Reviews

"Casino Royale" is an expertly crafted, intelligent, well-written, action-packed and just plain brilliant reinvigoration of the Bond franchise, with Daniel Craig as the best of all the Bonds that have come before. "Quantum of Solace" has none of those things. If you weren't already privy to the knowledge that this film shared a number of crew members from the Bourne movies - 2nd unit director (AKA the person that does the action scenes), editor, etc - it becomes pretty obvious within (literally) seconds of the opening of this film. (This Bourne-ishness reaches a ridiculous zenith during a scene in which Bond changes into a jacket that looks remarkably similar to the one Matt Damon wore in "Bourne Ultimatum". I swear, this moment provoked me to shout at the screen: "OH COME ON!") But whilst the action scenes in Bournes 2 and 3 are equally as frantically edited and shot as the ones in "QoS", they were much easier to follow and get swept up in. In "QoS", the action scenes (of which this film is almost exclusively filled with, for lack of a coherent plot to adhere to) are just too quick, too frantic, too incomprehensible and entirely pointless. To add insult to injury, the astounding practical effects work of "CR" is here replaced by frequent (and obvious, and shoddy) CGI work, which completely takes you out of the film. Though that's not the only thing that does that to the viewer. The writing is quite unspectacular, with character motivations murky and unclear, barely any memorable dialogue, and the supposed plot of the film being almost entirely non-existent. I can tell you the good parts of the film in just this paragraph: David Arnold's score and the Four Tet song at the end (but NOT the opening theme song), the cameos from directors Guillermo Del Toro and Alfonso Cuaron (spot them if you can), and the unexpected appearance of Stana Katic from "Castle". That is literally it. And all of that is why the film's final lines are so pertinent. M says: "Bond...I need you back." Bond replies: "I never left." Oh, yes you did, James. Really, you did. (P.S. - There's an argument to be made that Christopher Nolan has been subtly remaking "QoS" in every film he's made since it was released. Or maybe I'm just going mad...) ((P.P.S. - Thank god for "Skyfall".))

I caught a late night broadcast of this film on BBC2 last night (which, to readers of this in the future, was a few days before the start of the 2012 London Olympics), and might never have bothered with recording it to watch it later, if it weren't for the single sentence Radio Times used to describe the film. The sentence was this: "Film by the director of We Need To Talk About Kevin." And that was all I needed to hear. If you've seen WNTTAK, you'll know what I'm talking about, as that film is pretty much perfect - a finely crafted, nightmarish, intense, economically made, utterly brilliantly brilliant film. So when I saw that this short film was directed by Lynne Ramsay, I was in. So what's "The Swimmer" like, then? At first glance, it's rather arty. Shot in black and white, lots of slow motion, no particularly clear story being told? It all sounds a bit pretentious, doesn't it? But what I found was that in the film's minuscule running time, it successfully managed to create for itself a story, made up of nothing more than wordless images, music and snatches of dialogue from British films of long ago. This again sounds increasingly arty-farty, but it worked for me. The music picked for this film is eclectic, but when stitched together in this context, it somehow works. From the theme to "Lord of the Flies" (the original 60's film of which is given much love to), and some of John Barry's score from "Walkabout", to an old recording of "The Very Thought of You," a poignant usage of Vaughn Williams' "Fantasia" music, and even that music they used in the trailers for "Prometheus" (no, really!), together they all provide the film with some semblance of understanding the mindset of the man who swims. Meanwhile, the words spoken are never from The Swimmer himself, so we don't know why he's swimming, or where he's swimming to. We can only imagine it for ourselves, and the dialogue and random sound-bites pinched from films of old helps nudge us toward our own conclusions about what it is we've just watched here. The black-and-white photography is worth an especial mention, too, as it is just extraordinarily exquisite. Switching regularly from normal to slow-motion, and using many Steadicam techniques, it almost looks a lot of the time as if The Swimmer is certainly swimming forwards, and yet isn't moving at all. (Perhaps this is the point after all?) All of which brings me to the point made in this (ridiculously long) review's title. If you ever see this film, you will either love it, or loathe it. If you love it, you love it for the photography, direction, soundtrack, and its adoration for classic British cinema. If you loathe it, you loathe it for its really really slow pace (almost meditative), its lack of plot, its avant-garde-iness, and its surface pretension. Either way, whatever you bring to it when watching this, that will be what you get back by the film's end...

