Locke (2014)

2014-04-27

Twitter Plot Summary: Construction worker Ivan Locke heads down the motorway the night before his biggest job to fix a wrong he has committed.

Five Point Summary:

1. Left or right… let’s go right.
2. So many phone calls to make.
3. Stop saying she’s distressed!
4. Unravelling… and recovering.
5. Outskirts of The Big Smoke.

To some, the thought of 85 minutes alone in a car with Tom Hardy would sound like torture. To others, it would perhaps sound like the best idea ever. The reality is that, in this case at least, you’re just a passive viewer of the journey down the M6 with Hardy’s Ivan Locke. Locke is Welsh (not that this really makes much difference), and is intent on resolving a wrong he has committed, in the only way he knows how – by driving from his construction job north of Birmingham and travelling down to London for reasons that will become apparent to you as you watch the film.

This is very much a story that would be ruined if I were to give away any of the plot beyond this, but it would be entirely fair to say that this is not a big explosive thriller, but is in fact about a normal man dealing with a very feasible situation. Unfortunately for him, it’s a situation that’s arisen on the eve of his biggest construction job to date, leaving him with several balls to juggle in the course of his journey.

The thing you have to remember going in is that it is literally 85-90 minutes of Tom Hardy driving. There are no cutaways to other actors or other locations – much like Hitchcock’s Rear Window we are in the car with Locke almost from start to finish. Luckily for us, and despite his Welsh accent, he remains compelling throughout. The remainder of the cast appear via telephone calls, disembodied voices appearing through the miracle of Bluetooth and modern technology. The likes of Olivia Colman, Ruth Wilson and Andrew Scott (he of BBC’s Sherlock fame) all step up to the plate and make the drama all the more compelling. This displayed out so well, in fact, that a potentially boring conversation about construction – specifically, concrete – is still thoroughly entertaining despite the somewhat dry subject matter.

This is all down to the script – because of the structure of the calls and their impact on Locke’s journey they always serve a purpose and push things on despite the necessarily static aspect of the presentation. In this respect director Steven Knight has somehow managed to make it visually interesting, pulling out of the bag a number of different camera angles to keep things fresh. This is a small relief given that his last film was the less than stellar Redemption (or Hummingbird, if you’re in the UK) starring Jason Statham.

The only slightly concerning moments are those with Locke talking to himself in the vehicle. Whilst tonally appropriate, they do still jar slightly when compared to the rest of the production and run the risk of taking you out of the story. In that respect, however, it does allow you to see into his inner thoughts and explains his reasons for doing what he’s doing. Thankfully we’re not spoon fed absolutely everything and are allowed to piece together events slowly over the course of the narrative. It’s a well structured, low budget drama and would perhaps only benefit from seeing a bit more of Locke’s world beyond the confines of his vehicle. On the whole though, this is a very small complaint.

Score: 4/5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdaofZfgV_Q

The Love Punch (2014)

Simon Prior

2014-04-26

No matter the disguise, no matter where they hid, the public still knew they'd taken this film for the money. — No matter the disguise, no matter where they hid, the public still knew they’d taken this film for the money.

Twitter Plot Summary: After his pension fund is wiped out, Brosnan and ex-wife Thompson plot to steal an expensive diamond.

Five Point Summary:

1. The French have taken all the money!
2. Let’s steal a diamond, why not?
3. Allergy to cats, allergy to flowers.
4. Cliffhanger. Literally.
5. Yawn.

The thought of Pierce Brosnan teaming up with Emma Thompson for a grey pound pleasing adventure romp should inspire positive thoughts. Both of them are entertaining to watch (although the less said about Brosnan’s singing the better) and have a certain pedigree that makes them stand out from the crowd. Unfortunately, based on The Love Punch they could probably do with picking out some better projects in future.

