I’m probably going to be a little bias when it comes to this film. If you’ve been reading this here blog site thing for a while you may know that I’m a bit of a fan of James Gunn. Super was easily my favourite film of 2012 and that he managed to write a remake of Dawn of the Dead that didn’t suck means he should have won some sort of medal. Hell, it’s probably the only good, non-comedy, zombie film for decades. James works best on the fringes and here he’s been given one of Marvel’s more obscure groups of characters to present to an audience that, mostly, will have never heard of them at all. From the looks of the trailer Marvel isn’t going to be holding back on the spectacle required of Guardians of the Galaxy and it seems James Gunn’s visual style and sense of humour is making it through intact. Basically, I like what I see. Click the link below to see the trailer.

Looks pretty cool huh? I’m loving the cast for this. I have no doubts that Gunn was given free reign to go after whoever he wanted and Marvel accommodated. The film features Chris Pratt (Parks & Recreations, The LEGO Movie), Zoe Saldana all painted green, Karen Gillan all painted blue, Dave Bautista all painted a sort of grey and red… i guess they didn’t want 2 green characters. Vin Diesel is the voice of Groot, the giant tree man, whilst Bradley Cooper is providing the voice of Rocket Racoon… he’s the Racoon. Add to that we’ll have John C Reilly, Glenn Close, Michael Rooker, Lee Pace, Djimon Housou, Benicio Del Toro and, as seen in the trailer, Peter Serafinowicz. That’s quite the nerd dream come true.

It’s pretty incredible that it takes Marvel of all studios to take a risk on unknown characters like this. But keep in mind that when Iron Man was released he wasn’t the huge name with the casual audiences that he is now and with that one film they launched this huge runaway train of superhero fun. After the next Avengers film there is going to be Ant-Man and Dr Strange films. If those two films, along with Guardians of the Galaxy all do well maybe a few other studios will be willing to take the odd risk. Maybe then I’ll get the Megas XLR film I’ve always wanted.

Hands up who thought The Lego Movie would turn out good? I didn’t. I saw the charm in the initial trailer, but, kind of expected the film to end up being one of those kids films that end up being a series of dumb jokes wrapped around the most flimsy of stories. I mostly expected it to be a huge advert for Lego toys. Well, it is that. I’m pretty sure many people that have left the film have gone and purchased a Lego set shortly after. I probably would have if I had a spare few thousand pounds to buy what sets I could with that. So, like, one minifig and a small car, right? The Lego Movie represents everything that I should hate about films aimed at children. Its humour is puerile, its filled with nonsense, its a marketing ploy, it has that one catchy song that won’t fecking LEAVE MY HEAD!!!… It’s so frigging awesome. Click the link.

In The Lego Movie the ruler of the world, President Business (Will Ferrell), has possession of a relic that will allow him to complete a nefarious plan. A ancient prophecy says that, one day, a master builder will find a strange and unique piece, dubbed the Piece of Resistance, that he will use to stop the relic from being utilised. 8 and a half years after President Business steals this relic a unremarkable, very forgettable and incredibly meh Lego construction worker named Emmett (Chris Pratt) stumbles upon the Piece of Resistance and is soon whisked away by a master builder named Wildstyle (Elizabeth Banks) to fulfil the previously mentioned prophecy and stop President Business from destroying everything that makes the Lego world awesome.

The world Emmett lives in may appear bright and cherry but it’s world under extreme control. Everyone lives by a routine set out for them in their personal instruction books. Emmett wakes up, follows his instructions as precisely as possible and feels that he enjoys his everyday life. He watches the same TV show as everyone else, he likes all the same food as everyone else and he especially enjoys the only song on the radio, “Everything is Awesome”. Which you’ve likely hears about 4,000 times before even seeing the film. Within a few minutes of the film starting you’ll realise what the central message will be. That don’t need to follow others and pre-set rules. That you can live your life your way. That creativity is to be encouraged and not hidden away. Then you’ll notice the other thread. That everyone is special no matter how normal they seem. No matter how much of a blank slate they are they have something special about themselves that they can use.

Rumours that Emmett will be in Batman Vs Superman are unconfirmed.

Emmett confronts how mind-numbingly average he is as the film progresses. You’ll find yourself amazed that you’re connecting with a little plastic Lego man as his fears of being forgettable are presented to him by the Bad Cop (Liam Neeson). There’s a number of moments in this film where it suddenly becomes genuinely heartfelt. These aren’t the forced emotional content to tick off the “has sad scene” tick box either. These are actual well written, well directed and effective emotional moments. I’m going to avoid spoilers in this review as I honestly feel it would be detrimental to know where this story heads. All I’ll say is, and I am not exaggerating, the final act of the film adds a layer of context, of thematics and the sort of cinematic storytelling that works on multiple levels and, as such, elevates the film to an exceptionally high level. I am not kidding. The Lego Movie brushes against the bottom of being an actual, honest to goodness, masterpiece. The final act itself is a masterful stroke of genius.

So the film has two central themes that are pretty standard for a kids film. It, of course, brings along the usual “with friends by your side anything is possible” trope and also manages to make commentary on how play is to be encouraged. This film is basically doing parenting for you. The fact it nails each theme and idea is quite a feat. One that likely wouldn’t be possible if it wasn’t for the incredible pace it keeps up. How it maintains the pace without ever tiring I don’t know. How it does that and still manages to hit the right emotional notes is some sort of act of wizardry. I went into the film not really being aware of who was behind it. The directors are credited as Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, who have a knack of confounding expectations by directing films that are far better than they first seem. I then noticed Chris McKay was one of the editors. This explains so much. Chris McKay, if you are not aware, is the director of much of Robot Chicken. Well, there’s your fast paced humour and breakneck pacing. Looking back over the film I’m pretty much convinced he did a little more than just edit. There’s a cameo sequence which is almost entirely a Robot Chicken sketch, just minus the swears. These three men have (pardon the pun) constructed a most excellently crated work.

Liam Neeson actually turns in 3 performances and emotes more than he has had to on film for 15 years.

The animation and art departments are going to win some awards. Never has plastic been rendered so perfectly from inside a computer. They’ve gone for a realistically textured style but not limited themselves to the restraints of what range of motion a real Lego figure is capable of. The character’s motions allow them to bend in places for more articulate moments, such as anything requiring smaller actions. But that’s not to say the characters are animated in a traditional manner. Any time there is some pace required, or if it’ll be comically more effective, the characters are animated in a manner similar to how you’d expect a stop motion Lego animation to look. The result is something akin to a combination of a fan made Lego animation and Toy Story. I realise that is a huge gap so picture it like this, a character leaps or falls in 4 frames but emotes in 30. These styles, that should clash, meld together to create something truly unique.

As I’ve said, I do not wish to delve into spoilers regarding the final act. Maybe I’ll write something about it when the film has been around for a while. I realise it would likely take a lot of convincing on my part to prove to you that The Lego Movie is this legit. The best thing I can suggest is that you grab a child, preferably one of your own, and take them to see this film. They’ll laugh. You’ll laugh. Everyone will laugh. But best of all you will have witnessed a actual film that isn’t holding back. That, whilst relying on common tropes, isn’t presenting them in a common manner. A film that is honest in its intent to provide the whole family with enjoyment whilst also evoking what it means to be a child. For the kids they’ll enjoy the silly humour and action scenes, especially anything involving Batman, and will be struck by the connections made between characters in the final act as being something they’ll likely recognise from home. For parents they’ll be reminded how fun just playing and being creative can be. Maybe it’ll encourage them to spend more time playing with their kids. That can’t be a bad thing. In the end, both the children and the adults watching this film will have seen something that will connect, and possibly, stay with them. I can’t believe I am giving a rave review to a 100 minute long advert for Lego, but there it is. Go see it.

I’ve been writing about various incarnations of RoboCop a lot recently. I’m afraid this isn’t going to ease up just yet. This is because I decided, on a whim, to watch RoboCop 2 a few days ago and, as the rules do state, I must now write a review of it. At least it wasn’t RoboCop 3 I watched. I’m not actually sure I could even get through that film. RoboCop 3 gets all the flak it deserves. It is a terrible, horrible film. RoboCop 2 gets a lot of flak too. This is mostly unjustified. Click the link below for me telling you why I’m right and you’re all wrong.

In RoboCop 2 OCP is currently a little concerned about how RoboCop/Murphy (Peter Weller) is getting all his humanity back and stuff and kinda stalking his wife. It’s bad for PR I guess. OCP sets about making a new RoboCop but recent attempts have all failed. They hire the help of a psychologist named Dr Juliette Faxx (Belinda Bauer) to hand pick a new candidate to become RoboCop 2. She believes that a candidate that would crave and accept the power given to them would be best, and so she begins looking for serial killers. Yup. You can tell how much of a bad idea that will be already. Meanwhile OCP is extorting the Mayor of Detroit (Willard Kuzak) by not paying the police force. They hope this will lead to them being able to take control of Detroit when the Mayor can’t afford to pay up the funds he is contracted to which will enable OCP to begin construction of Delta City. Hopefully no major PR disasters happen for OCP in the coming weeks!

So the plot is a little bit stupid what with the whole telegraphing of the disaster that will be RoboCop 2, the character… not the film. But is the plot any more silly than the first film’s? It’s just as hokey and B-movie-tastic. When a film has a questionably silly plot whether it succeeds or not will generally come down to how well put together it’s component parts are. Luckily RoboCop 2, the film… not the character, is very well produced and directed. The script has a number of quality moments, such as a scene where RoboCop has been ordered to tell his wife that he isn’t Murphy, and the film is littered with just enough excess and satire to feel in keeping with the first entry in the series. Director Irvin Kershner does a pretty admirable job of impersonating Paul Verhoeven and it is clear that he understood what made the first film work.

Pull yourself together Murphy! HAH! Geddit?! It’s cos he’s in pieces!

The original story and screenplay for RoboCop 2 was written by comic book legend Frank Miller. Whilst his script didn’t make it to the screen intact his style is all over the film. The violent irony of the film’s opening scenes of one crime leading to another lie a Rube Goldberg machine of villainy is pure Miller. A little league team rob a store. A child becomes a drug lord. An incredibly high body count. All these elements feel ripped form a Frank Miller comic. He came to the set each day to watch the film being made, despite not actually being part of the crew any more. He even gets a small cameo as drug lord Cain’s (Tom Noonen) chemist. Miller’s original script for RoboCop 2 was eventually turned into a comic. I’ve not read it but haven’t heard great things. His script was described as unfilmable, which sounds about right for a Frank Miller story back then.

One thing that will strike you if you view this film right after the original (as I did this week) is how much the production value had increased. The RoboCop suit is now made entirely from fibreglass and looks a little more robust as a result, although I’m not sure about the lights added to his skull piece when the helmet is removed. There’s a sequence where RoboCop is taken apart by Cain’s gang and the animatronic RoboCop seen in the following scenes is one hell of a cool effect. There was a couple of similar effects in the first film which were equally as good but they were only on screen for a few seconds. Larger locations are used to great effect. The final action sequences involve a massive amount of puppet and stop motion effects to complete the fight between both RoboCops. Like many stop motion animations, they have aged a fair bit now, but they still look like actual physical being interacting in a real environment, something CGI has only been getting starting to the hang of in recent years. Production wise the film is pretty stellar and you can clearly see where the extra $23million budget this had over its predecessor was spent.

Best scene.

Despite all these positives the film is littered with many flaws. Whilst the film has a high body count the violence isn’t as extreme as the original film. There’s certainly nothing that comes close to the boardroom scene or Murphy’s execution. Peter Weller appears to be overacting with his motions at certain points, although it is almost in context when he’s re-programmed by OCP with hundreds of directives turning him into even more of a robot. Those scenes are among my favourites, especially when he’s reading the Miranda Rights to a corpse. The plot also has some bizarre pacing issues where RoboCop completes his arc not much more than an hour into the film by shocking the directives out of his system and, thus, regaining his humanity. He then disappears from the film for around 20 minutes. I have no problem with the scenes themselves but because he vanishes whilst the villains are doing villainous things it gives the impression that RoboCop has decided to take a few weeks off. It reminds me a little of how Batman barely appears in Batman Returns. The difference here is that RoboCop isn’t someone who hides in the shadows, only appearing when needed. He is literally a crime fighting machine who never takes a break. Well, apart from when he fancies a baby food sandwich.

Other issues include the president of OCP, The Old Man (Dan O’Herlihy), turning from a benevolent boss with one eye on the former glories of Detroit to an all out corrupt, near moustache twirling, villain. He exploits people, takes the side of Dr Faxx because she sexes him up and worries about the PR impact of a murder-bot rampage before anything else. Whilst he was the head of a corrupt organisation in the first film he was essentially good so the shift is bizarre. For me at least. I’m sure many just equate all of OCP with evil and therefore he must be too. I liked the idea in the original that the morally skewed business tactics of OCP executives was a commentary on the cold blooded Wall Street execs of the 80s and that the only thing stopping them from running wild was one man that represented a more balanced view. Maybe this was a better view of the gradual change in public perception from individuals being ruthless to entire corporations though.

