Last Movie You Watched? Mark 9

Ambler knows that 90% of everything is crap.

Transcendence (2 stars)

Very ambitious film for a first time director. Unfortunately, there's just too much territory to cover in under 2 hours, and it doesn't help that Johnny Depp appears to be sleepwalking through this very limited role. While he may have top billing, it's his wife that gets most of the screen time.

The film deals with nano-particle technology, quantum theory, singularity, transcendence, God complex, religion, resurrection, death, etc....it's like Patrick Swayze's GHOST mixed up with Michael Chricton's novel PREY. Yet, despite trying tackle such heavy themes, the audience can never quite get its mind wrapped around any one idea or concept long enough before the story ups the stakes and moves on to something even bigger.

If the story had been pared down a bit...a little more focused....this could have been something much better. Instead, it wanders all over the place and accomplishes nothing.

Reach for the Sky

move aside chaps, I may be some time.
A week ago, September 20, was what would've been Kennth More's 100th birthday. If Dickens' 200th can be made a go off, than, however small, so can More's. In a way I attribute my liking to 'old cinema' to this man (and my parents). Being a wee mite of about five or six I remember watching a film called Man on the Moon (1960, Basil Dearden) and seeing this chap muck about and all that. It was Kenneth More. It turns out on the edge of his zenith.
All these years later I remain probably the only person of my age to even know of this man or even give a fig. Perhaps not the best actor or the most renowned he nonetheless did some films I enjoy all the same.
Here he gets to play a real-life chap, Douglas Bader. When we had on the Beeb the Greatest Briton fluff, Bader was mentioned but someone couldn't help but wonder if he was more famous because of the film and that people likely thought of More as Bader rather than the man himself.
It's complicated. Richard Burton was first choice and likely could've encapsulated the man's dogged determination and distinctive fierce character and yet...yet More does a job. More went out to meet the man, spent some time with him, got to know his character and whatnot and then spent time learning how to 'walk again', that is to say, walk with the tin legs on top of his own.
The narration by Lyndon Brook might be a bit gosh-lumme and More's typical humour (a la Doctor in the House/Geneieve etc) is well used but at its heart is a solid core. Bader won't quit, he throws himself about gardens and golf courses, he'll do anything to fly again and by God he does. The same approach to his wife, Thelma.
Muriel Pavlow is a delightful actress (the most recent thing I saw her in was an anonymous customer in Black Books), she was smashing opposite Dirk Bogarde in Doctor in the House but here sometimes I wonder if it's a bit of a mismatch and yet in real-life some would say the same of the actual Bader couple. Kenny was only seven years older than Pavlow (much more between him and his last wife, Angela Douglas, of course) and so it's not too much of a stretch to believe in their love. They have this feel of them and them alone, with the world on the periphery.
A favourite moment is when the squadron in WWII listen to Churchill's finest hour speech. The look on their faces, the close-up on Kenny smoking his pipe and feeling like it's happening again. Or the crash where Bader is crippled in 1928. Or when he lies in bed: "Ssh, there's a boy dying in there!"
"No...there's not."
The Bond connection is Lewis Gilbert. The first of at least four films with More, indeed a few actors in Gilbert's films seem to crop up now and again along the way.
Indeed, the joy of the film sometimes is the crop of well-known faces. Your Sam Kydd, Harry Locke and even Nigel Green and Jack Watling.
And a stirring score by John Addison, who was Bader's brother-in-law.

This was probably one of More's best performances. I think Sink the Bismarck runs it close but Night to Remember just above that. This of course falls into the serious category. The comic category would be topped by Genevieve.

And I'm done. See you next week :)

Bad Words (2 stars)

Normally this sort of dark, ugly humor is my kind of thing, but it doesn't work so well for Jason Bateman. Movies, or tv, where the lead character is anti-hero, or unsympathetic, can last for a while as long as there is some character progression, arc, or bit of humanity. This film seems to be almost unrepentantly antagonistic right down to the bitter end. It's one thing for Bateman's character to annoy other adults by entering a spelling bee meant for kids...it's one thing for him to be unhappy with his life, but yet we're shown Bateman's character taking a 10 year old boy to visit a stripper/whore(?) and let her expose her breasts to the kid? Give shots of liquor to the kid? Take the kid out to restaurants and joy riding with a totally strange man? And yet, as I said, not only does this behavior get shown in the film, there are no consequences for it either. At the end, G.Trilby does not have the slightest bit of regret for corrupting a minor.

An unfortunate misfire for Bateman, who is normally at his best being the straight man playing off of others.

The Hunger Games: Cum Catcher

I have no idea what this was about.

The Wind Rises

Well, more than year after its release in Japan, I finally got to see The Wind Rises at the Tirana Showcase. Stupidity on my part meant I failed to check which version was playing so ended up in the English-dub. It was always going to be an uphill battle after that.