I caught "The Last Don II" on the channel True Entertainment (an offshoot of the True Movies channels, which always show old and crappy American TV movies) the other night, when my mum wanted to watch it, as she had seen the first "Last Don" series many years ago, and was curious to see how they had continued it. We were both disappointed. Why? Because "Last Don II" is actually a comedy. It may not be sold as one, but believe me, it really really really IS. For one thing, the music for TLD2 sounds like the spoof "Godfather" music that Alf Clausen always does in The Simpsons whenever Fat Tony and his crew appear in it (which is ironic, considering that Joe Mantegna - the voice of Fat Tony himself - appears in this too, as part of some outlandish dream sequences). And who composed the music for this? None other than Angelo Badalamenti, the man who gave us such memorable and inventive music in his collaborations with David Lynch. For shame. And then there's the acting. Is there any? Very little, it turns out. Most of the cast members are as wooden as an elm tree. (This isn't helped by the presence of both Kirstie Alley AND Patsy Kensit, who are both the dampest of squibs in an ocean of damp squibs in this series.) But a few of the cast who emerge unscathed from this include a very young Alison Pill (who deserved better material, but thankfully went on to be extraordinary in "In Treatment," "Milk" and "Scott Pilgrim"), Jason Isaacs (HELLO TO JASON ISAACS!) and one cast member who I thought was Stephen Root, but apparently isn't, but who near the series' end breaks out through the dull dirge that has gone before, and realises that he's in a comedy, and so acts accordingly by going completely over the top of OTT...and then they throw him off the top of a building. (Boo!) And then there's the death scenes, which are tragically mishandled. How is it possible that scenes involving a man getting crushed by a shipping container, a woman being blown up by a bomb in a box, a man being strangled in a prison cell, and so on, be the most hilarious parts of the whole series? It's amazingly awful, and breathtakingly bad. It's almost the worst thing I've ever seen...but I've also happened to see David Lynch's "Wild At Heart", which thus far remains the worst film I've ever seen. Anyway, you've been warned. Only watch "Last Don II" if you're viewing as a comedy, and have a steady stream of alcohol to numb the pain. (Watch with friends, as well, for maximum enjoyment!) =))

The basic premise for this rather enjoyable, silly and enjoyably silly spy spoof series is as follows: Tim (played by the ever-excellent Darren Boyd) is a single father with a wickedly smart (but mostly wicked) young son, who is always looking up at his father as if he were looking down on him - an attitude helped created in no small part by his mother (Tim's ex-wife). No matter how much Tim may try to impress his son, he is always a loser to his ex-wife...and Phil, who always happens to be there. And so, with a little extra "help" from his nigh-on sociopathic (and only) friend and work colleague at the computer store where they work, Tim decides to quit his job and move on to greener pastures, and try to improve his life. Which then leads to a job interview for what Tim believes is a job that has something to do with civil servants. Unfortunately, Tim is the only one who thinks this, as his interviewers - particularly The Examiner (played by a somewhat grizzled Robert Lindsay) - think that Tim knows he has come to be interviewed for a job at MI5... And from then on, hilarity ensues as it is sure to do.

The pleasure that comes from this show is finding out that the presumptions you might make about the characters and the story of the show are mostly proved to be wrong. The main character who is nice but dim, and constantly finds himself in ridiculous situations, mostly not of his fault? Almost. He IS nice, and he may not be terribly smart, but what becomes clear quite early on is that although everyone else around him may be - or may act - smarter than him, they are all actually the stupid ones, who are blinded by their own smartness and think that everything is happening exactly as they think it is. (The Examiner is the biggest culprit in doing this.) Whereas Tim - with his awkward, meek, bemused, but always amiable persona - seems to be the only one who is making any sense and acting perfectly normal. And what about the son, who is older than his years, precocious, smart and all that jazz? Yes, this SHOULD be annoying, but the young actor (who, incidentally, looks remarkably like Kevin Bishop) who plays the son is quite adept at handling all the big words and biting insults he throws out at such a rapid and sharply enunciated pace. And what becomes annoying about this character isn't the fact that he's the tried-and-tested trope of being "older than his years," but that his character has clearly been manipulated by his mother's spite towards the son's father into acting almost exactly like her, and that he treats everyone but his mother and...*sigh*...Phil with utter contempt. He is - as Tim's friend says early on - a bit of a dick. And as for Robert Lindsay's portrayal of The Examiner - he is simply a buffoon. How he got to become the boss of everyone that we see in MI5 herein is completely baffling. Harry Pearce he is NOT. Here, The Examiner is a man enamoured with spy novels and movies - preferring fiction over fact, and fantasy over reality - who has seemingly no grasp of what MI5 actually does and is mostly concerned with the gadgets and the guns and flinging his throwing stars around with major aplomb. He always has a demented twinkle in his eyes, and is disturbingly rather taken with his new recruit, Tim. Henceforth, he is a brilliant comic creation, meaning Robert Lindsay is at his absolute best. Forget "My Family"...he's back to "Citizen Smith" standards once again. Overall, the pace of the show is quick and sweet, and the humour is rapid-fire and highly witty, with a side of delicious awkwardness. (If you've seen Darren Boyd's appearance as Dave Wellbeck in "Twenty Twelve," you'll know that he is superbly gifted at creating cringe-worthy awkwardness that rivals anything from "Curb Your Enthusiasm".) So, if you're looking for a spy spoof comedy that's actually really really funny, and can be appreciated by adults as well as children, then forget the dross that was and is Johnny English. "Spy" is what J.E. should have always been, and more so...

