The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3

Ok, so there's not been any posts for a while, I've been busy and frankly not in the mood to be typing lots after a days work of late, then the films get backed up, I've got a load of Stickies on my dashboard with titles and ratings, so I'll catch up eventually, but I digress...

The Taking of Pelham 123, a Tony Scott remake of The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, I

haven't seen the original, but I'll try to catch it at some point, just out of curiosity.

For the most part it's a reasonably entertaining action thriller, by the numbers stuff really, but engaging enough, John Travolta comes across suitably ruthless and unhinged, Denzel Washington doesn't show too much of his teeth until the end and maintains a reasonable 'everyman' persona.

The hostages on the train are essentially box-tickers and the rest of the police and MTA staff equally as non-descript, a lot of tightening up could've been done buy losing some of this peripheral fluff and focussing more on the Garber/Ryder relationship. Another thing that could've been lost is the wacky vision effects and crazy fast cuts during the opening sequence (which almost put me off watching the rest) and the movie's main action sequences, fine ramp up the cut speed to build the pace, but they went way over the top, especially as the action sequences were intercut with slower paced control room or train scenes, too jarring.

It's not great, but it's not utter shite either.

The Taking of Pelham 123 - 5/10

The International

Lone maverick vs the big corporation, stuff that's been done before, the corporation in question in this case, is an enormous bank who's interests lie beyond simply making phat amounts of bonus, and the lone maverick in question? Clive Owen, a man who's emotional range is only a notch above that of Steven Seagal.

It's okay though, we've got Naomi Watts to lend her superb acting talents

SO! Clive Owen vs a Bank. Yeah, that exciting. Well, when it gets to the Guggenheim, that's quite good, then it drops back into it's dull procedurals again. I'm not saying procedurals are dull, Zodiac for instance is awesome, this one, however is no Zodiac.

It goes a little bit Bond towards the end, with a stonking lair (I have to admit the location dept. found some cracking locations). Only a little bit though, then it get's dull again. Kind of disappointing ending, but lives up to the rest of the film.

The International - 5/10

Mirrors

Pretty much Kiefer Sutherland's big screen comeback, Mirrors, as I recall, got panned by critics and didn't perform too well either. Sorry Kiefer.

It's directed by Alexandre Aja, who previously directed the enjoyable The Hills Have Eyes remake and the ridiculous Switchblade Romance/High Tension/Haute Tension.

Keifer plays Ben Carter, an alcoholic ex-NYPD cop who takes a job as night security at the burnt out Mayflower department store, curiously the mirrors in the store are in pristeen condition. Soon enough some spooky goings on start occuring where the mirrors are concerned and people think Jack, sorry, Ben is going mental, but he's not, no! There is crazy stuff going on with the mirrors and only Jack, sorry again, Ben can solve the riddle.

Okay, so it's not a great film, my girlfriend thought it was "a load of crap" for instance. I however quite enjoyed it, sure it's a tad slow and disjointed, but it falls in well with films of a similar ilk and kept me interested for a couple of hours.


Mirrors - 6/10

Eden Lake

A British horror/thriller from the writer of My Little Eye (which everyone tells me is crap). For Eden Lake, take one part "horror-in-woods-slasher-flick" add one part Deliverance and a whole lot of chav.

I'm not sure if it's even attempting to make any sort of intelligent comment on chav culture in the UK, or whether it's just using it to try and give us a slightly different take on things, although in the grand scheme of things it's no different to the various American redneck slasher type movies that have come before.

It possibly would've been ok, after all there's not many decent british horror/thrillers out there, however it takes too long to get going (as I've said before, I'm all for slow builds, if they're done right), or maybe it's more that it feels like it takes too long, I don't really give a shit about the couple introduced as our leads and thanks to her whining and their joint decisions, I fail to care about them throughout.

The writing could be tighter, although, credit where credit's due, he sure can write chav, and the kids sure can act it.