Overall RoboCop 2 is flawed in many ways, but as Red Letter Media recently said, for an sequel made when this was it is surprisingly good. It holds up well and reminds you that it is possible for a film with a real voice carry that over to its sequel. Usually the only sequels that come out well are to films that didn’t have that much character or charm to begin with, so there was less to get wrong. Take the Pirates of the Caribbean films, for example. In RoboCop 2 the satire is still sharp, the violence is still violent (just) and the bravado that the film carries itself with is still entertaining. It may not be a masterpiece, as the first film is, but it’s at least good. It’s better than the RoboCop remake, that’s for sure.

So I had an idea. Sometimes, in an attempt to keep my reviews between 1000 and 1500 words I tend to skim over a few aspects of a film. Sometimes I’ll even just not go into a certain aspect if I feel other aspects of praise or failure adequately convey the film’s overall quality. The recent remake of RoboCop is one such film that presented me with so much to discuss, both positive and negative, that fitting it all into one review would have been troublesome. So I thought to myself, why don’t I try something new? What I’m going to attempt to do in this post is dissect the various aspects of the film that I feel deserve to be talked about. How they effect the film’s story. How they elevate it. How they drag it down. Basically, my attempt at a little bit of a film studies style dissertation on production, story and the art of film. If this works I may start doing these for various other films. I always find it more interesting to do dissections of this nature with the more flawed films out there. You can learn a lot about what to do in cinema from Taxi Driver, but do you learn much of what not to do? So, click the link below to be whisked away to a very, very spoiler heavy dissection of RoboCop 2014.

Now this is likely to skip back and forth between elements of thematics, story & aesthetics, so don’t be surprised if I skip from discussing the appearance of the suit to the relevance of emotion to a cyborg. As mentioned there will be a hell of a lot of spoilers, so, if you haven’t seen the film you may want to save reading this until later. Unless, of course, you don’t care about spoilers. In which case, carry on.

THE SUIT

Lets start with what was seen, prior to release, as being a sure sign of the remakes inevitable failure. Well, other than it being a remake. A lot of people were ready to write off the film right away because of the entirely black suit. People instantly made comparisons of its appearance to the Batsuit from Batman Begins and the armour designs of the Mass Effect games. Both are valid comparisons. They are valid because the fragmented armour design, as used on the new RoboCop is very much a modern technique that has been used often over the last few years in many mediums. It is merely a sign of the times within which we live.

Now some would take that as a chance to bash the new RoboCop for dating itself so easily. But to do that would ignore that the RoboCop of Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 film was also very much of the time. That RoboCop was based around the appearance of (then) modern sports cars, all aerodynamic and curved. A metallic sheen given to emphasise the robotic nature of the character with only the lower jaw on display to inform the viewer of how little physical humanity is left within Murphy himself. It also reflected the leaning towards the bulkier heroes of the 80s. These days the hero characters in action films are leaner. They’re more agile and usually reliant on quick wits and physical speed to be better than their antagonist. Modern heroes are also near infallible in their actions.

The modern RoboCop suit is design in a way that is far more form fitting, built to emphasise agility and natural movement. Joel Kinnamen’s movements are a lot less restricted by the suit than Paul Weller’s. The original intention for RoboCop’s movement in the 1987 film was to be more snake like and fluid, but upon wearing the suit for the first time it became apparent this wasn’t to be possible. As a result Weller and his movement coach Moni Yakim devised slower, but more precise, machine like, motions which resulted and informed the entire performance Weller gives on the original film. This modern suit does nothing to effect how Kinnaman performs. As such he is free to move as he would if her were not in a robotic suit and the selling of the reality of his situation is lessened.

When in combat the new RoboCop moves with a precise fluidity that can occasionally look like a sped up version of Weller’s RoboCop. In these moments Kinnaman’s RoboCop feels more like a man in a machine, but outside of these scenes that is not the case. I’ll get more into the performance of Kinnaman as Murphy/RoboCop later as this difference in his movement really does have another effect on the film as a whole. What matters is that the new suit is designed to minimise the effect of a man being in a machine. He even spends the majority of the film with his face fully exposed. For the first 20 minutes or so of RoboCop being in the film the suit is presented in similar shades of grey and blue to the original suit. If ever there was evidence needed for how much a colour choice can effect the impact of a costume the moment the suit is turned black is the moment we see that without the grey metal the entire impression the suit gives us is changed. The metallic appearance gave RoboCop a definite man in a machine vibe. He is still sleeker in these scenes but the grey makes all the difference, especially the visor part which, when down, looks even less featureless than the original suit. When the suit is black and his visor moves into position he looks like he’s wearing some sort of sunglasses/cycle helmet fashion statement. The film ends with a scene where RoboCop is back in his grey suit, which feels a lot like a hastily added extra scene to appease the fans. One aspect of the suit is not “corrected” though. That being…

THE HUMAN HAND

Oh man, that human hand RoboCop now has. I had hoped there would be a reason to it existing. I mused in an earlier piece that maybe it would be used to represent the Right Hand of God. A moment I realised even then was likely expecting a little too much from this film. In a preview video I had seen they described the hand as being there because the government in the film’s universe require a human to be pulling the trigger, the hand being the indicator of humanity apparently. It was also mentioned as being a human hand to shake as a PR move by Omnicorp. None of this is mentioned in the film. Not once is the human hand so much as acknowledged. There’s a few moments where something good could have been done with it, but they never come to pass.

In one scene Gary Oldman’s Doctor Dennett shows Murphy what is left of his body inside the suit. In a fairly effective scene we see all the sections of his armour being removed until only his head (with an exposed brain), his windpipe and lungs and his hand are left. His hand is just kind of floating there in mid air. I honestly kept looking at it in this scene to see if there was anything attached to it holding it in place. The fingers are resting on a vertical pad so unless becoming RoboCop involved being bitten by a radioactive spider I couldn’t figure how it was floating there. It’s very weird.

At the film’s climax there is a scene where Murphy, all hell bent on arresting Michael Keaton’s Raymond Sellars for being suddenly cartoon evil, is forced to shoot off his own arm in order to rescue his wife and child. His arm is trapped under a fallen ED-209 you see, because this RoboCop is just clumsy like that. The arm he shoots off is not the arm with the human hand. I mused in the same previous post mentioned earlier that I thought he would lose his hand by the end of the film. The loss of the hand would represent one of the last remaining pieces of his humanity being taken away. Why did this not happen in the film? Did their order of RoboCop gloves come only with right hand ones? There could have been a moment where his arm is trapped, he knows he’ll need to remove his arm in order to keep fighting but he’s staring at his human hand realising that if he removes this he’s down to a face and lungs. He’ll never be able to touch his wife or child with his human hand. Could have been a somewhat tense and powerful moment there. Instead he realises he’s trapped and just guns his robo arm to pieces and carries on. I suppose it did stop him being able to grab his little electric bullet firing gun for the rest of the evening. So, a missed opportunity from a wasted and quite pointless aesthetic choice.

VILLAINY OR LACK THEREOF

Remember the villains from the original RoboCop? Of course you bloody do. Clarence Boddicker and Dick Jones were an evil double whammy. One representing the grimy underbelly of a Detroit gone down the toilet whilst the other representing the ruthless and morally dubious business practices of the 1980s. Both still have a place in the world today. We have gangs of irrationally motivated knife gangs in London, hell bent on harming other and laughing about it, as Clarence did. We have massive corporations taking our information and using it as a way of gaining extra currency. Hell, Google, not content with filming every street on the planet and exploiting your privacy for that lucrative data mining business model, recently purchased a company that make robotic flying drones. The relevance of the topic approached in the original RoboCop film are still important issues today and the film’s scarily accurate depiction of the future only serves to remind us that we’ve allowed that sort of corruption to continue despite being warned.

In the remake there is a drug lord is responsible for Murphy’s injuries, yes injuries, not death, that lead him to being turned into RoboCop. I cannot remember the name of this villain. I think it was Antoine Vallon, based on the imdb page for the film. Can’t be sure because he’s like 16 names down the credits. He is listed lower than the mayor of Detroit who is in about 2 scenes. Vallon (I’m committing to that name) has got some members of the police working for him, a case Murphy had taken it upon himself to investigate prior to being passively blown up by a car bomb. There’s about 5 months between him blowing up Murphy and him being killed by RoboCop in a scene that just kinda comes about before the start of the third act. In these 5 months it appears that Vallon does bugger and all about becoming a bigger crime lord. The next time we see him he’s just purchased some military weapons and then he’s dead. He is entirely forgettable. And I don’t just mean after the film has finished. When you get to the point where Murphy is investigating his own attempted murder you will likely have forgotten what Vallon looked like.

When it comes to Raymond Sellars, well he’s just morally dubious for the majority of the film. He is depicted as a modern business CEO in the style Steve Jobs. All ambition, visions of the future and an abundance of sweaters. His vision is entirely motivated by the fact that he can’t sell his military robots to US police forces meaning potentially huge market is beyond his reach. The creation of RoboCop, in the cybernetic form he is, is entirely controlled by the need for a human to be in control, as dictated by congress. This brings around an issue. The film now requires a bunch of scenes discussing the progress of Sellars political campaign to get a bill repealed. This is boring, as evidenced by similar nonsense in the Star Wars Prequels.

Another issue with Sellars is that he has nothing to do with the crime in the city, which I do not recall even being mentioned as a problem. There are corrupt cops but that goes with the territory these days. You can’t have any tale of police without at least one being on the take. As a tangential strand between Omnicorp and the drug lord Vallon the latter has acquired military weapons near the end which would have belonged to OCP, Omnicorp’s parent company. But Sellars hasn’t provided them with the weapons directly. He isn’t responsible for the corrupt cops, the crime on the streets and so is just a corrupt businessman. The reason RoboCop goes after Sellars at the film’s climax is because he orders RoboCop to be shut down for going about investigating his attempted murder. Sellars is worried that the military guns on the street will lead RoboCop to Omnicorp. So instead he attempts to murder Murphy… yeah. All this could have been avoided if he had some sort of prime objectives hard coded into RoboCop to prevent him from arresting someone in his position. Instead he just has…

RED ASSETS

Best scene.

In the film’s opening sequence, a fairly effective look at Omnicorp’s military robots being used in the Middle East through the eyes of a bias news team, we are introduced to a device which marks the news team as “red assets”. What this means is that, as far as the robots are concerned, they are the most valuable people in the area and must be protected at all costs. The robots cannot allow any harm to come to anyone wearing the small device attached to their wrists. This is never mentioned again for the following 2 hours until, at the very climax of the film, Sellars has one on and, as such, is preventing RoboCop from shooting him to death and such.

The problem with the red asset plot device is that, for one, we haven’t heard a single mention of it for two hours so it’s likely forgotten by many viewers by the end. Secondly, it isn’t a representation of any sort of corruption or evil on the part of Sellars or the world in which the film inhabits. He is using it as a survival tactic. This isn’t like Directive 4 from the original film, which was a product of paranoid bosses not wanting their own product turning against them. The fact that RoboCop is such an effective crime fighter would surely have made Sellars want some sort of fail safe in place to ensure he can’t be on the receiving end of Murphy’s cold hard justice. He has a tangential link to crime, not a direct one, but enough of one to bring him down. The reliance on a device made to keep people safe does show an element of him corrupting good will for his own needs, a cowardly act indeed, but it isn’t indicative of the world we are presented with, which in itself is a problem.

THE WORLD OF FUTURE DETROIT

The future of the RoboCop remake is actually one of those rare examples of a future that’s genuinely not too far removed from our own. For once Hollywood didn’t go crazy with their futuristic ideas. The robotics of the world are first introduced as robotic drones and ED-209′s in the Middle-East. This is something that, allowing for a few advances in technology, isn’t really that far away from now. You only have to look at some of the videos on Youtube of the sort of robotic creations being created now to see that, really, there’s not a massive amount of steps needed for us to get to the point where they could be fully automated and used in combat. The first time we see the cybernetic technology of the film’s world is when we first meet Dr Dennett as he’s helping a man that lost his arms play a guitar with his new cybernetic appendages. There’s a few examples of early versions of this sort of technology around now. So, the future of the remake is quite a nicely pitched one. Nothing looks too far ahead of any other tech. This was also true of the original RoboCop film with it’s predictions of disc based media formats and GPS enabled devices. So, yeah, I like the depiction of the future.

So what about the future version of Detroit? Pretty frigging poorly thought out to be honest. Firstly what company would establish it’s cybernetic headquarters in Detroit? When the original film was made Detroit was on a downturn. The crime addled and broken future was realising fears people likely had at the time. Now, Detroit is pretty much in a ruined state. Industry has died there and it’s could be considered to be in a worse state than even the original RoboCop depicted it. The Detroit of the remake seems like a pretty nice place. The only street crime we encounter is a few drug dealers that are “totally stoned”. The crime lord himself… who’s name I’ve forgotten again…Antoine Vallon, that’s it, pretty much seems to keep himself to himself. He only actually does anything criminal at the provocation of the police. It’s Murphy and Lewis that try to uncover the corrupt cops causing Vallon to react violently. Later he’s purchased some guns, to help defend himself against RoboCop, and he only uses them after RoboCop walks into his hideout and attacks.

