Top Fourty : Movie Soldiers

The good people at Total Film have published their list of the Top 40 Awesome Movie Soldiers. If you're a fan of lists, this one's a belter. Some obvious choices and some forgotten gems in there.

Enjoy:

Total Film : Top 40 Movie Soldiers 

Movie News : Bill and Ted's Mid-Life Crisis

A few weeks after Keanu confirmed that a script for a third Bill and Ted movie was in the process of being finished, co-star Alex Winter recently tweeted that he now had the finished article in hand. The screenplay has been written by Chris Matheson and Ed Solomon, who also penned the first two outings, but as yet no plot details have been confirmed. It would appear though that the film is indeed powering ahead and the Wyld Stallyns will once again be bringing the rock to a screen near you.

I can't help but feel a little bit apprehensive about this however. Other franchises that were rebooted for a 21st Century audience haven't proved especially successful. Terminator and Indiana Jones being prime examples. There was something distinctly late 80's and early 90's about Bill and Ted and the Heavy Metal slacker characters being very much a product of their time. Presumably however, given the lead actor's current age they won't be playing their younger selves and will instead be adult versions of Ted Theodore Logan and Bill S. Preston.

Maybe they will be embarrassing dad's with leather jackets, Megadeth T-shirts and bandanna's to hide their bald patches. Each will have gloomy emo kids who don't appreciate the genius of Eddie Van Halen and foolishly don't believe that a KISS song can change the world. Ted now suffers from a crippling alcohol addiction that began when his medieval queen-wife killed herself because she couldn't adjust to modern life and had a break down at the concept of Argos.  Bill has to work a second job as a greeter at Wal-Mart to make ends meets and bores all the kids who work there with tales about how he was always destined to save the world one day and used to hang out with the Grim Reaper. "You kids still like Pearl Jam right?"


Chances are this won't be the direction the new movie takes as harsh reality rarely has a place in light-hearted time travelling adventures. There has been some vague allusions to the plot by Keanu himself , who stated the following: "When we last got together, part of it was that Bill and Ted were supposed to have written the song that saved the world, and it hasn't happened. So, they've now become kind of possessed by trying to do that. There's an element of time and they have to go back." This doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me since at the end of Bogus Journey they came back to the present day and performed said song to an international TV audience. That was in the early nineties. How can they still be struggling to write a song that was on TV and presumably recorded by the TV station. Surely at the very least a viewer could hum them the tune.

Anyway, it awaits to be seen what the film will involve, but I hope they tread very carefully and don't 'Lucas' all over a cherished childhood movie. I dread to think that this will become a trend. Maybe we'll see the Goonies returning to the boondocks for a reunion after Chunk's funeral due to his chronic obesity and inevitable heart disease. Maybe a Labyrinth sequel where Jennifer Connelly returns to the Goblin King's realm only to find he's now on the run from the authorities over charges of gross indecency and inappropriate relations with young teenage girls. Finally we may see a fourth Back to the Future where a middle aged Marty and a geriatric Doc travel through time completing the Doc's bucket list before he guns it up to 88mph for the final time.

I am approaching this forthcoming adventure with extreme caution. George Lucas has a lot to answer for.

Den Of Geek - Bill and Ted 

Movie News : The CG distraction

Den of Geek recently published this interesting article on the good and bad usage of CG in films. It also looks at how sometimes badly done CG can prove a major distraction and ruin the enjoyment of a film.

Well worth a read if you have chance:

Den of Geek : When CG gets in the way of a good movie

Movie Reviews : Source Code *SPOILERS AHOY*

WARNING. DO NOT READ ON IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY SEEN SOURCE CODE. SPOLIERS-ARAMA.

By it's very nature, Science-Fiction films are open to personal interpretation and don't need to be grounded in reality. If we start watching SF films like we would a historical drama, picking out what we consider obvious plot holes or goofs, then we are , in effect, missing the whole point of what SF films set out to achieve. These are films that are meant to show the unknown and the abnormal, events and situations that aren't typical to our every day lives.

