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Monthly Archives: August 2010

Gamer

August 24, 2010
Film Reviews
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Gamer: (Blu Ray) it is the future (!) and computer games have reached the next level with humans controlling prisoners in a live PPV bloodsport called Slayers. The film opens with such a WTF battle – guns, explosions, slow mo, blood and teabagging. More generally the action’s scenes feel totally anarchic – good for conveying confusion, bad for having any idea of what’s going on. It takes sci-fi to the next level of ridiculousness with 1980s pseudo science; Butler being mind-controled in a game by some Justin Bieber lookalike through a fake brains… So many parts of the film reek of “This scene / character would be totally LOL” – let’s have the fattest, ugliest, stereotype computer geek – LOL; let’s have butler get drunk, then piss and puke – LOL; let’s get a rapper in it, LOL; Dexter as a baddie would be so LOL…  by the end it’s trying way too hard, especially that ridiculous dance number. The story’s a carbon copy of films like Running Man / Condemned / Death Race – and it has a vibe somewhere between cyberpunk and goth S&M freaks The BD picture’s very good throughout (camerawork and cinematography are great) but the soundtrack is on a whole other level – much like War this works the entire system… would be a great demo, if your shop was for over 18s. All-in, Gamer’s a pretty broad genre-spanning punky type film that doesn’t taking itself too seriously. There’s a good punt at a story, and enough action to keep everyone interested. I got the feeling that Gamer was just a really fun project for the people involved to be working on. Made by video gamers for gamers, while stereotyping their culture and the media… bizarre.

Score: 6/10

Spartacus: Blood and Sand

August 19, 2010
TV
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Spartacus Blood and tits Sand: 150% testosterone-fueled 13-part swords and sandals epic – It’s essentially what would happen if the cast of 300 violated the story and actresses of BBC‘s Rome. I’ll get the controversial stuff out of the way first. Violence, there’s literally GCI bucketloads of flying limbs, heads, blood and teeth every time someone grabs a weapon – most memorable; a gladiator cuts a dead opponent’s face off and wears it as a mask in his next fight – awesome… just awesome. Secondly, Spartacus is a celebration of Skin; it’s a conveyor belt of gratuitous Spartan chests, fake and real breasts, naked men fighting, women getting rammed, guys getting tugged off and gay gladiators bumming each other – most memorable; Lucy “Xena Warrior Princess” Lawless getting her gobstoppers out! Thirdly, the Dialogue sounds like 20 drunk sailors sat at a whiteboard and played the ‘best insult ever’ competition – some of the combinations are so imaginative and foul that they even impressed this sweary Scotsman. Controversy aside the actually story is so, so epic, and nowhere as linear or predictable as you’d expect – it twists and turns right to the last scene with endless betrayals, story developments and murders. The acting is also startlingly good given that there’s very few big names, so many characters, and everyone falls into either i) meat-head gladiators (for action) ii) sexed-up women (for skin) or iii) slimy political figures (for progressing the story). Other than a couple of slower episodes Spartacus is an absolute hit, that gets better as the series progresses: my lady even went from “this is so ridiculous” to a total convert, no mean feat for a series aimed at 15 year old boys! When the show works, it totally works – and if you can see past the gratuitous violence, skin and language – at the heart of Spartacus lies a compelling, well-written and well-executed story. Brilliant mix of drama, action and trash!

Score: 8/10

Life of Brian

August 18, 2010
Film Reviews
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Monty Python’s Life of Brian: (Blu Ray) Monty Python sketch-fest that kind of follows an everyman called Brian, who is mistaken for the messiah and turned into a religious leader. While it was offensive / notorious / boundary-pushing – to the point of struggling to get funding – at its time of release (1979) it doesn’t hold up too well these days. Definitely feels a lot more like a bunch of loosely connected scenes rather than a proper ‘film’ as there’s no constant themes and the story jumps around / gets caught up in tangents. Most disappointingly, it’s not ‘rolling on the floor’ funny, although fans of Python’s erratic / crazy / shouty style will be entertained. There’s some nice nit-bits of historical facts and characters. The BD picture’s pretty grainy, looks a bit washed out but textures do show a lot of detail. The sound starts off well, but most of the scenes end up being a shouty din with a terrible mix – probably down to poor and aged source material. If Monty Python’s your thing then this is decent, but it’s nowhere near the best comedy of all time, or even the best of Python.

