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Reviews
Black Swan (2010)
multi-layered but with a trowel
Almost everything about this film irritated me from the up close camera shots to give a sense of claustrophobia to the light spots in the actors eyes.
Maybe I got bored and found the whole film predictable and started noticing the obvious. It layers the trauma on top on further layers of 'meaning' to the point it bludgeons the viewer with the blinding obvious.
There was a point where I expected alien to pop out of her stomach -spoiler alert- and something close suddenly does, that is, out of her shoulder.
I did start laughing at one point.
It is watchable, and looks really good but...
Sus (2010)
Economic film making at its best
Sus is economic in cast and location, one room three characters, and its theatrical roots are evident. It gets a high score from me because it was on late night and I wasn't planning to stay up, the power of the performances kept me there to end. Its 90 minutes felt like an hour. Of course a low budget movie like this doesn't compare to big set and big budget cinema but it works. It is good to see a film that relies on good dialogue and excellent acting. Late night TV has become quite the venue for low budget movies and ones that failed to get wide distribution and box office takings. But amongst a lot of really dreadful movies there is the odd gem of which Sus is one. One other point, it is an historical movie set in 1979, I remember the issues but if you are the other half of the population, under 40; then you may find it educational.
Life's Too Short (2011)
comedy a precious commodity
Great comedy is a rarity, it's precious in the same way gems are but this is no gem. It is awful in its laziness.
The irony of the plot is that we get to laugh at a dwarf, the gags are predictable when it comes to height and the comic value of an over inflated ego are tired, worn and laboured. Where as Brent in the Office had a character who wanted to be liked and sought acceptance the alter ego of Warwick is shallow and two dimensional. He is an unbelievable w@nker and that's the problem, he is unbelievable. Sadly so are the cameos.
Warwick's selfishness, self importance or blinding crassness is milked in each situation being contrived and lacking grace or fluency. I suppose my problem beyond the limited boundaries of the plot/situation is that I am treated like an idiot lacking any ability to spot subtleties that are the source of good comedy. Of course, the other possibility is Gervais and Merchant can only deal in the blatant and brutal comedy of sarcasm, shock and parody.
If I knew what great comedy was I would be writing it, but bad attempts robs the audience. If the series had an bigger dimension, a plot, story line, substance even, then it would not have to rest on it being a comedy. Without being funny there is not much going for it.
Stalker (1979)
do I need to make the effort to get the most from this movie?
i was reminded of this film after watching the remake of Solaris because the original was associated with it in some cult showing on late night TV. I all ways read the best and worst reviews after i watch a movie just to see if i missed anything such as the plot or point.
stalker appears to have attracted the criticism of boring and praise for its subtlety. it is long, the pace is slow and the conclusions subtle. those expecting the rush of an espresso should best stick to the classic Hollywood formula movie but even those of us who like the quirky or the curious may find stalker a little too slow, too long and plot too simple. But i do remember it 20 years on and there are themes and images from it that have haunted me since.
the remake of Solaris was far more glossy with tight editing and short but it failed to satisfy and perhaps if it had the gentle pace of stalker where the characters grow on you and the environment and atmosphere slowly seduces the viewer it would have been better.
and that is the issue, we have been trained by the 90-120 minute movie format to the point that we find it difficult to accept something quite different. don't get me wrong; the classic movie format works really well it is just that it is a little like approaching art. pictures used to have to be paintings of real things and then abstract and surreal and modern art appeared on the scene. Some people think it is just pretentious nonsense and some babble enthusiastically about the groundbreaking nature of the work.
There are some artists, in movie making, whether writers or directors who are completely up their own bottom but that should not be a criticism solely directed at the art house movie maker, the latest King Kong remake is proof of that, but even if a movie is pretentious it should not matter if it works and Stalker does work it just does it in an unfamiliar way. Only i am not to sure if its up to me to make it work.
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
credit where it is due
the zombie/comedy genre is somewhat limited to judge Shaun of the dead, as far as the comedy goes it is humorous but not hilarious, but then very few movies can sustain the laughs. as for the horror; it is not and could not compete with the likes of the dawn of the dead remake and there is every reason to avoid that degree of horror. as for plot; well, it is well thought out with a descent preamble that is actually plausible considering it is a zombie movie and is free of the plot holes that seem to plague many movies such as 28 days later.
the main thrust of criticism beyond the inappropriate comparisons with other zombie movies is the humour and characters' unlovable behaviour but this misses the key plot element. it is a rites of passage movie where Shaun has yet to grow up and treat his life and women seriously requiring a crisis for him to move on. As a story of the child moving into responsible adulthood, even at 29! it is one of the few where the protagonist actually shoots his mother. It has its clever moments and part of that is the nature of the adolescent humour without it we would not be able to track his passage.