With Source Code, I did, at first, have serious reservations about it's ending owing to the fact that it doesn't abide by the 'rules' set out by the scientists earlier on in the film. The main concept of the film wasn't in question though and in brief is thus:  when someone dies, the brain stays semi-alive for a brief moment after death thus allowing clever scientist types to plug into the last 8 minutes of their memory and allow another human brain to re-live that 8 minutes as the initial person.

This initially made me work on the assumption that what the scientists had in effect created was a 'simulation' of sorts, an 8 minute fully immersive replication in which normal physical rules apply and the person entering can alter the events of that simulation, but they will be there only for 8 minutes. This is the explanation given by the military scientists in the film. We are told by them that Captain Colter Stevens is merely re-living the final 8 minutes of one Sean Fentress's life. The events Colter is repeatedly re-living have already happened, this is just a 'shadow' of what has already come to pass.

So at the film's conclusion, Colter has solved the mystery and saved the day within the Source Code. This means that in original reality, the second bomb attack is scuppered as the military can now locate the bomber using Colter's information. His job done, the original Colter, lying near enough dead in the military lab, has no purpose to keep revisiting the same 8 minutes via the Source Code. So when Officer Goodwin presses the big red button and thus terminates Colter's existence within the source code, she was in effect turning off his life support. Letting him die, as he requested.

Yet once the 8 minutes are up and the big red button is pushed, Colter doesn't cease to exist as the film's own logic would dictate. Instead we see Colter continue to exist in this separate reality, effectively usurping Sean Fentress's physical body and living his life. Now going off the in-film logic spelt out to us by the scientists, this is impossible. They too clearly believed it was all merely a simulation that Colter was entering into. We know this is the case because Goodwin and her boss both assume they will lose Colter for good once the button is pushed and his life support is thus turned off. He will be completely, 100%, dead. They don't believe he will live on in another reality. The film's scientists, who have fed us the knowledge we needed to follow the plot thus far, would appear to be  wrong.

This is in itself a rarity for a Sci-Fi film, as normally whilst a movie may not abide by our own rules of time and space, they do operate within their own set of rules. So, for example, in Inception, if you die in a dream, you die in real life and in Back to the Future if you cease to exist in the past then you are erased from the present. These are Sci-Fi concepts that are not really relevant to our own universe, but they are cast iron facts in the films themselves. Here though, the films own sense of logic is proven wrong.

The obvious explanation for why this happens is that the scientists themselves simply didn't understand the Source Code technology they had created. They did not know that what they were actually creating each time they send Colter back to re-live Sean's final 8 minutes was in fact another parallel universe operating entirely without interference from their own.

So in their original universe, the first bomb has already gone off but the second attack is stopped, Colter's plug is pulled and his physical body is allowed to die.  In this new universe however, both bombs are stopped, original universe Colter remains as Sean for the rest of his life, and new universe Colter remains in a box with the military waiting to try out the Source Code technology.


Granted, this makes some degree of sense and is a perfectly acceptable explanation for what happens at the film's end, but for me it was still not very well executed. Source Code was a great film for an hour, and then a mediocre one for the last 20 or so minutes. The initial premise was new and innovative and really kept you guessing. The final act however just felt a little forced, almost tacked on to ensure a happy ending. Even if this isn't the case, it completely shifts the tone and emphasis of the film as a whole. What starts out as Groundhog Day meets Quantam Leap, becomes more than a little bit Donnie Darko, with alternate realities now the order of the day.

The film as a whole was perfectly fine, definitely above average and Gyllenhall was faultless in the lead role. It just felt a bit underwhleming by th end, leaving you to fill in a lot of blanks yourself and forcing you to make a lot of assumptions. To its credit, it's a film that makes you think and sticks in your head for a few days after you see it. Personally, I went away and read up on the film and took on board several interpretations of what the ending means. The fact that a film can make you do this is surely only a good thing as it's talking points like these that make movies worth watching.