The one major problem is the script. It’s too fluffy and inconsequential to be entertaining, a poor attempt at the caper/heist genre. Villain Vincent (Lafitte) appears to have been taken from the stock “sneering French businessman” catalogue and is a nasty sort just because the script demands he be so. If he was any more two dimensional he’d slip between the cracks in the pavement. There’s his obligatory good looking fiancee, his enormous amount of wealth and the fact he bought the company Brosnan’s Richard worked for and wiped out his pension fund. Naturally the best plan of attack is to try stealing a very expensive diamond from Vincent in order to pay for his retirement. With Thompson’s Kate in tow, they set off for France and the sub-par Ocean’s Eleven style plot commences.

At least the core quartet look like they’re enjoying themselves. Brosnan and Thompson have good chemistry together and they are on the whole a believable divorced couple. The same can be said about Timothy Spall and Celia Imrie as their long time friends who come along for the ride, although they struggle to make the most of some bad material. Spall’s Jerry has the best of it, his previous military exploits and contacts coming as a surprise to everyone, including his wife. Beyond this, you take one look at the narrative and wonder if anybody realised that it lacked depth, purpose and value. Capers tend to be vary basic affairs, admittedly, but this one seems incapable of maintaining even a level of internal logic.

The film may be terrible, but at least they got paid to do it.

On top of the slightly ludicrous caper, there are also valueless moments where Richard and Kate get their son to do some illegal hacking for them via webcam – complete with bad taste gags featuring their son’s slobbish roommate. Apparently if you’re sharing a flat you never close the bathroom door, nor do you think it slightly inappropriate to start touching yourself in a shared area. A final subplot featuring Kate partaking in some internet dating with another Frenchman completely distracts from the core storyline and just serves as a needless sideline where more depth could have been added to the caper angle. And, in fairness, to absolutely every other aspect of the production if we’re going down that avenue.

A couple of amusing jokes go some way to preventing this from being an absolute disaster, and the banter between Brosnan and Thompson does go some way to making this palatable, but there’s ultimately not enough to recommend it to anyone. A shame, really, as a decent caper with Pierce Brosnan and Emma Thompson would be worth seeing.

Score: 2/5

Night of the Creeps (1986)

Simon Prior

2014-04-25

Her insistence on him watching soap operas had a totally unexpected side effect.

Twitter Plot Summary: When an alien canister releases parasitic slugs on Earth, those infected become zombies and the living must work out how to stop them.

Five Point Summary:

1. One continuous eyebrow.
2. A corpsicle.
3. Thrill me.
4. Contrazoom!
5. “Duck – it’s Miller time!”

Yep, it’s yet another cheap and cheerful genre classic from the 1980s, however unlike most of the other 80s horror films I’ve seen recently in this case it’s a film that decides to do things a little bit differently and break away from the pack. Night of the Creeps is packed full of one liners, amusing gags and a bucketload of gore, as well as carrying a surprising amount of emotional heft just for added dramatic purposes. There’s still the usual hair rock soundtrack and typical 80s fashion choices, but it also pays direct homage to the B-movies of the 50s, most notably by opening with a black and white sequence set in said era and subsequently playing up to many of the tropes that later spun out from the genre.

After a canister of something decidedly unknown and alien crash-lands on Earth and releases some alien slug things which attack a young man and enter him, for want of a better term. The story then flashes forward 27 years to the 1980s and the plot proper begins. For those of you wondering why no alien parasites took over the world in the intervening years, all will be revealed in the film.

Thrill me, he said. It'll be fun, he said. — Thrill me, he said. It’ll be fun, he said.

Lead cop Ray Cameron, played with sardonic sarcasm by Tom Atkins, gives a surprisingly deep portrayal of a man who is still haunted of his years as a young cop, where he witnessed his sweetheart being killed by an escaped mental patient. When his past literally comes back to haunt him, he starts a descent into actions that aren’t unexpected but are quite harsh given the tone of the rest of the film. This too is indicated with the friendship between Chris Romero (I see what you did there…) and his disabled friend JC (apparently named after John Carpenter and Tobe Hooper). Their buddy pairing is well realised and takes a few turns that again are somewhat unexpected but also equally welcome in order to keep things slightly fresher than the undead roaming the streets.

