Casino Royale
Surprisingly enough, this film is
good. The new Bond-chap must have given up caviar pies, or whatever they eat in W1, and concentrated on the weights, boiled chicken (skin off) and brocoli, because he has nice big chests. He is also quite good at the acting lark, although his style does seem to consist of staring at things very hard like he is trying to do Superman eye-lasers through them.
Downsides are the amusingly vulgar super-rich locations, the racism, and the uncool clothes (wanker slacks) that he wears when he's in Venice. Oh, and there's one bit where he appears to be driving a Mondeo - ha ha ha. But fortunately the Innovations catalogue has gone bust so Bond cannot crush a baddie's head in a effort-free mango juicer.
The History Boys
I have reviewed this film already (
shit) but I thought I would go and see it so I could give you more of indication as to why it is so mannered and fecal. Let me deal with the good things first. It is competently made, and Uncle Monty is entertaining in it, although when I see him, I can't stop thinking of the pigs in Animal Farm walking on their hind legs. And if you like reading the back of cereal packets you will rejoice because there are lots of words in this movie. Rather too many in fact. I could have done with some bed scenes and an exploding helicopter.
Unfortunately, although the film is in love with high culture, it rather lectures to you about it, in the manner of a boring old farty who knows everything about the late Beethoven string quartets, but refuses to go and see The Big Lebowski. The whole thing comes across, not as history, but as nostalgia. And it is not even nostalgia for the eighties. This offends me. The kids in this movie are supposed to be five years older than me, but they are weedy little swots who would have been bog-washed repeatedly had they inhabited the real world. The whole thing is fake because it's sustained by nostalgia for Uncle Monty's vanished 50s childhood, and he's a miserable bastard anyway.
The other things that are wrong with this is that it has about 6 endings, presented in ascending order of risibility. The direction is uncomfortable, and the editing is stagey - at one point the camera even waits for people, just to move on and off the set. Why not film a fucking bus queue? Someone should tell Nicholas Hynter that there is a modern editing technique called the cut, which is designed to remove the boring bits I don't want to watch (after the bed scene, before the exploding helicopter). And it looks like they used really cheap film stock, because the grains of emulsion on the print are fucking huge, like a big man's fist.
The Prestige
Bateman vs Wolverine, what's not to like? This film has been brought out in only a few, rubbish cinemas (like the Odeon Panton Street, London's second most
shit venue) as if the distributors were ashamed of it, like an idiot cousin. I confess that I was a little worried that it was going to be duff, because magicians are duff, and the 1890s are duff (too much brown), but it is actually brilliant. Patrick Bateman is so good that you forgive his accent, Hugh Jackman will take any role that involves sideburns, and Scarlett Johansson is both pulchritudinous
and good at acting.
People have talked a lot about how you see the twist coming, but that's not what it's really about The real twist is, you completely change your mind about who the psycho is. I thought about this film for ages afterwards, and I would quite like to see it again, only not at the Odeon Panton Street because a) like a toilet, it smells of wee but b) unlike a toilet, it's nine quid to get in.
In summary, this film is
good, check it out, and yes, pulchritudinous is a codeword, meaning primo garbonzas.
Casino Royale (with cheese)
I tried watch Casino Royale this afternoon but unfortunately it was sold out until the 9:30 showing on Wednesday in the year 3012 AD. So I came home and watched Zazie dans le métro instead. Louis Malle made this in 1960 and it is hilarious, to such an extent that it makes Dangermouse look rather staid (if you watch some old episodes of Dangermouse you will realise they all must have been on drugs). Also, Paris in 1960 looks well amusing - they have awesome motors and the Eiffel tower is properly dangerous. This film is
good and when you consider that all the British films from this period were about Dirk Bogarde being castigated for not cleaning out his whippet cage properly maybe it's a bit of a shame that Napoleon lost in 1815.