Score: 5/10

Films That Defined Us

August 13, 2010
Features
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Because one massive blogging meme just isn’t enough, Marc from Go See Talk took it upon himself to herd cats and get another on the go. This time, it’s about the films that really got us into the movies, and that have ultimately shaped our tastes into what they are today. To find out what everyone else wrote, here’s the master list.

As a nipper, the only surefire way to shut me up for a couple of hours was to plonk me in front of a telly, put on a VHS (those were the days!) and let cinema work its magic. Luckily for me, although my mum and grandad never had as big a collection theirs kicked arse, lots of arse. Below are a few of the films that got me into four of my favourite genres:


Action: as a kid, very few things could match the awesomeness of a James Bond flick. The stunning locations, prettiest women, finest vintage and supercars, cutting-edge technology & gadgets, craziest megalomaniacs, and of course – a super spy to match them all, 007. Even thought we know that Bond always saves the world and gets the girl – and no matter how many times they put that formula together – you usually end up with 90 minutes of cinema gold. The Bond films didn’t just change my taste in film, but was a shot in the arm for the entire Spy genre, inspiring everything from Indiana Jones to inception, Austin Powers to Bourne to Mission Impossible… not to mention and a thousand other rip-off movies and scenes.  Despite knowing every film inside out, Bond’s timeless appeal is still so strong that I recently got the re-mastered Bond collection and plan to start a bond-a-thon soon.

Comedy: makes up a huge chunk of my personality, which I can attribute to a healthy diet of classics from a young age. My super mum was forced to watch her Blazin’ Saddles, Young Frankenstein, Airplane! and the Original Mr Bean tapes way more times than I care to think about. Although great gags deliver the chuckles in a comedy film people easily forget that a comedy is nothing without funny characters, and the films mentioned above have some of the best in the genre – Igor, Waco Kid, Sheriff Bart, Striker, Rumack, Mr Bean…  Other than setting a stupidly high bar for every comedy I’ve seen since, these films have helped me mold a sense of humour that’s seen me perform stand-up and play as a self-deprecating comedy singer for years!

- What do you like to do? - Play chess... screw... - Well, let's play chess.


Horror / Zombie: As a teenager my pal Lummy and I went through a spell of somehow convincing our parents to rent us formerly banned and 18-rated films from our local blockbuster (those were the days!). Titles that stick out the most are Zombie Flesh Eaters (The scene when a chick gets here eye impaled on splintered wood will stay with me forever!), original Dawn of the Dead (although you couldn’t go wrong with any Romero flick – King of the Zombies) and Evil Dead Trilogy (This is My Boomstick!). While literally quenching our thirst for blood, guts and gore these titles also kicked off a life-long love/hate relationship with B-movies, video nasties, the horror channel, and the weird & wonderful Vipco titles. Unfortunately this genre is the least consistent because there are an unimaginable number of terrible titles out there… but that’s kind of why I love it.

Word Cinema: last but not least! Despite seeing the odd foreign film here and there my passion exploded while doing a crash course on World Cinema – purely to make up learning credits at University.  One of the assignments was writing an essay on Lars Von Trier’s Europa – the epic and original visual style, imagery and execution made me realise that there was fantastic cinema beyond UK/US releases. The course also studied and screened quintessential Godard, Fellini, Kurosawa, Bergman, Kieslowski, Truffaut and Lang films. Furthermore, the University library had an outstanding collection of foreign titles from the ‘essential’ classics to all big modern releases. I genuinely went through around 3 films per day in Uni, 90% of them were foreign. Even if it does make me sound like an arse, I generally can’t trust people that snub subs!

Honourable mentions must go out to The Lion King, Mary Poppins and The Matrix – all of which I remember watching until the VHS was worn down… those were the days!

Thanks for reading , and remember to check out all the other site’s articles

Cheers!