What I’m saying here is that the majority of the depictions of crime seen in the film are reactionary to the presence of the police and RoboCop. No-one is getting mugged. No-one is getting murdered. We aren’t introduced to Vallon as he’s in the middle of a getaway, as we were with Boddicker. We don’t learn what sort of character he is beyond “criminal” through his actions. Compare that to Boddicker who, when we first see him, throws a member of his crew out the back of his truck just to distract the police. Vallon isn’t tied strongly into the final scenes. His lack of impact and character means his fate is largely unimportant.

All this means that we don’t really get what is wrong with Detroit and the crime rates of the future that would justify the creation of RoboCop. Boddicker was an extension of the criminality of the future. Vallon is just a generic criminal guy. The two corrupt cops are more interesting villains, and whilst they get theirs, there is at least 2 more people above them. We never get the feeling that Detroit is a mess. You never get the feeling that anyone’s life is any worse off than your own so the stakes are lessened, the requirement for RoboCop is lessened and the shits you give are lessened.

PERFORMANCE

This RoboCop takes an interesting approach to the original films story by effectively being the inverse for the first hour. In the original Murphy had lost his identity and humanity when he was turned into a product of OCP. Here, Murphy is aware from the beginning of what he has been turned into and has to learn to accept what he is. Gradually, in an effort to make RoboCop as effective as the robots being used overseas, his humanity and control are gradually stripped away. This creates two problems. Firstly, the film then becomes about Murphy ending up in the same place he was at the start emotionally. The final scene even shows his family being allowed to visit him again, indicating that he has regained them too. What has been lost and gained here? He lost body parts and gained super powerful body parts. As a character he is in the same place.

Secondly, we spend so long watching his humanity gradually get stripped away that when he comes to regaining it and regaining control of his body through sheer will power it happens so quickly that it almost seems like it wasn’t that much of a big deal for him. Couple this with there being no discernible difference in his abilities after he’s turned near fully robotic, where he’s at his effective peak, and his abilities at the film’s climax and, again, you’re left wondering what he lost in the process of regaining his humanity. Remember that we have been told that he isn’t as effective when his human side is in control. This made no difference to him when he took out Vallon’s gang in pitch black darkness and when he out manoeuvred a pair of ED-209′s and the police sent to take him down. He even completes his goal minus an arm and still kicks all kinds of arse.

Because RoboCop is on some sort of victorious auto-pilot and because, during the sequences of the film where the story is attempting to be it’s most emotional, we’re never really given a chance to see much of a performance from Joel Kinnaman. During his introduction we get some sequences of Murphy being determined and going outside the rules to try to find the corrupt cops. He plays this so straight and bereft of personality that little impact can be made. Is a cop that willingly breaks the rules to expose internal corruption the best candidate to be the ultimate cop? From the perspective of a corporation looking for the perfect candidate I mean. The only other hint of personality is when he heads home to his family. In this scene everything is so wooden that it almost feels like his interactions with his wife and child are a scripted event he lives through day after day, the exact same way. There’s no chemistry. Only the most basic of familial bonding. It’s all very rigid and robotic.

This becomes Kinnaman’s problem. Given so little to work with in these scenes, as they aren’t particularly interesting scenes on their own, he little to build on. When Murphy first sees himself as RoboCop and the scenes following he does a fine job of depicting angry and sadness at his situation but that all passes in no time and before we know it he’s joking about shooting Mattox at the end of a drill. We has a few scenes of character and personality before it’s stripped away. Normally this is effective. You show how much of a sympathetic or likeable character eh is then begin stripping that away so we root for its return. The trouble is that there is so little effective character work before he becomes RoboCop that we’ve likely already written him off as being a bit of a dull character anyway.

In the original film Murphy was on transfer to Detroit. We saw him reacting to the crime around him as he hadn’t witnessed it before. We saw him bonding with Lewis instantly. We see him note the weight of the situation he is in when a fellow cop’s name is removed from a locker. We see him practising a trick with his gun intended to impress his child (Who we don’t see until 40+ minutes into the film) and because he gets a kick from it. We see him risk his life because he knows there isn’t any back up available due to how thinly spread the police are. His bravery costs him his life. This is all before he becomes RoboCop. When his humanity is stripped away the groundwork has been done and we want to see him return. That was managed in 25 minutes. In the remake, 25 minutes in, we’re watching Abbie Cornish cry for the second time (of many) and the only personality trait we have from Murphy is “likes fighting crime” and “has kid and wife, may like kid and wife, can’t be sure, could be an act”.

VIOLENCE, THE LACK THEREOF & ITS IMPACT

Let me start by saying that I in no way think a film has to be violent to be good. The violence in the original RoboCop is legendary. It sold the world. It allowed juxtaposition between two violent scenes early on, showing how violence can be used in differing ways. It gave the film an edge. You felt the necessity of a violent weapon against crime such as RoboCop as he was born from the violence of Detroit. Murphy’s death was so graphic that you wanted to see him enact the same levels of violence on his killers.

The RoboCop remake does a fine job of trying to be as violent as it can in the PG-13 certificate but this is not enough. RoboCop’s main gun is a glorified taser. Murphy doesn’t actually die, he’s merely injured to a state where he may die but wouldn’t have the highest quality of life if he did survive. The car bomb that injures him to this state is quick and there’s no depicted pain, other that Abbie Cornish getting the first of many crying scenes out the way. As the world isn’t depicted as violent RoboCop’s existence seems like a bit of an extreme. A commentary could be made that this equals the dynamic of technology used by OmniCorp overseas in countries that can’t compete with the robotic troops. The idea that this sort of law enforcement is going too far. That would be fair, except RoboCop stuns and arrests almost all of the time. If he was meant to be a commentary on the use of technology by the military overseas as being an extreme, RoboCop by comparison isn’t extreme enough.

This leads me to what is…

THE ESSENTIAL PROBLEM WITH THIS REMAKE

The problem with the RoboCop remake is this; nothing is depicted or conveyed to its fullest degree. Everything is muted. Everything is bland. Every punch is pulled. Every moment of satire lacking teeth. The film has all the building blocks of being a decent reinterpretation of the original material but its lack of willingness to push any element of its construction to its fullest potential leads to a film that is, quite possibly, one of the most painfully average blockbuster style films in recent years. If the satire had been sharper. If the violence had been stronger. If the character arcs were better defined by performance and stronger writing. If there was a consistent tone. If anything had stood out, this could have been above average.

Usually even the most basic of films will have something memorable or some element that gives it an edge. G.I Joe Retaliation had its Saturday morning cartoon feel and occasional unique action scenes. Many of the Marvel superhero films are simplistic but they have character personality and fun humour. They also have the building of a real film universe. Even Ultra-fucking-violent had weird effects and a kinda cool fight sequence at the end to prop up the utter bullshite that was the rest of the film. RoboCop has nothing that stands out. Everything is average.

In a film being average at everything can often be worse than being bad at everything. There’s a reason the phrase “so average it’s good” doesn’t exist. A good-bad film at least tends to have something memorably bad about it. That’s part of why we enjoy some traditionally bad films. Although the argument of what makes certain bad films good is a topic for another day. RoboCop 2014 is just a film of unremarkable qualities. It is the Arthur Dent of the film world. I’m sure some people will enjoy the film, but I doubt many will say it’s their favourite. As I said in my review, at least this RoboCop remake is trying to be a quality production. They have given enough shits to not completely balls up any one aspect. They just didn’t seem to do enough to make any one aspect stand out.

For every moment that approaches quality, such as the pitch black gunfight or the moral predicament of Dr Dennett, those same scenes are undermined by equally poor choices. The pitch black gun fight keeps switching to other different styles of shooting creating a scene with no clear voice. Dr Dennett is a sympathetic character but the story isn’t his. This means when we empathise with him we’re then dragged away to watch this boring ass robot cop do his boring ass things. A story about a visionary doctor asked to break his moral code to increasing degrees to remain funded is an interesting one. His story has emotion and allows the audience to ask themselves what they would do in the same situation. RoboCop’s story is told with so little gusto or awareness of it’s nature that it deflates the drama going on elsewhere in the film.

So, in closing, RoboCop is so bland a film that even Samuel L Jackson being crazy, Gary Oldman being Gary Oldman and Michael Keaton showing moments of crazy cannot save it. I had read that director Jose Padilha had clashed with the film’s producers and the studio regarding what this film would be. I feel like this is one of those situations where, at some point, there may have been a RoboCop story that had some energy and style to it but gradually it had been toned down to be as inoffensive and cookie cutter as possible. This film is an example of a film existing purely because the name is a product as far as the studio is concerned and they need to keep it relevant. It is more important that they have the name making them some money somehow than it is that the film provides any sort of entertainment. I have to laugh a little because I’m pretty convinced that MGM and Columbia figured that releasing the film head to head with some dumb little movie about Lego brick would have been an easy win. How wrong they were. The people went for quality entertainment instead. The Lego bricks have more personality than this bland product of consumerism.

I got chills. Click the link below.

Seriously getting no worrying vibes from this trailer at all. This looks incredible right now. Were they alluding to this being a sequel to the original 1954 Gojira film? Wouldn’t be the first in the series to be a direct sequel if it was. May cannot come soon enough.

I should probably take this as a chance to officially announce that I will be doing a Godzilla review season on this here blog starting in April leading up to the new film’s release. I’ll try my damned hardest to get every film but many are near impossible to get and some are extremely expensive. Thankfully a few are due for a US release just before the new film comes out. If I can get over 20 of them in total I’ll be a happy bunny. Have 8 so far in preparation. Let’s see how well this quest for the complete Godzilla collection goes.

Fine! I’ll watch an actually critically praised and award winning film that will likely scoop the best foreign language Oscar… wait, what do you mean it’s not even nominated? Not even a performance nomination? What… the… hell? So I admit I’ve seen worryingly few of the films that are nominated for Oscars this year. In fact I’ve only seen 2 films nominated for Oscars and both are in the special effects category, so they don’t really count… but really? Blue is the Warmest Colour isn’t up for a single one? Click the link to allow me to tell you why it probably should be. I mean, the other films in best foreign language may be better… I dunno… but this film is exemplary.

Blue is the Warmest Colour follows a, initially, 15 year old girl named Adele (Adele Exarchoupolos) who is just reaching a point in her life where she is attempting to find where she fits in. She begins dating a boy at school, which is going well until she sees a mysterious blue haired lesbian girl in the street. This girl, Emma (Lea Seydoux), works her way into Adele’s mind until she feels compelled to seek her out. When her curiosity leads her to a lesbian bar she meets Emma for the first time and they strike up a friendship, which leads to a relationship. The film then spans several years of their life as their relationship grows and develops.

Where to start? I almost typo’d Sartre there before correcting it. That would have been a good point. The characters bond over philosophical discussion many times. The very first scene of the film shows Adele’s class discussing the meaning behind a book they’re reading which regards regret and the feeling of loss associated with not taking a chance. The regret of not doing what you wish you had done. This begins the film’s thematic strong points. As the film progresses various philosophies and debates are brought up which contain relevance to the story. These scenes may be mirrored multiple times in different situations to provide layers to the ideas and themes the film is presenting.

Gay pride rally! WOOOOO!

Director Abdellatif Kechiche utilises repetition to frame the social differences between Adele’s home life, Emma’s home life and their eventual life together over the course of three meals. Each contains a similar set up but the conversations, the directions of the discussions and the emotional states of the main characters are all presented differently. A dinner at Emma’s parents involves discussion of art and philosophy coupled with Adele trying oysters of the first time, which she had previously stated as detesting. A dinner at Adele’s parents involves a Spaghetti Bolognese, her mother’s go to recipe already seen earlier, and discussion of boyfriends and work. Her parents believe Adele and Emma are just friends, a sign Adele may not be sure they’d accept them as lovers. Later, a dinner at Adele and Emma’s home features Adele cooking her own take on her mother’s bolognese whilst everyone discussing art and philosophy. All attention is on Emma who Adele cannot get a moment with. The only connection she makes is with a young actor, himself finding that he is stuck in a role where he must pretend to be something he is not. A role Adele is pulling off by acting happy for Emma’s friends.

One thing that is refreshing from this film is how it isn’t about a gay couple fighting back against oppression. It isn’t about characters being scared to reveal they’re lives to the world. There is one scene where Adele’s school friends turn on her when they believe she may be gay, and the dinner scene, as mentioned, involves her parents being clueless to her relationship status. That is 2 scenes in a 3 hour long film that are concerned with the sort of drama pretty much every other gay film would jump straight to. What Kechiche has done, in adapting the Julie Maroh comic, is kept the focus on the life of the relationship itself. Over the approximately 7 years of the relationship there likely would have been other events such as those two scenes, but they wouldn’t have been important to the story being told here. What’s important is Adele finding a truth about herself and the journey it takes her on. This is essentially a straight love story film between two women.