It isn't the slightly blurred ending to the plot I object to though as such, more it's execution. There are some endings to films that are left open to interpretation as they are thought-provoking and deliberately set out to leave you wondering what has happened. There are some however, like this one, that just seem to be rushed and require you to fill in blanks yourself mainly because the filmmakers themselves didn't get round to doing so.

Anyway, it's well worth a watch, but for me the pre-release hype was not quite lived up to. The complex science fiction at work here is skirted around rather freely and the ending actually feels a little anti-climatic rather that rousing as the director presumably intended. Perhaps it will improve on future viewings, but I still left my screening feeling rather underwhelmed.

Movie Reviews : The Doors

I recently reviewed Oliver Stone's psychedelic biopic of seminal sixties band The Doors for Flick Feast. The controversial depiction of Morrison as an self-aggrandising egomaniac was questioned by some with certain members of the band publicly rebuking Stone's film upon it's release. Nevertheless, if you can ignore any questions of accuracy and focus instead on the great sense of time and place that Stone manages to capture, there is still a lot to enjoy in this film. It's far from perfect, but it's visually impressive and the soundtrack, which is of course dominated by the band themselves, is first rate.

You can read my full review here:

Flick Feast : The Doors

Movie News : Winklevi Vs Zuckerberg

The real life courtroom saga involving the Winklevoss twins and facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, as immprtalised in David Fincher's The Social Network, seemingly reached a conclusion of sorts this week with a Judge turning down their attempts to have their inital settlment overturned.

Read my full report on Lost In The Multiplex here:

Winklevi Vs Zuckerberg 2 : Electric Boogaloo.

Movie News : Empire's Danny McBride Webchat

Empire online have posted the transcript from their interactive webchat with Danny McBride, star of Eastbound and Down and more recently medieval stoner comedy Your Highness. It makes for rather amusing reading and if you're a fan of McBride it's well worth a look-see.

Check it out here:

 Empire's Danny McBride Webchat.

Movie Reviews: 300 and United States foreign policy.

When I first saw Zack Snyder's adaptation of Frank Miller's "300" graphic novel, it was at the local cineplex and looked mightily impressive up there on the big screen. The 'super-imposition chroma key technique' (yeah, I looked it up) which Snyder used to give the film a unique, part animated part real life look was perfectly suited to this over the top tale of excessive bravado and the various battles and combat scenes especially profited from the Director's ability to be freed from the burden of conventional logic and physical limitations.

It was no classic by any stretch of the imagination. The plot was fairly simple, hard blokes walk off to face much bigger group of hard blokes in order to safeguard their way of life, ...Casablanca it ain't. Snyder also appeared to adopt the Dean Learner from Garth Merenghi's Dark Place approach to editing, "anything without dialogue was considered for slow motion." Visually however, it was pretty enjoyable. Snyder's stylized depiction of ancient warfare was suitably entertaining and fuelled the inner Neanderthal in me.

Recently however, I re-watched 300 on the small screen and saw the film in a slightly less enjoyable light. Much was made of this at the time of the film's release, so I'm well aware that I'm not the first person to point it out, but the very thinly veiled subtext of this film sees the white freedom-loving West taking on a tyrannical regime of the East and ultimately, though losing the battle, emerging victorious. It's not that I didn't see this at all the first time I watched 300, it's hard not to notice the decidedly unsubtle talk of safeguarding freedom and fighting the just fight, but I was more willing to overlook it the first time round as I was too focused on the crash, bang, wallop visual effects. The first time you see a film like 300, you aren't too concerned with any subtexts or alternative readings. You just sit back, let it wash over you and gorge yourself on popcorn.

Watching again though, with eyes afresh and perhaps now looking for something more than just a good fight scene, there are clear parallels with modern day American foreign policy in both Iraq and Afghanistan and Snyder appears to be beating the drum in favour of American imperialism. I don't think this is a case of simply reading too much into a film, the parallels are fairly clear to see. Firstly there is the noticeably un-Greek looking Spartan warriors. The 300 Spartan Warriors are all markedly Anglo/American in appearance, with Gerard Butler looking about as Greek as John Wayne looked like Genghis Khan in The Conqueror (1956) http://bit.ly/fTX6he.

