back drop is just that; a backdrop.

Any criticism thrown at the film is the same thrown at any adaptation. The novel is a pretty astonishing piece of work and the film, while doing a more than admirable job, doesn't reach those heights. The strength of the book came from McCarthy's prose and the mindset of the man. Short of having endless inner monologues this just couldn't be fully replicated onto the screen. It's just the nature of adaptation.

The Road is a success. It looks beautiful and it features some dazzling performances (special mention must go to Robert Duvall who is utterly mesmerising in little more than a cameo), and beneath the murk it is uplifting. There is light at the end of the tunnel, the tunnel is just very dark.

Review: Milk

2010-02-08T09:23:00.002Z

Sean Penn's party piece is biopics.

He's brilliant in everything, but he really truly shines when he is portraying a real person. In The Assassination of Richard Nixon, he showed what he can do when he has a real person with a real life and history to draw from.

As Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man elected to major office in the state of California, Penn gives a subtle, human and very accurate portrayal, channelling Milk's persona and mannerisms without letting it descend into parody or simply impression. As a man Milk was strong and courageous but with a deep vulnerability and Penn nails the balance between shy mild mannered man to emotional and angry leader expertly.

Curiously, director Gus Van Sant never really decides which story to tell. The politics of the story, Milk's rise from idealist to City Supervisor and the struggle therein, is glossed over. Scenes showing Milk and his campaign team discuss how they will run the campaign are often followed by scenes of the team receiving news of defeat. Skimping on the details of Milk's career dilutes the emotion of his eventual and inevitable victory.

On the flip side however, the film doesn't delve quite deep enough into who Harvey is and what makes him do what he does. Surprisingly, by the time the film has ended we haven't learnt a great deal more about him. We know he is a courageous man, a man who will step up to deliver a speech moments after receiving a death threat, but what else drove him to keep going and what effect did it have on him?

There is odd pacing at work as well. The film has a slow burning momentum that remains consistent, neither speeding up or slowing down. It's peculiar, particularly as the film's climax is specifically revealed in it's opening moments. As the viewer, we know what will happen but the film never seems to build to it. Even as the film enters the third act the pace doesn't pick up.

This must be intentional, and to be fair, this isn't a thriller. It's a snapshot of a time before gay rights were considered an issue, when homosexuals were literally rounded up and thrown in jail. It's astonishing to think that there was a time when a politician could describe homosexuals as "perverts" during a political debate. Van Sant wisely chooses not too shy away from the more shocking elements of the prejudice displayed, some of the mindsets of the people in authority (a policeman refuses to acknowledge a murdered man's partner as such insisting that he was his "trick") are everybit as unnerving as the physical abuse.

The film has a terrific supporting cast, James Franco proves that he is so much more than Harry Osbourne and I desperately hope he continues to seek out challenging roles like this. He and Penn have great chemistry and Franco is confident in the role. Diego Luna comes close to taking his character over the top but brings it back and provides some pathos. The real stand out though is Emile Hirsch. Virtually unrecognisable beneath a perm and some very period glasses the one time Speed Racer plays real life AIDS activist Cleve Jones. Hirsch plays Jones with playful flamboyance but keeps the performance grounded, something that a lesser actor may have fumbled. Hirsch does great work and shows serious talent as a terrific character actor.

It all comes back to the central performance though and, as ever, you cannot take your eyes off Penn, he is magnetic and completely carries the movie. He brings a passion to the role and while the film itself doesn't often commit to where to focus the story Penn sells it and does a great service to a man who started a truly remarkable human rights movement.

Mikey's Musings: Why Cars 2 will be brilliant

2010-02-06T08:57:00.001Z

Cars is Pixar's weakest film. It's not as funny or as touching as the likes of Toy Story and the characters never quite resonate in the same way as the Parr family did in The Incredibles.

It's still far superior to 90% of animated features released these days.

When it's sequel was announced in 2008 (the first Pixar film to get a sequel since Toy Story) it was met with bemusement. Why were we getting a sequel to Cars when Monsters Inc and Finding Nemo were so much better?

It's because Pixar aren't in the business of churning out sequel after sequel of their most popular works. They care about their stories and characters, aggressively defending and protecting them from corporate tampering. If Pixar were in it for the money we would currently be looking forward to "The Incredible Incredibles" and "Finding Nemo 3: Where'd he go now?"