When it does get going, it's not too bad though, there's kids committing violence (as much is explained on the back of the DVD), a fair bit of gruesomeness and a reasonably interesting end. However, because it's not totally clear as to where it's coming from, I'm not sure if it packs the punch it should.

Eden Lake - 5/10

Lakeview Terrace

Overall, not great, it's a by the numbers nasty-neighbour film, Samuel L Jackson, strolling through the performance of him playing himself and any attempt to get the audience to sympathise with him fails big time. Interesting to see Patrick Wilson in something else, I'd only seen him in Watchmen... he's roughly as downtrodden in this.

It's also a slooow film, it's set against the backdrop of the recent California wild fires, but apart from a bit of smoke they don't really show up til the end, more could've been made of this I feel, it certainly needs something to ramp up the tension a little.

(this was a recent watch, but I've got a load that I haven't typed up, so trying to catch up as well!!)

Lakeview Terrace - 5/10

Watchmen

Now I saw Watchmen around opening weekend over here in the UK, so it's been a good few weeks since then and I'm only just getting around to typing something up on it. To be honest, I did try pretty soon after but I couldn't figure out what to write about it...I still can't really, but here goes.

I'd read the graphic novel a while before seeing the film and, while I can see what all the fuss was about, it's not one of my favourite comics, it's a laborious read, weighed down with a lot of metaphor and waffle (yes I'll probably get flamed for that), and for once I actually agree with Jonathan Ross' view on the movie, in that it stayed TOO faithful to it's source material.

Whilst trying to satisfy the book's hardcore fanbase (and possibly Alan Moore as well..good luck) and depsite the changes that were made and the stuff that was left out, it's still a very heavy going film, very wordy and slow, with A LOT going on, I came out feeling that I possibly would've rather seen a stripped down plot, even adapted more for the film format, cos as a FILM, it's not the best narrative.

On the technical side of things, yet again Zack Snyder pulled out all the stops, he's clearly geeky about the technical side of things and pushing new technology, visually Watchmen is great, a real feast if you will, even if the speed ramped fights feel a little cliched now.

Watchmen - 7/10

Death Race

Good old Paul W.S. Anderson is back with another cheesy sci-fi movie, but then this is where he belongs. I remember enjoying Mortal Kombat, I remember feeling sick about AvP (I need to re-watch Event Horizon), so as long as you don't give him a well loved franchise, he should be able to pull off a reasonably entertaining action movie.

Add The Stath to the equation, especially Stath in a car, and things are looking up. Take this film at face value, it's a Paul W.S. Anderson remake of a Roger Corman (prod.) movie, it's not Citizen Kane.

It's stupid, cliched, stuffed full of the crappy 'reality tv' message that seems to be popular at the moment (do people forget The Running Man??), but at the end of the day, it's a big car chase, cars with big guns, that'll do me!


Death Race - 7/10

Eagle Eye

I heard a fair few people slagging this off when it was in cinemas, frankly I think they were too hard on it.

Sure it's not the best action flick in the world, but it's just an action flick just the same, and you can realistically only expect so much from that genre. Okay yes there are some that exceed those expectations, but you shouldn't start out that high.

Eagle Eye has kind of a good premise, ordinary guy and ordinary girl, plucked from their everyday lives by a sinister woman on the end of a phone who can track their every move and influence things around them, forced into doing things against their will etc. (all in the trailers)

One comment that's consistently popped up is that "it gets ridiculous" I kind of agree, it's been seen before though in some form or another, and to be fair it's no more ridiculous than most other big budget action movies.

Suspend your disbelief and just go along for the ride.


Eagle Eye - 7/10

Pineapple Express

Apart from two moments when I chuckled, one involving an ear, I can't remember the other, it's just plain rubbish.

I'm not a fan of the Apatow camp, when I first saw the trailer I thought it could be quite good. I was wrong, it's the same old Apatow-style shite. Most of the characters talk like Seth Rogan, which is annoying, much like Seth Rogan.