Blue is curiosity in this film. Bam! Mind blown!

Now, regarding it being a straight love story film… that sex scene. Or rather sex scenes. Oh man, the films one weak point. I feel like I may have to hand in a man card here, and believe me I realise how odd this will sound coming from a guy but, man there was too much lesbian sex. There’s 5 sex scenes, 4 between the two girls, although one is technically a fantasy, and one goes on for around 6-7 minutes. It is also quite clearly shot from the point of view of being a male fantasy. At first there’s moments of tenderness but before long the girls are pretty much fisting and going ass to mouth. There’s a scissoring scene and… you’ve gone to find the clips on the internet haven’t you? OK. What I’m getting at is that these scenes go against the naturalistic and emotionally focused scenes the rest of the film is made up with. They feel different, like the director had a fantasy porno shoot he’d always wanted to do and this was his chance.

The rest of the film is shot so softly and with such excellent command of the pace of each scene that the previously mentioned scenes really feel like they’re from somewhere else. I swear to God about 60% of the film’s shots are close ups of the actors faces as they emote and react to each other’s performances. Both Lea and Adele do a superb job in playing their respective characters as believable people. It would have been so easy to have made Emma the overly cool, near manic pixie dream girl character. Instead she is kept grounded. A mystery at first and gradually we learn as much about her as we do Adele and she fleshes out into being a real person. I’m frankly baffled that neither one of these girls has an Oscar nomination for their performance this week. They’re spot on. Although Adele could learn to close her mouth when she eats. Seriously girl, have some manners. No idea if Emma eats with her mouth open, there was a leg in the way at the time. OH NO HE DIDN’T!!!

Ahem. So, Blue is the Warmest Colour is an excellent film. How excellent? Very excellent. It has honestly been a long time since I’ve seen a film that, barring a few moments as mentioned, manages to maintain such a strong focus of vision without wasting a minute. The film may be 3 hours long but it is a superbly paced and incredibly performed 3 hours. The French title for the film is La Vie d’Adèle – Chapitres 1 & 2. The director has stated that he’d like make a sequel to this but very much doubt it will happen with ether Lea or Adele reprising their roles. Both have been vocal about how difficult and near abusive he was to work with. Lea has also stated that it may have been hard, but life is hard and she still loves the directors work. She just didn’t so much like how he treated them. I don’t think I’d want to see any following chapters without the same leads. These roles are theirs now. I do wonder if either actress will be able to escape the film’s impact. This is a film that will be discussed for many years.

So after that little tease of a trailer during the Superbowl we were left in anticipation… or more likely, left shrugging, at the prospect of a new Transformers film. I may be a bit controversial here when I say that the Michael Bay Transformers films aren’t exactly brilliant. Especially that pile of wank known as Revenge of the Fallen. I did somewhat moderately enjoy the third film though. I do suspect that was due to Shia LaBeouf’s character… human… person… having an actual character arc. A really, moronically, simple character arc it may have been. But it was definitely there. Just. Well, Shia LaBeouf is out for this new film and Marky Mark is in. Also, Dinobots and a very big spaceship which I’m gonna say is Unicron. People have told me it’s a ship belonging to a Decepticon called Lockdown but there’s no way Michael Bay isn’t going to make that transform. Anyway, click the jump below for the embedded trailer.

Well, I dunno. Not exactly blown away with it. The classic G1 style truck is a nice touch, although I’m sure the flames will be all over Optimus within 20 minutes. The trailer suggests that, despite the Autobots saving the world in the last film, they have decided to hunt down and exterminate the remaining Transformers on Earth. Obviously property damage was a bigger deal than all they could have learned from them and the added protection against future Decepticon invasion. Rumour has it the Transformer with the gun head is Galvatron, which I’m gonna claim only lends credence to my Unicron theory. Also, that big ship was eating the buildings and stuff at 1:56. Oh and pausing it at that point will allow you to see somewhere in the region of 8 or more big name company logos all facing directly to the camera. Only Michael Bay would feel the need for that much product placement in a film that’s main purpose is to sell (increasingly crappy) toys to children.

Do you see what you have done to me Michael Bay? You have made me cynical about a fucking Transformers movie! Anyway, this film is out… who the fuck cares… Summer the something… June 27th apparently for the US and July 10th for us lowly peasants in the UK. Meh.

Because it is an unspoken goal of The Film Dump to review every film made in the 80s (Hint: film review 300 is an 80s films) it was only a matter of time before I got to Jim Henson’s master work, Labyrinth. Also, because Labyrinth is a great film it was also only a matter of time before I got to it. This is a film I probably watched fortnightly as a kid. I was actually unaware, until recently, that it had failed critically and financially upon its original release. I had always assumed it was a huge deal because it was a huge deal to me, my friends and pretty much everyone around my age and younger today. The film is still referred to as a cult classic. There’s nothing cult about how poplar Labyrinth is. This film is legit, so, click the link below and I’ll tell you just how much Labyrinth is one of the most legitist films ever.

Labyrinth follows a teenage girl called Sarah (Jennifer Connelly) who, one night whilst babysitting her baby brother, gets so annoyed by his crying that she does what any teenage girl would do and wish him to be taken away by the Goblin King. Totally normal behaviour. Also, The Goblin King is David Bowie. I did tell you this was an 80s film. Sarah realises this was a bit of a rash move pretty much immediately and begs Jareth, The Goblin King, to return her brother. He explains that she can only have him back if she can solve his labyrinth and get to his castle in 13 hours. Of course this isn’t going to be as easy as solving a maze would seem. The labyrinth is a twisted and magical place that is constantly changing and shifting with a dreamlike logic that will test Sarah’s mind and determination to save her brother.

What this film does exceptionally well is create a coherent, and yet suitably incoherent dream scape of a world from the Goblin King’s world. Much like Jan Svankmajer’s Alice almost every element of the Labyrinth can be seen in tiny little visual clues dotted around Sarah’s home and, primarily, her bedroom. She has a Goblin King stature, there’s a doll of a ballroom dancer contained behind glass, cuddly toys that share similarities with the creatures she encounters. She also has a collection of fantasy books that share many similarities with regards to their themes as Labyrinth does itself. Books such as Where the Wild Things Are and The Wizard of Oz., for example. These objects even come into play later in the story as she must effectively leave them behind in order to continue with her journey. This completes a stage of her rite of passage that is central to the film’s story.

Look at that fecking gorgeous image right there.

Thematically the film is essentially about a teenager learning about responsibility, about how life isn’t always fair and how to open herself up to others. Early on she is abrasive with her parents, sees her responsibility to babysit her brother as a chore and inconvenience to her life and would rather escape into fantasy than deal with life. Basically she’s a standard teen. He journey through the labyrinth require her to trust others, force her to test her patience and to rely on her wits to outsmart the world around her. The film does a superb job of gradually changing the characters personality from being a bit of a little drama queen to being an actual mature and compassionate human being. This is accomplished through tiny details such as eventually remembering the name a the dwarf companion she encounters called Hoggle, who she repeatedly calls Hogwart by accident early on. Something The Goblin King does too, suggesting he’s viewed as barely a person. Also, it kinda convinces me that JK Rowling stole all the names she uses from 80s fantasy films. Other scenes show her rejecting a perfect fantasy world Jareth presents to her and in another scene she helps rescue a creature called Ludo, showing her increased care for others. Something that wasn’t present earlier when she had first shunned Hoggle in a mean spirited way. She really does start off as quite a brat.

The transformation of her character by the film’s end is genuinely well executed to a degree that doesn’t tend to be present in a lot of fantasy movies these days. The icing on the cake comes in the final scene and I believe it is those moments that really cement this film’s longevity. The character themes it tackles ring true for almost anyone. It’s not delivering a message that as a teenager you have to give up on flights of fancy, but rather that those fantasies are what make you who you are and, as such, shouldn’t be abandoned. It reminds you that if you loved a film, book or game as a child, despite you having grown up and fully formed your personality, you can still love it as an adult as this fantasy is part of what made you who you are today. That you are the sum of your parts and influences and that the things you love can never truly go away.

Overactor.

A hell of a lot of mention should go to Jim Henson’s creature workshop for the puppets and effects pulled off in this film. Jim’s previous film, Dark Crystal, as quite the showcase for the mastery of puppetry. Labyrinth is just an incredible feat in this regard. The variety of puppet types are increased. The ingenuity of how on set actors were combined with practical effects such as masks is just superb, Hoggle being a pretty ground-breaking mixture of performance and puppetry himself. There’s a few moments where the puppets have started to look a little dated now but the entire world is so uniformly consistent in its crafting that they blend right in. Barring some slightly problematic chroma key and masking effects the visuals in Labyrinth are near flawlessly executed. Any problems those effects could have had could easily be fixed with a high quality remastering of the film to adjust the colour tones and remove that tell-tale blue glow. Regardless, this is still a practical effects masterclass that nears Aliens levels of perfection.

Performance wise Jennifer Connelly is still in that awkward pre-adult acting phase in her career where the majority of her line delivery is via the medium of wood. She had improved a fair amount since Phenomena though, so that’s good. David Bowie flits between clearly not being sure what to make of this and being entirely wrapped up in the fantasy. Which leads to a typically unique performance from old Mr Stardust. This is perfect because if he was to ever come across as normal for the slightest moment the fantastical nature of his role would have been shattered to pieces. I doubt there was any danger of that though, especially when his wardrobe is so gosh darn fabulous. All feathers and short jackets coupled with spandex tights so revealing he’d get put on a sex offenders register these days if he stepped near a girl as young as Jennifer was whilst wearing them. Bowie also provides all the musical numbers in the film with only one being performed by anyone other than him. That song is Chilly Down and features on vocals, amongst many others, Danny John Jules, who you likely know as Cat from Red Dwarf. I’m not shitting ye. He’s also in Little Shop of Horrors you know. Fun facts!

See! It’s Cat in little Shop of Horrors. Now watch this become the pic that gets randomly selected to represent this review.

There’s a very good chance that if you were born post 1980 that this film is likely amongst your favourites. I honestly think I would struggle to find someone that hasn’t seen this among my friends and would be equally as unlikely to find anyone that dislikes the film. Labyrinth isn’t perfect, as noted, but it’s an honest, fun, fantastical film with genuine thematic worth. Jim Henson and his crew conjure up imagery that so few other directors can even come near approaching. No, Tim Burton doesn’t manage it. He’s a fraud. This film has heart and an incredible amount of care lavished upon it, all of which shows on the screen. As far as I am concerned, and I am aware I have said this of a few children’s films, this is essential viewing for any young person you may have brought into this world. Get it in your collection and make them watch it.

You know what films are fun to watch, and to a greater extent, fun for me to review? Those films that are so of their era that many people today either A) write them off as some random film of their time or B) are one of those young whipper-snappers that seem to think anything made before they were born isn’t worth their time. Clueless is one of the the most mid 90s films of all time. Even more so than Wayne’s World, Bill & Ted and maybe even California Man (Encino Man to you Yanks). I’m not sure if Clueless is more 90s than Bio-Dome… but I’m sure I’ll visit that film eventually to decide. Regardless, Clueless is actually an undeniably fine film. Click the link below and I’ll tell you why it’s actually brilliant. Also, if you’re from column B stop trying to be cool and watch something decent for once you petulant whipper-snapper!

Clueless, much like its inspiration, Jane Austen’s Emma, tells the story of a young rich girl who has a knack for matchmaking but never has the time or desire to find a partner of her own. In this 1995 take on the story Emma is now Cher (Alicia Silverstone) who is very much the fashion obsessed, very popular and very wealthy valley girl archetype we all know now. Her best friend, also named after a formerly famous singer now known for doing infomercials, Dionne (Stacey Dash) joins Cher as they attempt to make over a new, and quite clueless girl at their school called Tai (Brittany Murphy). Cher and Dionne focus their efforts on finding a boyfriend for Tai, regardless of her interests. This sets up a series of events that could easily be described as a direction-less plot but is, in fact, an actual honest to goodness character study of a teenage girl discovering who she wants to be and how to fulfil the void in her life, on her way to womanhood. This also involves Paul Rudd (as Cher’s step brother Josh) because it is his duty to appear in as many films as possible before he became a household name so years later you can go “oh, man, forgot he was in this”.

What this film does exceptionally well, other than most things, is gradually peel the layers off its main character whilst never betraying the person you see at the start of the film. In Cher’s very first scene, set to The Muffs version of Kids in America, Cher describes her daily life of picking the right clothes, her love of fashion, her friend Dionne and so on. All whilst smashing her Jeep (which she hasn’t got a driving license for) and being gloriously unaware of how shallow she’d be coming across to anyone listening. Her life, for all intents and purposes, revolves around fashion, boys and being popular. As the film progresses, and almost from the off, you’ll have these tiny moments of dialogue, small character exchanges, where Cher shows signs of actually being a very intelligent and a more sympathetic person than her shallow first impressions may suggest. My favourite example being correcting one of Josh’s friends on a line from Hamlet which Cher knows accurately thanks to Mel Gibson. Fun fact: One of my Uncles worked on that Mel Gibson Hamlet film. True story.

