Quick Movie Review: King Of Comedy

9/10

I want to belittle all of Martin Scorsese's work - believe me. Anyone responsible for Gangs Of New York, a self indulgent, bizarre and overlong waste of time, should get a bit of a beating at every opportunity, but today I'm reduced to merely referencing that later film obliquely, since all you can do is stand and applaud King Of Comedy, a film that is just plain darn good.

Damn that guy.

This one is an opportunity for Robert De Niro to act outside his usual casting and get his teeth into a rare "loser" role. He plays Rupert Pupkin, a guy obsessed with getting famous and those with fame, most particularly Jerry Lewis' Letterman/Leno alike.

Also in the mix is Sandra Bernhard as a particularly creepy and obsessed fan who has a more "base" ambition.

The sheer amount of damage these people display, and which is superbly acted, is quite breathtaking. We are in the presence of two or three great acting performances while watching this film.

In fact, De Niro has never been better - astonishing as you'd imagine in such a tough role.

The journety of this film is the main thing, so I'm not going to spoil any of it, but take my word for it - it should be on your "to see" list.

This is a quick review since Mark Kermode mentioned it earlier, and I don't want to seem like a bandwagoner!

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Movie Review: Crank

5/10A

You know, again it is the case that this particular example of mental film-making is so aware of its limitations, so glories in its excesses and so exceeds all conceivable limits of tasteful understatement it is hard to give it anything other than a cautious endorsement.

Lets be clear from the start - this is not a mature film. It is not one that you will walk away from feeling your time was well spent in a culturally bettering way or with a better understanding of the human condition.

It follows the fabulously monickered Chev Chelios (Jason Statham) who wakes up to find that he has been poisoned, and he decides to go out and get revenge on his killer before the venom finishes him off.

This is vaguely reminiscent of an old movie I recall, made in the fifties or sixties called, I believe, DOA, in which a man comes to police station in a similarly terminal condition and tries to lead the police to his killers before he expires.

Crank is nowhere near so civically or legally minded.

To stave off the effects of the drug, Chelios is forced to keep his heart rate up, doing this through the effects of hard drugs, destructive and ridiculous car chases, punch ups and in one memorable instance, sex with his doped up girlfriend in the middle of a public square in Chinatown.

For this reason it is hard to really sympathise with the crazy self destruction of Statham's character, and "The Stath" is hardly the most sympathetic of actors anyway, coming over more like one of the carcasses of meat Rocky used to punch, rather than Balboa himself.

Still, it's an enjoyable thrill ride in the same vein as the likewise plot-deficient Shoot-Em-Up, and while I preferred the latter film mainly because of its cast (Clive Owen and Paul Giamatti) that knocks the socks off this one.

It's still an enjoyable way to spend some time, and follows through with its plot to the logical conclusion.

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Quick Movie Review: Clueless

5/10

An enjoyable romp loosely based on Jane Austen's Emma, Clueless was watched by me purely because it has Paul Rudd in it and some outrageously short skirts.

Boasting committed comedy performances and with a reasonably honest sense of its own intelligence I enjoyed it, without being too overwhelmed by any particular sequence or character. Not to be avoided like the plague, just don't feel too excited to see it.

Now that IS a quick review.

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Quick Movie Review: Bounce

5/10

I'm going to be cautiously kind to Bounce.

I switched off Ghosts of Mars and there was Henstridge again, though acting for real - and after the earlier film anything was going to look good.

It's the sort of movie you can pretty much sleep through and not miss any major plot points, but I have a certain degree of good will towards it for at least making an overture to breaking the centuries old chains of Romantic Comedy criteria.

Ben Affleck's high fling ad-exec decides to give his air ticket away in order to spend a night with Natasha Henstridge; the beneficiary being recently a humiliated playwright who wants to get home to sell Christmas trees with his son and see his family.

The plane crashes, and Affleck's character is all but destroyed by survivors' guilt - descending into alcoholism and despair, before finally being admitted to rehab after a disastrous performance at an awards dinner.

As part of Alcoholics Anonymous (which, incidentally, I didn't realise was quite so God-oriented) the members are encouraged to seek out those they have "wronged" and apologise. Not really caring that the whole thing is not really is fault, Affleck seeks out the family of the playwright only to find that he was married to the ever-perky Gwyneth Paltrow.

From the very moment he doesn't tell her the truth immediately, the film is seemingly on rails - with one major difference. The ending is not a universally, unquestionably happy one, though redemption is sought and maybe achieved.