Okay, I'm typing this as I watched the end, third chuckle involving a car.

If you liked Knocked Up, Superbad etc al, you'll like this.

Pineapple Express - 2/10

Bangkok Dangerous (2008)

As a movie, this is pretty badass! Unfortunately, Nic Cage... not so badass.

From what I can gather (from just watching the trailer), this remake is quite different from the original 1999 film by the same directors. There seems to be a few similar set pieces, but that's about it.

Cage is an assassin, who goes to do a job in Bangkok, needless to say, said job doesn't go to plan and gunfights ensue. Throw in a ladle or two of sentimentality and the odd bit of dodgy camera work/choices and you've got a fresh new remake on your hands.

It's okay, not brilliant, I think it would've been better with someone more convincing as a badass assassin, or alternatively, played up on the ageing pro type thing. Worth vegging out to of an evening if there's nothing else tho.

Bangkok Dangerous - 6/10

Southland Tales

I seem to remember Richard Kelly's Donnie Darko follow up getting universally panned, being ridiculed at Cannes and disappearing back into the edit suite for a time, I also remember being very very intrigued by the trailer.

I missed seeing it in the cinema, in fact I missed seeing it for quite a while, always unsure as to whether it looked any good or not. Skip forward to December 2008 and an HMV 3 for £20 deal (this, [Rec] and Death Sentence btw). A day off over the xmas period and a quiet sit down to finally watch Southland Tales.

It's very weird, it makes very little sense, although you can follow a basic plot, it's over the top, part film - part music video and I loved it.

All the characters are off the wall, quirks, their affiliations are all over the place and for the most part you're not sure who's working for who or what their agendas are, which I guess kinda works as our main protagonist Boxer Santaros (Dwayne Johnson) doesn't really know what's going on either, at least not until the film's conclusion.

The highlights of the film for me, apart from just the really randomly enjoyable style, are Dwayne Johnson, Seann William Scott and Justin Timberlake. Now that may make me sound like a twelve year old girl, but their performances in this, whilst not Oscar worthy, certainly made me look at them in a different light.

The film is pure Sci-Fi, it's all out bat-shit crazy for it and that's part of what makes it so wonderful, it takes a heavy influence from Verhoeven, which is no bad thing but it's also, stylistically very now. It's a bit heavy handed with it's politics, but it does the job. I can see how it's not to everyone's tastes, but I was pleasantly surprised and am looking forward to The Box.

Southland Tales - 8/10

Quantum of Solace

For the second outing for Daniel Craig as Bond, they've given us an odd mix of Bond, Bourne and a film with very little plot or character arc.

QoS is all about the action, it's simply a ride, a number of set pieces strung together. The opening car sequence is great btw. They're really trying hard to fuse old-school 60's Bond with 00's Bourne, and they're doing it in a really jarring fashion in this one.

With Casino Royale, they did the 'reboot' thing and did it pretty well, Bond was more hardcore, rough around the edges and basically brutal, yet he was still Bond. The film around hi, though, was more standard action thriller.

With QoS, Bond is less Bond and the film around him is more Bond. (?!) Okay, here Bond seems to quip less (so he's pissed off about Vespa, whatever), in fact he says less, he's all moody and quiet, however, we do get a Goldfinger homage, and a bit of a stab at a villain's lair towards the end. You can definitely tell that they were trying to hark back to some of the classic stylings of the older Bond films.

So QoS, all icing and no cake (I like that!), weak ending, weak villain, shite villain's plot, weak henchman and a weak (of character) Bond. The action's gone a little too Bourne, getting too close and scrappy, we need to stand back a bit with Bond, Casino Royale got it about right on that score (see B&W toilet fight and the staircase sequence), however I'm hoping this is going somewhere.

QoS is a direct sequel from CR, and they're were rumblings of a trilogy at least, so we can only hope that with the third part of this story, with Quantum coming more into play, we have a massive end sequence resulting in Bond infiltrating an enormous underground lair or similar, fighting his way through before right before it looks like he's gonna lose it Felix turns up with the cavalry, C'MON!