Where to begin, as we discuss "Extraordinary Rendition"? Perhaps it might be best to start with the film's positive aspects, and then move onto its negatives. So, here are its PRO's: The performances of the three main leads are quite brilliant. Omar Berdouni - an excellent actor who (with the exception of...say...the big part he played in the first episode of Channel 4's Bernard-Hill-narrated "Ancient Egyptians" several years ago) has of late played numerous characters in 9/11-tinged films (such as "The Kingdom" and two Paul Greengrass films, "United 93" and "Green Zone") and TV shows (notably the BBC drama "Occupation") - plays another character set in a post-9/11 world, only this time is the main focus of the film, instead of a supporting player. From start to finish, Berdouni imbues his thinly written character with enough believability and sympathy for the viewer to care for him as he is plucked from the streets of London, and thrown headfirst into a terrifying and inexplicable situation of endless fear and torture. Berdouni never overdoes it; he keeps his character's emotions cool and calm at the start, and when he is subjected to his horrific ordeal, his anger, frustration and fear can all be seen bubbling under the surface, until cracks start to appear - and when those cracks do break, the result is truly poignant. Ania Sowinski does very well with what little she has to work with, as Berdouni's character's wife. To begin with, her character isn't objectionable at all, and is well above being just a serviceable wife character for the main male protagonist to bounce off of at the film's start. Unfortunately, by the film's end, her character becomes terribly predictable and unreasonably whiny, for reasons that the film never takes the time to explain (if it even has a reason with which to help explain her ultimate behaviour). But the real star of the film, once again becoming a major scene-stealer (even for such a dark role), is Andy Serkis. He plays a haggard, fatigued and despicable interrogator, whose job it is to extract the information he believes Berdouni's character has, but clearly doesn't have. Serkis doesn't play this person as a straight-up evil bad guy - by his own word (which may or may not be true), he's a man with a family, trying to earn his keep through this job that he hates. True to his character's form, he almost makes you think that this might be true, and almost makes Berdouni's character think that he did something to deserve the punishment he goes through. As for the torture scenes, they are as about as horrifying as you might expect. Eventually, the process of having seen so much of this horror played out before your eyes (the most unsettling torture scene being the one involving "dry drowning") leaves the viewer exhausted - probably something the film-makers fully intended. But now for the CON's: As hinted above, the script isn't particularly well fleshed out and written. The characters are mere sketches of proper human beings, leaving the actors to have to try and do the fleshing out themselves. The story is provocative and disturbing, but it lacks the proper hefty dramatic weight needed to make it stick in the mind. As well as that, the structure of the story aims for a Christopher Nolan-esque non-chronological story jumble, which in this film's case makes the proceedings occasionally confusing. There's no real need or reason for this shuffling of story chapters to take place, other than for some stylistic verve. Unfortunately, the film doesn't really have the metaphorical meat on its bones, nor the running time, nor the budget, for this to work properly. The editing, meanwhile, is almost unwatchably choppy. If you've seen the "Transformers" films and think their editing is too slipshod, then prepare to re-evaluate that opinion. And overall, the film feels just far too rushed. Its running time is only 77 minutes! Even an episode of "Sherlock" is longer than this. All through the film, I kept catching myself thinking that a lot of the scenes needed to be slightly longer, to allow the atmosphere of each scene to breath and be fully appreciated. It's hard to explain with words, but if you ever see the film, you'll know what I mean. In the end, it's a film with admirably dark and provocative themes, pulled off with a tiny budget, great acting, and which does what it sets out to do - shock, disturb and make you think. But technically, it could've been done so much better, with a better eye for characters, atmosphere, tension, and drama...