Affleck and Paltrow are not two of my favourite actors, but after the horrors of Ghosts Of Mars, I was glad to see something that does the job as required, even if not being particularly special in the process.

As such, a classic 5/10 contender and vastly superior to the similarly plane crash premised Random Hearts, a lousy Harrison Ford snoozefest from many years ago.

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Movie Review: Ghosts Of Mars

2/10

It is something of a running joke with me that three words in particular can send me running in terror from any theatre, those I saw on a Cornwall theatre box office noticeboard.

Those three terrifying words are;



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New



Musical.

Now I can say that the movie based equivalent of this rule of thumb is "John Carpenter's" - if ever there was a man whose very name was a testament to absent minded, brainless mediocrity it must be the erstwhile film-maker behind the classic Halloween and its first sequel, as well as more lovable than they are good romps like Escape From New York or Big Trouble In Little China.

It seems that at a point somewhere around 1990 Carpenter's mercurial talent finally dribbled away and led to such embarrassing, stillborn monuments to wasted budgets as "John Carpenter's Vampires" or this outrageous misfire.

For me, the title "Ghosts Of Mars" (originally "John Carpenter's Ghosts Of Mars", of course) conjures up a fascinating movie - a study, perhaps of mankind coming to terms with the guilt of violating the stasis of a dead world, perhaps making wondrous discoveries and seeking out a new meaning to their existence as they spread to the stars.

But then, of course, you read the cast list - Ice Cube, Natasha Henstridge, Pam Grier, Clea Duvall & Jason Statham are not the cast for a meaningful look into our souls.

In fact, I'm not sure any of them are capable of a meaningful look if their next straight to video release depended on it.

Let's get the story out of the way first. In the sort of move sci fi films take when exposition would be too much effort, we are front loaded with a lot of information regarding a colony set up on Mars - that "terraforming" is not yet finished (for non geeks, the practice of "terraforming" is the practice of rendering an uninhabitable planet, habitable) and that for no discernible reason, the society is Martiachal in nature, perhaps because of a surfeit of female actors being available, possibly to try and make a point. Whatever point they may have been trying to make, though, is hindered by the classic decision to have lots of homosexual female characters, and make poor old Statham randy as all hell - because naturally in a male-dominated society many authority figures are aggressively gay and women are always trying to talk men into having sex with them while working. Yeah.

In this world, a strange force has been unleashed that possesses the minds of people, turning them into savage, warlike maniacs - for the look, think Duran Duran's "Wild Boys" video with more blood - who chop off non-possessed people's heads and burn up the colonies of the "invaders".

So here's what the film is saying.

Er... nothing.

While it may become humanity to have a little respect and say "we're not the first people to have lived on this planet", why bother when you can have gunfights instead? You take a concept as lofty as "Ghosts Of Mars" and reduce it to a four set gunfight with lousy acting and hackneyed plot devices. The leads have little to no chemistry and the supporting cast are here for paycheques only.

Only Jason Statham, playing to type, comes out with any kind of credit, if only for sticking to his role faithfully and not being too hateful. Henstridge displays all of the emotional and dramatic range you would expect from the woman whose greatest role was as a sex obsessed alien in Species.

As for the action sequences, Bond in the 60s looked better - the grenade explosions here are depicted almost indentically to the classic "a bit of a bang and a guy bouncing off a trampoline" formula.

Plus it has Clea Duvall in it! She was in How To Make A Monster for christ's sake! And she's in most of this one! What the hell?

Many bad movies are destined to become cult classics. This is not one of them. If I can teach you anything, dear reader - it is to put this list in your "never watch" file.

Ouch. Anyone's career would take a hit if responsible for this - and John Carpenter has Vampires on his conscience too - maybe it's time to hang up the viewfinder, Johnno.

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Quick Movie Review: Zombies: Wicked Little Things

3/10

The story is, a mum and her two daughters move to a creepy old house because they are broke after the death of the kids' dad - and he left them the home in the will.

There are lots of problems with this movie, but I won't waste your time making you read all of them - I'll stick to the highlights.

First of all, it is not a "zombie movie" per se. Of course, it concerns the return of some dead, wronged children from a mine shaft where they were left to die by a very bad person many years before, but they don't really follow any of the traditions or conventions of the Zombie movie (they talk, for example, as well as carrying weapons...)

Second, while all the acting is, to put it nicely, reasonable, no characters are likable or sympathetic - the mother is a terrible parent, leaving her young daughter alone for long periods only to be surprised when she is not there any more when she returns home - this happens at least three times. The youngest daughter is close to sympathetic, but is barely present, presumably due to school commitments (a high budget is not one of the film makers problems) so we get very little - the older daughter is as hackneyed an older teen as you could imagine, concerned with coolness, boys and a bit of reefer (guaranteed death to anyone caught smoking it and enjoying it, btw). Yawn.