The Thick Of It

August 11, 2010
TV
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The Thick of It (Season 3): Fly-on-the-wall mockumentary that takes a satirical look behind the scenes of a governmental department, and British politics in general. It’s essentially The Office, set in Westminster. Synonymous with the show (and ‘In The Loop’ spin-off movie) is Malcolm Tucker. He starts off the season as fantastic insult-generating machine but by half-way mark he’s degenerated into such an unlikable character, that is until we see his human side for an episode, which is a nice touch, but it doesn’t last long. Still “I wouldn’t piss on you if you were allergic to piss” is one of the greatest insults ever. Stuart, the Spin doctor with the bullshit bingo buzzwords was my favourite character, yet biggest stereotype. The rest of the cast hit all the right notes too, and although the characters are all part of the satire, they are rooted firmly in reality, which makes them more believable – much like the situations, storyline and the show overall. Like everything Lannucci does The Thick of It is razor-sharp, and up to the minute. The main problem is that there’s far, far too much fucking swearing in your average fucking episode – so much, that it warrants an 18 cert in the UK, sitcom fail! At the best of times it detracts from the comedy, at the worst of times it sounds like you’re eavesdropping in a prison. Although Malcolm is usually the main source of comedy and is essentially the show’s saviour, it’s too big a task to place on such a hateful character. Funniest in small doses.

Score: 6/10

Genius or Arse #4

August 6, 2010
Genius or Arse
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King of the ArsesMel Gibson: Having seen Irreversible, Antichrist, Baise Moi, Audition (+ other Miike films), both Funny Games, Requiem for a Dream, and Spice World, it takes a lot to shock this writer. In saying that, after listening to the leaked Mel Gibson tapes I was positively disgusted. This guy’s supposed to be a devout Christian yet, allegedly hates homosexuals, clearly hates women, allegedly beats women, allegedly hates Jews, drink drives and – more generally – is an all-round out-and-out scrotum. When he’s not massive being a ball-bag in his free time, he’s a ‘practical joker’ on set, playing pranks like flashing his ass, making actors do scenes with clown noses, nailing nude pics of co-stars to crew notice boards and pretending to be a dangerous stalker, or an offensive German alter ego. Most shockingly, if you look at his 25 year career, for such a high-profile actor he hasn’t actually been in a single great film… (Braveheart maybe, but as a Scot, that’s a whole other story!) Not unlike a chronic disease, Gibson is becoming worse and worse but never seems to fuck off.

Verdict: While this has hardly a fair trial, it’s getting harder and harder to defend this guy. Jury votes are in: ‘King of the Arses’

The Edge of Genius or William WallArse – You Decide

The A-Team

August 5, 2010
Film Reviews
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The A-Team: a crack commando unit gets sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn’t commit; these men promptly escape and try to clear their name, by any means possible! It was an honourable attempt at a decent story, which was good in parts but landed somewhere between you’re average Seagal and Bourne Flick. You get what you see with the simple characters, but it’s hardly a character piece. Hannibal/Neeson looked uncomfortable throughout, but Murdoch/Copley picks up all the slack, and ends up the film’s real star. Patrick Wilson‘s also decent. The action was great, and should leave you grinning ear to ear because it’s cool & gratifying escapism (flying tanks, mad stunts, explosions, dogfights…) right up until the last big play where it got so ridiculous that CGI had to take over. We got a solid 3 months of hype in the UK so I wasn’t expecting much, but The A-Team is simply an enjoyable, over-the-top action film. Probably 20 minutes longer than it should be, but much better than expected.

Score: 7.5/10

Changeling

August 4, 2010
Film Reviews
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Changeling: Angelina Jolie gets re-united with her missing son, but all is not what it seems. Jolie’s great, and the cast in general are quite strong, however, I wasn’t entirely convinced with Malkovick. There’s a LOT of terrible accents through the film. It makes all men and police of the time look and sound like assholes, and by the hour mark I was screaming out “OK, the police are corrupt, we get it”. It’s all trundling along in a fairly textbook manner for around 90 minutes but in typical Eastwood style massive, depressing, twisting plot points start firing in until the final scenes. I would re-watch it, but only to play the “my son” drinking game. Overall, the story’s good but it’s dragged out for much longer than it can sustain, and turns into a boring courtroom drama for last 20 mins…

Score: 4/10