Tag: Bob Hoskins

Snow White and the Huntsman

By إبن البيطار (Own work) [GFDL (www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia CommonsTime to take Little Miss to the cinema and this retelling of a Disney-fied classic seemed ideal.

Snow White and the Huntsman

“Lips red as blood. Hair black as night. Bring me your heart my dear, dear Snow White.”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Evil stepmother takes over a kingdom while the king’s true offspring tries to win it back

See it if you like: dark fantasy flicks which focus as much on story as spectacle

Gillian had been wanting to see this since she eyed the poster in the cinema. Little Miss had, I think, seen a trailer on the telly. I was pretty much just along for the ride. Funnily enough it was the second film in two days we’d seen with Charlize Theron in it (after yesterday’s Prometheus) – and it very almost has Michael Fassbender as he was considered for the role of the Huntsman.

Now this is a story that all of you will have heard before, and which virtually everyone will have enjoyed in its cartoon form. There are certainly parallels to this version (Snow White’s costume early in the film and her relationship with wildlife, for instance), but the tale twists and turns in different ways. The scriptwriters had a very different vision and some excellent ideas for bringing the tale to life. A shining example is the evil stepmother’s magic mirror which melts and appears in humanoid form that only she can see.

The effects, in fact, steal the show. They’re imaginative and seamless. From the creatures in the magical forest sequence to the dwarves (of which there are actually eight…). Rather than taking the easy route of hiring eight people of diminutive stature, the director has opted for some very well known names and some fantastic jiggery-pokery to make them appear very realistically miniaturised. I was sat there for a good few minutes trying to convince myself that it was actually Bob Hoskins up there. And Nick Frost. And Ray Winstone. And Ian McShane.

Visually, then, it’s great. The story is well enough known in one for to be easy to follow, and all the better for the fact that it’s a new (to me at least) version. If there’s one thing that lets it down it’s the pacing. I found things to be a little drawn out at times. While the action sequences, and there are a lot of them, were bursting with excitement, the dramatic scenes were a little slow and made the film really feel like all of its 127 minutes. Having said that, Little Miss enjoyed the whole thing and it must have been good for an 11 year old to sit right through without complaint.

Certainly the cast give it their all with Kristen Stewart being perfect as the titular character and Chris Hemsworth convincing as the man sent, at first, to hunt her down. Feminists will appreciate that Snow White is no shrinking violet saved by a handsome prince in this version, instead being more of a Joan of Arc character gaining strength as the tale progresses.

I tend to find myself agreeing with the current average score on IMDB – around 7/10. With a little better pacing, it could have jumped up to an 8, but it’s still pretty good and shouldn’t disappoint. The 12A rating is spot on, too. The violence isn’t grisly, it’s very much a fantasy piece, and there’s no real nudity (a bare back is about as much as you see).

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Wall Street 2 / Made in Dagenham

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

Two-film Saturday again. I popped over to the Cineworld in Edinburgh to chill out and forget the world for a few hours. First up on today’s list:

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

“Why don’t you start calling me Gordon?”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Young upstart financier finds himself engaged in corporate corruption, and engaged to Gordon Gekko’s daughter.

Oliver Stone returns, bringing the iconic character of Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) back for a second airing some 23 years after the original. Wall Street was, and still is, an iconic piece of film-making, exposing all that was wrong with the financial world at that time. This sequel attempts to do the same, focussing on events of the last couple of years.

The films kicks off with Gekko being released from prison while his estranged daughter Winnie (Carey Mulligan) is shacked up with a fledgling financier, Jake Moore (charisma vacuum Shia LaBeouf). The bank Jake works for starts to crumble, his mentor and boss Louis (superbly played by Frank Langella) tops himself and Jake finds himself “teaming up” with Gekko in a bid to find out what happened to start the whole mess.

LaBeouf is the odd one out in this film as he’s capable, but just not that great. Given his past roster has included being eye candy for girls in the awful fourth Indiana Jones film, and the teen-kid from both Transformers movies it does surprise me to see him in a “serious” role. He’s OK as far as it goes, but just doesn’t really carry it off that well.

Douglas is, of course, excellent. Slimey, sleezy… and you never quite know if he’s being genuine which does lend itself well to the plot. Langella, as I mentioned, was superb – probably the best actor in the film.

It’s a tad under two hours long, but manages not to flag right the way through and the story carries on right until the very end with little “fluff” hanging off the plot. Having said that, there are few major surprises as we go through other than the very end which is – in honesty – a little weak.

Perhaps not as powerful a film a the original, and mainly as we are now as a public somewhat more informed of what happens in the financial world. After the revelation that was Gekko’s first appearance we have discovered that sharks like that aren’t just movie characters and villains in books. On the flip side, it makes things all the more believable.

The reviews I heard on the radio yesterday weren’t all that favourable, but I enjoyed it. In fact, I think I’m going to try and find a copy of the original to watch. It’s been a long time and I’d like to compare them.

Made in Dagenham

“Unskilled, my arse!”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Company pays peanuts to women, they go on strike, **** hits fan, world is changed.

Based on the real events of 1968, Made in Dagenham follows the story of a couple of hundred female workers who downed tools and forced first the world’s largest motor manufacturer, and then the British government to change the law relating to sexual equality.

The film begins with the gears already in motion, the women threatening to turn off their sewing machines unless they are given a better pay grade. On their side is foreman Albert (Bob Hoskins) and he drafts Rita O’Grady (Sally Hawkins) in as a right-hand-woman. They also allegedly have the support of the union, characterised by the slothful Monty Taylor (Kenneth Cranham).

Meetings go from bad to worse, and the women walk out causing problems further down the production line as the new “Escort” has no seats to fit into it. As the situation blows out of proportion, men are laid off, factories close and Ford execs are shipped to the UK to try and deal with both the workers and our government.

Top two cast members for me have to be Richard Schiff (Toby from TV’s The West Wing, looking surprisingly young without a beard) as one of the execs, and Miranda Richardson as then First Secretary of State  Barbara Castle. She really does bossy and shouty very well, and I confess I can’t see her without thinking of her as the Queen in Blackadder II.

The story twists and turns with both high and low moments. The women’s demands increase from “a bit more cash” to “equal pay” back in the day when women were routinely paid a fraction of the amount that men were for the same work. Council estate hardship is compared to posh house luxury as Rita befriends the wife of one of the factory bosses (played by a damn hot Rosamund Pike), giving another facet to the story as women’s domestic suffering is also highlighted.

There’s a fair bit going on here and on the whole it’s played in a lighthearted way, but it’s a fantastic story boiled down to a little over ninety minutes. How close it is to the actual events is down to the historians to tell me, but it’s a very entertaining dramatisation and I’d highly recommend it. Another victory for British cinema.

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