I shall reserve final judgement until I see it in its correct form, but my first impression is that - despite Miyazaki's magnificent backdrops - The Wind Rises is an unworthy swansong for such a great director. As someone who loves manned aircraft, this film should've been made for me, but I found it a surprisingly coy and slow biography of Jiro Horikoshi. It's also very old-fashioned and, I hate to say it, somewhat unimaginative.



The silly but more cinematic interludes with Gianni Caproni had me wondering whether his might have made a more interesting story. Caproni wasn't much of an engineer (unlike Horikoshi), but he was some kind of a visionary.

The Equalizer - a touch overlong, bears only a faint resemblance to the TV prog and nothing in the score is up to the standard of Stewart Copeland's brilliant original theme ... but still fairly entertaining, esp. when McCall (Denzel Washington) is offing Russian mobsters in a variety of inventively nasty ways.

It would seem I'm the only member who's seen a film in the last week. Either that or you're a bunch of lazy fucks happier talking about the good old days at MI6.

The Machine (Caradog James) is a great surprise. It's a British SF film with a tiny budget ($1.2m) yet big ideas. The premise is crazy - England is in a war with China, hopelessly outgunned and with only artificial intelligence to fall back on. Cue desperate scientists and generals who will stop at nothing in order to win. This is what the UK industry should be doing on an everyday basis: exporting Q films with lofty aspirations beneath their action trappings. Reimagining Hammer for the 21st century.

The cast worked for peanuts so I hope The Machine earns them some plaudits. Leading man Toby Stephens has either matured as an actor or was woefully underused in Die Another Day, while Caity Lotz journeys from irritating scientist bimbo to something far more worthwhile. Denis Lawson is a General Groves-type character, the bad guy who is the only one intelligent enough to know what The Machine means for the future of mankind. There's a decent score too, with Tom Raybould channelling Gary Numan in all his paranoid 1980 pomp. Farting analogues at their best.

Erica Ambler wrote:

It would seem I'm the only member who's seen a film in the last week. Either that or you're a bunch of lazy fucks happier talking about the good old days at MI6.

2014 films I've seen?

The Grand Budapest Hotel - Best film of the year so far. Great performances, script, art direction.
Maleficent - I felt like I was watching a classic Disney film, and that's all I wanted from it.
Magic in the Moonlight - Looks great, Emma Stone great, Colin Firth overacting at times and a pessimistic perspective from Allen - expected more magic than cynicism.
Chef - Wanted more food porn. Knew where the story was going, but not bad by any means.
The Amazing Spiderman 2 - Fine for a superhero film… Nothing special, just brainless with a good cast.
The Monuments Men - Could have been so much better with such a good cast. Looked good but forgettable and full of plotholes IIRC
Edge of Tomorrow - It's a shame the film industry is going down the video game route.
Robocop - Can't remember.

With the Halloween season coming up, I decided to catch a few horror icons I never really got around to seeing, with this being the first:

A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected, mainly for some of the atmosphere and Englund's presence. It makes a good b-movie. What almost kills it is the acting. Aside from Englund and Saxon, the main cast is absolutely atrocious.


A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985)

It was on Netflix Instant, so I just gave it a go for a morning watch. It's the definition of an inferior sequel. I fiddled more with my phone than paying attention to what was going on (and there wasn't much anyway).

Erica Ambler wrote:

It would seem I'm the only member who's seen a film in the last week. Either that or you're a bunch of lazy fucks happier talking about the good old days at MI6.

The Machine (Caradog James) is a great surprise. It's a British SF film with a tiny budget ($1.2m) yet big ideas. The premise is crazy - England is in a war with China, hopelessly outgunned and with only artificial intelligence to fall back on. Cue desperate scientists and generals who will stop at nothing in order to win. This is what the UK industry should be doing on an everyday basis: exporting Q films with lofty aspirations beneath their action trappings. Reimagining Hammer for the 21st century.

The cast worked for peanuts so I hope The Machine earns them some plaudits. Leading man Toby Stephens has either matured as an actor or was woefully underused in Die Another Day, while Caity Lotz journeys from irritating scientist bimbo to something far more worthwhile. Denis Lawson is a General Groves-type character, the bad guy who is the only one intelligent enough to know what The Machine means for the future of mankind. There's a decent score too, with Tom Raybould channelling Gary Numan in all his paranoid 1980 pomp. Farting analogues at their best.

I actually saw this too Ambler. I thought it was enjoyable. The climax was pretty standard action movie fare.
I did find Caity Lotz intonation as "The Machine" a bit annoying. I get what she was trying to do, but she perhaps overdid it a bit.

Yes, any claims I make for The Machine are based on it being low budget, British and thoughful beneath its bmovie action flick exterior. I agree about the last act , though. Not knowing how to end a film seems to be the curse of modern movie making.

As for Caity Lotz I thought it was going to be a Denise Richards/TWINE situation, but it turned out to be nothing a bullet couldn't put right. To be fair, it's a difficult part, possibly more suited to a dancer than an actor.