Oh Alicia Silverstone. You were all popular and stuff for, like, a year. Maybe.

There’s many other moments, such as Cher’s uncanny ability for metaphor use in debate class, where she may sound like she’s spouting nonsense but is actually drawing from her own life to create an accurate example of the benefits of immigration. This is despite the fact she didn’t know her maid was not Mexican. As the film shows you these small moments of humanity in the otherwise vapid exterior you can find yourself caring for her as a person. Her wants and needs are genuine and you’ll be happy to see her succeed. That’s not to say that there isn’t a few moments where the film forgets certain plot threads or appears to resolve them off camera. For example Tai goes from having a crush and an actual connection with skater boy Travis (Breckin Meyer), to ignoring him as she’s fully engulfed in the world of popularity, to having a crush on Josh and then Travis again. With very little scenes to indicate her transition of interests she is (spoilers) with Travis in the final scenes.

Now this happens with a few plot threads and normally it would be a little inexcusable but this film is about Cher and her journey. The seemingly fickle changes in some character motivations fit with the themes of teenagers not knowing what they truly want. It would have helped to have kept us in the loop over a few more scenes but the increasingly monocular focus the story has on Cher and her journey allows this to be a less troublesome oversight. Also, I could have done with more Donald Faison as Dionne’s boyfriend Murray cos that role is basically proto-Turk.

The film’s soundtrack is incredibly good and manages to describe the time within which it is set without once dipping into the pool of grunge music that would have been huge at the time. I suspect director Amy Heckerling wanted to avoid using any music which may have felt too fashionable and instead focused on songs that were of the time but not so iconic that they would date the film forever. Bands such as The Muffs, Radiohead and Mighty Mighty Bosstones may be very 90s bands but they aren’t associated with strong fashion movements, especially not any represented by the leads in this film. The closest would be Travis in his pot smoking skater group.

Oh Brittany Murphy, you’re all dead and stuff now. That makes me sad. Everyone go watch Drive in tribute to her. The Marc Dacascos one I mean.

Clueless is shot by Bill Pope, who I’ve established multiple times as being one of my favourite cinematographers for his sheer versatility. He does his usual fine job here. There’s a lot of nice crane shots, tracks and steady-cam moments as the camera moves with the actors through a scene. It’s not anything ground breaking but Clueless is nice to look at. Similarly Heckerling has ensured that every scene has small moments between characters that help progress of inform of relationship developments without the use of words. These aren’t things that are difficult to work into a script yet many films forget that most of the information we receive is visual and so that should be used to free up space for things that can only be described via dialogue. For example, why have a character verbally flirt with someone when they can give a cheeky tickle whilst talking about something else? There’s even a moment earlier one where Cher and Dionne explain the body language of a pair of teachers they had set up together which is then silently mirrored in a later scene with Cher.

In the end, whilst I can fault Clueless on a few factors, such as the abandonment of certain characters in the last half, the film itself is a real character journey and does a fine job of translating a 19th century novel to the modern day. It is littered with subtleties and details that rarely happen today. There have been a few high school set films since that have nailed the craft of film like this has, 10 Things I Hate About You and Orange County for example, but few manage to capture a moment in cultural history whilst also telling a timeless tale. Fine, I’ll commit to it. Clueless is pretty much a masterpiece. Is it better than Heckerling’s other classic though? That being Fast Times at Ridgemont High. That’s a review for another day methinks.

So a fellow blogger, and regular commenter here, who’s site is called Thoughts From The Booth recently awarded me with The Liebster Award. My initial reaction ranged from “what is that?” to “Has Joe’s account been hacked and now he’s sending complimentary spam?”. I get a lot of complimentary spam, by the way. If in doubt, Google the potential spam comment. That’s my advice for today. Where was I? Oh yeah, Liebster thing. The Liebster Award is a blogger network prize the origins of which I’ll explain after the jump. Effectively though one blogger nominates a number of other bloggers they enjoy, all of which have a limited number of followers, in an attempt to spread the word and get some juicy subscriber cross-pollination going. In the process you answer a series of questions the nominator poses to you. So, Thoughts From The Booth nominated me and after the jump I’ll nominate someone else and answer the questions posed to me.

First off, thanks to Joe from Thoughts From The Booth for thinking this random collection of film reviews what I do write is worth reading and spreading to others. Thoughts From The Booth is a film blog that, unlike mine, actually manages to find the time to review recent and actually good films. Something I struggle to do because, well, I wanna watch dumb 80s stuff so when I do review an art film it surprises you. Also, I mostly watch dumb 80s films. To give you an idea of how much more legit his film choices are, his last three (at the time of writing this) were The Counselor, Cutie and the Boxer and Rush. So, click the link to his site which is up in the first paragraph, and also here, and see what he has to offer you in the world of Fillum Jurnalizum. I’ll answer his questions in a bit.

Where did the Liebster Award come from? No-one really knows… ooooh… except we have Google and Yahoo answers and stuff now so we kinda do. The earliest appearance of the award comes from a German Blogsport site. The word “Liebster” means “dearest” in German, which means when you’re nominating a site for this award you’re nominating one of your dearest sites. As in most liked, not most expensive. The original idea was to pick 5 bloggers with under 3,000 viewers/followers and pose them the questions so anyone following their links will get an idea of who this awarded blogger is. There’s a good explanation of all of this here. Now, I’m one of them freaks that doesn’t really follow that many blogs, and it seems the ones I do are way out the follower range. So I will be nominating just 1. So…

Dear Ben from Views From the Sofa. I pick you cos you do the writings good. Views From the Sofa doesn’t just cover films, but also entire TV series. The site went on a bit of a hiatus a short while ago but Ben has recently brought it back and I reckon a few extra readers will convince him to keep it going. He recently reviewed the 90s Batman Animated Series which, as you may know from my Batman reviews, is pretty much the greatest interpretation of Batman there has ever been. So go there and have a read of his reviews. They’re good stuff. I’ll probably tweet you about this or something. Remind me if I don’t, assuming you’ll read this. Most importantly though, here are your questions.

1. What is the greatest film of all time?

2. What is your favourite film of all time?

3. If there was one film, book, cartoon or anything you’d jump at the chance to create an entry of, in any medium, what would it be and what would you do?

4. SNES or Mega Drive?

5. what is your favourite Police Academy movie?

6. What weapon would you bring to a fight with Rob Schneider? Describe in detail how it would be used?

7. When you see a guy wearing that bloody Kurt Cobain t-shirt, or a girl wearing that Audrey Hepburn Breakfast At Tiffany’s t-shirt do you A) roll your eyes. B) appreciate their taste. C) Scream “YOU WEREN’T THERE! YOU DON’T KNOW NOTHING ABOUT THEM YOU WORTHLESS HUSKS OF ALLEGED HUMAN BEINGS!!!”?

8. How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

9. Greatest TV Series cancelled way too soon?

10. Which director has had the most impact on you with regards to thematic or stylistic approach? Would you say they have shaped your vision of what a great film should accomplish? And would you consider them an auteur? Please argue their merit in 2,000 words or less.

And here’s the questions Joe at Thoughts From The Booth posed to me. Let’s see how dull I can make these answers!

1. What is your favorite movie that makes you feel like crap?

Emotionally it’s Grave of the Fireflies. I doubt I could even write a review about that without makign myself depressed. Amazing work of art though. And that sentence constituted a review and so now I’m depressed. Thanks a lot Joe. From a purely quality view though, probably Batman & Robin. God I wanted to drill a hole in my head when I rewatched that for review, which would have worked if Peter hadn’t stopped me. It’s a wretched mess of a film with 0 redeeming features. Although, now I think about ti, I’d say the same about Titanic 2 and Ultraviolet.

2. If You could have lunch with one person, alive or dead, who would it be?

Yasujiro Ozu. I’d challenge him to a drinking contest and he would kick my arse but it would be worth it.

3. What is your ideal band line up? You have to have a singer, bassist, two guitarists, and a drummer

Vocals: Maynard James Keenan.
Bass: Geddy Lee
Lead Guitar: Kirk Hammett
Melodic Guitar: Gabriela Quintero
Drummer: Blake Richardson

4. Where is your home away from home?

The Prince Charles Cinema in London

5. What was your high school experience like? Or how is it going so far?

Pretty much hated school. Didn’t go to college or university when I left. I did go to college eventually for a film studies course which I pretty much did to check if there was any gaps in my knowledge. The course turned me onto Jan Svankmajer and helped me make my mind up that I wanted to either write films or write about films. Guess which one I’m doing.

6. Are you an optimist or a pessimist?

I’m optimistic about my pessimism. It’s always there for me when I need it and it never lets me down, unlike that damned optimism with it’s hopes and dreams and whatnot.

7. What is your rainy day film?

Scott Pilgrim vs The World. Cannot reiterate enough how much I love that film. For some reason it never gets old. Incidentally, I feel the same about Ghostbusters, Spaceballs and Transformers: The Movie.

8. Which film have you seen the most in your entire life?

Ghostbusters easily. There’s a few that would come close though such as RoboCop, The Empire Strikes Back and Lethal Weapon. Can you tell I grew up in the 80s?

9. What is your ideal job?

Ideally one that pays enough to get by. I’d much rather be making money doing something creative though. If I could get into the world of film making that would be amazing but I’d be happy just earning enough from writing about film to get by. I am some way off that goal.

10. Are you afraid of the future like I am?

Nah, the future kicks arse. We’re gonna have, like, jetpacks and hoverboards and replicators and shit. I do fear for the future of actual quality mainstream film though. Seems quality is in the fringes now rather than being seen by the masses.

11. Do you read? What is your favorite book?

I’m a comic book nerd. Grew up reading the UK Transformers comics, Judge Dredd and the like. Now I’d say my favourite comic is Watchmen closely followed by Blankets. I do read word filled books too though, but I tend to gravitate toward text and factual rather than novels. Currently reading Story by Robert McKee. It is one dense read. When that’s done I have Kevin Smith’s Tough Shit to digest… erm… I should say read.

I figured it was about time I took a break from teenage girl coming of age stories and watched something a lot more masculine. What could be more masculine than the world of male modelling? Nothing, that’s what! Zoolander, for those of you that don’t know, is a simple tale that attempts to answer a question that plagues all of us from time to time. Is there more to life than being really, really, really, ridiculously good looking? It’s a tough quandary to fully explore in the course of just one film, especially one that is only 90s minutes long, but Ben Stiller gives it his best shot. Click the link below if you’re so hot right now.

Zoolander follows the exploits of title character Derek Zoolander (Ben Stiller) as he is unwittingly, and that is exactly the right descriptive, drawn into a plot to assassinate the Prime Minister of Malaysia by a secret organisation of fashion executives. See, in this world, every major assassination in history has been carried out by male models. They can get in anywhere, they can get close to anyone and, most importantly, they don’t think for themselves. When fashion mogul Mugatu (Will Ferrell) is tasked with carrying out this assassination in just 14 days he realises he needs the blankest of all slates to turn into a killing machine. Derek is perfect for this. Plus his career is on a downward spiral because rival and newcomer Hansel (Luke Wilson) is so hot right now, so no-one would miss Derek anyway. As Derek is clueless it falls to investigative journalist Matilda Jeffries (Christine Taylor) to uncover the conspiracy and save Derek from what he has been brainwashed to do.

Gotta love the silly concepts for comedies. They don’t seem to happen so much now. In recent years comedies have, by and large, been rooted in a world closer to reality with bizarre events coming out of it. Go back to the time of Zoolander and things were a little more outlandish and just plain fun. I miss those days. The silliness of Zoolander, along with it’s quick wit and blunt but effective satire, is what carries the film through its 90 minute runtime. Like many comedies that are largely concept rather than plot based there is a large amount of the film that focuses on scenario rather than actual plot progression, but this isn’t so much of a problem. What the film does is set up the plot quickly, whilst also giving us plenty of time to acclimatise to the character’s quirks, and then just gets on with the funnies.

The dark underbelly of male modelling.

A subplot involving Derek’s search for acceptance by his father, and his quest to find something more to life, exists only as an excuse for a model working in a coal mine sequence and a handful of purposefully cliché moments. This could have easily been removed from the film and replaced with something else focusing solely on Derek’s quest for meaning. But these scenes provide a good series of memorable laughs and also the site of Vince Vaughn, Jon Voight and Judah Friedlander all sporting brilliantly spiky, yet soft, hair. There’s a few other sequences that could have been shortened or skipped but the world we’re being presented with is fun enough that none of these scenes fill too much like filler. Ben Stiller remembers that, with a wafer thin character, you need to work at giving him plenty of traits and desires to keep us amused with. The build up of his new look, dubbed Magnum, becomes a key moment in the film’s climax. As does Derek’s inability to turn left and his want to establish a centre for children who can’t read good and want to do other stuff good too. So while these scenes don’t always move the plot on they give us different views of a character who’s defining trait, other than being really good looking, is his stupidity. He’s always stupid, but at least he’s trying to be something else and has a desire for change.