If you'd like an idea of how Pixar studios work I encourage you to watch The Pixar Story. It charts the rise of the company from John Lasseter's early days at Disney all the way to the release of Ratatouille. Watching it, it couldn't be clearer how hard this studio works to create truly special films. When Toy Story became such a success Pixar was put under pressure to quickly produce and release a sequel, a demand which would clearly impare the quality of the film. Rather than see a sub par Toy Story 2 come out, Lasseter, hot off the back of producing Toy Story AND A Bug's Life without a break, took control of the production and steered it back on course. To this day it is considered among the greatest sequels ever made.

So Pixar have earned the benefit of doubt. Of the many works they have in the library, Cars is the film Lasseter wants to revisit. In my book that means there is a good story to tell and more of the world to explore. It means that the studio perhaps realises that Cars has more potential than the first film realised and that it can be done correctly and is excited to do it.

That's a good thing. A production company like that is very hard to come by and should be supported. I mean who really wants to see Monsters Inc. 2: Monster Babies?

Review: X-Men Origins: Wolverine

2010-02-04T09:40:00.002Z

Fox Executive 1: So, Wolverine is still popular right?

Fox Executive 2: Sure.

Fox Executive 1: And Hugh Jackman is a big big star?

Fox Executive 2: You bet!

Fox Executive 1: I got it! We'll make one of them prequel things. We can put all those characters in that we couldn't cram into the last one. How much money have you got on you?

Fox Executive 2: $50

Fox Executive 1: Terrific, that can go to the FX department. Get me a photo of Hugh Jackman, I'll make the poster myself. Start shooting it right now.

Fox Executive 2: OK but shouldn't we write the script fir...

Fox Executive 1: Guy, I got this ok!

Fox Executive 3: Hey guys i'm going to go and burn some money.

I have no proof that that conversation took place. However I remain absolutely convinced that the actual studio meeting that greenlit X-Men Origins: Wolverine was, if not quite that moronic, definitely that brief. It didn't matter what the film was, it didn't matter if it was good just as long is it came out before Joe Public forgot what an X-Man was.

It's quite apt I suppose that the X-Men series deals with evolution, Fox have managed to make the next evolutionary step in turning a respectable film franchise into nothing more than a revenue generator. If X-Men: The Last Stand was Homo Habilis on the "Evolution of Dumb" chart then Wolverine is using tools and making fire.

Should I be this annoyed about this film? Yes I should! It's not good enough. When the source material is so rich and deep there is simply no excuse when the film turns out to be a complete vacuum of creativity.

My good chum Scott (who has created the most Metal blog on internet by the way. Don your AC\DC t-shirt and head to deathtoallbuttmetal.blogspot.com immediately) loaned me the Novelisation of Weapon X, the story that this film wants to be. Now that story could never really be adapted into a mainstream blockbuster, it's dark, unpleasant and incredibly violent, but beneath that violence is character. The graphic novel strives to get to the depths of the character and learn who he was and what happened to him. It's pretty haunting stuff, Logan is subjected to extreme torture both physical and mental. The film jettisons this in favour of predictable action set pieces and astonishingly bad special effects.

Let's talk about special effects. Im pretty forgiving of ropey special effects. The TV show Lost has quite possibly the very worst digital effects i have ever seen, truly awful, yet the show remains probably my favourite thing ever. The effects shots are always in support of the story. The show is bursting at the seams with ideas, plot, subtext, character, emotion and intrigue, so much so that a dodgy looking submarine barely registers. But in a film that specifically and purposefully eschews depth of plot and emotion in favour of 'splosions 'n' brawlin' why is the action so sub par? Why do Wolverine's claws look worse than they did in the first X-Men film 11 years ago?

The most frustrating thing about this film is the way characters are just shoe horned in with scant regard for things like plot or logic. I say characters but this film has none, just a checklist of names deemed popular enough to film but not popular enough to feature in the original trilogy. Stryker visits Logan who then visits Wraith who tells him to visit The Blob, who tells him to find Gambit. A tip for the next film guys, just put them on a conveyor belt and drag them across the screen itll be faster and cheaper.

Any silver linings? Ryan Reynolds is the highlight his all too brief time on the screen breathes a bit of life into the proceedings. News that he will be getting his own spin off as Deadpool should delight but if this is what a spin off of X-Men looks like what would a further spin off look like?

