mtenga Reviews

Sexy Beast (2000)

A slightly surreal twist on the gangster movie

[8/10 · 17 September 2005]

Ray Winstone seems to have made a career for himself playing psycho hard nuts, but there was surprisingly more humanity to his role as Gal in this film, even a tenderness. It was the classical actor Ben Kingsley who had the real nutter role. Both were played admirably even if Kingsley still looked a bit like a librarian despite his short hair cut, tattoos and mockney accent.

Anybody who has seen the excellent 70's movie Villain with Richard Burton will recognise that Ian McShane who had a pretty boy role in that film to Burton's Kray style gangster, gets to ham it up this time as the bad gangster himself. He was quite menacing and the scene with Winstone and James Fox towards the end contained a shocking surprise.

The plot was fairly standard fodder, the retired and Spanish ex-pat gangster Winstone pressed into one last job by his former colleagues. The twist being that the former colleague Kingsley, actually has an ulterior motive.

Add in the always excellent but sadly underused Amanda Redman and a slightly comic turn from Cavan Kendall and you have a stellar British cast.

I got the impression that I was watching a play rather than a film at times and the language will not impress your maiden aunt, but overall it was enjoyable. A few surreal dream sequences mark this film as something more than just the standard swearing, violence and big heist flick.

All in all very enjoyable and worth watching but not a classic.

Reign of Fire (2002)

Watchable but not hugely memorable

[7/10 · 9 September 2005]

Firstly I'll say that I enjoyed the film and it kept my interest to the very end but ultimately it was clichéd and unoriginal in most respects.

The characters and settings will be fairly familiar to anybody who has ever watched an apocalyptic movie such as Mad Max, The Postman etc... Like the brooding hero partly responsible for setting the whole thing off, his wise cracking second in command, the driven lost soul but good hearted American etc.. etc..., Nothing new.

The dialogue was slow, not very snappy and I was constantly hoping for things to errr catch fire, but they never did.

A saving feature was the special effects. Seeing the dragon in its full glory at the end will no doubt have terrified many children and the odd adult and it was excellent. But the weak and obvious plot and dialogue did not save the movie, or make it worth a second view.

Thunderheart (1992)

Important and entertaining

[9/10 · 2 September 2005]

This is a film all should see. The depiction of the native Americans and the hardships that they face was true to life. They were portrayed as real people with good sides and faults rather than the stereo typical clichés.

The "conquering" of the Indians and the appropriation of their land by the white people was not conveniently ignored or falsely sanitised like you might see in a 1950's movie.

There was good acting all around and Val Kilmer shows that he is more than just a macho pretty type by bringing some depth and honesty to the role. I was touched when he admitted to having been ashamed of his heritage when he was a child. That will ring true for many of us brought up in minorities surrounded by a white majority.

Grahame Greene was the outstanding show but the normally likable Fred Ward's role was under developed in my opinion. Sam Shepard was good as well.

Mysticism, politics and cultural interaction all come to play in an eventually uplifting movie. The end "trade" scene and awakening of the Kilmer character left me feeling good.

Total Reality (1997)

A very poor film

[4/10 · 21 June 2002]

This film is striking only in its banality and use of cliches. Sadly it was obvious throughout up until the ending. But don't be mistaken into thinking that it ended strongly. Only a little unexpectedly, though nothing worth watching the thing through for.

From the taciturn and wronged hero, to the Germanic baddy, to the expendable team, the characters were entirely wooden and obvious. The two FBI agents Smith and Wesson (geddit?) gave some hope of humour, but that came to nothing.

I am a big science fiction fan but it is hard to find any redeeming quality in this film. A turkey!

Official Denial (1993 TV Movie)

Mostly Good

[6/10 · 7 June 2002]

Official Denial has much to recommend it and also much that I did not like. The negative points were the risible aliens/spaceship/cardboard soldiers/"spirit world" native American, all of which appeared to be out of a comic strip. Also Dirk Benedict who was totally unbelievable as a bad guy. The special effects also gave the film a feeling of a childrens TV programme.

The positive side was the fine and sympathetic performance of Chad Everett as the General and also the ending which was quite ingenious. It was great to see the power shift from the Everett character to the Parker Stevenson character, who knew the secret at the end. The secret itself was a nice touch as well and ended the movie on a high note.

