Sunshine

Posted on December 29, 2011 by jaycluitt

In the not too distant future, the Sun is dying and a team of American and Japanese scientists and astronauts are dragging a bomb with a mass equivalent to Manhattan Island through space in an attempt to reignite it. The crew aboard the Icarus II, comprising of a “Hey, it’s that guy” cast including Cillian Murphy, Chris Evans, Rose Byrne, Michelle Yeoh and Mark Strong, predictably encounter setbacks on their mission to save the Earth, but everything is handles with a keen eye and a steady hand by director Danny Boyle, for the first two thirds at least, as tempers fray, fists sly and lives are lost for the sake of the mission. Alas, the final reel, when the film switches from interesting, character driven sci-fi to frenetic horror slasher, is where the charm is lost. If only Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland had paid more attention to a fitting finale than to designing space suits that are trying far too hard to be iconic.

Choose life 6/10

Saw

Posted on December 28, 2011 by jaycluitt

Launching a new sub-genre, in this case the US branch of torture porn, is a difficult task, but can pay off in spades if done well. James Wan, writer/director of Saw, knows this, for although on the surface his creation looks like just another horror franchise kick-starter, scratch the skin and you’ll find an intelligent, tightly plotted thriller that just happens to be sick and grotesque enough to stay with you for days, if not years later.

A serial killer going by the nickname Jigsaw has been trapping people who he deems worthy of needing to re-evaluate their lives. His traps are deadly, but can be survived if the victims are willing to suffer physical and mental scarring, and abide by his rules. Awakening in a disgusting, windowless bathroom, Dr. Gordon and Adam (Cary Elwes and fellow writer Leigh Whannell) find themselves in such a predicament, each chained by the leg to opposite corners of the room, equipped with a tape recorder, a gun, a saw apiece and a corpse in a pool of blood, with the only way out looking to be losing a foot. Meanwhile, cops Danny Glover and Ken Leung are closing in on the criminal mastermind. The plot remains just on the right side of ingenious, with some of the best twists seen in horror, and the psychological scares do greater work on the psyche than any sudden jumps although a couple are thrown in to please those unable to fully grasp a new kind of horror film.

The sequels took a great premise too far, making the plot far too convoluted and the reasons for participants being tested too obscure and mundane – undoubtedly Jigsaw would find me worthy of testing for spending too much time watching films – so go no further along the Saw blade than this fresh cut.

Choose film 7/10

Wonder Boys

Posted on December 27, 2011 by jaycluitt

Always be wary when a DVD cover proclaims the feature it houses is an Oscar winner, yet follows this statement with an asterisk not revealed until the fineprint on the back of the box, for more than likely this will lead to a win for one of the lesser Oscars that, though probably well deserved and awarded to people who are very good at, and have worked very hard on what they do, does not make the associated film any good. And so it is with Wonder Boys, overly proud recipient of the Oscar for Best Original Song for Bob Dylan’s Things Have Changed, so worthy is it that I cannot even remember hearing it, when part of me was specifically listening out after discovering the win. Whilst Michael Douglas gives one of his best performances as the mild-mannered, scarf-wearing, adulterous English professor Grady Tripp, he is let down by a meandering plot involving a dead dog, a 7ft transvestite, a stolen dress and an epic manuscript, and a fairly average cast with Tobey Maguire it’s obvious weak link – impressive when Katie Holmes is also involved as a besotted student. Too much takes place without a reason – is Maguire’s James fascinated with celebrity deaths just because he is weird? – and the script is far from excellent (“I’m not gonna draw you a map, sometimes you need to do your own navigating.”)

Choose life 4/10

Evil Dead Trilogy

Posted on December 23, 2011 by jaycluitt

When five college friends go to stay in a mysterious cabin deep in the woods, it’s safe to assume they’ll be lucky to see their homes again, as they will undoubtedly encounter a clan of cannibalistic hillbillies or some centuries old curse. So when, in Sam Raimi’s schlock horror debut, the kids find the Book of the Dead, bound in human flesh, written in human blood, and play a recording of it being read, the dead become free to walk the Earth, and the kids must struggle to stay alive until morning, in the hope of finding their way back to civilisation. So far, so standard, but where the film differs from the gory also-rans is when a girl is dragged into the woods – by the woods – and raped by a tree. Plug sockets and light bulbs leak with blood, and one by one the kids become possessed by demons, with bloodied eyes, gnarled, pallid skin and faces like beaten up clowns. Raimi’s innovative camerawork and game cast – all terrible actors aside from our hero, the uber-chinned Bruce Campbell – stand this film out from its imitators and inspirations.
Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn is that rarest of sequels that rewrites the entire plot of its predecessor in its first 7 minutes, showing what the film could have been had a greater budget been available – a more attractive love interest, advanced effects and even a back story for the Book of the Dead. Having discovered an audience for his own brand of homemade horror and slapstick splattery, Raimi lets himself, and reprising star Campbell, off the leash, balancing the grotesque with the quirky in such classic scenes as Ash cutting off his own possessed hand and replacing it with a fully operational chainsaw. The more what the fuck moments add to the feeling of watching someone’s head explode onto a screen – the maniacally laughing moose head and bizarre neck extension are standouts, and this remains a tremendously fun, if occasionally bat-shit insane adventure.
As with Raimi’s other threequel, 2007’s Spiderman 3, the approach to Army of Darkness is to take everything and throw it at the script, see what sticks, and include it all anyway. This leads to a film with a frankly ludicrous premise – at the end of part 2 Campbell’s Ash opened a rift in time, and is now stranded in 1300AD, and stretches it past breaking point with the sheer volume of ideas piled on top. The opening death pit scene is fun, but the ensuing insanity of a two-headed Ash (beginning with a repulsive eye growing on his shoulder), Gulliver’s travel style tiny men causing havoc and a skeletal army complete with beards takes it all too far. The result is a film still endlessly enjoyable and quotable, but lacking the overall playful sense of fun from the previous entries.
The Evil Dead choose film 8/10
The Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn Choose film 9/10
The Evil Dead 3: Army of Darkness Choose film 6/10