Quantum of Solace - 6/10

The Kingdom

It begins, pretty harshly, with a terrorist bombing of  American families in Saudi Arabia and a group of FBI investigators making their way over to find out what's what.

For about half the film, it's very much a 'procedural', following the steps they need to take and the barriers they encounter while in Saudi, then it becomes more action orientated, guns RPGs and car chases.

It's fun and I was also genuinely shocked by the start, but it's hard to know where it sits politically. It's clearly a film about issues that are high up the political importance scale at the moment, but at the same time it's very Hollywood spin on it all, being rather one sided, not totally, but a fair amount, heaving around stereotypes and possibly not being as clever and worthy as it thinks it is.


The Kingdom - 7/10

Mission: Impossible III

I've been waiting to see this for AGES, I enjoyed the first one, the second was utter pants, but with M:I-III, J.J. Abrams is a the helm, so that's gotta be promising!!

For the most part it is. It certainly ups the ante from number 2 (both films take a very different tack from the original Brian De Palma outing), and it's a hell of a ride through most of the film, throw in some, 'here's how they actually do that' bits and Philip Seymour Hoffman and it's top notch. Simon Pegg was pretty funny, although did seem a little out of place among it all (still can't see him as Scotty, but that's not far off now).

It was also my first look at Billy Crudup and while he was pretty good, I'm not entirely sure how he's gonna come across as Dr. Manhatten in Watchmen.

But anyway, the plot has a couple of interesting twisty turns in it and as I say, it's a pretty good ride for the most part, but I was HIGHLY let down by the ending, something I wasn't expecting and I can only hope that Lost doesn't fall foul of it, if he has the reigns for the finale.

Mission: Impossible III - 6/10

Logan's Run

Logan's Run is an odd film, it's a good ol' 1970's sci-fi, which feels totally of it's time, set in the obligatory dysotopian/utopian future, Logan is a 'Sandman' basically a copper who chases down 'runners'.

'Runners' are those who's life clock has run out (at the grand old age of 30), but don't really feel like getting beamed up and disintegrated. All's going well until circumstances lead Logan into becoming a runner himself.

There's a whole load of stuff that's never really made totally clear, not ambiguous, just not explained properly. Peter Ustinov is brilliant as the 'old man' and Jenny Agutter is HOT!! She alone is a good enough reason to watch this!!

Besides that, it was quite entertaining.

Logan's Run - 6/10

Ocean's Thirteen

To be honest this was a lot better than I thought it was going to be, plot wise there's a heist, it's a very involved heist, and it involves people that don't really like Danny Ocean.

Don Cheadle's toned down his Dick Van Dyke impression since the first one which is much more pleasant to the ear!

It's basically a big romp, there's no jeopardy for any of the characters you know they're gonna come out on top, it's just a matter of how they get there and how entertaining that journey is.


Ocean's Thirteen - 7/10

No Country for Old Men

I read the book prior to seeing the film. Wasn't overly impressed to be honest. The typeface and layout used in the book is really off-putting, but I digress..

The film follows the book pretty closely, losing only a few elements. What's good about the film is the characters come across a lot better, the humor comes across (not so much in the book) and the language translates slightly better (yes as an Englishman, reading Southern American isn't a strength).

Javier Bardem is as good as everyone makes out, but as a story it's all very disjointed, subtext heavy and ultimately bleak and disappointing. Josh Brolin's character's actions don't seem to ring true and things just seem a bit forced. As a Coen Brothers film, it's far better than Intolerable Cruelty (what isn't?!), but not up to Fargo or Big Lebowski standards.

No Country for Old Men - 7/10

The Orphanage (El Orfanato)

The Spanish language version of a "Quentin Tarantino Presents.." this "Guillermo Del Toro Presents..." follows a very similar style to Guillermo's own films.