As a twist on the by then established zombie format, Night of the Creeps works well because it doesn’t go out of its way to stick too closely to that formula. Happy to take a few twists and turns at a time where zombies had suddenly taken to saying “Brains!” and George Romero had taken the genre underground (literally) and made it increasingly grim in 1985’s Day of the Dead, Night of the Creeps balances somewhere between the two. There’s the obvious body horror of having alien slug things enter you and take over your body like a parasite (mixed in with some possible allegory about the AIDS virus), plus the joy to be had from witnessing a small scale zombie outbreak. If you’re into that sort of thing, of course.

Whilst the effects may not be entirely up to scratch, Night of the Creeps has its own level of charm that more than makes up for it. Besides which, this is the 1980s we’re talking about – if we started complaining about effects from that era, we’d literally not be able to watch anything ever again.

Score: 3.5/5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhLGYUYTTD0

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

Simon Prior

2014-04-24

She was ecstatic to find out she'd be working with Steve Carell. — She was ecstatic to find out she’d be working with Steve Carell.

Twitter Plot Summary: Young Olive Hoover reaches the final of a beauty pageant, leading her family to take a cross-country trip to get her.

Five Point Summary:

1. Bit grim to open with a suicidal gay man, what what.
2. Did they really just leave her behind?
3. Is the bus going to make it?
4. That’s no way to treat the dead.
5. Let’s all dance, why not.

This is yet another of those films where I had seen a number of the spoofs but never the source material, Bad Grandpa last year being one of them. Well, no more! Little Miss Sunshine happened to show up on TV and I went out of my way to watch it. In hindsight, I’m incredibly glad that I did.

It’s one of those usual dysfunctional family capers where everybody is at each other’s throats yet they are completing the journey for the benefit of young Olive (Breslin) who has been accepted into the final of the Little Miss Sunshine beauty pageant. The only problem is the pageant is on the other side of the country and a road trip is necessary. Adding more emotional drama to proceedings is the arrival of Steve Carell’s Frank, brother of Sheryl (Collette) who has recently tried to kill himself following a relationship that went sour. Despite this slightly tragic edge (of which there is more to follow), it never becomes maudlin or depressing. Instead this is used as a stepping stone to link emotional weight with some offbeat comedic humour, which works brilliantly.

You can see the VW van as a metaphor for the family as a whole and the journey they find themselves on. It’s rickety and liable to break down and fall apart at any moment, yet with the collective assistance of the entire family it keeps moving and doesn’t stop despite all its faults. That might be a little too on the nose for some, but it really does work. Ironically, as the van becomes more and more decrepit, the family unit is always strengthening and bonding.

There’s also Olive’s journey to take into consideration – she’s an awkward girl who doesn’t have the right body shape or outward appearance for a pageant like Little Miss Sunshine. But then it’s really about being yourself and not worrying what others think of you. It’s not about winning, it’s about taking part. By the time we get to see her dance at the pageant, a dance that has been teased throughout the film, you’re rooting for her regardless of the outcome. And, perhaps, in spite of it.

The new judges for Britain's Got Talent made their presence felt. — The new judges for Britain’s Got Talent made their presence felt.

It’s a huge testament to Greg Kinnear’s performance (and, indeed, the script) that we grow to like his character as time moves on. Starting off as a brash “yes we can!” style businessman, he starts to mellow as they get closer to their endgame. This is in part pushed on following his interactions with an always-excellent Bryan Cranston, but also from the long exposure he has to his family. Without making light of the input from Toni Collette, Alan Arkin and Paul Dano, all of which have significant roles and character moments, the performance from Steve Carell is superb and completely at odds with the typical kind of comedic performance expected from him. It proves without doubt that he does have serious acting chops, for any doubters that may have considered otherwise.

