Category: Review

2012

2012 (film)
2012

Yes, yes, I know it’s Thursday and I saw the films on Monday. I just haven’t had much time to draft posts recently. With Monday being St Andrew’s Day and East Renfrewshire council really pushing the Homecoming celebrations we got the day off and I decided to use it partly to veg out at the cinema.

I’d hoped to catch up to 8 films over the weekend, but workload cut me down to two. First up:

2012

What a remarkably silly film. A lot of the impact of this insane effects-fest was lost on me as screen 7 at Cineworld in The Forge Shopping Centre is about the size of my old front room. I swear the TV I bought a few month ago is larger than the screen.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: the earth’s going to end, people panic, things explode or get washed away and the companies that sell software to make shonky CGI giggle into their bankbooks.

It’s Roland Emmerich, the guy who washed the world away in The Day After Tomorrow and blew up the White House in Independence Day. Only this time he’s not messing. Why blow up a few buildings when you can tilt an entire town on its side and drop it into the ocean?

This is a disaster movie on a grand scale. The shame is, the scale’s so big it’s just hard to comprehend and it seems to lose all impact as a result. Look at the classic disaster films like The Towering Inferno or The Poseidon Adventure (even the remake wasn’t bad). Big-name actors in a tight situation with peril at every corner and they could die at any time. Your wage bill had no say on whether you survived or not.

There is just no sense of peril in 2012 at all. At no point was I tensing up thinking “are they going to get out of this?” because they always do. There isn’t a bit of originality in it apart from the size of the thing.

John Cusack is adequate as the lead character – a divorced father who ends up trying to save his kids (very Tom Cruise in War of the Worlds). Danny Glover is adequate as the President of the USA. Woody Harrelson is adequate as a nutjob. Everyone’s adequate. It’s a plot-by-numbers.

SLIGHT SPOILERS: I rarely put these in so you’ve had a warning. This is like Independence Day with earthquakes and water. The President sacrifices himself to help save others. The White House explodes. A man saves his family. Someone gives an impassioned speech about humanity that brings everyone together.

It’s all been done before. And even the effects aren’t that great. They’re simply too big to be taken seriously. And despite all the money thrown at it, the limo in the early “chase” sequence still has all the realistic physical motion of one of the vehicles in PIXAR’s Cars.

But, you know, switch your brain completely into standby mode and it’s watchable. Just don’t even consider thinking about the pseudo-science involved. That way lies bad headaches.

[Next review in next post.]

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Broadband Genie

Broadband Genie
Broadband Genie

Joe’s made a couple of comments on some of my older posts and he asked me to have a look at his website. I admit, the first time he left a comments I thought “spam”…  but the fact is he read the blog post and wrote a pretty darn lengthy and appropriate response. Not the acts of a spammer, just of a guy who’s interested in blogs and happens to work for a web-based company.

I’ve been buried with coursework over the last few weeks and I’ve been meaning to review his site for ages, feeling guilty every time I saw the email reminding me “starred” in my inbox. So here it is!

Joe’s site is Broadband Genie and it is genuinely useful. It’s not so much a sales site as a consumer advice one and therefore I’m happy to give it the once over. Now is an ideal time to have a look, actually, as there’s a special section on all the package deals on mobile broadband being offered by a few of the netbook and laptop retailers.

I don’t think I’ve ever reviewed a website before, but here goes!

First impressions are good. It’s well-enough laid out that you could think it’s commercial. However, it isn’t. It’s funded by people clicking on links to providers once they’re decided – using the information on the site – which one they want to go with. The links are sponsored and BG get a little kickback.

Having looked through everything (well, a lot of it!) I’d say their claim to be unbiased is a true one. All the information you could need to decide on a UK broadband provider (home or mobile) seems to be here and in a nice, easily-readable format. There’s also a regularly-updated blog and a forum where you can air your views publicly.

If you’re in the market for a new broadband provider, this certainly seems to be a site worth visiting to help you come to a decision.

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Film Wednesday

Taking Woodstock
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 Saturday

Just for a change, a Saturday visit to the picture house and what a change it made crowd-wise. While I much prefer an empty theater (as people are generally selfish, noisy buggers in this country) it is good to see that the cinema is still a popular place to go. The queue was pretty big at 1pm, and by the time I walked past at 3pm I was glad I’d picked up the ticket for my second film in advance – the queue was out the door and up the street!

The Men Who Stare At Goats

Weird title, weird film. Apparently based on a weird book – which I actually remember seeing in the Popular Science section of Waterstone’s many years ago.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: a journalist with a failed marriage heads for Iraq to write a war story. On the way he encounters a retired soldier who claims to have been part of an elite psychic soldier outfit. And this is apparently based on a true story…

The main cast is astounding: George Clooney, Jeff Bridges, Ewan McGregor, Kevin Spacey… Robert Patrick is headlined, but he’s only in it for five minutes. They’re all damn good as well. McGregor managed to pull off a decent American accent without sounding stupid while Clooney pulls off stupid without looking… well, stupid.

This is a film about complete mentalists. It’s hard to tell where the line is drawn between docu-drama and complete fiction. I’d guess that the book is the same, partly as it just seems to far-fetched. Yet how unlikely is it that armies were throwing cash a potential psychic “weapons”?

