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Sean_Preston
Reviews
Adam and Joe Go Tokyo (2003)
Adam and Joe: The BBC Years
Being a fan of the previous show, I was not impressed when I heard of the pairs plans to join the BBC and make a show about an excursion in Japan.
However, by the time the first episode had aired on BBC3, I was left setting the personal planner on the TV for next week (applauds 'series link'). It was the same irreverent, sly and quietly witty humour that had made the student fodder show of the late nineties a cult hit.
The shows followed Adam and Joe in their bid for (the tongue was firmly placed against the cheek) stardom and fame in Tokyo and indeed Japan. Though of course, the show was always about the comedy, with many guests, docu-segments and general foolhardiness.
Favourite moment? When Joe fed some awful seafood-based confectionery on a stick to a blindfolded Adam. "Think of it as a lolly... a dirty lolly." For those that never saw it, tough break kiddo. As it was a step up from the first show in truth, and the more recent Shock Video wasn't an excrement stain on a tissue, floating out to sea with a pile of sewage, by comparison.
Diarios de motocicleta (2004)
Above all, an engrossing road movie.
Innocent in it's political intent. In fact, devoid of everything you might pre-conceptually believe this movie to be about. In essence, what we have here is one of the best road movies ever made. Exploring the common themes of road movies; Journey (would you believe?), adventure and self-discovery (often found at it's greatest in road-movies, that stark contrast to external discovery exemplifies the discovery of ones self, I suppose).
The film is a subtle one, yet emotional. The film doesn't once try to manipulate drama or emotion in even the most obvious scenes. Instead, Gael García Bernal, one half of the terrible twosome that sexualised everything they did in 'Y Tu Mama Tambien', is given the burden of carrying the dramatic weight. And doesn't fail for a second.
As the credits rolled, I realized that I was surprised by what I had witnessed, this film, a film that was likely to be very good but with indulgent touches of preachiness and ugly amounts of pretence, was in fact a VERY good film that had the power to move me without obvious conventional manipulation or the political corruptness at hand.
The film was made in the best possible way. It cannot be more than 8/10, but that is more to do with the limitations of this type of story. However, I'd still consider this (alongside 'Eternal Sunshine OF The Spotless Mind' and the US/UK release of 'Hero') to be one of the films of the year.