The ending is quite subversive in one respect, although you can kind of tell where it’s going based solely on watching the other beauty pageant contenders and prefaced with your understanding of Olive’s relationship with her grandfather. True to form, everybody learns a valuable lesson in the end and they’re all better off as a result. Well, mostly. It’s a winner because there’s real emotional heft – Steve Carell’s character has attempted suicide, after all – but this is successfully combined with decent jokes and, eventually, a sense of gleeful anarchy.

Score: 4.5/5

Die Hard 4.0 (2007)

Simon Prior

2014-04-23

"Sorry man, my white vest is in the wash." — “Sorry man, my white vest is in the wash.”

Twitter Plot Summary: John McClane is back for a fourth outing, this time being an analogue piece in a digital world.

Five Point Summary:

1. Older, more grizzled, more sanitised John McClane!
2. Taking out a helicopter with a car? Normal day at the office for McClane.
3. Is Tim Russ ever anybody else besides Tuvok?
4. CGI jet. So this is what has become of the Die Hard franchise.
5. No ‘F’ bomb. Actually, that is what’s become of it.

Late arrivals in previously complete franchises have recently become all the rage. Die Hard 4 (or Die Hard 4.0, or Live Free and Die Hard) arrived 12 years after the previous film in the series and it’s sadly clear from the start that the movie business has moved on quite substantially between 1995 and 2007. In context Die Hard 4 isn’t actually too bad an action film, arriving at a time where the third entries in the Pirates of the Caribbean, Spider-Man and Shrek franchises tickled the top 10 and the likes of 300 and Transformers were redefining the action genre. The plot of Die Hard 4 is therefore almost completely appropriate when taking this into consideration.

John McClane (Willis) is now an older police detective, but you can tell he’s still hard as nails because he’s chosen to shave off all his hair. After a brief reintroduction to his daughter Lucy (Winstead), McClane is asked to pick up a computer hacker (Long), who it turns out is a small cog in a much bigger scheme. And thus they head out on the road in order to prevent the scheme from going through, accompanied by explosions and fights aplenty.

Die Hard 4 continues with the formula of buddying John McClane with somebody inappropriate, in this case Justin Long’s computer nerd/hacker. McClane has always been portrayed as a bit of an analogue creation, so pitting him against a technological threat is a good idea on paper, and mostly in practice also. The point is laboured a little too much, but then this is tempered by something else blowing up, which is a fair trade-off.

In many ways Die Hard 4 retreads previous territory. Lucy is a surrogate for ex-wife Holly (even going so far as to use Gennaro instead of McClane as her surname), and Justin Long’s hacker Matt is a poor stand-in for Samuel L Jackson. It also doesn’t help that the villain Thomas Gabriel, played like a modern version of Timothy Olyphant’s own sheriff Seth Bullock from Deadwood – minus the moustache – is inherently impotent in terms of pure villainy. The scheme itself is an entertaining notion, with Olyphant and his team of computer experts planning on stealing a lot of money and then crashing the system shortly afterwards. This works in the context of pitting McClane against a problem he doesn’t quite understand, but Gabriel is not the most entertaining of Die Hard villains and at this point in the franchise is definitely the least impressive of them all.

John McClane's new disguise as Mary Elizabeth Winstead puzzled the villain. — John McClane’s new disguise as Mary Elizabeth Winstead puzzled the villain.

Disappointingly there is an excessive amount of CGI used to varying effect, and the initial theatrical release even went as far as sanitising McClane’s hard swearing. The DVD/Blu-Ray release manages to fix this to an extent, but it’s a poor state of affairs when the Die Hard franchise tries pandering to a general audience rather than sticking to its guns (no pun intended) and being violent and sweary. In its favour is that the explosions are the biggest the franchise has seen to date, and almost make up for the abomination that is the CGI fighter jet.

Still, it remains entertaining and the action on the whole is nicely choreographed. McClane has to deal with at least two enemies who are either well versed in the art of parkour, or are kung fu experts in the form of Maggie Q. Whilst Gabriel may not have the same level of physical impact as these two, he at least has the brains to steer clear from a physical confrontation. Bearing in mind this is the director that gave us the video game visuals of the first two Underworld films, we should perhaps be grateful that it didn’t end up being any worse.

