Citizen 16

Wait, scratch that. To be a double entendre it would need to have two possible meanings.

I checked, and it’s a genuine poster on their official website. I don’t know where to even begin describing what’s wrong with this.

I’m starting to get a shitload of draft posts building up. Three potential options when faced with this situation: Actually finish and post them, delete them all and start fresh or let them build up, gaining such mass that they eventually implode in on themselves, consuming first the site, then the internet, then everything. I’ll give the first option a try.

Kick-Ass lays it’s cards on the table right from the off with a brilliant opening, reproduced in the first 54 seconds of this trailer.

To be honest I’d not been expecting much, and had seen even less, of the film. So when the kid jumped from the roof with his ridiculous winged suit I sat praying that he’d go smashing into the ground (because I’m that special sort of asshole.)

Ah, I thought, now we’ve got ourselves a movie.

This is not to suggest that Kick-Ass is in any way a subversive parody of superhero movies/comics. In fact it’s clear that the author has a great fondness for the superhero genre. It’s actually a pretty conventional superhero tale, just that, in the world of the film/comic, the level of reality has been knocked up a few notches. And it is very much the product of a comic series. You can almost see where one chapter ends and the other begins as the tone shifts throughout the story progression: nerdy guy and his nerdy life; the birth of a shitty hero; the introduction of Hit Girl…

Ah yes, Hit Girl…

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A Daily Mail Intermission

Of course every country needs it’s own batshit insane right-wing news outlet. The UK seems to suffer more than most but by far the most rabidly frothing insane of these is the Daily Mail. To illustrate my point I’ll quote a section from Christopher Tookey’s “review” of the film:

The movie’s writers want us to see Hit-Girl not only as cool, but also sexy, like an even younger version of the baby- faced Oriental assassin in Tarantino’s Kill Bill 1. Paedophiles are going to adore her.

WHAT THE FUCK!?

To be completely clear, the film in no way tries to portray her as sexy. To be honest, it makes me worry about Tookey’s ‘state of mind’ that he’d even think to go there. You can read the full car-crash here. It’s just as fucking mental throughout.

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Both Chloe Moretz and Nicholas Cage are brilliant as Hit Girl and Big Daddy. This means, applying the Nick Cage method of film making, he will be shit in the next 5 or 6 films. What I wasn’t expecting was that those characters weren’t just an excuse for swearing and violence, but actually added real heart to the film.

Also, and it has to be said, small children swearing is always funny.

Finally a nod must be made toward the soundtrack because it’s great. In fact let’s listen to a bit now:

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Waiydaminute, that’s that song from Sunshine. Guys, that’s just distracting. As was the bit later on when you used that John Murphy track from 28 Days Later. I know they’re good songs but, come on now, just stop it. Don’t do that. Bad film makers.

In Summary: Kick-Ass. It’s this year’s Zombieland.

It's a shame this film isn't terrible. Then I could be all "Shutter Island? Pft, more like Shitter Island, right guys." Ah well.

Okay, review time. Shutter Island. DiCaprio. Scorsese. Remote mental institute. Go.

Stop.

Hmm, the dramatic tension clearly needs to be amped up a few notches for this review. I know, I’ll add a track from the film’s score. Play this:

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That’s better. Okay, Review: Go.

No, still not right. It gets more dramatic. Skip forward to 1:37. That’s it. That’s the one. Now we’re ready for a review.

It’s good.

Shocking reveal! More dramatic tension! Skip to 3:37! THAT’S IT, THAT’S FOREBODING! This entire track is playing as they’re driving to the institute. NOTHING’S EVEN HAPPENED AT THIS POINT!

Okay, that’s enough of that. Just turn the music off. It’s ridiculous.

A lot of people seem to be under the impression that this film is, in fact, much better than good and should be, perish the thought, taken seriously.

“Shutter Island” requires multiple viewings to be fully realized as a work of art.

-Wall Street Journal

No, it doesn’t. It’s not a work of art. It’s a good film.

It even has problems. My biggest issue stems from the way, right at the start, the film starts to introduce the fact that something is ‘off’. It’s a clear indication that this is going to be a film with a twist, and that knowledge undermines the building drama of the lead character’s investigation. That the twist is then delivered in a large chunk of exposition right at the end ultimately leaves it feeling unsatisfying.

(Compare to The Usual Suspects, which keeps its cards held tightly to its chest for most of the film and then delivers its payoff in a succession of visual and audio cuts juxtaposed against the detectives dawning realisation. Sure, it screams “look how clever I am” but it gets away with it because, fucking hell, it was clever.)

It’s a shame, because there is a lot that’s done well throughout the film. It’s at its best when it’s exploring the mindset of DiCaprio’s Teddy Daniels. Some of the conversations between Teddy and his partner Chuck, as well as flashbacks to his time in World War 2, work really well. They’ll make the film worth watching more than once (although probably not more than twice.)

Still, let’s not be fooled into thinking it’s somehow genius.

It’s also worth mentioning that DiCaprio gives a fantastic performance. He’s been good in a few things now, so maybe I’ll stop telling people that his best ever role was as the retarded kid in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape. Maybe.

My need to introduce them to my flatmate recently led me to re-watching The Day Today and Brass Eye. It was good to hear, shortly after working through the series, that Chris Morris’ comedy film about Islamic Jihadists (something I’d heard about years ago) is finally approaching a release.

