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Reviews
Churchill: The Hollywood Years (2004)
Worse than the Blitz
**Might contain spoilers, although i can't believe that it's possible to spoil this rubbish** The mere fact that this film currently has a rating of 5.3 is a joke. It deserves no more than 2. It's a useless film, lacking any humour and most of all any story. The idea itself isn't the worst. Do a comedy where Winston Churchill was an flashy American rather than the strong and alcoholic British war leader we all know and respect. To take this half decent idea and turn it into the single worst comedy of all time is unforgivable. Most of the so called comedy performances are woeful, Vic and Bob - who once used to be funny! - are pathetic. There is hardly any story, and what story there is either makes no sense or is so bad you'd rather it wasn't there at all. Christian Slatter! You're having a Barry!!!! Just about everything in this film stinks, even the title stinks. The one joke which doesn't want to make you vomit your face off involves your stereotypical British failure of transport. Don't expect it to make you laugh, or even chuckle, you may rise a little smile.
I purchased the DVD having been assured off a friend that it is funny, that person has since told me he was "having a laugh". I now refuse to speak to him. The DVD currently lies at the bottom of a pile of crap DVDs which contains woeful entertainment such as Extras, Teen Wolf Too (+ teen wolf, which is okay), Bo Selecta series 3, The day after tomorrow, Jaws 2, 3, 4 and Licence to Drive. Yes this film is worse than Jaws 3! I do plan on either burning it or perhaps giving it away, so if anyone wants this pile of crap then drop me an email, i'd be delighted to hand it over - so long as you don't hold me responsible for any negative effect it will have on your brain - and i'd be delighted to pay the postage to get rid of the rubbish.
..So yeah, i think this film is useless. If i could give it Zero it'd get zero, but since the lowest i can give it is 1, that is what it's getting. It doesn't even get an extra point for being "so bad, it's good" because quite frankly, its so bad its worse than bad. We're talking Santa with Muscles here, kids.
The Grimleys (1999)
Fantastic and rare!
The Grimleys was something very rare, it was a good ITV sitcom! The first two series were brilliant. The third lost some as - in my opinion - Doug 'Dynamo' Digby was the best thing on the show. The way he'd bully the kids during PE. Those days were before my time but i could see reflections of my own PE teachers and their superior attitudes in Doug Digby. The Brum (Birmingham) accent is always good for comedy - no offence - and classic lines of "ave yow been drinking ribeenah" said by Ms Titley to Gordon when he tried to grow a moustache, will live with me forever. It's not just the brilliant performances by Connelly (whom i could not stand before this), Holden and James Bradshaw, but there's several other characters who stand out. Noddy Holder as the nice teacher, Planer as the bone idle striking miner (or whatever he was supposed to do) and Darren cartwight as Gordons brother Darren were great characters and great performances.
Series 3 was funny but not a patch on the first two. The show had moved into the punk era, Ms Titley wasn't the innocent of the first two series, Doug Digby had died - a brilliant death sequence where effectively Gordon kills him (not deliberate, was in a sports challenge of some sort) and celebrates (not much sense there). Doug is replaced by Trebilcock who's a woodwork teacher and isn't very funny - i recall he always made his class make pencil boxes and for a coffin made them make a huge one. I didn't watch all of series 3 because it just wasn't the same. Still funny but when you consider what had come before it was hard to watch.
Alias Mrs. Jessop (1917)
Find it and you might like it!
It is impossible to see this film nowadays as it appears to have been lost somewhere in the vast emptiness of the early 1990s. I do remember watching it with my Uncle back in the 1980s on an old Betamax video. As a youngster seeing a black and white film usually meant one thing, it was boring, but in the case of Alias Mrs Jessop this couldn't be further from the truth.
The film is silent but the plot managed to keep a youngster (me!) entertained. The loose basis of the film is the good Mrs Jessop and the Evil Cousin Jessop are posing as one another and confusing the poor romantic interest of Good Mrs Jessop (the real one). It has funny moments and you do feel sorry for the male love interest (I cannot remember the name). Overall it's a decent watch and has some split screen action, which i'd imagine was pretty new back then. Give it a look.. if you can ever find it!
The Football Factory (2004)
About as realistic as Evertons European success chances
I sat down with a few cans of Stella to watch this film on DVD. By the end i was as bored as i could ever be. I'm a football fan of many years and have seen my fair share of 'real' violence outside and inside grounds in my time. With this experience i can honestly say the film is as unrealistic as they come. Football violence nowadays is usually restricted to stick throwing and girl slapping amongst 'men'. The film trys to paint hooligans as having a great laddish lifestyle, fast cars, fast fists and fast girls. The hooligans i've known in my time don't fit this bill, so i suggest the film is more based around drunken fools who get into scraps rather than hooligans.
The film never convinced me it was going anywhere. It reminded me of any anti-social behaviour based film, but happened to be loosely associated with football. The characters were weak and poorly acted. The storyline was as weak as the tea at Swansea City and the ending was up there with Guesthouse Paradiso fighting for the award of "rubbish ending of all time".
If you want to see football violence then go back to the years when it was really around (Nowadays it's just drunken girl slapping) so try watching ID. That's not a fantastic film but it's much better than this rubbish. (2/10)