Score: 3/5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0qAZq0Zmcc

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)

Simon Prior

2014-04-22

"I'm gonna crush you like a spider. Caught in an electricity net. In winter." — “I’m gonna crush you like a spider. Caught in an electricity net. In winter.”

Twitter Plot Summary: Peter Parker returns as The Amazing Spider-Man to tackle Electro, Rhino and The Green Goblin and… his relationship woes.

Five Point Summary:

1. Quipping Spider-Man. Now that’s more like it.
2. Times Square electricity. Stuff.
3. Romance angle – getting a bit OTT now.
4. That was a bit anti-climactic.
5. Franchise building.

Rebooting the Spider-Man franchise just a few years after the relatively dire Spider-Man 3, which suffered from “Too Many Villains” syndrome, seemed like a good idea at the time. And in fairness the reboot starring Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone wasn’t too bad at all. Ignoring some slightly iffy special effects and the fact it left a lot of plot threads hanging, it did its job well and gave Spidey a bit more of an attitude in line with Marvel’s own Ultimate line of comics. Whilst it never came close to reaching the apex set by Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 2, it did at least establish a believable relationship between Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy which always felt strangely absent between Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst.

ASM2 does at least provide a few decent twists to our expectations – Norman Osborn isn’t in the position we would expect, and the plot does a few things out of the ordinary in a mostly successful bid to keep us on our toes. The trailers have not done ASM2 any favours, billing it as a big whizz-bang display of action set pieces. As it happens it’s not an action extravaganza, instead it’s primarily about the relationship between Peter and Gwen which is under strain following the promise Peter makes to Gwen’s father at the end of the first film. This takes up the majority of the narrative and may leave a few unsuspecting audience members cold.

The attempts at franchise building are clear from the off, and whilst the presence of Rhino, Electro and the Green Goblin may seem like an overcrowded lineup on face value, it’s not too bad on the whole. Rhino barely gets any time and is only here seemingly to set up the Sinister Six movie that Sony want to put out in the near future. The appearance of the Green Goblin, too, feels a little arbitrary and could have easily been saved for a third movie. Have the characters moving into position and being directly referenced, by all means, but that doesn’t mean we need them clogging up the narrative.  On top of all this, Electro gets the short end of the stick despite being the core villain. His origin is actually quite good – the man nobody recognises finds his face plastered all over the screens in Times Square in perhaps the film’s best set piece, morphing from Spidey fan to Spidey nemesis through a rushed but entirely plausible transformation. Their final showdown feels very much like the incident with The Lizard in the first film, rushed and a little anti-climactic. Given that ASM2 runs for more than 2 hours, it’s odd that this could feel rushed, but then when your story is divided between emotional drama and superhero action, something has to give.

Spidey had a sideline career in the fire service.

More scenes featuring Harry Osborn would’ve gone down a treat as Dane DeHaan is a commanding screen presence. His scenes with Andrew Garfield are electric (ahem) and each acts as an opposing mirror to the other. That’s nothing of course when compared to the onscreen relationship between Garfield and Stone – they have a chemistry that just works, and even when compared to the first film it’s in a league of its own.

Still, at least the wisecracking, quipping Spider-Man is here, which is most definitely a good thing. It sets Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man clearly apart from the Spidey’s of the past, and adds laugh out loud/mildly chucklesome moments between the drama and bursts of action. It’s still far from perfect, but progress has been made since the 2012 reboot, and with any luck that will continue into the next one.

Is there an Alan Rickman plummet?: Yes

Score: 3.5/5

Highlander: The Source (2007)

Simon Prior

2014-04-21

McLeod contemplated beheading everyone involved in the production of The Source, including himself.

Twitter Plot Summary: Duncan MacLeod goes in search of The Source of Immortal power. Inexplicably.