Characters are introduced and killed off just as fast, the "zombies"' make up makes them resemble nothing as much as depressed Clowns and there is absolutely, definitively, no depth.

In fact, the only reasonably effective sequence is at the very end, where the bad man gets his comeuppance (actually it's the bad man's grandson or something - bad luck, Junior!) and our leads get drenched in his blood from the loft where he's hiding. No - it's not that good a sequence, but I'm clutching at straws.

The real tragedy is, unlike The Strangers or Alone In The Dark, it is just not a film worthy of a hideously negative review - it is too well made to be mocked or entertaining through sheer incompetence, but too bad to enjoy.

There is no reason to see this, so don't. I don't know how much clearer your faithful reviewer can be.

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Movie Review: Beyond Re-animator

5/10A

Oh dear - if you don't want to read about how silly and hilarious this outrageous tongue in cheek horror movie is or some of the more nasty bits, don't read this review.

The origins of Re-Animator lie with that well adjusted H.P. Lovecraft fellow, who wrote the original tale ("Herbert West - Re-Animator") as a satire on Frankenstein and the like, playing up the melodrama to comedic levels while still obtaining creepiness from the premise and his usual way with words.

The original film dispensed with much of what little subtlety there was and went down the broader, more comedy horror angle.

Comedy horror is a weird genre and it is best done with absolute conviction. Those of us unfortunate enough to have seen Scary Movie know that playing it with open mockery just won't work.

To this end, Re-Animator's great strength was in its utter conviction to seeing its logic through in grisly and horrible fashion - the most legendary sequence is a severed head performing cunnilingus on a captive victim - probably the nastiest idea in what is already a pretty icky movie. Its next major strength was its lead, Jeffrey Combs - who many will recall from The Frighteners where he played another strange oddball character. An absolute master at delivering utter nonsense with Shakespearian conviction (Nanoplasm and re-animating the dead are hard sells for even the most talented of actors.) he is the giant of a planet around which all the subsequent nonsense revolves, and it's hard to imagine anyone else carrying this film.

As for the story itself, the pretext exists purely to allow the now incarcerated Herbert West to get up to his old tricks and use his "formula" to bring the dead back to life. In this picture he has an accomplice in the form of a traumatised young doctor, obsessed with the idea of returning people from the dead since his sister was killed by one of West's creations.

And the whole thing takes place in a prison, presumably (if not intentionally) in Mexico, since the entire crew, most of the cast and several of the ADR folk are clearly from south of the border where, coincidentally, films are cheaper to make. (wink)

It's an odd prison, overseen by a warden who, once you've realised he resembles nothing as much as the lost Chuckle brother, it's all you can think about (we were shouting "not Chico Chuckle!" every couple of minutes). It also features a single female staff member, a nurse, who wears nothing beneath her smock but underwear, since that's policy, clearly, in an all male prison(!)

Naturally, when West and his little buddy start bringing folk back from the dead, the same old problems arise - the newly undead are just mindless monsters, good for nothing but violence. West believes he has a solution in the form of "Nanoplasm", a sort of life force or soul substitute that he has been harvesting from the recently killed, so starts experimenting with using this - with unintended consequences, not at all surprisingly.

From this point on the film is pretty much on rails, and nothing really unexpected happens in the plot (ie: it all goes to hell) but there are moments of crazed brilliance - the young doctor is beaten up by the reanimated corpse of his love, who all the while is begging him to kill her - the warden becomes crossed with a rat, and the sequence during the credits when a rat is fighting with a reanimated, er.... gentleman's privates was one of the most incredible laugh out loud moments I've seen in ages.

Poorly acted by all but the lead, badly directed - it's sole saving grace is in the physical effects (the usual get out clause for makers of horror films). They are breathtaking in their audacity, and even when played for laughs they still have a satisfying "ewww!" factor.

It's not big, it's not clever, and it's so far from sophistication it makes Little Chef look Michelin starred, but it was funny, and silly, and hit just the right note when I saw it.

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Quick Movie Review: I'm A Cyborg, But That's OK

5/10

Park Chan-Wook, maker of Oldboy, Lady Vengeance and Sympathy For Mr Vengeance, three excellent movies, if of questionable morals, makes a bit of a mis-step with this odd movie.

It concerns a young lady who, upon being traumatised by her Granny's commital to an asylum becomes comvinced she is a cybertnetic organism - a cyborg.