The Persian hoards on the other hand take on a range of foreign guises with baddies drawn from across Africa, the Middle East and even the Orient. They are all shown as either soulless barbarians who rely on their ineffective 'mysticism' when they run into trouble, or, particularly in the case of Persian Leader Xerxes himself, effeminate almost androgynous characters who lead debauched and freakish lifestyles. This is in direct contrast to the tall, muscular and honourable Americans/Spartans whose chiseled abs and flowing hair make them the pinnacle of physical specimens.Purely on a visual level, there is little doubt that this story is a battle between the predominately Anglo-Saxon West and the generically evil Asian East.

The much espoused rhetoric of the Spartans is also worryingly similar to that delivered by the proponents of American neo-con foreign policy. At one point the Spartan Queen (who is later abused by McNulty from the Wire, ...I bet he was bragging about it to Bunk later that night at the local Taverna), says to a local politician, "freedom isn't free at all, It comes with the highest of costs. The cost of blood." If ever there was a line out of the Rumsfeld/Cheney play book of post-bombing raid justifications, it was this one.

The whole film is littered with a distinctly modern day American rhetoric, with the unseen narrator telling us how "free men stood against a tyrant" and the same character, now back on screen, closes the film by saying "this day, we rescue a world from mysticism and tyranny, and usher in a future brighter than anything we can imagine." At this point I pictured a cringe worthy blend of George Dubya on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln claiming 'Mission Accompalished' and President Thomas J. Whitmore rallying his troops in Independence Day.

Obviously, the Director himself denies any such parallels, and quite rightly points out that he is merely attempting to transpose a pre-existing graphic novel to the big screen and that we can't impart modern day foreign policy readings onto ancient Greek tales. Yet surely, when Snyder was making the film, he could see the controversy looming on the horizon. He was making a film based on an ancient battle of Good Vs Evil based along race lines and shrouded in uber-nationalistic ideals. I fail to believe that as Snyder went along, he didn't catch on to the glaring parallels between this and the current ongoing battle between East Vs West based upon socio-political lines, again shrouded in nationalistic ideals.

If he genuinely didn't mean to nod towards modern day politics, then fair enough. It's all just an unfortunate coincidence I'm sure and the desire to cash in on American national pride never even crossed Mr. Snyder's mind.Even if this is the case, watching 300 is still hard to undertake without a strong sense that you are watching an attempt to justify American wars in the middle east in the name of democracy and freedom. As I said at the beginning of this ramble, this argument is not new, it has been made before, but only with my second or third viewing does the full extent of the dubious onscreen message really sink in. Oh, and we haven't even touched on the distinctly fascist approach the film takes towards racial purity and eugenics or the unashamedly homophobic dialoguse.

Ah well, that's another film ruined for myself by over-analysis, time to cleanse my film pallet with something good, honest and wholesome, free from nationalistic breast-beating and brazen stereotyping......now where's that copy of Casablanca? Oh wait.

Movie News : The Dark Knight Rises

There has been a lot of hearsay and conjecture surrounding the finer plot points of Christopher Nolan's third and final Batman outing seemingly since the director confirmed he would return for another instalment. Dating right back to immediately after The Dark Knight was released and Internet message boards went into over-drive predicting various Riddlers and Penguins to fill the void left by the untimely passing of Heath Ledger and the resultant loss of his unique take on the Joker.

As time has passed however, little by little the official details have begun to leak out. We now know that Anne Hathaway will join the project as Catwoman, and that a trio of Inception Alumnus are also involved with Tom Hardy confirmed as Batman back-breaker Bane and both Jason Gordon-Levitt and Marion Cotillard are signed up with unconfirmed roles.