Five Point Summary:

1. So the bad guy is yet another version of the Kurgan?
2. Singing “Who Wants To Live Forever”? Pah.
3. Awkward love scene in the forest. Very awkward.
4. The car just blew up because a fiery tree landed on it. Erm… Okay?
5. Power ballad finale? Really?

Opening with a bored narration, The Source sets out its stall from page 1 and never dare to reach above this level of mediocrity. The world has gone to pot and Immortals – beings who can only be killed by having their head removed – are looking for The Source, their ultimate power and entirely different from The Prize which they were previously chopping each other’s heads for. The reasons behind this are clouded by iffy plotting and substandard direction, and raises the question as to why this film even exists.

It’s sloppily edited, badly acted and features special effects akin to a SyFy TV movie – as it happens, this is exactly how it was first broadcast, so in context it makes perfect sense. The plot is bunkum, a last roll of the dice for the Adrian Paul-led continuity that followed on from the Christopher Lambert movies. Of course, continuity has never been a strong point of the Highlander series. The first film wrapped things up quite nicely and it’s been an ongoing attempt at keeping the story going since then. In this case we’re supposedly in a world of lawlessness in a dystopian near future, but all it looks like is Eastern Europe on an average Saturday night. There’s a couple of fight sequences – superfluous – and a villain who is yet another Immortal cut from the same template as the Kurrgan, gruff voice included. The only difference here is that MacLeod is joined by a team of fellow Immortals on his quest, and advances in special effects means the bad guy can now run around very quickly in blurred speed motion. Other than wanting to kill all the good guys, he doesn’t have anything more to define him beyond his pasty white complexion.

The Guardian's Hulk Hogan impression was awful. — The Guardian’s Hulk Hogan impression was awful.

Given that this is a franchise that spawned five films, it’s amazing it’s managed to push the concept this far – not forgetting the many seasons of the TV show that introduced us to Duncan in the first place. Adrian Paul is the best actor of the bunch in this instance, although he’s still not particularly good. His accent wobbles about so much it’s difficult to take his tortured Immortal soul seriously. You see, Immortals can’t have children so this is apparently one of the big themes at play in The Source, although it’s that badly scripted it’s almost pointless. More grating are the constant references to Queen’s original soundtrack and random quotes taken primarily from that first venture. The Guardian sings a line from Who Wants To Be Forever, and there’s an awful cover of Princes of the Universe set to an entirely pointless and incredibly boring montage sequence.

Thankfully the proposed sequels to this new direction for the franchise didn’t come to pass, despite it setting up a potential new start for the series. Not only is The Source an affront to the film’s that preceded it, but it’s also a terrible film on its own. It comes to something when your characters go on an epic quest and you feel by the end that it is neither epic nor the slightest bit necessary. Furthermore, throwing in a random montage sequence at the very end just to explain what’s happened should be all you need to know. Watch that 3 minute clip to save you watching the whole film – you’ll thank me for it.

Score: 0.5/5

Goal! (2005)

Simon Prior

2014-04-20

He'd never seen mud before... welcome to the north of England! — He’d never seen mud before… welcome to the north of England!

Twitter Plot Summary: A Mexican immigrant living in Los Angeles is given a trial with Newcastle United football club and a chance to live his dreams.

Five Point Summary:

1. Stannis Baratheon!
2. Ahh, Newcastle. I less than 3 you.
3. Anna Friel as a nurse. You now have my interest.
4. Brian Johnson of AC/DC fame!
5. Boring, expected resolution. Yawn.

I’ve always found sports movies to be a tricky proposition. They usually follow the same structure – underdog makes it big and overcomes his many issues before the end credits – so my interest in such films is based on whether or not they do something fun or interesting or even completely different with that structure. Goal!, released in 2005, does none of that and sticks so rigidly to the formula that it makes you wonder why they bothered making it at all.