It got pretty good reviews when it was in the cinema, and overall it's not bad, got quite a good end, although does suffer a bit from Return Of The King Syndrome, my main complaint is that it's VEEERRY SLOOOOW, it's a good story though and we stuck it out.

Not as creepy as I was expecting, there's a couple of creep-out moments, but it's not IMO, a full on scarefest. Well crafted and looks beautiful, Guillermo's certainly on a mission!

The Orphanage - 7/10

The Dark Knight

Before I start, there are probably spoilers here.

Y'know there's a very strong possibility that there's been more hype around this film than there was when Lucas announced he was making 3 more Star Wars films. This hype unfortunately primarily exists because of Heath Ledger's untimely departure from this world, ok there was interest in his portrayal of The Joker beforehand, but it then became known more for being "the role that killed him", which is a big shame.

I'm glad the film's doing well, especially on the IMAX performances (I buckled and saw it today at a normal cinema, cos I don't know when I'm gonna be able to get to IMAX), as it's good to see IMAX getting noticed for something other than droll James Cameron docs or making people sick. But the hype machine's in overdrive on this one.

Anyway, I'll move away from that amateur assessment of what's going on in the world and onto what I thought of the film.

I was as excited about this as the next person, I really liked Batman Begins, I like the comics, I like Christopher Nolan, I was intrigued to see where he was going to take it and the fact that it was stated that they were going for the "psychopath joker" rather than the "camp tv series joker" AND that one of the main influences on their Joker, was Alan Moore's "A Killing Joke" which is FUCKING AWESOME!

People are saying that TDK is much like The Godfather Part 2 or Heat. I haven't seen Godfather 2, and it doesn't have the same energy as Heat, and (at the moment at least), as a film, I actually prefer Batman Begins.

So why? Why am I not jumping up and down like a rabid fanboy like I probably should be?

The film's slow through most of it, and it's a bad kind of slow, not a good kind of slow (like Alien), it lumbers around, people chat, Bruce Wayne worries a bit, more chat, exposition, explanation, too much.

I really don't like the dialogue, (the screen I was in had a shitty sound system this could be contributing), there's a lot of "thinking out loud" type stuff in this and "summing up for the audience" at the end... what am I watching Scooby Fucking Doo?

There's some seriously bad editing too (I think this has been picked up on the IMDb boards as well), a few shots that look like they were cut back for the ratings, and then just some shoddy editing, or some amazing ventriloquism by Christian Bale, one of the two.

The opening scenes are great, starts setting things up pretty well, then it gets a bit boring for a bit, Scarecrow! damn, underused again with bad attempt at comedy, then Joker pops up again, he's ok, then we have the 1-on-1 with him and the Bat, this is, in no uncertain terms, FUCKING AWESOME, this is where I got an enormous... grin on my face and thought "Okay, here we go, this is the movie I want to see kicking off now!", cue faster pacing, explosions, jeopardy, pain and...oh.. it's slowing down again now... why is it not going well....it's alright now we have Joker and Two-Face!! C'mon!!...please? just a bit... No you don't need to explain it to me...no really you don't...

Characters;

Bale is Bale, he plays BW/BM much like he did in the first, only he's even more arrogant now he's been doing this for a year. His lisp has got worse, or maybe its just he has more dialogue as BM now and you get to hear it more. He doesn't offer much else, except in the interrogation scene, but then that's quickly forgotten about.

Gordon is possibly the best character in the film and obviously Gary Oldman does an outstanding job of playing him in every single of his scenes (even the one's where he's explaining to the audience)

Harvey Dent/Two-Face, has potential, which would be interesting to see if he's about for the 3rd film, but I don't know if they'll fully explore it or not, I like how they deviated from his origin story, but feel they didn't run with it enough. Aaron Eckhart did a pretty good job, but there wasn't really enough time for the split personality to settle in.

Scarecrow, painfully underused again :(

Random crime bosses and gangsters, were pretty pointless.

Alfred Pennyworth, same old same old from Mr Caine, nothing new to see here.