I'll tell you the exact moment this film lost me completely, the moment when I realised that not an ounce of attention was being paid. When Logan finally undergoes the procedure that makes him what he is (a scene shown in flashback in X-Men 2) absolutely no attempt is made to match the continuity from the previous films.

This isn't a review is it? It's just a rant. But why should I put any effort into making this a well written opus when the film being reviewed is this lazy and thoughtless.

As an action film, X-Men Origins: Wolverine is poor, as the continuing chapter in what was a flagship franchise it's a travesty.

Review: Inglourious Basterds

2010-02-01T21:10:00.001Z

No one else could have made this movie.

I know that sounds incredibly obvious. From the opening moments its clearly a Tarantino movie through and through. What I mean is that no other director working today could have gotten away with what he has. Not Scorcese, not Spielberg, not Scott.
He has made a 70 million dollar World War Two movie that is 60-70% subtitled, he cast Brad Pitt in a supporting role and cast relative unknowns in the main roles, the film features pretty horrific imagery and ends with somone machine gunning Hitler in the face.

He made a film with no concessions whatsoever. That needs to be admired and applauded.

He also made it very, very "Tarantino".

It's interesting comparing Tarantino's recent works with his earlier breakout films. Death Proof and Kill Bill are the films he revels in, each existing in a heightened reality allowing him to excercise his very unique (and oft imitated) personal style unchecked. Hell, Pulp Fiction, Resevoir Dogs and Jackie Brown seem quiet and intimate by comparison. They're not straight drama, but they are grounded in something resembling reality.

Inglourious Basterds falls somewhere between the two.

As Chapter One helpfully explains the film is set "Once upon a time in Nazi occupied France". The trailers and marketing campaign would have you believe that this film is about a group of Jewish-American soldiers sent into France to brutally massacre Nazi spreading panic through The Third Reich. That's not completely true. Like Pulp Fiction, Basterds is actually a series of plots that weave in and out of each other finally converging into an explosive climax.

It's a very rich story filled with great characters and a strong structure. The problem is, im not sure Tarantino trusts himself to make a straightforward movie and just let the story tell itself. So expect booming Samuel L Jackson voiceovers, an el mariachi soundtrack anouncing characters and lettering scribbled across the screen with arrows pointing out the villains.

Tarantino doesn't cameo in this but he certainly makes his presence known and the effect can be jarring.

But where the effect kept me at arms length, I'm well aware that for others it sucked them in even more. For them Tarantinos stamp was simply the triumphant cherry on top. If i'm honest, im a little jealous.

So what works? Absolutely everything else. Tarantino is capable of creating truly mesmerising scenes with just a handle of characters sat around a table (something i thought he may have forgotten after Death Proof), gone is the hyper real ramblings from Death Proof and to an extent Kill Bill, the dialogue is far closer to the casual conversational style that made Resevoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction so exciting.

The opening scene for example, an informal chat between the film's villian and a French farmer is so unbearably tense my clenched jaw began to hurt. Tarantino slowly turns up the tension at such perfect pace in this scene and allows it to last just long enough to make it unbearable. Its an expertly judged scene.

Of course a scene in which a villain chats to a farmer cant rely on direction alone. It takes serious actors to pull it off, which where we come to the film's secret weapon: Christoph Waltz.

Earning every accolade thrown at him, Waltz plays Col. Hanz Landa, an SS Colonel so famous for his uncanny ability to seek out Jews, that he has earned the nickname "The Jew Hunter". Waltz is magnificent in this. The kind of villain that has you grinning everytime he is on screen. Landa is charming, funny, intelligent and capable of absolute horror. While he is excellent at his job he is completely emotionally detached from it. When he complains about the paperwork it requires he may as well be an aggravated office administrator.

The genius in the performance is how straight Waltz plays it. Landa could so easily have been a moustache twirling cartoon, but Waltz makes him so much more. He owns every single scene he is in and does so without taking a single bite out of the scenery. Honorable mention goes to Melanie Laurent as Shoshana who is arguably the real hero of the piece. Laurent gives Shoshana strength and fire but also a subtle fragility, a fragility exposed in an early scene with Landa that is eye wateringly tense.