Erin Gray looked pretty throughout but was not entirely convincing as the long suffering wife with the "fruit loop" husband. Although she appeared worried she did seem to take it in her stride a little too easily. "My husband is a nut", "Ho hum", "Just another daily happening". That was not quite believable although she gave a good performance, as did Stevenson.

There were some good one-liners and a healthy cynicism about governments and the military. The plot was strong also and it did all come together at the end. All in all this is a film to watch a second time but certainly not a classic, for me.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

A dreadful disappointment

[4/10 · 24 May 2002]

With a brilliant theme, tens of millions of pound, a superb cast and an adoring public in rapt anticipation this movie should have been a cinematic triumph. Seldom have I been so disappointed.

Whilst the settings were lovely and the film was writ large, it was entirely boring and overly long. I was praying for the end a long time before the "conclusion" and my young niece and nephew had already fallen asleep. The problem was that the plot was boring and the director never really managed to bring the book alive. Nothing of consequence seemed to happen and the film just meandered along with pretty scenes. I could not get involved.

One of the most annoying things about the film was the ending. It just seemed to stop. It was as if the film was just a starter served up before the main course. That sort of thing is okay as long as a film exists in itself as a piece. This seemed to be more of a 3 hour trailer.

Whilst pretty, this film is a real lemon and I will only watch the followup when it goes to video.

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

A truthful and funny parody.

[10/10 · 24 May 2002]

Most people like me who are reaching their mid-thirties are likely to have watched thousands, or maybe even tens of thousands of movies. Unlike my parents, we are part of a generation brought up on television. That being the case with so many fine movies around it is difficult for me to pinpoint one as an absolute favourite. But this film would certainly have a good shot.

Peter Sellers and George C Scott probably give the performances of their rich careers. After having now watched the movie 30 or 40 times I still find myself laughing at the deadpan and stiff English Officer Group Captain Lionel Mandrake. Sellers as the President is entirely believable and as the German scientist Strangelove both funny and frightening. Scott is hilarious as the paranoid war-mongering General. The scene where the President asks him "have they got a chance?" will live in my memory forever. Keenan Wynn, Slim Pickens, Stirling Hayden and the lovely Tracey Reed are all simply excellent in support even though Wynn and Reed only have cameos. The fact that some of the jokes are obvious and telegraphed and that it sometimes descends into slapstick, only adds to the effect.

It is funny and a parody but it quite accurately portrays a number of serious points. 1, The paranoia of politicians and the military. 2, The fear that technology was starting to rule men rather than the other way around. 3, The well known, but not talked about much reliance that the American military placed upon recruited former German scientists.

Whilst the film is a parody and meant as a comedy I believe it hurt the American political and military establishment so much that they banned it in the States for a while. Fail-Safe, that other excellent nuclear accident film was released around the same time and suffered by comparison to Strangelove.

The film is a salutary reminder that at almost anytime our future and safety could possibly be in the hands of people who are unstable, or machines that are far from reliable.

Virtual Nightmare (2000 TV Movie)

Small Town American Nightmare

[7/10 · 23 May 2002]

On viewing Virtual Nightmare numerous other films came to mind. Total Recall, The Stepford Wives, The Wizard of Oz and also The Matrix. Despite this, the film did not seem that derivative and for me exists in its own right as an original.

The premise underlying the film was more believable to me than The Matrix, which I could not take seriously. The fact that there were no really big names in the film added to the charm and I was not focused on a Bruce being Bruce, or Arnie being Arnie. I could concentrate on the film itself rather than the star.

There were a few surprises along the way and I never lost interest for a minute. Though having said that there were some gaps in the plot and the ending was ultimately a little unsatisfactory, in the same way that Total Recall was. It was not quite up to the high standard of what had gone before.

The film seemed to convey to me the dangers of over eager consumerism and small-minded indifference to anything beyond our own doorstep. I would certainly watch it a second time in the near future and maybe again sometime in the distant future, but for me it is not a film to watch over and over again. Highly enjoyable though and evidence that you do not need a huge budget or a big name to create something worthwhile.