The Jacket
Time travel can often make for great, fun movies – the Back to the Future trilogy and Terry Gilliam’s Time Bandits being prime examples. They can also make for disturbing, psychologically and philosophically confusing films examining the paradoxical possibilities of being able to alter history, like Gilliam’s superb Twelve Monkeys. This film is so consciously modelled on the latter that at first glance it could almost look like a rip off.
In fact, although stylistically there are resemblances to Gilliam’s 1998 Monkeys movie, this is an adaptation of the 1914 Jack London book The Star Rover. Best known for his canine epic White Fang, London was one of the most prolific and successful American authors of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and dabbled in early science fiction around the time that the genre was being invented by the likes of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells.
The Star Rover was effectively an early call for an end to inhumane treatment in prisons – a fairly topical subject considering the recent uproar over the abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay – as a prisoner locked in an asylum undergoing experimental treatment experiences a kind of astral-projection time travel to various eras.
Here, Oscar-winner Adrien Brody plays the internee, locked up for criminal insanity following a roadside shooting which amnesia prevents him from fully recalling. Strapped into a straightjacket and locked in the dark, his growing hallucinations gradually become lucid as he ends up in the distant future, finding out about his own death just days away in the real world. Much as Bruce Willis in Twelve Monkeys had but days to prove his sanity and save the world, here Brody has but days to prove his sanity and save his life. But, as with Terry Gilliam’s other masterpiece Brazil, are these trips to the future real, or is he actually insane?
Brody does his usual excellent job – just the right level of utter confusion in the eyes to lend credence to his apparent time-shifts, as well as to emphasise just how terrifying the claustrophobic “treatment” he is being put through must be. Director John Maybury, whose last outing was at the helm of the 1998 Francis Bacon biopic Love is the Devil, makes a competent shot at imitating Gilliam’s grittier, more disturbing techniques, amply aided by Mullholland Drive and Evil Dead II cinematographer Peter Deming.
Add to that a supporting cast including Jennifer Jason Leigh, Kris Kristofferson and Keira Knightley, a soundtrack by disconcerting electronica genius Brian Eno, and the knowledge that this comes from the production company set up by George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh, who act as producers, and you’ve got the makings of an very interesting film. Confusing, thought-provoking and enthralling, it may fall down a bit towards the final reel, but is nonetheless a worthwhile addition to the time travel genre that will most likely keep you guessing until the very end.
Star Wars Episode III: The Revenge of the Sith
What is there to say? We’ve all been disappointed by the last two and yet we’re still all going to go and see this one anyway.
This marks final closure after more than twenty-five years of Star Wars being the single most successful set of films of all time. At least, until George Lucas changes his mind again and goes off to make another trilogy.
Yep, with this movie we finally find out the official version of how Anakin Skywalker becomes Darth Vader. It involves an intergalactic war, lightsabre battles, a volcano and a bunch of incredibly detailed special effects, that much is guaranteed. But is it actually any good?
What is most interesting about these Star Wars prequels is not so much the reactions of the 25-40 year-olds who are old enough to have been the target audience of the original films at the cinema, but the response from the kids who are the target audience today. Back in the late 70s and early 80s, Star Wars was everything. We lived and dreamed Star Wars, and our parents loved it too. These new films simply don’t seem to have captured children’s imaginations in the same way.
To be fair, it’s a fairly tall order to compete with the rampant success of the original trilogy. They did something no other films had previously managed, with groundbreaking special effects and a depth of imagination rarely before seen on screen. So it’s not really fair to complain that the new films aren’t as innovative. It’s also not fair to complain that they aren’t as liked – moaning fans of the originals have ensured that most people will slag them off, given half the chance.
The only fair thing is to wait for a quarter of a century and see how they all look then. Of course, the trouble with that is that the original trilogy as most people remember it no longer exists. George Lucas likes tampering with his creation so much that the DVDs are based on the 1997 “Special Editions”, with further new special effects and footage. Even the new series has been altered between cinema and its DVD releases – The Phantom Menace in particular receiving a number of effects tweaks to ensure the computer graphics were as up to date as possible for home viewing.
In the meantime, this latest – and final – instalment brings twenty-eight years’ worth of storytelling to an end. Star Wars has had such an impact on not only Hollywood, but also people’s lives in that period that it would be a shame not to mark its passing. But – as with the last two bitter disappointments – don’t get your hopes up for genius.
Millions
Coming as it does from director Danny Boyle, this film is a significant surprise. This is, after all, the man who brought us the hugely unpleasant Trainspotting and Shallow Grave, as well as the zombie horror 28 Days Later. He’s hardly a prime candidate to produce something as sweetly engaging as this. In fact, in places it’s almost so sweet as to be vomit-inducing.