There are laughs a-plenty, most of them quite dark. The fact that McGregor’s character ends up in a quest to become what the psi-ops regiment called a “Jedi” is not lost on the viewing public either.

Overall a good film that doesn’t outstay it’s modest running length.

Jennifer’s Body

The last decent female-based teen horror film was Ginger Snaps and that was released ages ago. Jennifer’s Body goes more down the “monster” than “werewolf” route but does it well with some great black humour. And two hot girls snogging.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Town bike Jennifer turns from slut to blood-hungry psycho, requiring the blood of scared teens to survive. Her best friend is the only one to know her secret and she doesn’t like it.

When I saw the trailers I thought “rubbish – move on”. Then I saw some reviews, and not just from the likes of Baz Bamigboy and Jonathan Ross‘s far less talented sibling who will say anything is the “Best film of 2009” if it gets them a free bag of popcorn. The schedule fitted in with my free time so I took a chance.

The film opens after the end of the main plotline with one of the characters putting us into the scene. The story then jumps to the beginning and is more or less linear from there except for a brief jump back to explain exactly what happened to Jennifer (Megan Fox). Fox, incidentally, is hot. Scorchy hot. I-would-give-a-limb hot. But credit must also go to co-star Amanda Seyfried who plays the frumpy best friend, Needy – “frumpy” in the sense that as soon as she takes off her glasses and shakes out her hair she’s also typically sexy.

Everything happens at a good pace with the characters not being too stereotypical. The gore isn’t over-the-top and the effects are good. What I liked most, other than the humour, is the way the two main characters act opposite each other and how Needy develops.

You can pretty much guess what happens, it’s the ending that’s fairly original. Although not a huge twist, it’s definitely well written.

Don’t avoid this film just because it has obvious eye candy in. Don’t get me wrong. Fox isn’t that great an actress, but her hotness is actually useful in this film. And you get to see her with her tongue down another hot chick’s throat. Admittedly this scene was made somewhat less erotic by one numpty in the cinema crying “YAY” in a dull monotone, resulting in a huge outburst of laughter and a smattering of applause.

Still, that’s a throwaway moment in the film in my opinion. The main reason to see it is Seyfried’s performance. And the poor jokes.

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The Merchant of Venice

William Shakespeare
His friends called him "Billy-boy". Maybe.

[There are loads of adaptations of this play – the version I watched is detailed here on the IMDB and here at Wikipedia]

The what now? That sounds like a Shakspeare play or something. Which it is. And this is the film review category which means I must have watched it. Which I did. Which is weird. Which it is.

That’s a lot of whiches. More, perhaps, than Macbeth. Watch it, though, I did.

Like it? Kinda.

I have a deep-seated loathing of Shakespeare. It’s nothing personal. I didn’t know the guy and he didn’t seem to stand for anything I disagree with. It’s predominantly to do with the complete ****er of an English teacher I had at school. The man had the ability to take something you held dear and make you loathe it with a passion simply so that you wouldn’t agree with him.

Imagine the sliminess that exudes from Nick Griffin. Put it into a character who looks more like a stretched tall English butler and you have an idea of what I’m getting at.

As a result, I built literary brick walls between myself and the Bard. And Chaucer as well, but in fairness that really is gobbledygook. This is a shame as, despite being in overly-flowery language, Shakespeare’s not that bad. You’d be amazed how many turns of phrase we use regularly that come from his plays.

One prime example – as it’s from The Merchant of Venice – is “a pound of flesh”. This is the payment that Shylock (itself a generic term for “Jew” which is somewhat less commonly used now) demands of Antonio should he default on a loan. We don’t use it for quite the same reason in the modern day, but the fact that a phrase used by a playwright over 400 years ago is still coined today – and by people who won’t have even heard of the work, let alone read it – is pretty impressive.

Now I’ll be honest. While watching the film, had I not been given a rough idea of the storyline and had a (prospective) English teacher sat with me pointing things out I would have missed a lot of the detail. The story itself isn’t too hard to follow, but for the uninitiated Shakespeare’s flowery dialogue (I guess scholars would call it “detailed prose”) is still hard to follow.

What this did allow me to do was something I don’t often manage – to concentrate on the performances. On how the words were delivered. Given that it was often hard to grasp their meaning, it was left to the actors to convey the emotions.

For that reason, this has to be one of Al Pacino‘s finest displays. I’ve always rated him. Like Morgan Freeman, he can be in a complete dud but you’ll always remember the parts with them in as they’re simply superb actors.

He plays Shylock in the adaptation I watched – the 2004 film directed by Michael Radford. Pacino’s monologue (“If you prick us, do we not bleed?” – that one) was positively wonderful. Jeremy Irons as Antonio is, again, a great actor though he really comes into the limelight during the final courthouse scene.

Would I go out of my way to watch another Shakespeare adaptation? Or even pay £30 or so for a theatre ticket? I don’t know. I still like my entertainment to be “easy”. I don’t mind thinking about something while I’m watching it, or afterwards. But having to read or be told about what happens prior to viewing so you can follow it still seems like too much hard work.

I have to thank Kat for convincing me to watch this one, if for no other reason than the aforementioned Pacino scene. It’s certainly given me a little more respect for the little bald guy with the ruff (Shakespeare, that is), and I’ve enjoyed doing some reading on Wikipedia about the play. I still think, though, I prefer my dramas in modern language.

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