Shaun of the dead does a good job considering that it is a low budget comedy horror, it may not be American werewolf which is a classic but it is as funny and as a movie the script and plot are a whole lot more tighter than dog soldiers or 28 days or 28weeks. It is not going to be as scary or horrific as zombie movies but it is comparable IMHO, to the original Dawn of the Dead that had the depth of observation as part of the subplot.
it seems to be one of those movies that will be compared when it needs to be judged on its own merits.
Dog Soldiers (2002)
could have been a classic
it could have been great, but it is let down it is not the macho soldiers with guns being gun ho blokes, in fact shawn makes an excellent sargent and the lads are sadly very believable.
its not the half man / half border collie, although they could have kept a little mystery but the lack of cgi was good its not the sound track, the score sounds expensive the problem is ego.
well , maybe but the writer and director being one and the same always seems to cause problems. the lack of plot is the writers fault, the first part was very good. (except for some very dodgy post production. There is a button on avid to do automatic colour correction, and do not do night shots with blue skies, do them with diffusing cloud. but hey what do I know?). The second part was predictable, how much action can you squeeze into a cottage? And the comedy was so lame. But it could have been great if the Ego had asked others what they thought. Just reading the comments by other, more critical, users displays just how smart people are. I hope doomsday, coming soon, with an apparently excellent cast will have more depth and originality and i hope for the best. we the audience deserve the best. don't we?
A Hard Day's Night (1964)
film lovers should watch this; it is not just a fan movie
i was barely born when this film was made and i went through my Beatle phase 30 years ago but it is a ground breaking movie. The plot is thin but watch it for the hand-held camera work, framing, choice of scenes and direction. It is an excellent example of the dramatic/comic documentary.
The Beatles acting is surprisingly good in a natural sense given their complete lack of training. They are not character actors (incidently yellow submarine was voiced by actors not the band) but the director (or somebody) did an excellent job. On a historical level it is worth watching just to see 60s Britain; the cars, girls, styles and character actors.
As a film it is a first in its very natural yet polished look and is beginning to look less dated as the years roll by
Hyperdrive (2006)
series three and still awful
the BBC has the unique method of funding by taxation, which is great when they make great television, Life on Mar, Life on Earth, Dr Who and even Red Dwarf but to spend money on something so unfunny is a waste.
Sure its not always a good idea to compare like for similar but what made most of the Red Dwarf series great t.v. was narrative, plot development and characterisation, the laughs only come when the proper work of narrative has been done. Despite good actors, reasonable special effects and a reasonable budget it simply fails because the basics are overlooked. it is simply a sketch show with no structure. I watch it for the instruction it gives in getting it right. Is BBC Manchester just full of yes men/women who have no desire to create and think Hyperdrive is worth the money spent on it?
Northern Exposure (1990)
intelligent funny and great American TV
Time has shown just how intelligent, funny and sensitive NX was. It never got too sentimental and i suppose it helped that it expressed a liberal agenda. I actual quote an episode in history lectures where a new discovery causes the town to debate the philosophical question of what is truth and what is fact in history. The dialogue is natural yet intelligent and funny and like many episodes serious questions are debated but in an entertaining way. And that was its success, it was always entertaining and the makers never lost sight that it was a TV show.
did it have any bad points? well some episodes were not as good as others simply because some were classics, my favourite were Maurice's feast and that bottle of wine and Napolion.
It is not repeated on UK digital networks but i hope it will, if you get the box set take your time and do one episode a week there is a lot to digest and it is nice to wait.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005)
movies are not TV or books or radio plays they are movies
hard to rate Hhgttg, the casting was OK the production was fine, the cgi was so much better than 1980s BBC attempts, obviously, but not as good as the book, and even the screen play was fine. Movies are not books or TV they need to be short and punchy which makes some of the adventures not found in the original a bit lame. I presumed they weren't written by Douglas Adams but it turns out that the producers claim they are. Adams' writing is funny because it sublime and gently but it seems he or the producers were going for the in your face laughs a short movie demands. In the ideal world they would have taken their time and made three or four sequels allowing Adams' unique and fabulous humour to get the recognition from a new audience. So watch the film and then read the books and then you will get the drunk joke reference, the petunia gag as well as being entertained for days.
King Kong (2005)
when did Peter Jackson forget to make films for the viewer?
Well not really a 1 but it needs to be dragged down a bit.
Movie making is about enthralling the audience and no amount of cgi or budget is going to make up for a simple tale spun out for Three Hours ,i would so like to shout that!. There was at least an hour of footage that if left on the cutting room floor would have made it oh so enjoyable. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy needed to be long just to cope with the complexities of the plot, but King Kong was based on a film.I can appreciate that it is a fantasy and therefore some of plot is not going to really string together but to make it even more fantastic because you can just bogs the narrative down, counter any kind of characterisation and is simply unnecessary.
It is simply too long, and why an experienced filmmaker can't see this is perhaps ego and a big fat budget to prove it.