But it’s important to take films on their own merit, and in the context of what they are trying to achieve. This sets out to be a family film, and it has more than enough to appeal to all ages. The only requirement is to leave your cynicism at the door, or else the sentimentality – not to mention the religious aspects – could get overwhelmingly unbearable.
Yep, the guy who brought us Heroin, squalor and ultraviolence in Trainspotting is now bringing us the spiritual benefits of charity and an overtly Christian worldview. In fact, this could almost seem cynical after all, but in an entirely different way – a cynical attempt to tap into the American market. After all, it’s a British-set film with a British cast, the biggest name of which is the unknown outside the British Isles James Nesbitt, it has a fairly big name British director, yet is being released in the US first and has religious themes that are far more likely to appeal to Yanks than Limeys. It’s also set in a depressed part of the North, just like past British cross-Atlantic hits Billy Elliot, Calendar Girls and The Full Monty and, again like Billy Elliot, revolves around a boy who’s considered odd for his unusual interests. It seems to be trying to tick all the boxes at once.
Luckily for Boyle, if this was his aim he seems to have succeeded amply. The American critics almost unanimously adored this film, with praises heaped upon praises. It’s already a financial and critical success on one side of the Atlantic; the only question is whether it can translate – religious manifestations and all – back to the British market.
Ignoring the religious aspects – largely in the form of benevolent apparitions by various Christian saints – this is basically another retread of Brewster’s Millions, about a sudden influx of cash that has to be spent within a very short period of time. The story has been remade countless times before since its first appearance as a film in 1914, and this time is given an added contemporary spin – the reason the money has to be spent is that the cash is in pounds, and Britain is here just about to join the euro, making the currency itself worthless. Found by a small boy with an active imagination – a bit like Tim Burton’s schmaltzy Big Fish – there is now an added appeal to the youth market. What would a bunch of schoolchildren do if they had millions of pounds?
It is, however, more than just a fantasy-made-reality light comedy, with various messages about responsibility towards one’s fellow man and the rest of society. For some it may be far too preachy for its social as well as religious messages. It is, however, a finely-crafted movie nonetheless, and yet another indication that Danny Boyle remains an interesting, intelligent, highly talented and entirely unpredictable filmmaker.
Kingdom of Heaven
In the current political climate, producing a film about a bunch of Christians charging off to the Middle East to slaughter as many Muslims as they can instantly sets all alarm bells ringing. What’s the message? Is this pro-war or anti-war? How is Islam portrayed? What’s the agenda?
Yep, this is a big-budget Hollywood epic about the Crusades. It’s a fascinating part of history which to date hasn’t really been done much justice by the movies. There was 1935’s Cecil B De Mille epic The Crusades, which made a decent stab of things considering the constraints of the technology of the time, and then 1954’s King Richard and the Crusaders, which bizarrely starred Rex “Doctor Dolittle” Harrison as Muslim leader Saladin, and that, bar the odd brief mention in various Robin Hood movies, is about it.
It makes very little sense that there haven’t been more movies based on the various Crusading campaigns of the late 11th through to early 14th centuries. They have pretty much everything you could ask for in a spectacular piece of cinema – huge armies, powerful characters, confusion, tragedy, mistakes, victories and losses. Then there’s the noble enemy in the Third Crusade’s Saladin, portrayed as worthy of the utmost respect by, among others, Dante in The Divine Comedy and Sir Walter Scott in The Talisman. There’s also the various tales of devious and unscrupulous deeds from campaigners on the supposedly Christian side, adding a sense of ambiguity to the whole thing. It is grand, epic subject-matter, and needs grand, epic films.
So, whereas the Golden Age epic master De Mille was the ideal choice for a Crusades movie in the 1930s, today there is again one obvious candidate for director – Ridley “Gladiator” Scott.
As this film is effectively being sold as “the third Lord of the Rings movie, only without all that fantasy nonsense” – massive battles, sieges, a band of warriors trying to do what’s right, a massively evocative musical score and a bit of cross-cultural romance to boot – I suppose getting Orlando Bloom in as the main lead seemed a great idea. He’s used to this sort of thing after playing Legolas, after all – and he’s done the slightly more historical stuff in Troy to boot. The fact that he can’t act for toffee doesn’t matter – he looks pretty.
Yep, Orlando Bloom is not a good choice, although to be fair he does put in a good effort. Thankfully, he’s backed up by a superb supporting cast, from the well-known and respected Jeremy Irons, Edward Norton and Liam Neeson to the little-known but superb David Thewlis and Brendan Gleeson.
Over all of this, however, lies Ridley Scott’s superb eye for a spectacular shot. It is just as visually impressive as you’d expect, as vast armies clash in the deserts round Jerusalem, siege engines advance, and swords and armour glint in the setting sun.