Cue a trip to an asylum herself at the behest of her daft and prejudiced (if not mad herself) mother.

There she meets all manner of crazy folk including a boy in a cardboard mask who steals things, a liar, a man convinced he has to apologise for everything etc etc

Unfortunately that is about it - of course she gets entangled romantically, and goes through ups and downs, but the whole thing resembles nothing so much as One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest with all the fun and plot removed. It has little message, few jokes, and stilted performances notable in their difference fromt hose in his earlier films.

I laughed at a couple of bits, and her fantasies of acting out her cybernetic powers were ok, but I also yawned twice and wasn't really sorry to see it end.

So, a classic 5/10 then.

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Movie Review: Victim

7/10

This is an exceptional movie, in the literal sense.

Made in 1961 , it tells a moral tale about what was known as "The Blackmailer's Charter", or the aged, christianity inspired anti-homosexuality laws that existed at the time.

According to imdb, it is the first english language film to use the word "Homosexual" at all!

Dirk Bogarde plays the barrister Melville Farr (outrageously decadent name!) presented with a problem when his lover commits suicide while being questioned about missing funds. The police suspect he was being blackmailed, and finding copious amounts of material concerning Farr the police are pretty sure what's going on. Thing is ; does Farr copme out and help trap the blackmailers - ruining his reputation and marriage in the process? Or should he maintain his reputation and burgeoning career by keeping silent?

While many others refused to play parts in the film because of the subject matter, Bogarde is intense and excellent as the central character although everyone else bar his wife is fairly two dimensional, in the style so prevalent at the time. As the wife, Sylvia Sym is excellent as the woman who loves a man who cannot love her back - capturing her torment and conflict perfectly.

As for the film's message, it's entirely anti-status-quo. While people's views are mixed from homophobic and archaic to more liberal, the coda and final speeches make it clear that these laws caused needless suffering and gave licence to hundreds of people to profit from what is in the end, hardly a choice on the victim's parts.

Now, as for the filmmaking itself, it's your typical kitchen sink drama level, no particular flashy camera moves or innovations in filmmaking, but solid as a rock.

I can recommend this to you purely for its originality in story. It's an importasnt, while not essential, part of film history.

I enjoyed it very much.

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Movie Review: The 40 Year Old Virgin

8/10

There's so many ways this movie could be appalling.

It could have gone for the main character as spotty greasy nerd with no social skills, but instead imbues is lead with a genuinely believable likability.

His quest to get the girl could have been uniformly crude, obvious and graphic, but instead it is more enjoyable and even, at the very end, strangely touching.

It might have had all the laugh-free gross out qualities of lame fare like Scary Movie, or in fact any film with a title in the " (noun) movie" format. In fact its humour comes from unexpected quarters, not the protagonists obvious ignorance in lovemaking, but from his relationships with those around him - and their journeys are as interesting as that taken by Andy (Steve Carell)

The supporting cast could have been obvious, selfish, two-dimensional or wooden. They are anything but. We have one of the most accomplished casts in modern comedy - Paul Rudd, Romany Malco, Seth Rogen (admittedly playing that Seth Rogen character) and Jane Lynch all add such skill to smallish parts that they lift the film up to next level.

Jane Lynch in particular as Andy's amorous boss is an absolute dream. Since Lynch is capable of reading a eulogy and making it funny she has outrageous fun with with her uber-creepy dialogue - at one point delivering a short piece of dialogue so perfectly I woke up the baby next door with my laughing (don't tell the dad, please, it took an hour to calm her down).

The dialogue in question, for those who have seen the film, was the "I'm very discreet" section culminating in some nasal acting... genuinely laugh out loud funny.

Catherine Keener is also excellent in what is on the face of it an unforgiving, unfunny part (the woman of his dreams? YAWN!) lending a sense of fragility and ridiculousness to the character while still making her believable as someone you might fall in love with.

Paul Rudd, too excels in the role of dumped lover, totally in denial about the failed romance that ended years ago.

But this is Carell's movie, and luckily we have the good side of Steve4 here - pathetic but sympathetic, slightly dopey yet likable, odd but believable. He has taken pains, clearly, to mould this character in the image of his standard fare. While this role doesn't take him out of his comfort zone, I do see him pulling a Robin Williams in a few years and adding to his performance in Little Miss Sunshine some more good dramatic roles.

As for the film, 40 Year Old Virgin manages to be silly without being condescending, funny without being overly crude, and touching without being mawkish. I loved it, in a silly way.

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