Another element of Zoolander which makes it stand out as such a fun comedy is the sheer brilliance of each character. Every single person in the fashion world is either weird, perverted, a hippy, practically brain dead or a combination of each of those traits. Mugatu is a brilliant oddball villain that may well be Will Ferrell’s best character. Yes, even including Ron Burgundy. There’s something incredibly memorable about every second he is on screen. He’s practically a one man quote machine and his performance is littered with ticks and a rhythm to his dialogue that have the effect of making everything he says and does mesmerising. Personally his outburst at being given a foamy latte is my stand out moment. Or maybe his explanation of outdated child labour laws.

Oh this scene. Everyone loves it.

Along with Mugatu Jerry Stiller does his angry old man routine as Maury Ballstein, head of Balls Models. Luke Wilson’s Hansel appears at first to be a more worldly and possibly maybe intelligent rival to Zoolander, but he’s just dumb in a whole other way. He’s still smarter than Derek but the film hinges on everyone being smarter than Derek so that makes sense. It’s David Duchovny as legendary hand model JP Prewett who turns up to steal a few scenes in the middle of the film. He plays the effective role of the informant explaining the outlandish truth of the film’s plot in a way that could have only been done by Fox Mulder in 2001. A brilliant piece of casting to be honest. This may also be the most cameo filled film of all time. Everyone from Paris Hilton, to Larry Sanders, to Fred Durst and even Billy Zane (yes Billy Zane himself!) make an appearance. David Bowie even judges a “walk-off”, this film’s equivalent of a wild west duel.

Zoolander is a film made to be fun and not much else. There is nothing wrong with that. To me a film should be honest about it’s goal and should be laser focused on achieving that goal. Zoolander’s goal is fun and light satire and on those merits it is a resounding success. There’s messy plot moments, a few dodgy turn of the century effects and a moment where the film almost has a chance to comment on something meaningful (in this case Bulimia) it is very quick to sidestep and chuck in the jokes. These problems can’t be avoided, but neither can the laughter. Stiller’s direction is capable, of all his films I’d say it’s (ironically) the least visually interesting, but it does the job. It also features a very well chosen soundtrack featuring No Doubt, Herbie Hancock and Frankie Goes to Hollywood, the latter serving as key plot device. The sum of its parts mean that Zoolander stands up as being just a really, really, really, ridiculously good time, and sometimes, that is all a film needs to be.

Every once in a while I like to review one of them films that’s all like “I’m big and important! Listen to me!” and ones that lazy critics call “an unflinching portrayal of X that cuts to your core or some shit.”. Today’s film fits both of those categories by being about all sorts of important human rights issues and war and stuff that requires Leonardo DiCaprio to pursue an Oscar again. Blood Diamond is a story set during the conflicts in Sierra Leone at the end of the 20th century when child soldiers were used to fight wars that propagated the selling of diamonds mined from conflict zones in Africa. Millions of African people were forced to leave their home towns to become refugees from a conflict they played no part in over a commodity they would likely never see. There’s a potentially strong and worthwhile story to tell here. Does Blood Diamond manage that? Click the link below for my thoughts.

The main story that pulls you through the film follows a father who’s taken away from his family by the RUF (Revolutionary United Front) and forced to mine for diamonds. The RUF at the time were responsible for the use of child soldiers, almost always children taken from their families and reconditioned to fight a war. They would also cut the hands off anyone that they didn’t want for the mines in order to stop them from being able to vote. The father, Solomon Vandy (Djimon Hounsou), soon learns how harsh life in the mine is as workers are killed for attempting to hide even the tiniest diamonds for themselves. Solomon finds a clear diamond the size of a small birds egg and, in the midst of a raid on the mine he buries it out of sight with the intention of finding it later. After being captured as part of the illegal mining operation a diamond smuggler called Danny Archer (Leonardo DiCaprio) overhears talk of this diamond and uses his connections to free Solomon with the intention of using him to recover the valuable stone. They soon meet an American reporter, Maddy Bowen (Jennifer Connelly), who’s looking to expose a jewellery company thought to be buying conflict diamonds. Their journey to find this blood diamond Solomon has buried leads them on a route through the worst of the troubles Sierra Leone experienced at the time and questions the nature of why people do horrible things to each other for such a small reason as a tiny rock. It also does the whole “are people basically good” thing and then turns into a Hollywood action blockbuster at random intervals.

Blood Diamond is a slightly confused film. It begins by depicting the horrors of the time, families torn apart, needless slaughter of innocent people, children having their hands removed. The sort of thing you would have heard about on the news but never seen the aftermath of. The news at the time liked to focus on the use of child soldiers rather than everything that led them to being there. So right from the start the film sets itself up to be a harsh look at, and a condemnation of, the terrible conflicts of those years. The trouble is that whilst it’s a clear condemnation, and whilst the film remembers to say what the cause of this is, it stops a little short of delivering the true gut punch along with any powerful truths. The film ends with some text asking if you truly know where the diamonds you may own come from but his message isn’t hard enough in its approach to make the audience potentially feel bad for any diamonds they may have purchased in the past without questioning their origins. To add to this the final hour of the film appears to lose sight of its main focus on the setting and begins to allow itself to be more of a straight forward action film with occasional heart-string tugging attempts.

How can 20 years have passed since Labyrinth and she’s only aged, like, 2 of them?

About a third of the way into the film you can begin to feel this shift happening. We start to see a story arc for Danny that involves him using his morally dubious methods to buy his way out of Africa. He has that goal to escape this world in his mind and along the way he gradually learns that, despite the impression he gives, that he may well be a basically good person. He puts the needs of Solomon and Maddy ahead of his own promising them what they want whilst making it clear to them that he’s only interested in that diamond. Along the way there is a few sequences involving the RUF attacking towns or Danny and Solomon’s path being blocked by militia. At these points we start getting action beats. And not just simple moments of heightened tension and hostility, but full blown set piece driven action sequences. It turns out that Danny was formerly a mercenary and is pretty much a super soldier. He does the old fake prisoner quick-draw trick on some guards. He pops caps in heads like it’s a reflex. There’s even a brief car chase sequence.

Now, as a fan of the more flamboyant films out there I can’t say that having a disconnect between the thematics and the presentation cannot result in full cohesion. As you may be aware I am a little obsessed with RoboCop. A film that juggles a number of themes smartly whilst also being a ridiculous action Sci-fi B movie. But when a film is taking on very real conflicts and attempting to deliver a message that is not just meant to make you think but to also effect how you regard your own life you can’t really juxtapose those thematics with big Hollywood action scenes. You can’t depict a near morally corrupt character as a hero. You can’t layer on schmaltz at the last few scenes. The film has to decide it’s path, tone and message and stick to it. This isn’t a story meant to cover a broader scope of humanity, allowing it the leverage to be a genre piece. This is a story about real events, real suffering and real horror that still go on today. To frame scenes of violence as action set pieces with moments intended to make the audience cheer and sequences designed to make a character appear heroic for the purpose of giving him a happy ending goes against the reality of the story.

Leo was trying to find the right time to tell him about his role in Django Unchained.

That all said, Blood Diamond is still an exceptionally well made film in terms of shooting, cinematography and the progression of it’s actual narrative. Edward Zwick’s direction is as solid as it always is. But as with The Last Samurai his story is at odds with the action he presents on screen. I get the impression from some of his work that he’d like to make big action movies that make you think. He needs to pick better subjects. The production quality is superb though with only a few composite shots showing cracks in the film’s veneer. One scene at a beach side bar at night has some particularly badly done digital compositing with all sorts of rough edges around character’s heads where the night sky has been implanted behind them. On a technical level there really is very little to fault the film on. Which is typical of Zwick to be honest. He’s a very much an above average director who I always think is on the cusp of making something exemplary.

Performances are strong throughout the film, especially from Djimon Hounsou and David Harewood. The latter of which plays the films de facto villain of Captain Poison, and RUF soldier responsible for the attack on Solomon’s village and the taking of his son Dia (Kagiso Kuypers) who is then enlisted into the RUF’s military. Captain Poison is pretty much an irredeemable terror of a person that is the argument for Danny’s belief that not all people are basically good. The argument being that no good could exist in such a man. There was a missed chance to depict the character as something more than being just pure evil, but as he is he’s a pretty incredible villain anyway. That said, the fact he is so incredibly nasty leads to one of the previously mentioned audience cheer moments when he is eventually killed.

Overall Blood Diamond is a very well made film that needed to decide sooner what sort of story it was telling. Its gradual reliance on Hollywood tropes or warm fuzzy feelings, action set pieces and romance all work to diminish the potentially powerful message the film could have delivered. There is way more good to the film than the bad though and as a piece of entertainment it manages to succeed fully. It’s just that this shouldn’t have been about entertainment.

I am going to start by saying that I cannot promise I won’t spoil something. I am going to try as hard as humanly possible to not spoil the film though. A fair amount has been shown in trailers already so anything to do with that is fair game as far as I’m concerned, but man… they’ve really made it hard to not mention all the cool stuff that happens in this film. This is… and I’m asking you to brace for hyperbole here… the exact Captain America film my nerd brain has been wanting to see for years. It may be the best film in the Marvel cinematic universe. I can’t decide for sure right now. Click the link below and I’ll try to explain… hopefully without spoiling too much, just why The Winter Soldier is such an excellent comic book movie.

Marvel and directing duo Anthony and Joe Russo have made a lot of noise concerning the tone of Captain America: The Winter Soldier. They’ve been pitching it as a political thriller in the style of The Parallax View and Marathon Man. Except with super powers, of course. Whilst I wouldn’t go as far as to say that this film features as much political intrigue and tension as those and other such thrillers have, you can see where the Russos are coming from. The story revolves around secret organisation SHIELD potentially being compromised, which soon turns into a manhunt carried out by SHIELD agents to capture and kill Captain America (Chris Evans) for apparently betraying his country. He enlists the help of Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) and Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) to find out the truth and expose those responsible for corrupting the work of SHIELD, and for the evil that they are on the way to committing. This plot is made all the more complex when an incredibly skilled assassin with a bionic arm shows up that is known only as The Winter Soldier. I won’t say what the villainous plot is but it is nicely tied into a brief message to the viewers asking if you really know what is going on with all that data you chuck on the internet. I have a semi-paranoid friend of mine that won’t put anything of himself on the internet. He will lap this up.

So whilst the film does feature much intrigue and sinister plots being concocted in the shadows the film does not forget that it is actually about a super powered man beating up evil for truth, justice, freedom and other American things. Captain Britain fights for apathy, disappointment and politeness you know. The depiction of Cap’s powers really are handled better than they were in his first outing and in Avengers. In those films the majority of his actual superhuman feats came from leaping over large gaps and running quite fast. Well, I suppose surviving in a block of ice for 70 years was pretty superhuman too… but that was more of a happy accident. In the second scene of the film (I’ll discuss the first in a minute) we see Cap doing what he does. Running around taking out bad guys in stupidly efficient fashion. And then he kicks a guy in the chest and the poor bloke goes flying over the edge of the boat their on. Cap runs past a guy an casually barges him right over the edge of the boat like the guy weighed all of 40lbs. Later he survives an at least 30 floor fall onto marble floor. He runs right through doors. He bounces his shield off multiple people to hit a single target and manages to move to exactly the position the shield comes back to him at. This is exactly how his powers should be presented. There was a few hints of this in The First Avenger but most of the time his strength and fighting ability has be pretty much only just beyond human. This is much more in keeping with his comic book counterpart and I loved it.

Teenage Mutant Patriot Turtle.

Now about that first scene. It’s really good. Not remarkable… but it reminded me how few films, especially action films, will dare start with a scene of dialogue. Now, when you make a sequel you need to find a way of getting people up to speed as quickly as possible. You cannot assume that everyone has seen the previous film so brevity of exposition becomes vital. In the first scene we see Sam out on a morning jog around the Washington Monument when a man comes running past him at 4 times the speed. As he goes past he says “on your left” as a courtesy… and gradually as a mocking remark as he passes Sam over and over. They stop to talk, Sam introduces himself to Steve Rogers/Captain America. Sam has figured out who he was already. Sam asks about being unfrozen and adjusting to the world. He suggests as Marvin Gaye album to listen to which Steve adds to a list of things to catch up on. Rogers gets a message on his phone which has a suitably spy like display and Natasha pulls up in a car asking if anyone’s seen a fossil, referring to Steve and he laughs. The following scene is the boat assault.