The political agenda? It has none. The purpose is simply to make truck-loads of cash, while sticking relatively close to historical record. Sure, there’s a bit of sixth form philosophy in here, the nature of good and evil, that sort of guff. But the primary reason to see this film is epic battles filmed by a master director. In that it does not disappoint. The only remaining question – in the events the film is based around, the Muslims won – can Hollywood bring itself to have the “good guys” lose?
It's All Gone Pete Tong
The phrase from which this film derives its title was a popular bit of rhyming slang for a while in the early to mid 1990s – “Pete Tong, wrong” – a tribute to the habit of one of the earliest superstar DJs to make mistakes during his sets. As you might expect with a title like that, it revolves around the club DJ scene. Which seems a tad passé these days, but still.
Thankfully, however, this is not merely a mindless trip through clubland like the inexplicably popular Human Traffic from a few years back. Nor is it a documentary about the now pretty much past it world of insanely loud music, overly-energetic dancing and mind-altering drugs. At least, not really.
Seemingly loosely based on Citizen Kane, the movie is a partially documentary-style attempt to explore the life of fictional superstar DJ Frankie Wilde, partially a regular movie following his various difficulties. With contributions from the likes of Carl Cox and the man himself, Pete Tong – both playing themselves – as well as a thumping soundtrack, it’s a convincing look at the club world of the 90s built around a great central performance from the often criminally underrated Paul “Dennis Pennis” Kaye as Wilde.
The major conceit, as with Citizen Kane’s “Rosebud” investigation, is that the filmmakers are trying to uncover what happened to the once legendary DJ, who vanished without trace a few years ago. The basic answer is uncovered pretty early on – he went deaf and had a breakdown. After all, how can you mix music if you can’t hear the beat? After setting up the character, his attempts to cope with his sudden change in circumstances and plans for the future – if he has one – form the bulk of the movie, and it’s all good stuff.
Although a DJ with a coke habit going deaf could easily end up an excuse to preach about the damage clubbers are doing to themselves, that would – let’s face it – hardly pull in the punters. Instead, the story of Frankie Wilde’s tragic fall is layered with dose after does of richly black comedy.
There are also some nice surreal touches chucked in for good measure to emphasis Wilde’s other major problem – a hefty cocaine addiction personified by a six foot tall badger in a fairy costume being a particular highlight. That in itself should be enough to demonstrate that, despite the talking heads from real life DJs, this is anything but a serious film.
With a less talented lead, this could all have come crashing down, much like Wilde’s career. But Paul Kaye is more than up to the task, turning in a superb performance that’s at once obnoxious, funny and endearing, and well worth the price of admission on its own. It’s about time he got a decent break onto the big screen, and this could well be it - he’ll be cropping up in a big budget blockbuster before you know it.
House of Wax
This film has two things that should instantly set off warning bells to stay well away. First, it’s yet another remake of a horror classic, following pointless recent retreadings of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Amityville Horror and The Ring. Second – and most important – it stars Paris Hilton. Actually, “star” is probably too strong a word. She certainly doesn’t feature as prominently as she did in the film for which she is best known, but she is nonetheless relatively high up the billing and is the only member of the cast, bar the chick who played Keifer Sutherland’s daughter in 24, who has any kind of name recognition value.
A spoiled rich-kid accidental porn star and someone off the telly are hardly adequate substitutes for the original 1954 classic’s line-up of Vincent Price and a then unknown Charles Bronson. Although music video director Jaume Serra makes a fair stab at his feature debut, he is also no match for the original movie’s visionary cult director André de Toth. It is also, it must be said, pretty much a travesty to take that classic film’s name and put it to this utterly bog-standard slasher movie.
Quite how anyone thought, after the likes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Scream and Scary Movie ripped this kind of formulaic trash to shreds, that a straight take on the old “pretty young people get hunted down like animals by a crazed killer” genre could be taken seriously, it is impossible to tell. They’ve even roped in Jon Abrahams, one of the stars of Scary Movie, as if to underline the point. As such, there is the constant expectation that the whole thing is meant to be a joke, making it impossible to get into the right mindset and impossible to get scared.
It also really doesn’t help that Paris Hilton is nowhere near as pleasant to look at as she and certain sections of the lad mag press seem to think. She is, after all, only here as eye-candy. In fact, the entire cast is only there as eye-candy, so in many ways it’s entirely appropriate that the psycho killer they run across in a deserted town wants to turn them all into waxwork figures once they’ve been despatched. They’re all a bunch of plastic nonentities, so that’s probably the best thing for them.
In short this is both a pointless remake and a pointless revival of a thoroughly ridiculed and outdated subgenre, directed by a first timer and starring a bunch of relative unknowns. It is by no means an interesting addition to the world of the movies.