This weekend it was confirmed that The Social Network actor Josh Pence would also be joining the ever growing cast of notable young talents. Pence's face may still be unrecognisable to many of us as he was the unseen body double for the Winklevoss twins in David Fincher's recent Facebook drama. Some eyebrow's were raised however when it was announced Pence would take on the role of Ra's Al Ghul, last seen being played by Liam Neeson in Batman Begins. Several websites have confirmed that Pence will play a young Ra's Al Ghul 30 years junior to Neeson's take on the character in Nolan's debut Batman movie.

The appearance of Ra's has given further credence to the already well circulated rumour that Cotillard will take on the role of Talia Al Ghul, Ra's daughter, and Bruce Wayne will once again do battle with the mysterious League of Shadows.

There is much anticipation for Nolan's next film following the phenomenal success of both The Dark Knight and Inception, but the director is notorious for keeping his cards close to his chest. The casting of Pence could be a red-herring plot wise, but it may just be that the final pieces of the puzzle are falling into place.

source: Hollywood Reporter

Top Thirty : Lamest Movie One Liners

Total Film have compiled a list of the '30 Lamest Movie One-Liners', and there really is some gold in there. Such gems as this moment of Wilde-esque wit from Arnie in Batman and Robin : Mr. Freeze – “If revenge is a dish best served cold, then put on your Sunday finest…it’s time to feast!”

Amazingly....that's not the worst one.

Total Film : 30 Lamest Movie One-Liners

Top Ten : Crimes Against Star Wars.

Den of Geek recently compiled a list of the 'Top Ten Worst Crimes Against the Original Star Wars Trilogy', and it really does make for excellent reading.
If you're a fan of Star Wars, or maybe just a fan of lists in general, have a look and see what you think. I wholeheartedly agree with the choice of number one.Damn you Lucas.

Den of Geek : Top Ten Worst Crimes Against the Original Star Wars

Movie News: The Expendables 2

According to reports from Hollywood, The Expendables 2 is on the cards and, shock horror, it's director will once again be Sly Stallone. 

The all-action original had such great potential and ultimately failed to deliver. It took itself way too seriously and lacked any humour or self-awareness. The cast read like a who's-who of 80's, 90's and even 00's action stars, but unfortunately nobody told them they were making the ultimate brainless action film and they spent most of the film attempting to prove they still have some dramatic muscle. For many of these guys, that ship has long since sailed.
That being said, if they can keep the same cast, and learn from the mistakes of the first outing, maybe they can turn things around and really produce something jaw-dropping this time around. Sly is sure to want everything bigger, faster, stronger and louder, so quite who he can add to proceedings is a bit of a mystery. Jean-Claude Van Damme is the only really obvious option. The muscles from Brussels famously turned down a roll in the original, but I'm sure with the right pay cheque he could be drafted in for the ride.

Source: Box Office Mojo

Movie Reviews : Armadillo

Armadillo is a powerful and compelling documentary that gives the viewer a startling insight into the frontline experiences of young soldiers. Filmmaker Janus Metz and cameraman Lars Skree spent six months following three young Danish recruits, Mads, Daniel and Kim, as they ship out to Afghanistan and are stationed at the ‘Armadillo’ base in Helmand Province. Through chronicling not just the danger and fear experienced in combat, but also the tedium of every day life, Metz seeks to show the enormous effect the war has on these young men.

You can read my full review on Flick Feast here:


Flick Feast - Armadillo

Movie Reviews : Skyline

Proof , if ever it was needed, that having quality special effects cannot redeem an inherently bad film. I don't really know where to begin with this disaster. Skyline is woefully acted, contains nothing but thinly drawn and under developed characters, has an astonishingly cliche riddled script and packs no dramatic tension whatsoever. The Brothers Strause who produce and direct Skyline, decided to fund the project themselves in order to be free of studio interference. Unfortunately, in doing this, they gained full creative control and thus blame for this monstrosity lies solely at their feet.

Read my rather scathing review for Flick Feast here:

Flick Feast - Skyline

Top Ten : Final Scenes

I recently compiled my top ten final scenes for Flick Feast, and ever since I've been plagued by those movies I left out. Pulp Fiction, Blair With, Citizen Kane, and more recently the gut-wrenching end to Aronofsky's The Wrestler, all could lay claim to a place on the list. Nevertheless, the ten I settled on are all truly great moments In cinema.
A good ending can redeem even the worst of films, and often it's these final scenes that we leave the cinema talking about and dissecting.