Again, Brad Pitt headlines this but its Waltz you'll be thinking about when you leave.

That's not to say Pitt and the Basterds aren't memorable, they just aren't the focal point of the plot. In fact for the most part they act as comic relief. They get the cool big moments and quotable dialogue but the heart and soul of the film is in the quieter moments. It's not in scalpings (oh yes) or gun fights it's all in the exchanges.

So there we go. That review is far more positive than I thought it would be. It's "Quentin Tarantino presents Inglourious Basterds" which is fine. It's vital that Directors can still make films without having to pander to studio interference, in the caseI wish Tarantino had reigned himself in just a bit. At times it feels like he a made "Tarantino" movie first and a WW2 epic second. I wish it had been the other way around.

Mikey's Musings: What makes an event movie?

2010-01-31T08:54:00.001Z

Last week James Cameron's Avatar became the highest grossing film of all time passing James Cameron's Titanic. According to Boxofficemojo as of 30/01/10 it has earned $1,924,744,073 worldwide and it's still looking comfortable.

Cynics might attest this success to the release date, the lack of any huge competition and of course the substantial extra revenue brought in from the 3D priced tickets, but there is no denying that Avatar has become something of a phenomenon. A film that just keeps going and going topping the weekend box office week after week living off word of mouth and repeat business.

It's an event movie.

If I'm being honest it's been exciting watching it hurtle towards Titanic. Titanic which has been the figurative Everest of the Box Office chart for thirteen years. There was a time when box office experts claimed that it would take decades (plural) before Titanic was conquered. They claimed that the cultural impact and hype that kept it number one for fifteen consecutive weekends simply couldn't be replicated. That with the birth of the DVD and rise in internet piracy people just wouldn't want/need to revisit a film in the cinema. Some even suggested that we would have to wait until inflation caught up before seeing a new champ.

That was an event move too.

But what makes an "Event Movie"?

Sayeth Wikipedia: "An event movie is a film whose release itself is considered a major event, such as an anticipated sequel or a big budget film with major stars generating considerable attention."

That sounds about right. I suppose by that logic most of the big summer pictures from the last few years are "event movies" right? But there must be something more that propelled Avatar this far. Something that sets it apart.

Quick: Take a look at the All Time World Wide Boxoffice list. Excluding Titanic and Avatar the entire top ten are sequels or based on pre-existing works. In fact you have to scroll all the way down to number 19 to find a completely original work (Finding Nemo). Okay, yes, I'm being a bit charitable here. Titanic, I suppose is a remake of "A Night to Remember" and we can't really ignore the Avatar-is-DanceswithFernGully arguement, but neither had a serious existing fanbase to rely on.

So what then? Let's ask Mr Cynic. Firstly, the release date; would Avatar have made as much money had it gone up against Transformers or Harry Potter? Probably not. The decision to push the release back until December obviously paid off. Only a few big releases came out to put up a fight but Avatar reigned supreme. Even more impressive is that while Avatar dominated the charts the films that came didn't seem to suffer much as a result, it wasn't that the other films weren't making money, it was just that Avatar was making more. In fact those that were released, like Sherlock Holmes and Alvin and the Chipmunks did pretty healthy business. Not Avatar business, but solid nonetheless.

So that leaves the increased price of the 3D tickets doesn't it? As of the 13th of January 3D tickets sales for Avatar accounted for 79% of the total (15.6% 2D and 5.4% Imax). Consider that, in my local cinema, 2D tickets cost £7 and 3D cost £9 and it hardly seems fair does it? (At this point my cinema isn't even showing the film in 2D anymore.)

One point to Mr Cynic.

But beyond that must be a reason that people are paying that extra money to see it.

It's because Cameron made a film quite unlike anything else. The narrative is pretty weak and the characters are (as many have pointed out) ironically 2-dimensional but it is spectacular. Even it's harshest critics agree that from a technical standpoint the hype was justified. He took bleeding edge technology and created a dazzling action adventure. He made something that needed to be seen.

That's where the word of mouth came from. The online community had to see it because of the twelve years of top secret development, Joe Public sees it (based on a huge marketing push from Fox) and it becomes the talk of the water cooler. The film gathers momentum and the rest is history. It's release and box office have become a "major event" and it has "generated considerable attention".

Avatar is the ultimate event movie.