Been busy working hard the last couple of weeks. Will be back to updating probably around the 27th, right after Xmas is over with. Some good news to share then and other stuff, see ya then.Sunday, December 23, 2007
A Quick Word
Been busy working hard the last couple of weeks. Will be back to updating probably around the 27th, right after Xmas is over with. Some good news to share then and other stuff, see ya then.
Monday, December 10, 2007
Best Trailer of All Time...
Probably my favourite trailer of all time from the classic movie Psycho (1960)
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Saturday, December 08, 2007
Thursday, December 06, 2007
"Lorraine, my density has bought me to you."
Back to the Future
(1985) manages to be be splendid family entertainment despite featuring a storyline involving incest and attempted rape. Of course as far incest goes, it not as if anything distgusting is actually done, Marty's mother Lorraine wants Marty really bad, of course she doesn't know that it is son from 30 years in the future. I guess Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale felt Biff forcing himself on Lorraine was needed to make George a hero, putting her in a genuinely dangerous situation for her.Anyway, enough about the iffy parts of BTTF, you all know the story and if you don't where the heck you been?. I really like the cast in this movie all utterly memorable in their own little way. The story is strong and there's an whole bunch of exciting moments.
It's certainly the most fun time travel movie ever made and one of the best, I really liked the sequels, but this is in a class of it's own, HIGHLY RECOMMEND.
First Blood
(1982) is often cited as one of the first films of the guts and glory Reagan era action film, which I feel is an unfair comment of the movie, it's certainly true of the sequels I'll give people that, but this is a story about a fractured and clearly affected ex-Vietnam vet whose persecuted by a small town sherrif department because of the way he looks.
The body count is actually extremely low ***SPOILER ALERT*** One notable death featuring a deputy falling out of an helicopter seemed to be more out of need for survival then killing the other person ***END OF SPOILER***. Sly Stallone is pretty good here, he was never the greatest of actors, the rest of the cast like Brian Dennehy and Richard Crenna are also on good form and the ending is also pretty low key considering what was to follow.
This would probably be more highly regarded today if they'd gone with the original book's ending (I won't give it away), but it's a film I really liked, so I'm going to have to I recommend it.
Empire Records (1996) is one of those films I always think as slacker films that came about in the mid 90s and features a young cast who either made it big, fairly big or not big at all, among them future Oscar winner Renée Zellweger aswell as Liv Tyler. Also in the cast is Anthony LaPaglia and Maxwell Caulfield and the plot is so slight it's barely worth mentioning, the story is basically a day in the life around a record store that's about to be brought up by a franchise.
It's enjoyable thanks to some great performances such as Brendan Sexton III and Ethan Embry and a really good soundtrack. Recommended.
A film that you can surprisingly somewhat compare to Boogie Nights in a good way is The Pornographer (1999), and is an indie production about a man who watches a lot of porn and thinks he can do a better job of directing. Despite it's showings on late night erotic slots over here on U.K. channel, the film brings up some good points but ultimately some scenes of T&A can't help but mute the point. Better then it should be, but not amazing by any stretch of the imagination.
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
Tomorrow is another day...
Back tomorrow, just got in, too tired, reviews coming up for First Blood, Empire Records, Back to the Future and an indie film called The Pornographer (which is nothing like you'd expect it to be from the title)
Monday, December 03, 2007
"Do you wanna play football lad or do you wanna do some maths!?"
My favourite scene from the wonderful movie Kes (1969). Brian Glover is brilliant here.
Sunday, December 02, 2007
"Captain Insano shows no mercy."
I think Adam Sandlers make very watchable movies and contain some funny moments -I might have already written that somewhere on this blog (I can't really remember) whilst something like The Wedding Singer is a really good romantic comedy, a film like The Waterboy (1998) is purely for laughs.
Adam Sandler plays idiot Bobby Boucher (very similar to his Cajun Man character from Saturday Night Live) a waterboy for a college football (American) who egged on by Coach Kline (the ever great Henry Winkler) uses his aggression to tackle one of the players and he is made a quarterback for the team whilst keeping it secret from his overprotective mother (the ever great Kathy Bates) The film is funny, but nothing special (I couldn't decide whether to give it 2 or 3 thumbs up from Fonzie), Sandler manages to get by on the angry young man/buffon shtick he's done in plenty of movies, while the support is good from Winkler, Bates and Fairuza Balk as his jailbird love interest Vicki Valencourt. Not life changing but good enough.