Get Carter

Posted on December 23, 2011 by jaycluitt

Get Carter is justifiably remembered for Michael Caine’s gripping portrayal of London hard man Jack Carter, visiting his old stomping ground in Newcastle to bury his brother and sort out the men who killed him. Caine is iconic as the immaculately attired, quick witted vengeance seeker, endlessly quotable (“Clever sod, aren’t you?” “Only comparatively”) and calmly menacing, yet credit should also be given to director Mike Hodges (…Flash Gordon). The framing of the shots is excellent, particularly when showing Caine watching a video, as a cleverly positioned mirror allows us to see both what he is seeing, and his reaction to it, without the need for split screens, a delayed response or a clumsy cut. The ending is brutal, if perfect, and it will take a great deal for me to sit down and watch the inevitably terrible 2000 Stallone remake.

Choose film 8/10

Two Days in Paris

Posted on December 22, 2011 by jaycluitt

Jack and Marion (Adam Goldberg and writer/director Julie Delpy) are a typical couple in their mid-30s on a holiday in Europe, culminating with two days in Paris to visit the French Marion’s parents. Jack is an insecure, devious hypochondriac, paranoid of terrorist attacks and knows less French than your average American, whilst Marion’s parents (played by Delpy’s real life mother and father) know very little English, and Marion herself seems reluctant to act as translator, leading to various comic episodes, most notably with Marion’s father attempting to act out cunnilingus to Jack at an exhibition of his artwork. The film plays on both French and American stereotypes – the French are homophobic, xenophobic, inappropriately flirtatious wife beaters, all of whom have either gone out with or are trying to go out with Marion, whilst Americans are brash, ignorant tourists. The performances feel natural – up until the arrival of Daniel Bruhl’s self-proclaimed fairy, and the situations never feel overly contrived, just maybe a little exaggerated, and the cinema would be a better place if more romcoms were as insightful and humorous as this.

Choose film 7/10

Big

Posted on December 21, 2011 by jaycluitt

When 12-year old Josh Baskin is denied a ride on a roller coaster for being too short, and is therefore embarrassed in front of his dream girl, he wishes himself big at a fairground fortune booth. The next morning he awakes as a 30-year old Tom Hanks, complete with chest hair, deeper voice and a ripped pair of space pyjamas. So ensues a fish-out-of-water comedy, as Josh, having been chased from his house by his understandably terrified mother, must fend for himself in the big wide world.

Hanks is incredible as man-child Josh, in his first truly memorable role, utterly convincing in an underappreciated performance, arguably Hanks’ best, be it kneeling on a chair, eating Oreos or simply swinging his bag as he walks, every touch adds to the sense that this really is a 12-year old boy in a man’s body.

If there are any faults, they lie in the third act, when the clichés drop thick and fast into this previously original movie. Josh begins to realise his responsibilities and grows up, ditching his best friend for a girl and eventually, if a little suddenly, realising that he just wants to be a kid again. There is also one of the most uncomfortably wrong relationships ever seen in film between Josh and corporate climber Susan (Elizabeth Perkins), so squirm-inducing it probably would have been omitted today (that said, it’s just as bad as the centuries-old vampire/teenage girl romance from Twilight… not that I know anything about those films). But regardless of however many faults the film may have, one scene, featuring Hanks, his new boss (Robert Loggia) and a giant floor keyboard in a toy store, makes any film worth watching. This is the kind of scene that never fails to cheer me up.