Having said that, it does what it sets out to do perfectly well. With no apparent pretensions to be more than simply a slasher flick, it’s probably rather mean spirited to be overly critical. But at the same time, if you go expecting a decent horror film, you’ll come away feeling like you’ve wasted both time and money. Stick with the original, and if you want a slasher flick, go for one of the classics like Halloween or Friday the 13th. Don’t bother wasting your money on this kind of nonsense.
Friday Night Lights
For most people outside of the United States, the idea that watching a bunch of schoolchildren play sport could actually be worth getting worked up about is almost incomprehensible. If you watch a football match, you want it to be decent, surely? You’d much rather see David Beckham kick a ball around than auntie Flo’s next door neighbour’s boy, Archie – wouldn’t you?
However, as with so many sporting movies, the sport itself is largely incidental here, with the off-pitch tensions being the prime focus. So it is to this film’s major credit that the central role of the coach has gone to an always excellent actor in Billy Bob Thornton. Unfortunately, however, the basic plot is almost identical to that of another recent US sport-based import, the Samuel L Jackson-starring basketball flick Coach Carter, released a couple of months ago.
Both Coach Carter and Friday Night Lights revolve around teams of academically underachieving dropouts from underachieving neighbourhoods whose only hope of any success in life comes from their success at their chosen sport. Both Coach Carter and Friday Night Lights revolve around superb and inspiring central performances from the actors playing the coach/mentor. Both films also received rave reviews in the US.
Even though the sport may be somewhat alien – with the perennial difficulty of trying to work out why these people need body armour to play rugby – the basic themes and message are entirely familiar. It’s in many ways a standard retread of a typical genre film, looking at coming of age rituals, the need to apply oneself to gain any kind of success in life, and the hopes that older generations always pin on the young.
While it may say little that’s new, this is nonetheless and accomplished and moving film which, focussed as it is around yet another great performance from Thornton and good supporting turns from the likes of the (now all grown up) Lucas Black of American Gothic fame as the youthful team members. It’s a travesty that Thornton hasn’t yet won an acting Oscar – although he did pick up a statuette in 1996 for Best Adapted Screenplay for Sling Blade. This is both the kind of film and kind of performance that might make the Academy sit up and take notice again, even though he should really have won for The Man Who Wasn’t There – and for that he didn’t even get a nomination.
Americans love their sport movies; us Brits seem to prefer the real thing. But if you’re tempted to see what the yanks get so worked up about with these things, this could be an ideal introduction to the genre.
A Good Woman
Oscar Wilde is always a good option for anyone planning a film. His convoluted yet accessible stories and wit-laden dialogue simply refuse to grow old or tired. In the last few years we’ve seen excellent versions of The Importance of Being Earnest and An Ideal Husband, both starring Rupert Everett, and now it is the turn of Lady Windermere’s Fan to get the big-screen treatment – albeit under a different name and without Everett among the cast.
It must be said, at first glance it looks like they’ve missed a trick. Why the name change? Lady Windermere’s Fan must still have some recognition value, surely? And even if he is the wrong age for them all, couldn’t they have roped Everett in for one of the male parts?
Even with the alterations – the story has also been shifted from Victorian England to the Italian Riviera of the 1930s – this is everything you would expect from a film based on a Wilde play: sumptuous sets, sparkling dialogue, glittering costumes, and a superb ensemble cast that includes starlet of the moment Scarlett Johansen, Oscar-winner Helen Hunt, Oscar nominee Tom Wilkinson and a host of lesser names putting in decent turns. Add to that Wilde’s trademark ability to uncover timeless truths about relationships and human nature, and it is easy to see not only why this story still holds appeal more than a century after it was written, but also why the number of screen adaptations of it already runs into double figures.
Johansen is Lady Windermere, one half of the most popular young couple in the ex-pat Riviera society, yet pursued by another man; Hunt is gracefully aging seductress Mrs. Erlynne, out in Italy to attempt to wrangle her way into the high life. Deviousness abounds, with twists and surprises aplenty – assuming you are unfamiliar with the original play, that is.
The only slight trouble is that Wilde’s dialogue tends to work best at pace – rapid-fire quips and pithy observations rattled off almost as if the characters haven’t really got time to think. Although the performances here are all decent – with Tom Wilkinson in particular standing out as Lord “Tuppy” Augustus – both Hunt and Johansen seem to specialise in speaking their lines in a slow drawl, as if almost bored. While this may add a certain realism in places, this is a Wilde play – reality here is meant to be heightened, exaggerated, almost a parody. There’s something not quite right with this version of the tale.
Even so, the typical Merchant Ivory-style costume drama feel that anyone going to a film like this would hope for permeates every frame, taken a notch above by Wilde’s dialogue – even when this has been toned down by the screenplay or the actors’ delivery. It may not be the best Wilde adaptation of recent years, and Rupert Everett may be missed, but it still makes for an entertaining couple of hours, and for fans of this type of movie it’s certainly worth a look.