This scene is so well written it kinda makes a mockery of how poor the average action film is scribed. In around 1 minute we have learned that Steve is faster tan the average human. Sam and Steve discuss being in the military, informing us of Steve’s military background. Sam knows who Steve is right away which informs the viewer that Steve is famous. The discussion of being frozen and the list of research over the last 70 years of pop culture inform us that there’s been a gap in his life. The phone informs us of his secret agent status. Just the fact that they’re running around Washington DC immediately conjures up images of American patriotism. The appearance of Scarlett Johansson informs us of how hot she is… a vital part of understanding everything.. maybe. There’s a number of scenes later in the film that manage to provide a similar amount of character information through just dialogue and small actions. This is what screenwriting is all about.

Is it spoilers that he has the old suit on? Pretty sure that was in a trailer.

It seems bizarre to be praising any film for getting these basic tenants right, but then I’ll see a film like Star Trek Into Darkness and every other scene is full of terrible characterisation and illogical plot points. I’ll see films that plain get sidetracked from it’s goal in order to provide lengthy action set pieces that go nowhere. I see films that seem to value making characters look cool over making them be characters we can care about as humans. I’ll watch Man of Steel and wonder why they feel the need to explain one plot point 3 times, or why Pa Kent had to be killed by a giant tornado. How about this for shocking? Captain America 2 manages to get through its entire 136 minutes without once depicting Cap as a Jesus Christ allegory. Seriously, think about the amount of Christ poses you’ve seen superheroes in recently. It’s lazy and tired and usually completely pointless. Nothing in The Winter Soldier is lazy, tired or pointless. Every single scene flows to the next brilliantly. Even when they fake you out at one point with the direction of the next scene they justify it with a moment of surprise. You realise the scene you think you may have missed wasn’t needed because they told you to expect something unexpected in the previous scene. This is easily, bar none, the best written Marvel Cinematic Universe film.

Direction wise the Russos have managed to surprise the hell out of me. These guys have never made a film like this, they’re mostly known for You, Me and Dupree for God’s sake. They’ve directed a lot of Community and Arrested Development between them too but never a huge budget action blockbuster. They seriously knocked it out the park for the most part. There’s a few fight sequences where I felt like taming the camera down would have helped a lot. But I’m heavily against pointless shaky cam, as I’ve ranted about many times before. There’s an odd shot in the middle of a car chase where the camera is, I assume, meant to be pointed at the ground with the two vehicles either side of the image, showing their proximity and the speed they’re travelling. Barely any of either car is in shot and it’s pretty much all blur. No idea why that one shot stood out to me. Generally though, everything else is shot very well. There’s a really nice shot near the end that I won’t spoil that reminds me of the sort of contemplative shots you don’t expect from these films. I look forward to seeing what they do next… provided it’s not a sequel to You, Me and Dupree.

Didn’t talk much about Winter Soldier himself. Possibly too spoilery. There was a funny moment in the cinema during his big reveal scene though that I had previously called happening.

There’s a lot more I’d like to discuss with this film but I mustn’t. I want you all to go in and be surprised by all the small little things that happen or are mentioned along the way. They really have done a good job of hiding a number of moments and plot points from being shown in trailers and I feel like that has helped me enjoy this more. Amazing Spider-man 2 and a new X-Men film are on the horizon and I feel like I’ve seen way too much of them already. Especially in the case of Spider-man. As far as this film goes it’s a triumph. Effects work is fine, performances are as solid as you’d expect, with Anthony Mackie being a character I really want to see more. Put him in Avengers 2, hell give Falcon his own film. So glad he’s been depicted as a human being and not a cliché. The score is at it’s best when it’s merely mood pieces, the more heroic pieces being largely forgettable. Overall though, there really isn’t much to dislike. I may do a very spoilery post about the film on Sunday for the Weekend Dump, so be aware of that potentially happening. I just wanna talk about the stuff and the people and the references! Go see this now for fucking Christ’s fucking sake!

So a while back I figured what type of films got me the most views. It seems that the formula basically involves reviewing a film that is full of sexiness and stuff. This was figured out when I noticed that my review of Showgirls was by far and away the most viewed review I have ever done. Also, my Blue is the Warmest Colour review pulled in a load of views in its first day. That had sexy ladies in it too. So, before I start Godzilla month (oh yes, that’s happening) allow me to introduce you to one of my favourite sexy films of all time. That film is Barbarella. Which you probably guessed based on the title of this review… and the fact there’s a pic of Jane Fonda as Barbarella up there… Also, there’s a good chance you Google searched for “Barabarella with shirt off” to find this site. Click the link below to see if I provide such a pic!

Barbarella is a very, very 1960s French-Italian produced, English language, science fiction comedy that was pretty much slated by critics and ignored by the masses upon its release. Around 9 years later some film called Star Wars was a fairly decent success and the decision was made to chuck Barbarella back out in the cinemas, because the studio had it lying around and needed a sci-fi film to cash in with as soon as possible. The cut that was released was edited to hell down to a PG cert. I have never seen this version. I came across the film some 16-17 years ago when I was a teenager, which it turns out was the perfect time to discover Barbarella. Erm… because it had just been re-released uncut and that who real cinema fans watch films. No other reason. Thanks to Barbarella’s international influences (it’s based on a French comic) along with the decade within which the film is produced, you get what could easily be described as a concentrated extract of exactly what the 1960s was. The imagery is psychedelic. The characters are sexually liberated, or will soon be. The costumes range from bizarre to ridiculous. All of this is wrapped together with a paper thin plot and several large spoonfuls of silly.

What there is of a plot serves to be pretty much perfunctory. It is merely a goal for Barbarella to achieve as she is charged with the task of finding a scientist called Dr Durand Durand (Milo O’Shea) who has created a weapon of potentially enormous power, which is quite a problem as Earth had established peace centuries ago. Barbarella heads off for the Tau Ceti region of space where he is believed to be hiding. She soon crash lands on an ice planet and then proceeds to have a series of adventures that involve either her clothes getting torn or her being brought to orgasm… not always in a traditional manner. If there is a lesson to be gleaned from Barbarella it is that all problems can be solved by being hot and having sex with either hairy men or bird men. This all sounds pretty sordid and nasty, and to be honest… sordid is about the right descriptive. That all said, the film is always jovial and is littered with sci-fi based satire.

She seems to like it.

So whilst the film is not the most complex and layered piece of story telling there has ever been it does have many positives going for it. The most striking element is easily just how plain imaginative it is. Space is depicted as a colourful undulating place. An effect achieved by using microscope lenses to film water molecules. A similar technique was used in recent years to create the space effects in The Fountain. It is obviously cruder here, but sits as a stark contract to the visualisation of space seen in Star Trek at the time. Not accurate at all, but who cares in a film like this? Barbarella’s space ship has an entirely shag pile carpet interior, all over the walls and ceiling. In one scene she is put to death by a flock of Budgerigar. A band of children, all twins, attack her with small robotic dolls. Literally every sequence in the film features some sort of bizarre threat, set design, theme or all three at once. Regardless of the film’s plot, there is never any moment that could be considered dull.

The film is also packed with a number of tiny details, mostly intended for humour. A password Barbarella is given by the subtly named resistance leader Dildano sounds like incoherent nonsense. That’s because it kinda is. The password is “Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch”, which is a real village in Wales. Lord knows why they chose that, funny though. The city she ends up being brought to is called SoGo, an apt reference to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Gun shoulder rests have small hands on them, for some reason. To add to this each set is distinct from the last with a visual variety many films struggle to come anywhere near attaining.

Here’s your topless pic! What? You wanted nips? Bad boy! Dirty boy! In your bed!

So whilst Barbarella is a treat for the eyes (the film and the character), and it also manages to provide some light hearted entertainment, it is not without many, many flaws. Barbarella is a largely ineffective protagonist, often relying on happenstance to save the day. She spends a lot of the film being captured over and over, only to randomly escape whatever predicament she is in… which leads to her capture again. Whilst the comedy is played in a camp fun way Jane Fonda herself only just manages to pull the jokes off. To her credit she does an amazing job maintaining the required tone of the film, it’s just her line delivery on the more jokey moments that’s an issue. She was clearly game for anything when this film was made though. There wasn’t many Oscar nominated actresses willing to short circuit an Orgasmatron through sheer insatiable sexuality on screen. They usually did that sort of thing in private then. The plot’s episodic nature is very apparent, which exposes the story as being dragged from multiple issues of its source comic. There’s some very rough ADR moments leading to very clearly dubbed dialogue.

Even with its flaws Barbarella is a joy to watch. It’s effects are kitsch by today’s standards, but are filled with charm and often very well done. The music is suitably “swinging” and “jive”. composed by Jean Michel Jarre’s daddy Maurice you know. This is one of those warts and all experiences that I would like to believe that no-one could truly hate. Surely everyone gets some level of enjoyment from a film that is this joyously silly and daft? I cannot, in good conscience, call Barbarella a poor film. This is a work of some kind of art and that is what matters. Its influence is spread everywhere from sci-fi, to music to even avant garde fashion designs. Barbarella is also the first science fiction comic book character to have a feature length film adaptation produced. Prior to this sci-fi comics had only been adapted as serials. When watching this film I am always reminded at how boundary pushing this must have been in 1968. It actually baffles me that the film is 46 years old this year. Regardless of actual technical quality, Barbarella is a bona fide (hehe… bona) cult classic of a film.

That’s the new Godzilla trailer right there. It’s like they released it today to coincide with this post.

Back when I first started this blog, nearly 3 years ago, I figured a good way to try to grow the site would be to marathon review entire series of films at a time. This would usually be done to hype myself, and maybe you guys, up for an upcoming release. The first season I did was for the X-Men films. It was a manageable set of films to cover in a few days, what with there being only 5 films at the time. Gradually these seasons got a little larger though. Harry Potter was 8 films. Batman had 18 films, to which I’ve added another since. James Bond season featured 23 films. It was that season that prompted me to create a category just for Bond film reviews. Next month the Gareth Edwards directed, Legendary and Toho Pictures produced Godzilla film is released. It was looking pretty impressive when the first trailer leaked out, now it’s looking pretty damn incredible. Last year I decided it would be a good idea to review as many of the Godzilla films as I can in the build up to the release of this film. Little did I know how tricky this would become. Click the links for words regarding the upcoming Godzilla season.

Quite some time ago a bill was edging toward being passed called SOPA. It would have meant that any company, for the slightest reason, could request your site be removed from the internet and you could potentially be charged. The reasons could be for something as small as using a screenshot for a film without their permission in your review. They had decided that as people pirate films and music quite often and then comment on it, sometimes by using clips from these products as examples, that the only answer was to blanket ban anyone that made reference to films or music without approval. I don’t condone pirating films at all. Have always purchased every film I review in some capacity, be it via Netflix or from my cable TV or a physical disc. I shut down the site for a day as part of a protest against that and stated that I am against this nonsense. I also established that I never use pirated or torrented copies of any film I review. This ties into Godzilla season.

I knew that getting every Godzilla film would be tough. There is a total of 30 films spread across a 60 year period of film history. In Japan Toho has released all of these in a nice, and very pricey, boxed set. Outside Japan, well… it’s kind of a giant mess. You see, at some point in the distant past, Toho decided to license Godzilla films out individually to various publishers. Universal retained King Kong Vs Godzilla, as they had part produced that film, and that remains one of only 3 Godzilla films to be released on DVD in the UK. One of the other films was the original Gojira, which was released in an excellent remastering by the BFI, although never on Blu-ray. This is the same as the Criterion release in the US. The third film was that fecking 1998 Roland Emmerich abomination. The rest of the films I was going to have to acquire from the US. This would prove tricky.

Hearts on fire. Burning desire.

Of the 29 currently released Godzilla films around 8 of them were on sale on Amazon for what I would consider a stupid price. This ranged from £30 for Godzilla Final Wars to nearly £500 for Godzilla Vs The Sea Monster. Suffice to say I did not have the money for these films. I set out then to grab as many as I could. The current list of attained Godzilla Films is as follows.

Bolded title have been added since this article was posted.

Gojira (I have the Americanised Raymond Burr starring version too)
Godzilla Raids Again
King Kong Vs Godzilla
Mothra Vs Godzilla
Gidorah, The Three Headed Monster
Invasion of the Astro Monster
Godzilla Vs The Sea Monster
Son of Godzilla
All Monsters Attack (I actually accidentally purchased this twice… whoops)
Godzilla Vs Hedorah
Godzilla vs Gigan
Godzilla Vs Megalon (Which dropped suddenly from £90+ to £5 in recent weeks)
Terror of Mechagodzilla
Godzilla Vs Biollante
Godzilla Vs King Gidorah
Godzilla Vs Mothra
Godzilla Vs Mechagodzilla II
Godzilla Vs Spacegodzilla
Godzilla Vs Destoroyah
Godzilla 1998 (Ugh… yes I actually purchased this. For £1)
Godzilla 2000: Millennium
Godzilla Vs Megaguirus
Godzilla, Mothra & King Gidorah: Giant Monsters All-out Attack
Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla
Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.
Godzilla: Final Wars

Godzilla Vs Audrey II was unexpected.