It was even better, today, to finally see a clip of it.

via Edgar Wright’s Twitter feed

Here’s one of the first stills from the upcoming film Scott Pilgrim vs. The World… *squee!*

To be honest I’m regularly flipping between excitement and trepidation over how good this adaptation is going to be.

via RADIOMARU

Watch this trailer:

Did you watch it? Good, because I’ve now just saved you the trouble of going to see Law Abiding Citizen.

All the best moments of the film are in that trailer. Okay, technically that’s not true: The bit at 1:28 where you see the judge answer her phone and in the next scene you see Jamie Foxx looking all horrified? In between those two bits the judge gets shot by her phone. Just imagine her answering it and then a chunk of skull flies from her head, blood and brain matter in tow. Can you imagine that? Good, you have now seen all the best bits of Law Abiding Citizen.

What remains is completely stupid filler. It’s entertaining enough, but you’re always thinking “when are they going to get to the bit in the trailer when they use a remote-controlled turret to blow up a car?” Hands down the best bit in the film (and thus in the trailer) is at 1:37 when Gerard Butler says “release me… or I kill everyone.” I was a little worried that the film itself would introduce some context to make this line less brutally retarded, like “…in the upper echelons of the state’s judiciary.” No, it’s delivered straight, apparently Butler actually plans on killing everyone, even if his actions don’t ever seem to support such an audacious claim.

It’s pretty hard to know who the film expects you to empathise with. I have a feeling you’re supposed to be rooting for Jamie Foxx but, and I know I’m repeating myself, Gerard Butler wants to kill everyone. Seeing as his traps usually only kill one or two people I wanted to see how long it’d take to work through all 6 billion of us. That would have made a much more entertaining film.

So yes, the film is so face-twistingly, massively stupid that it would almost be worth recommending. Except you’ve just seen the trailer, so you really don’t need to.

Larry Gopnik is having a bad time. He’s wife wants a divorce, his chance at gaining tenure as a physics professor is under threat, his racist neighbour is stealing his lawn and someone from the Record Club thinks he owes them money. His life hasn’t turned out as he expected, not that he’s really sure what he expected.

Essentially A Serious Man is a black comedy, with serious problems troubling the lead character. Where the comedy shines through is the host of caricatures that are the people Larry must deal with, or seek solace from. Larry himself is almost completely impotent, unable to stand up to even the smallest pressure applied on him (and he has a lot of pressure to deal with).

The Coens have always made films about a particular place and time, encapsulating a piece of America through broad, larger-than-life characters. Here they deal with a suburban Jewish neighbourhood in the 60s. The Jewish community remains a focus throughout, Larry’s son goes to the local Yiddish school and is approaching his Bah Mitzvah and, in search of solace, Larry himself seeks the advice of three rabbis from his local church. A large chunk of the comedy comes through his inability to reconcile the lessons of the Rabbis with that of everyday life.

Do I recommend it? I enjoyed it a lot and its probably one of my favourite of the Coen’s films. That said its a slow film, almost glacial. The main character walks a fine line and can come across either as a sympathetic figure being overwhelmed by the problems he faces or as a spineless and ultimately pathetic man. Your enjoyment may depend on just which side of that divide you fall on. Ultimately its worth seeing with one caveat: If you hated the ending of No Country for Old Men you will equally hate the ending to this film.

Art style: Good – These days it seems that anyone can shit out a CGI fluff piece, populate it with talking animals, throw in some poop jokes and rake in the profit. If that sounds overly cynical then… Well, let me start over.

There’s no good reason why I should care about the state of children’s films – or of children’s animation in general. But thanks to the ridiculous size of my family and the fact that I’m the oldest of 7 siblings, the youngest being 5 (or 6, I forget), I have seen a fuckton of children’s films over the last 25 years. I would happily include The Jungle Book, The Lion King and Monsters, Inc. among my favourite films. So when I go home to see the family and have to endure the likes of Ice Age or Over The Hedge I can’t help but feel sorry for kids today.

So, to return to Fantastic Mr. Fox’s look, seeing anything that looks as if it was crafted with care and patience instantly gains points in my book.

Cast: Good – Even people I generally find terribly irritating, like Jarvis Cocker and Owen Wilson come off well here, although that’s probably more to do with script, and George Clooney and Meryl Streep suit the film’s depiction of Mr and Mrs Fox. All that said the whole film is stolen by Michael Gambon as villainous farmer Bean. Gambon also gets to deliver the best line of the film in response to Jarvis Cocker’s Petey admitting he’s just making his song up as he goes along: “Well that’s just bad songwriting. You wrote a bad song Petey!”

Story/Humour: Goo… Wait, - Okay, so despite everything I said at the top of the post Fantastic Mr Fox isn’t really a kids film. The director, Wes Anderson’s, influence clearly overshadows that of Roald Dahl. Fox is having an existential crisis, his son Ash is dealing with inadequacy and rejection, scenes are dialogue heavy and the makers blanket replacement of ‘fuck’ with ‘cuss’ is a pretty shallow attempt at making the characters seem grown-up in a film marketed at children. That doesn’t make it a bad film, in fact its the reason I’m writing about it – most people reading this probably aren’t looking for film recommendations for kids.