EQUALISER - Denzil Washington

7.5/10

I liked it, up there with Book of Eli and Safe House.

Gone Girl - possibly personally knowing of 'happy' relationships that actually have a lot of bullshit façade going on helped, but I really liked this. Bleakly brilliant.

GONE GIRL (2014)

This one was quite a ride. A long ride, but a ride nonetheless. It's David Fincher at his Fincheriest, though, and I know that's not quite everyone around here's cup of tea. Regardless, it's as well-crafted as expected, gets a lot out of its cast (primarily Rosamund Pike), serves up some entertaining, schlocky twists, and above all, confirms that marriage is pretty much the fucking worst and nobody should ever do it.

GONE GIRL - Caught this early today, found a free voucher at the local cinema and was still valid.

The direction is the usual Fincher - a glossy, sepia/vomit-coloured look and a distinct lack of any heart. However, what drags the film down is Gillian Flynn's source material and screenplay, which like Entertainment Weekly, is smug, superficial, and beyond cynical. An offensive take on human relationships. This is a hate film.

My last film wasn't Gone Girl. Twas Red Heat. Remain somewhat neutral on Schwarzenegger but this is probably my favourite of what I've seen. The Russian Streets track one of the better bits.

and scene.

The Drop

Ultimately I deemed it to be pretty underwhelming.

Tom Hardy's performance in the lead role is worth seeing, but Lehane's plot is largely a predictable collection of genre cliches.

Agent Hamilton 2: But not if it concerns my daughter - Swedish Bond ripoff with Mikael Persbrandt of The Hobbit. Horrible title, flick itself looks like a TV film with ambitions to become a bigger franchise. No surprises in the story, it's a revenge and hostage rescue plot, lots of shooting and fighting. Persbrandt doesn't show much emotion throughout. Made it hard for me to care for his character. The rest is very convoluted, who did what for which reasons, IDK, all a bit mysterious. There was a first Agent Hamilton, could be I should have watched that first. Don't recommend it, watch something else.

Gone Girl (2014)

I had a lot of fun with this. Pike says she'd love to return as a Bond girl just to get naked with Craig. EON, take that opportunity and use her better than you did a decade ago. Overall, I like this about as much as I like any other Fincher flick, meaning A LOT. The more nihilistic that depresses Sharky, the sweeter it feels.

ATM with Alice Eve

This film was not at all what I expected.

Captain America: the Winter Soldier

Venal, sentimental and everything I despise about manchild Hollywood. From Hitchcock to this. Fucking abysmal and shaming for everyone involved.

Dunkirk

largely with visiting Dover and it's castle Thursday took to the collection for one of Ealing's last films. No out and out comedy (few humourous moments though. One I find unintentionally funny is the 1940 newsreel with its BBC chap saying "Thank you Mr Chamberlain, for all you tried to do!...And hello Mr Churchill") like Ealing's main body of work but...well, a decent film. A fair few familiar faces such as Barry Foster and Bernard Cribbins (early role, two lines) pepper the film. Sure it probably takes some liberties but like most films of the time and before it tells the story as closely as it can. John Mills in one of his 'common man' roles (at fifty, a very old corporal you might say) leading his ragtag band of troops to the beach at Dunkirk after being cut off in Belgium. On the civilian side Bernard Lee and the late [yes, great] Richard Attenborough. The former bitter to a point at the state of the war and the latter quite happy to make profit.
At times it's quietly moving, typical British stoicism. The sight of bedraggled troops coming ashore at 'Dover' and the wiping out of the field post in the woods and Lee's death on the beach.
Benefits by blending archive footage in with the film, so Stukas diving on what is probably Poland seamlessly (for the most part) end up bombing the field post.
And a stirring theme by Malcolm Arnold (re-used and tweaked for Heroes of Telemark).

FRIGHT NIGHT (1985)

A favorite of mine since I was a kid. Makes for a nice tribute to Hammer and Hitchcock.

I'd like to check out the remake to see how they did with it. (Not well, I'm guessing.)

THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING (2014)

A resounding meh given the notion that this is supposed to be a contender comes Oscar season. Schmaltzy with no real sense of purpose. Eddie Redmayne is fine as Stephen Hawking—I see he's getting awards buzz and I don't totally disagree with it—and I liked the sweeping, just-as-shmaltzy score, but the story does a flimsy job of getting me to empthasize with his family as they struggle to deal with his disease. Maybe it's because they all act relatively polite about it considering the circumstances, which I am going to blame on them being British.

I can see this being something Armond White will like. But me ... neither here nor there. It wasn't terrible. And the girl is cute. Met her today, actually. I'd smash. But it's a bit unsettling walking out a film that's being called "inspirational" where the lead is crippled by an awful disease and his wife leaves hin.

B-

NO WAY OUT (1987)

I remember at the time thinking what a great, twisty, mind-blowing political thriller this film was. I think it's held up fairly well after 27 years, but there were some things that could have been done differently that would make the film better.