October Sky
This film caused me some aesthetic squirming. It's quite nicely done, and it's about an interesting subject. But it's so obvious. It's about these teenagers who, after the Russians launch Sputnik, are inspired to make their own wee rockets. Pretty early on in the film, the Laura Dern science-teacher tells one of the teenagers that he should carry on with his rockets, because then he can enter the regional science fair, and should he win the regional science fair, he can go to the national science fair, and should he win that, he can get a scholarship, and go to college, and get out of this crummy mining town. So, you know that what's going to happen is that he's going to enter the regional science fair, and win, and enter the national science fair, and win, and then go to college and get out of the crummy mining town. Apart from that, the only surprise is that Laura Dern dies of Hodgkin's Disease.
Oh yeah, there are obviously Seemingly Insurmountable Obstacles to be overcome, but this film was "based on a true story" and I think we all know what
that means.
So, the aesthetic squirming had to do with trying to work out whether this film was
good or
shit, because the only problem with it is that it's utterly predictable. Is that really such a bad thing? I like Laura Dern, and Chris Cooper's good as well. This film really is the perfect three-star movie. So I hummed and hawed over what rating to give it, until practically the last scene, where Laura Dern sees the boys' final rocket rising into the clouds from her hospital bed. And then, it was like, phew. This film is
shit.
The other entertaining thing about this film is that there's a subplot where one of the characters writes to Werner Von Braun, because he's the father of the US space program. OK, maybe you can forgive Werner Von Braun for being a major in the SS. his excuse was that Himmler made him do it. But I can't help but feel that the Americans wouldn't be quite so tolerant of him if he'd pounded the shit out of their cities with his charmingly named V-2 (vengeance-weapon 2) rockets. So I must admit, I did think it was quite amusing that this film which tries very hard to be nice, and would invite your mum over for tea if it could, I found it very amusing that this film should be so keen on this prominent nazi, the sort of man who'd use slave labour to build rockets to kill 7,000 Londoners, and all because Hitler was a poor loser.
Land of the Dead
I have to disagree with Dave in my rating of this film. He thought it was poo, which is a shame, because this is a
good film, sorry Dave, you're
wrong, what more can I say?
It doesn't have any big starry actors in it, and the whole thing has that flat 80s straight to video look about it. The script's not brilliant, and some of the characterisation is dodgy. For instance, the romance interest with the Asia Argento character is dumb, it reminded me of the love angle in that shitty Arnie film, Eraser. Incidentally, don't you feel baaad for ever watching Schwarzenegger films, now that he's about to take over the world and become a planetary dictator? You had your chance to stop him by not buying a ticket to see Last Action Hero. Actually, shit, we tried that, and it still didn't work.
But, who cares about the romance interest. Really. This is a z. o. m. b. i. e. movie, k? While it might disappoint fans of the more traditional brainless school of zombie movies, which are essentially paranoiac survivalist wet dreams, this has a lot more to offer. It's the first political zombie movie. Yes. The zombies in this one get
organised, dammit. Dead pride.
There are some interesting things in this movie to take away and think about. While most action films could normally have their plots rubber-stamped for nazi-correctness by Goebbels, this is pleasantly different. And there's a scene where zombies eat someone's guts. What more do you want?
Howl's Moving Castle
Obviously I liked Spirited Away far more than I should have done. Well, this is not as good. But it's still worth it. Had it made any sense at all it would have been fucking brilliant. It's just that there needs to be a coherent plot, and towards the end it just starts making stuff up. I was reminded a bit of Highlander 2, and how can that possibly be a good thing?
I don't know what the celebrity voice-over print is like. I am a snob, so I went to Islington to watch the subtitled one. When they show a dubbed film in Islington, that's when the lintels of civilisation will crumble.
What I really liked about this film, and what qualifies it as
good, is that there's this whole child's world created in it. The world is totally plausible, but completely insane. And all the mad magical things are so well characterised, it's like they're real. As opposed to Star Trek, for instance, where the alien races are differentiated according to what colour their stupid make-up is.
Oh, and there are more of the scary blob people in this film. They frightened me. It's maybe fortunate that psychedelic mushrooms are now illegal, because had this film come out in the spring, you might have been tempted to watch this film on them. And that would be the prince of bad ideas.