Our plucky underdog is Santiago Munez, a Mexican immigrant now living in Los Angeles who dreams of making it big in the world of football – otherwise known as soccer in some parts of the world. He’s spotted by a former football scout who wrangles him a trial with Newcastle United. Perhaps an odd choice of club to feature in a film, however their fans are as dedicated as it gets so from that perspective at least the passion for success is there. Once in Newcastle Santiago has to prove himself to the manager and the training staff, undergoing several rites of passage and overcoming a number of obstacles on his way from getting his foot in the door to playing for the first team.

There’s a number of cameos from Newcastle United first team players from that period, including Alan Shearer. Thankfully most of the football players featured have no dialogue, but just to make it all the more cringeworthy, David Beckham turns up in a speaking role and is shockingly bad, but then that will come as no surprise. Every sports movie genre cliche is played out and doesn’t deviate from its path at any point. There are literally no surprises and it ends in exactly the way you would expect. It even does the whole “Rocky!”/“Adrian!” thing that was cliche back in 1976, let alone 2005. The thing is, with a couple of twists to the script this would have been far better than the sum of its parts yet it doggedly refuses to do so.

If you were expecting subtle emotional drama, forget it. The emotional angle is played up to the hilt and rarely seems to make any sense, a jumble of sequences thrown together whereby Santiago is estranged from his father, his budding relationship with nurse Roz (Friel) is tested, and he tries to make new Newcastle signing Gavin Harris realise that, at 28 years of age, he needs to start acting like a role model for the younger players rather than partying like a crazy man all the time.

The only thing I got out of it was that it’s set in Newcastle and there are some really nice aerial shots of the city, and the opportunity to say on a couple of occasions that I’ve walked down some of the streets seen in the film. Oh, and to a lesser extent, Anna Friel dressed as a nurse – that’s usually good for business. On all other accounts it’s not worth your time. Oh, and Sean Pertwee doesn’t die – that came as quite the surprise.

Score: 1.5/5

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Yh3Zpxnisw

Billy Liar (1963)

Simon Prior

2014-04-19

He couldn't remember which one of his three girlfriends she was. — He couldn’t remember which one of his three girlfriends she was.

Twitter Plot Summary: Compulsive liar Billy Fisher has dreams of being a writer, but his dreams often end up more elaborate than reality.

Five Point Summary:

1. Welcome to Ambrosia!
2. Funeral home. Apt.
3. How many relationships does he have on the go?
4. I feel sorry for his Mum.
5. Two pints. Two pints of milk.

Billy Liar forms part of the British New Wave of cinema in the 1960s, a filmmaking trend that showed the realities of life for the working classes and often drawing attention to the existence of families and persons living in the north of England – a place which, as it happens, I have a growing affinity for as time moves on. Billy Liar is an interesting component of the New Wave in this respect in that it doesn’t quite conform with the conventions of the pseudo-documentary style the genre is known for. Indeed, the opening sequence is an elaborate fantasy set entirely in the head of Billy Fisher, the lead character and titular liar. He has concocted the nation of Ambrosia, where he appears to inhabit most of those living there, and is a fantastic place for him to escape from the austerity of post-war Britain.

And Billy Fisher really is a compulsive liar, engrossed in his own little fantasy world where his imagination is king and reality can take a running jump. This has the propensity to get him into trouble – when we meet him he is in relationships with three different women and is perilously close to having it all fall apart around him. Billy is essentially a child in a man’s body, self-centred and prone to making rash decisions that will hurt those closest to him. Other than the effects his actions have on his family, they have wider ramifications for those living in his town and, in particular, the three women who are all targets for his affections.

His impression of Heath Ledger's Joker was not appreciated in the office. — His impression of Heath Ledger’s Joker was not appreciated in the office.

It’s worth taking into consideration the time in which this film is set and when it was made. The war was still fresh in many people’s memories by 1963, and its effects could still be felt. This is shown in the film, but never specifically referenced. Old, ramshackle buildings are torn down in order for new ones to be built, and the damage inflicted by the war, both physically and mentally, can be felt in most scenes. It’s perhaps no accident that Billy works in a funeral directors – a potent metaphor for his generally moribund existence.