You can read my final list here:

Flick Feast - Top Ten Final Scenes

Movie Reviews : The Social Network

Director David Fincher's much lauded movie covering the creation of Facebook by Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg, is now out on DVD and Blu-Ray and is every bit as engrossing and entertaining the second time around. Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin also deserves a large share of the credit, as it's his Oscar winning screenplay that brings the hyper-intelligence and dogged determination of the main characters to the fore. The key roles are all perfectly cast, with Englishman Andrew Garfield especially excelling as Zuckerberg's best friend Eduardo. If you haven't already seen it, seek The Social Network out right away.


You can read my full review for Lost in the Multiplex here:

Lost in the Multiplex - The Social Network

Movie Reviews : Fair Game

This underwhelming thriller is based on the real life story of outed CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson and her husband, US Ambassador Joe Wilson. For a film that held great promise, what with Watts and Penn in the lead roles and a plot revolving around international espionage and the Whitehouse and CIA being at loggerheads, Fair Game is ultimately a little disappointing.  It starts off well but peters out long before the end and fails to leave any lasting impact.


Read my full review for Lost In The Multiplex here:


Lost in the Multiplex - Fair Game

Guilty Pleasures : Independence Day

There are some films that, despite their obvious flaws, be it laughable dialogue, cheese laden acting or cliche ridden plots, we can't help but love. For me, Independence Day ticks all of these boxes. When it comes to explosive, brainless, all-action cinematic extravagance, few come close to Roland Emmerich's 1996 behemoth. Will Smith is never better, Jeff Goldblum is never Goldblummier and Judd Hirsch steals every scene he is in. I know it's no work of art, but I always enjoy a hearty dose of ID4.

 In this article I wrote for New Empress Magazine I explain the roots of many a guilty pleasure, and put forward my argument in favour of Independence Day:

New Empress Magazine - Film Confessionals: Independence Day

Movie Reviews: Saw 3D: The Final Chapter

The final instalment in the bogglingly successful Saw franchise was released on DVD recently. I have never been a big fan of the whole torture porn/horror genre. It seems to rely too heavily on shock tactics and gore and not bother with minor details like plot or dialogue. I had only ever seen the first of the Saw films, which I did actually quite like, but I had an inkling this 7th outing for the franchise might not quite compare.

How right my inkling proved. Saw 3D was truly a woeful film, with no redeeming qualities whatsoever and laughable acting in parts.  doubt whether even the most passionate of gorno aficionados could find much to enjoy in this dismal mess.

Read my full review on Flick Feast here:

Flick Feast - Saw 3D 

Top Ten : Westerns

I recently compiled my list of the top ten essential Western Movies for the Flick Feast website. As a genre, few can claim the longevity of this most American of art forms. From the early days of cinema, through it's heyday of the 1930's and 40's and including it's various resurrections and reincarnations, "Horse Opera's" as silent movie star William S. Hart called them, have always proved hugely popular. Perhaps it's the exciting adventures and rich characters that these movies possess, perhaps simply just a longing for a bygone era where good versus evil was (usually) more clearly defined . Whatever the appeal, some of cinema's moments have come from this extensive and varied genre

Check out my list on Flick Feast here:

Flick Feast: Top Ten Westerns

Movie Reviews: Inside Job

 Charles Ferguson's eye-opening and fascinating documentary examines the causes and effects of the recent global banking crisis. The effects of this crisis resonated around the entire world and yet the complex causes of the financial meltdown can often pass over most of our heads. Inside Job does demand a great deal of attention from the viewer, as if you drift off for a minute you may well miss an important piece of the puzzle, but on the whole, it offers valuable insight in a straight forward and understandable manner.

You can read my review of Inside Job on Flick Feast here:

Flick Feast - Inside Job