I have something of a love/hate relationship with the entire Wayans' family, In Living Color was a great sketch series, I'm Gonna Get You Sucka was very funny. Whilst on one hand, Scary Movie 2 was awful, ditto Little Man and White Chicks, Kim Wayans performance in the sit-com In the House was beyond annoying and Damon Wayans is probably the most abusive loving dad in sit-com history on My Wife and Kids (go and watch and see how sometimes his actions should class as child abuse). Don't Be a Menace in South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood (1996) (I think I spelt it write), falls closer to the hate section.
Now I didn't hate this movie, I just thought it was rarely funny, I was familar with many of the films they spoofed -Boys n the Hood, Juice, Menace II Society etc- but there just wasn't a spark to be had- written by and starring Shawn and Marlon Wayans, who went onto do Scary Movie (and you could probably accuse them of creating the modern spoof, one that is made up of often bad recreations of other movies such as their own Scary Movie 1 &2, and then it's Wayanless sequels aswell as Epic Movie and Date Movie). Laughwise Bernie Mac's little role raised a titter and a couple of scenes made me smile so it wasn't entirely bad
I know a lot of people who find this hilarious (same for the Friday movies which I just could never get into>, maybe there seeing something I'm not, I'd recommend watching Keenan Ivory Wayans earlier I'm Gonna Git You Sucka (which is something of a spoof of blaxploitation movies) instead. but fans of Shawn and Marlon will lap it up.
Saturday, December 01, 2007
"Have you got a frozen Zoom?"
Ronnie Barker was a legend, with a number of very successful series under his belt, he was just not a fine comedy actor but a fine actor all around, I recently purchased 12 disc Ronnie Barker set, so over the coming weeks look for little reviews and notes popping up...
Seven of One
, was a BBC television series that aired in 1973. The show was seven individual episodes each kind of serving as a potential pilot for a series (though I reckon some if most where planned as one offs from the beginning). The legendary Barker was the only actor to appear in all 7 episodes, two of the pilots went onto two successful shows (more on that in a bit). Here is the episodes one by one- Open All Hours: Also starred David Jason. Of course this would eventually go on for four series. I like this sit-com because of it's simplicity: A man runs a corner shop and his nephew works for him, the show works obviously because of Barker and Jason (who's know slouch when it comes to great comedy).
- Prisoner and Escort: Would go onto become the series Porridge (which lasted 3 series, have 2 christmas specials and a spin-off series), what's different to this then the Porridge series is the fact Fletcher (Barker) only gets to prison at the end of the episode. Funny stuff, I should note only two episodes in and Barker as already proved he's convincing at more then one type of character.
- My Old Man: Another fine character from Barker, there's a lot of funny moments here as an old man forced to movie in with his upper class wannabe son and family (Hey they could have almost sued the makers of Frasier). Not my favourite episode in the set but still very good.
- Football Blues: Probably the weakest episode, but I still laughed out loud a couple of times particulary the match footage and the attempt to scare the other team at the end of the episode.
- Another Fine Mess: Barker as somebody remarkabley like Oliver Hardy and Roy Castle as somebody remarkably like Stan Laurel in the funniest episode of the series. One gag involving a carpet and a piano leg had me in stitches for ages. This really is a wonderful tribute to Laurel and Hardy and they get the characters down perfect.
- One Man's Meat: Barker plays a man forced by his wife to go on a crash diet -which means taking all the food out of the house etc.- and he's home alone going crazy with hunger. One racist moment aside a great episode with Barker carrying most of the episode. Joan Simms and Prunella Scales are also in this episode.
- Flying for a Quid: It's all about a father and son obsessed with getting a winning betting slip for a lot of money the grandad had before he died, funny episode, again there's an whole bunch of laugh out loud moments within the episode.
It's just a shame, there was only ever one series of this, I laughed a lot. Ronnie Barker is excellent as every character he plays here (8 characters over the series, he plays 2 in the final episode. Recommended for fans of Barker or British Comedy.
In case you didn't realize Julie Brown rules
Julie Brown singing Cause I'm a Blonde from the classic 80s movie Earth Girls are Easy.
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