Further breaking it away from its New Wave brethren is that Billy Liar is a comedy. There are some incredibly deep themes at play – how we choose to live our life, the impact of war on the younger generation twenty years after its end, the futility of hope, and so on – yet it’s still ostensibly a comedic tale. There are farcical overtones to Billy’s simultaneous relationships with three women, his seeming inability to escape from his fantasy world of Ambrosia (or indeed, fantasies of him machine gunning his parents after they chide him), and his attitude towards work and the real world, but in the background is a genuine sense of pathos and regret in that Billy is destined to remain in his fantastical comfort zone rather than attempting to live out his dreams, which comes across more as a defence mechanism than anything else. It certainly goes some way to explore the notion of the futility of dreams and following your passions. Whilst this melancholic tone does play a large part to the tale, it never comes at the expense of the gentle humour – that makes it a winner in my book.

Score: 4.5/5

Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)

Simon Prior

"Excuse me, do you have any Grey Poupon?" — “Excuse me, do you have any Grey Poupon?”

Twitter Plot Summary: The life of time traveller Billy Pilgrim, mostly seen through his WW2 experiences and his time on the planet Tralfamadore.

Five Point Summary:

1. He’s unstuck in time, like Sam Beckett!
2. Death threats and Nazis.
3. Gratuitous nudity!
4. Dresden bombing.
5. Sorry, but Tralfamadore looks rubbish.

Having read the original novel by Kurt Vonnegut, the story never struck me as one that could be adapted particularly well for the screen. Featuring a story where the lead character, Billy Pilgrim, can travel through time to various points in his life, from childhood all the way to his incarceration on the planet of Tralfamadore where he is poked, prodded and analysed by generally benevolent alien overlords.

You could argue that Slaughterhouse Five is a potent anti-war message, concentrating primarily on Billy Pilgrim’s time spent as a prisoner of war during World War 2 and surviving the subsequent bombing of Dresden. This would be a perfectly valid argument, of course, but it misses out on what I think is the key point of discussion. At its core, Slaughterhouse Five (named for the camp/animal slaughterhouse where Pilgrim is interred) is an existential work, delving into what it means to live, to be an individual, to exist. The impact of war plays a large part of that, for obvious reasons, and plays a large part of the story, but the very nature of human existence is questioned throughout as a result of Billy Pilgrim’s ability (or inherent lack thereof) to travel through time.

One man and his dog. And aliens from the fourth dimension.

Due to his time travelling ability Pilgrim is entirely aware of how his life will end, which in its own way is a powerful piece of information to hold. What does a person do with their life when they know how it will end? In the case of Pilgrim, this knowledge adds a layer of calm to his existence, almost to the point of being nonplussed about everything that goes on around him, even settling into a career and marriage despite seemingly having little interest in either of them. This is played out to a lesser extent in the film’s extensive scenes set during World War 2, with Pilgrim constantly threatened by his nemesis Paul Lazzaro and building his friendship with Edgar Derby. The Dresden scenes are certainly some of the more powerful, the bombing of Dresden in particular – and the destruction we see afterwards – are ones that linger in the memory. At times it’s almost easy to forget the science fiction/time travelling angle.

The film covers these big themes as well as any film adaptation of a slightly obtuse narrative source material can, although much of the knowing and somewhat fatalistic humour of the novel’s repeated phrase “so it goes” doesn’t even feature in the film script. This is perhaps a good thing, as drawing too closely to Vonnegut’s text would have undoubtedly made the narrative too difficult to follow – as it is it’s already pushing its luck. This even includes a number of key differences between the novel and the film – Vonnegut doesn’t appear nor act as the narrator, for example. Whilst to a modern audience it looks dated and incredibly 70s, those big themes are still hard hitters and the film remains engaging despite still barely holding a torch to the novel. But then – so it goes.

Score: 4/5

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