Taking Woodstock

I managed to get an afternoon off work due to the school going on fire and everyone being given the rest of the day off. Taking this as a sign from some random deity that I was being overworked (despite it being a day when I had no lessons all afternoon anyway), I took the opportunity to head into town and see a film or two.

Harry Brown

The timings worked out well for me to walk right into Harry Brown which certainly lived up to the trailer. This is one of the best films I’ve seen this year and proves that Michael Caine is every bit the actor he ever was.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Harry (Caine) is a pensioner living on a really dodgy housing estate. One of his OAP friends is killed by scum on the streets, the police aren’t helping and Harry used to be in the army…

The opening scene, filmed as if by a scrote on a moped, is both harsh and harrowing. It sets the tone for this dark film perfectly. There is tension throughout, uniformly superb performances and great direction. You really want to reach into the screen and batter the chavs – kudos to the actors playing them.

For a film to fill you with revulsion in the way this does is testament to all those who worked on it. The only bad thing about it is that it’s too realistic – not a fault of the film itself, but of life in Britain these days. There is simply nothing in it that couldn’t (perhaps even doesn’t) happen in this sad state we call real life.

Yes, that’s a depressing review but that’s how the film makes you feel. But that’s the point. It makes you feel.

Harry Brown is so gritty you could use it to make the entire length of the M1 safe to drive along during the frostiest of winters. It’s harsh, hard-hitting, taught… and British.

So I guess we do have something to be proud of in this country after all.

Taking Woodstock

Off the other end of the scale we have Taking Woodstock directed by Ang Lee who’s most recently famous for gay shepherd chick-flick Brokeback Mountain that I avoided like the plague after sitting through the first 15 minutes in Phuket.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: a Jewish boy, Jake (Henry Goodnam), sees a chance to get a concert going on land near his parents’ motel to drum up trade for the summer. Things get ever so slightly out of hand…

Apparently if you remember Woodstock then you weren’t there, but there’s enough documentation around it to allow Lee to make a pretty good “this is how it happened… maybe” film. The film is “based on” some stuff or other and how true it all is is anybody’s guess. However, what’s important is that it makes both a good story and a good film.

Imelda Staunton is fantastic as the Russian Jewish mother who seems to hate the entire world and is probably the best character in the film. Seeing as there are Jewish people in the film, they are legally obliged to find a part for Eugene Levy and he pretty much plays Eugene Levy. Enigmatic at first, then turns out to have some smarts after all.

It’s a great film to look at and has its feelgood moments. One thing it’s lacking, though, are downers. What little hiccups appear through the film – townsfolk rebelling, teen nazis trying to cause trouble, mafia protection trying to muscle in, council officials with health violations – all are dealt with so swiftly that it just seems pointless including them in the plot.

What could have been a film about an event, and as such ended up being more of a documentary, ends up focussing on the characters and this makes it much better. We see most of it through Jake’s eyes which makes it all the more interesting as the whole thing is astounding to him.

I particularly liked the little bits in the background and short sequences which are based on classic footage and images of the event. Top of these has to be the three nuns finally agreeing to raise their fingers in “peace” signs. It’s right in mid-background of one scene.

Oh, and there are boobies. And other bits. Which is a bonus.

One thing, though – does Ang Lee really have a thing for guys kissing? Seriously, don’t let him do a kids’ movie.

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Film Wednesday

                          

The original Get Carter with Michael Caine, that is. Not the (apparently) awful Stallone remake? Or failing that, have you lived anywhere on Tyneside in the last thirty or so years? If you can answer “yes” to either, then you’re likely aware of the god-awful eyesore that is the Gateshead multi-storey car park.

Well, the good news is that it’s finally getting pulled down this year. The local council have put special lighting on it in an attempt to make it look better in it’s final few months, but as far as I can tell it’s just a huge lump of now-colourful concrete.

I do remember as a kid that we used to park there when we went to Tesco and Shopping City. I always wondered why the stairwell on the top two floors had iron railings to stop people falling or jumping out. As if you’d be fine propelling yourself off the ledge of the other ten-or-so storeys. It’s now Tesco who’re paying for the demolition so they can build a new hypermarket there, with a cinema and so on. Gateshead needs a brush up – it has since I was a kid. If I recall, one of the problems with demolishing the car park was the number of shops underneath it which would have to be relocated. I’m wondering if that’s happened, or if Tesco’s just bought them all out.

Either way, I hope the facelift the town gets is worth all this hassle. Sometimes history has to go – because it’s too damn ugly. Now, will someone kindly start working on getting rid of the similarly monstrous concrete car park on the other side of the Tyne Bridge?

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Seen Get Carter?