Choose film 8/10

The Usual Suspects

Posted on December 20, 2011 by jaycluitt

Is it OK to ruin the Usual Suspects yet? Doesn’t anyone who cares who the ending already? Its 16 years old! Is it not another Sixth Sense or Empire Strikes Back, where the big reveal has either been witnessed firsthand or spoiled by someone else? Miraculously, my film watching companion had not seen or heard the ending to Bryan Singer’s sophomore film, and he’d have throttled me had I revealed it (Marcos hates spoilers, and will punch you in the head) so no, it would seem there are some out there yet to discover the fate of the five criminals bought in for a line-up, nor do they know the identity of their tormentor, the mythical Keyser Soze, so I’ll try and tread carefully. The cons in question – Stephen Baldwin, Kevin Pollak, Gabriel Byrne, Benicio del Toro and a career-launching, Oscar winning Kevin Spacey – have been brought together on a bogus line-up, and use their time in incarceration to plan a robbery, bus is it all a part of a bigger plan?

Told in flashback by Spacey’s weaselly over talkative ‘Verbal’ Kint, the tale begins with the death of Byrne’s Keaton, a crooked cop gone straight and the closest the gang has to a leader, after what appears to be a drug deal gone wrong. Chazz Palminteri, the cop to whom Kint tells his story, has his own theories as to what went wrong, but his opinions, and those of the viewer, get in the way of seeing the truth, ably assisted by Christopher McQuarrie’s deservedly Oscar winning ever twisting screenplay.

The cast are exceptional, particularly the scene stealing del Toro and Pete Postlethwaite at stoic lawyer Kobayashi, but it is the fine balance between tightly plotted twists and turns and sporadic bursts of action and violence that plants this firmly on the choose film list, regardless of whether you know the ending.

Choose film 9/10

Braveheart

Posted on December 20, 2011 by jaycluitt

A young Scottish boy in the 13^th Century is mentally scarred by the sight of dozens of his kinsmen slain and hanged. He is too young to fight the English, for it is those villainous scoundrels that are to blame, and when his father and brother do not return from battle he is sent to live with his scarred uncle Argyle (Brian Cox). Taught to use his brain before his sword, he grows up to become Mel Gibson, returns to his home village and falls in love, only for those Anglo-Saxon bastards to kill her too. Understandably, this sends Gibson’s William Wallace into a bit of a tizzy, so he sets about raising an army to thwart the tea-drinking tossers and their leader, evil Edward I. I’m no historian, but to say the film is blinkered by a love for the Celts is no exaggeration, with us Englanders shown creating laws where it is fine for us to sleep with a Scotsman’s wife on her wedding night, and banning the kilt-wearing types from brandishing so much as a stick. I’m not saying this didn’t happen, and I’m not going to burn any calories finding out, but I’m going to assume that something from the mind from Gibson can be taken with a rather hefty pinch of salt.

That being said, Gibbo gives good as the rabble rouser, hinting at the madness (and mullet) of Lethal Weapon, with an imposing presence and questionable accent. Much too can be said of Gibson the director and producer – roles for which he took home the Best Director and Best Picture Oscars in 1996. With an eye for locations and an ear for mixing the comic with the tragic, this is a well balanced film. Some of the fights and chases feel a little clunky, and the many brutal deaths – throats slit, fence post impalings, gouged eyes and mutilated horses – seem a tad gratuitous at times.

Choose film 7/10

The Blues Brothers

Posted on December 19, 2011 by jaycluitt

No, you’re not seeing things. Hell has not frozen over, a pig did not just fly past the window and Paul W. S. Anderson did not just make a good film, I have written a post. I honestly cannot explain why I haven’t written anything for the past 2 months (2 months? Sheesh, sorry), but rest assured I have been steadily watching films, I’ve handwritten a bunch of posts and just haven’t gotten round to typing them up, so hopefully over the next few weeks I’ll catch up with the 60-odd films you’re all dying to read about.

So, here we go. The Blues Brothers, a 9-piece rhythm and blues band fronted by brothers ‘Joliet’ Jake and Elwood Blues (John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd) started life as a sketch on American comedy show Saturday Night Live, who’ve had something of a chequered history with sketch to screen adaptations. For every Wayne’s World there’s an It’s Pat, Coneheads or A Night at the Roxbury, but it all kicked off with the Brothers Blue, an undeniable stone cold classic, with a supremely quotable script, dead-on performances and more cameos than Belushi’s eaten hot dinners. Everybody from Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles and John Lee Hooker shows up to belt out a number whilst Jake and Elwood set out on a mission from Gahd to get their band back together and raise the $5,000 dollars required to save the orphanage they grew up in. On the way they are hunted by the police, led by John Candy’s plaid-clad detective, rival band the Good Ol’ Boys, a group of Illinois Nazis, the army and Carrie Fisher’s flame thrower toting vengeful ex. With so much going on it would be understandable for the central stars to stick to their sketched personas, but both give it their all, especially Belushi, whose absence couldn’t be replaced by the trio of John Goodman, Joe Morton and a little kid when the ill-advised Blues Brothers 2000 rolled around. Above all, the film never loses its sense of fun, even with a two-hour plus run time unpopular with traditional comedies. A high level of farce – the brothers are remarkably blasé about the level of destruction around them, at one point strolling away unharmed from an exploding building – helps to retain the silliness, and the soundtrack deserves a place in everyone’s music collection.

Choose film 9/10