Volcano
If you look at old books, you really do get the feeling that back in the old days, people were a lot thicker. They had the occasional bloke like Shakespeare and the Buddha, but it doesn’t make up for the dodgy spelling and the lack of PSPs. Look at a bloke like Chaucer, for instance, probably the biggest name in English Literature before 1500. Not only can he not spell, by the looks of it he can’t even talk, and he only has two topics of conversation, namely: God and farting. As you can see they can't draw horses either.
It’s not just the dark ages that display the widespread dispersion of the shit-head gene. I was watching that Volcano movie on TV last night, and it seems like everyone was really dim in 1997 too. Back then people believed that nature was so piss-weak that it could be controlled by Tommy Lee Jones, and that lava had the approximate singeing power of your mum’s toaster. Ann Heche plays the vulcanologist, Don Cheadle has a look of barely suppressed despair, and there is a heroic dog as well.
Shit.
Breaking and Entering
This is the new Sam Minghella comedy, and let me tell you, it's pretty funny stuff. Jude Law plays a north London architect, who takes an interest in a young thief, and then starts boffing the thief's mum, who is a Bosnian Muslim, played by Juliette Binoche! At this point I was laughing really hard at Law's brilliant deadpan delivery, and then these people who I can only describe as cinema goons came down the aisle and asked me to leave. I pointed out that I had paid nine pounds fifty, and bought a load of pick and mix, and they ought to be more considerate of their patrons. At this point the smaller one gave me vouchers for TWO free tickets, and said I could have as much pick and mix as I could fit into a bag, "just so long as you fuck right off, sir."
You can't ignore value like that. When I got back home Dave told me it was supposed to be a serious movie, which explains quite a lot. With this in mind the film recieves the
shit rating, but it is a good for a handful of stale cola bottles if you enjoy yourself enough.
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
This film is like a highlights reel of the most disturbed and offensive things that have ever been comitted to film. It is the same as practicing really hard on a pinball game, then going down the pub with a bag of 10ps, and not leaving until all the high scores are yours. You will laugh so hard when you watch this film that actual defecation becomes a strong probability. If you don't think this is
good then that's a sign that you have reached the point in your life (i.e. the 35-44 demographic) where you're never going respond to amusement ever again.
Down by Law
If you have seen Leningrad Cowboys Go America or Blue in the Face, you may recall the extremely cool Jim Jarmusch cameos, where Jim rocks up and chats about how the SS officer smokes fags in old war movies, or some such guff, and the movie instantly becomes about five degrees cooler. Down by Law enables the devoted
cineaste to gauge the exactly how cool Mr Jarmusch is, using the glory of The Scientific Method, and the answer is, extremely frikkin' C. He made Down by Law in 1986, slap bang in the middle of the least cool decade since the 1890s (when sideburns and brown were so in) and it is still highly cool today.
Most prison-break movies are extremely long, maybe to convey the tedium of sitting around counting sand grains while waiting to get bumholed, but Down by Law feels slight at 90 minutes. It makes Oh Brother Where Art Thou look like a bloated and unnecessary homage. In fact I am beginning to think that setting bits of Down by Law in a jail is a master stroke because the key to being cool is to sit around absolutely bored out of your fucking skull, yet not to show it. Anyway, I really liked this movie, it is
good.
I saw Borat last night as well, but I have not recovered sufficiently in order to give an account of my experience. This will be coming soon.
Red Road
This Glaswegian CCTV drama is made by that woman who used to be in Number 73, Andrea Arnold. It's a well made character study, and it's gratifyingly boring in places - you expect the main character to witness nasty crime from her control room, but most of the time she watches a bloke walking a fat old dog. I was really miserable when I watched it cos I did an interview at work and I couldn't remember what letter of the alphabet came after p, but I still thought it was
good.
Surprisingly enough, this film is good. The new Bond-chap must have given up caviar pies, or whatever they eat in W1, and concentrated on the weights, boiled chicken (skin off) and brocoli, because he has nice big chests. He is also quite good at the acting lark, although his style does seem to consist of staring at things very hard like he is trying to do Superman eye-lasers through them.