Rachel Dawes, thank the lord for Katie Holmes "scheduling conflicts", but depsite Maggie Gyllenhall's better performance, the character's a tad incidental, but possibly a good thing for part 3 ;)

Mayor, blah blah, Ramirez, blah blah

The Joker.... here's the biggie, Heath Ledger's portrayal of The Joker is such that people are screaming for him to receive a posthumous Academy Award, that it's one of the best performances of all time etc etc. It's very good yes, Oscar worthy, I don't know, as good as I was hoping for, no.

There's been a big thing made of how creepy and messed up Joker was going to be, how he was a proper psycho, hell bent on destruction and chaos, yet through most of the film he's actually pretty mellow. I was hoping for a full on electrifying performance, I wanted to be SCARED by him, this didn't happen. There's a level of violence to him, a small hint of comedy, only the odd gag here and there, but there's only really one scene/sequence that features the Joker I was hoping for and that's the interrogation scene.

Here's where he really comes alive, where him and Batman are 1-on-1, there's flaws with the dialogue here too, but the scene plays out beautifully, Joker keeps pushing and pushing and Batman starts to crack, Joker just takes the abuse, here we get a REAL Joker laugh (hairs on the back of my neck!), Batman going crazy because he can't deal with him, it's awesome, then Batman goes off to be all heroic and Joker is left to make his way out, still awesome, after everything's done in the police station, it all starts to fizzle out again and by the end we're back to not so great again. The reason? Who knows, maybe that's how they wanted it and they think it's realy psycho like, maybe we couldn't see the Joker I wanted to because at the end of the day, it's a Batman film and needs to be suitable for a certain demographic??

Hellboy.

When I first saw Hellboy (the first one) in the cinema, I thought it was okay, not great, but okay. Then i watched it again and started to really like it, now I love it, the film got me into the Hellboy (and BPRD) comics and I'm quite looking forward to The Golden Army.

My point is that I'm hoping that after another viewing I'll start to like TDK more, I sat wondering if I had seen it on IMAX first would I have liked it better, am I just being a little unfair on it (yes and no maybe). Did I enjoy Iron Man more? yes I did.

I will be going back for another viewing, hopefully on IMAX and I will be buying it on DVD, I hope I like it better as it goes on.

The Dark Knight - 7/10

Doomsday

Take the following ingredients, stir in and spice up with liberal other influences;

• 1 part Aliens
  
• 1 part 28 Days/Weeks Later
  
• 2 parts Mad Max (mainly 2 & 3)
  
• 2 part strong female lead with damaged past
  
• Oregano
  

I love Dog Soldiers! I thought The Descent was an admiral attempt to get everyone taking home grown British films seriously again (and not a bad film), but when I saw the trailer for Doomsday, I swear I could see Neil Marshall doing backflips over a Great White.

It looked SOOO bad!

A problem I have with "hot new directors" at the minute, and in some ways it's a bit of an unfair criticism, is that as soon as they're given a load of money to make a film, they go all shite. They start off with a cracking low budget debut, then someone comes along and gives g'twirty gillion squid to make a movie and they deliver a cow pat. (this probably isn't a new problem)

Now I was pleasantly surprised by Doomsday, it's not the total cow pat that I was expecting, but at the same time it doesn't have the wit, charm or inventiveness of Dog Soldiers, it is British yes, as the use of the word "Bollocks" proves, and I like that about it, I like that Neil Marshall is proud to be British and allows that to come through in his films and it's also nice to see someone attempt a big action film in the UK (in a non piss take way unlike some).

At the end of the day, it's not taking itself very seriously, it's a big fun action movie with PLENTY of gore, some pretty good gore at that, a few good lines, but not much substance. Rhona Mitra was better than expected, but at the same time, doesn't have the presence to really pull it off.

A few pretty good action bits, a lot of silliness and some enormous unfinished plot lines and holes.

Let's see what he does next, maybe not Outpost, something else??

Doomsday - 7/10