Add to that the new film which I certainly will be seeing and I think that’s not a bad set. This list may grow before I’m done though. Yup, I am not finished getting these just yet. I have a relative that collects Godzilla films and I will be raiding his collection. I know for sure that he has Final Wars, and hopefully a few of the other missing films. Sony have recently announced a set of double packs they’ll be releasing on DVD and Blu-ray on May 6th in the US. Hopefully these receive a UK release too, although I won’t count on it. To add to that a number of other, previously very rare, Godzilla films are seeing releases throughout may. These include Vs The Sea Monster, Vs Hedorah and Vs Gigan are getting a release in May. Destroy All Monsters is down for release in July, this is important to me as it was one of my favourite Godzilla films as a kid. As I’m sure I can get Godzilla Final Wars this leaves me with 3 films to find, and they may be a challenge.

For both Son of Godzilla and Godzilla Vs Mechagodzilla there is believed to be no current license holder in the US. Wikipedia has them listed as being owned by Sony Pictures, but most fan sites seem to disagree and, if they were with Sony, wouldn’t they be getting released alongside the 4 double pack they’re bringing out soon? It would make sense that the license has lapsed since the last time they were released so acquiring a old copy seems to be my only chance.

Ugh, this guy.

The last Godzilla film I need is a whole other kettle of fish. To the best of my searching and knowledge the rights to Godzilla 1985, or the Return of Godzilla as it is also known, are not just unclaimed but no-one knows for sure who owns them. Not even Toho. Word is that a company called Lakeshore had the rights at some point, then they’re catalogue got purchased by Image but all enquiries to Image seem to result in a dead end. The consensus is that Image don’t own the rights either, suggesting that Lakeshore had lost them before being acquired. I’ve also read that Toho are merely waiting for the license to expire so they can sell it on again, butt his would mean they know who has it now, surely? Regardless, a release of Godzilla 1985 seems very unlikely in the near future.

So, I have my work cut out for me. It appears that, worst case scenario, I will be reviewing just 22 of the 30 Godzilla films. I have a chance to grab a few more, and if any cheap copies surface of the films I am missing I will be adding them to this list. No matter what happens, though, I have a lot of films to cover over the next month. Best part is, Godzilla isn’t the only special set of reviews I’ll be doing. April 25th is The Film Dump’s 3rd birthday, and as is tradition, I will be picking a “special” film to review on that day. All these Godzilla films will also take me up to review No.300, which will mean another “special” review. If you don’t know what I mean by “special” just look up the what I have reviewed at every 50 film mark. With the exception of Chinatown they’ve all be decidedly “special” films. I have films in mind for these, look out for them as this month rolls on. On top of that The Amazing Spider-man 2 is out and, provided I have the funds… I’m kinda skint right now, I’ll be reviewing that too. So, busy month ahead. Come back on Monday for the first Godzilla film review which will be, of course, Gojira!

UPDATE: So I just popped around to my Uncle, the B-movie collector, and had a look through his collection of Godzilla films. I have now attained a further 5 films to knock off the list. They are Godzilla Vs The Sea Monster, Son of Godzilla, Godzilla Vs Gigan, Godzilla Vs Hedorah and Godzilla: Final Wars. This leaves just 3 that I have been unable to attain, Destroy All Monsters, Godzilla Vs Mechagodzilla and The Return of Godzilla/1985. Not a bad set I’d say. I’ve added them to the list above.

Back when I was a youngster of some variety formerly decent British TV Channel, Channel 4, set up a film sister channel called Film 4. This was back in 1998, which means the variety of youngster I was would have been a 16 year old. Early on they did a few nights of Godzilla films and it was then that I saw the original Godzilla. Before this point I had seen the 1998 abomination “starring” Matthew Broderick and a number of random Godzilla films on VHS. The original Godzilla, or Gojira as it probably should be referred to in order to differentiate itself from the previously mentioned US film and the upcoming reboot, was a very different film to the ones I had seen before. It was slower paced, darker and there was no other monsters in sight. Also it was in Japanese. At this point, if you did see a Godzilla film, it would have likely been the English dubbed versions which often edited down from their original versions. This was the first Godzilla film I had seen without it being presented through the distorted lens of a US film studio. This was the real Godzilla experience. I watched the film again last night for the first time in a long, long time. How did it hold up? Click the link below.

The plot of Gojira follows the aftermath of the destruction of a Japanese fishing boat, along with the destruction of a boat sent to search for them. The locals of the Odo town the boat came from are unsure what could have caused this destruction, believing it may have been an underwater volcano. One of the elder locals believes it may have been something a little more mythological. He suggests it is an ancient creature local fisherman would fear during his youth called Gojira. They hold rituals to ward off the creature but that night the town is attacked by what, at first, is dismissed as a hurricane. The houses that appear to have been squashed from above suggest differently though. Archaeologist Dr Kyohei Yamane (Takashi Shimura) heads to the town to investigate and discovers giant footprints, a Trilobite and a lot of radiation. This suggests to him an ancient creature, mutated by nuclear tests in the Pacific, must have come ashore. No-one believes him but when the monster appears during the day the Japanese Government have to accept that there us a very real threat to their country that was still in the process of recovering from the destruction caused by the bombings that ended World War 2. Now the Japanese military needs to find some way of killing this creature before all of Japan is laid to waste.

The ghost of the devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is felt almost constantly throughout Gojira. There’s no light heartedness, no bright happy moments. At the film’s mid-point Godzilla attacks Tokyo itself and there’s scene after scene of people being helpless to fight back against this force of destruction. There’s one particular moment where a mother is cowering in the street holding her children in her arms promising them that they will be with their father soon. Yes, Gojira is that dark. The shots of Tokyo left in ruins after the attack mirror similar images of a destroyed Hiroshima in the days after the bombing by the US. This works its way back into the films main narrative as a scientist named Dr Serizawa secretly holds the key to killing Godzilla but cannot bring himself to allow it to be used.

That bridge is screwed.

He has devised a weapon of mass destruction he dubbed the Oxygen Destroyer. The weapon would rend Oxygen molecules apart form their combined atoms an cause any living matter within its range to effectively be liquefied. He knows the bomb will work but cannot allow the device to be used through fears that, if it is used, the world’s superpowers will want control of the weapon themselves in order to have an edge in the building nuclear arms race. The fact a film feature a man stomping on buildings whilst wearing a giant rubber monster suit is willing to confront, tackle and condemn the use of weapons of mass destruction is pretty daring. This isn’t a misguided argument either. This is right on the nose and lays bare the feelings many Japanese people felt following the end of the war. That Godzilla was created by such a weapon only adds to the weight of the message that mankind is doomed to destroy itself unless we take responsibility for our destructive ways. In the end Serizawa destroys all his notes on the weapon and detonates it himself whilst under the ocean in order to ensure that he is taken with it, and so that no-one will be able to copy his work.

Gojira was a film that was never actually meant to happen. Originally the film’s producers were due to make another film entirely but when that project fell apart Toho charged them with the task of making any film at all. They were inspired by a nuclear testing incident known at Lucky Dragon, where fishermen were caught in the fallout of a nuclear bomb test that yielded a larger force than expected. The fishermen were struck down with the effects of radiation poisoning despite being in what would have been termed a safe zone. They were also influenced by the Ray Harryhausen film The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms. The original plan was to use stop motion effects for the monster itself but when it was explained just how long the sort of stop motion effects used in films such as King Kong would take the decision was made to just chuck a guy in a rubber suit and have him kick some buildings over. The film was made for the then equivalent of $1.5 million and whilst it’s effects look very dated today, at the time they were easily equalling the sort of effects seen in US science fiction. The smart decision was made to have Godzilla mostly attack at night, hiding any weaker elements from shot. This serves to add to the film’s brooding and bleak atmosphere.

If you look real closely you can see Godzilla woz ‘ere scrawled on a wall.

The fact Gojira exists as a film is pretty amazing considering the situation it was created within. It is also very important that this film was made. At the time Japan didn’t really go for this sort of spectacle driven film making. The likes of Yasujiro Ozu were telling family dramas (The masterpiece Tokyo Story was released a year earlier) whilst Akira Kurosawa was making a name for himself with police and detective themed and had, in recent years, made a couple of films that I believe a few people liked called Rashomon and Seven Samurai. There was certainly no-one making films starring giant monsters at this point. Whilst Gojira was not a critical success at first, it was a box office success. A sequel was commissioned almost immediately, that being Godzilla Raids again. Today Gojira is rightfully recognised as a near masterpiece. The film uses a slower pace to gradually build to the Tokyo attack scenes and the payoff is as spectacular as it is horrifying. The film’s score, composed by Akira Ifukube, has become iconic since and manages to drive the film onwards with a composition that that conjures up mental imagery of lumbering movement and impending doom.

The film may not be this perfectly crafted gem, it is showing its age and has some of the melodrama has a slightly forced feel at times. You can see the beginnings of so much of modern Japan’s culture in this one film though. From Godzilla himself to the fear of the atomic bomb to the slight extravagance of Serizawa, a scientist that is not only brilliant but also youthful and has a cool eye patch. He is pretty much an internally conflicted anime character brought to life. The film’s rough production helps lend a level of grit to the story that results in making the eventual destruction of Tokyo look all that more violent. Gojira is an important film in the history of Japanese film making and serves as a study into the mindset of a post WW2 Japan. The film almost explains the last 70 years of their culture in the course of 86 minutes. This is essential viewing for fans of Japanese cinema.

So my review of Gojira went up yesterday and right after I was done with that I moved straight onto watching its sequel, Godzilla Raids Again. I had never seen this entry in the series before. There’s quite a few Godzilla films I haven’t seen, to be honest. Not surprising considering how much off a ball-ache it is to actually acquire these things. Godzilla Raids Again is the film that laid the groundwork for the monster Vs monster films that would come to be the main focus of the series from this point onwards. I believe, off the top of my head, only 2 Godzilla films made after this point didn’t feature a second monster. And one of those was the Roland Emmerich film that didn’t even feature Godzilla. This film features Godzilla though, so it’s all good. Click the link below or something.

When pilot Koji Kobayashi (Minoru Chiaki) is forced to land his plane in an area around Iwato Island his friend Shoichi Tsukioka (Hiroshi Koizumi) heads out to rescue him. Whilst on the island they witness a fight taking place between two giant creatures. One of which is unmistakably a new Godzilla. They return home and report what they saw and the second monster is identified as an Anguirus, a dinosaur that must have been awakened by the same nuclear tests that awoke the original Godzilla. From here on a new way of defeating Godzilla, along with Anguirus, must be found as all knowledge of the Oxygen Destroyer used in the previous film had been lost when Dr Serizawa took his one life.

As far as a Godzilla film’s story goes, this is pretty much par for the course. Unlike the first film’s strong anti-nuclear message Godzilla Raids Again is content to push that to the sidelines in favour of spectacle and action. The human element of the story is more focused on the romantic entanglements of Tsukioka and Kobayashi than it is on the suffering and helplessness of those effected by Godzilla’s destructive path. Overall the entire film has reduced the thematic and emotional hooks that make the original stand out as more than just a monster movie. The film’s tone really isn’t that dissimilar to that of a 1940s aerial war movie. The pilots may not be military but the film revolves around the fishing business they work for as if it was a military operation. Lots of radio tower communications with the lovely young ladies back home and all that. The finale involves bombing runs and copious amounts of model plane sweeping by the camera footage. Many of the shots repeated multiple times over.

If you don’t move he can’t see you.

The repetition of shots, and an earlier scene that features near a solid minute of clips from the previous Godzilla film, would lead you to believe that production quality had been dropped overall. To be fair, they’ve merely re-prioritised. The film’s budget was reduced from Gojira and it appears that their approach was to take what money they had and put it all onto the Anguirus suit and one key action sequence. When Godzilla and Anguirus bring their fight to Osaka the quality of the effects jumps up a little from the previous film with far more detail in the actual crumbling of the buildings. Osaka Castle even gets destroyed in a scene that takes its time teasing you with the building’s eventual collapse/obliteration. There’s also a surprisingly dynamic looking model shot car crash followed by a factory explosion in the lead up to this sequence.

The rest of the film doesn’t share this dynamism though. Many scenes take place in the same few locations and, during the first half, often involve men in suits discussing how to deal with the monstrous threat. So whilst the film’s director, Motoyoshi Oda, has embraced the increased spectacle of having two monsters fighting he hasn’t matched the heightening of reality in the human scenes. Everything is still played as being incredibly serious, especially for the first half. There is some levity later as Kobayashi reveals he is looking to find a wife and everyone teases him and laughs and he takes on nickname “Mr Groom”… The day after the whole of Osaka was destroyed and he and his friends are picking through what remains of their business. That wouldn’t have happened in Gojira. The day after the Tokyo attack in Gojira we see some children crying as their mother’s dead body is carried away. The levity is required to endear you towards Kobayashi though for the film’s finale sequence so they got away with it… just.

As this is the first monster film to feature two creatures going at it you can forgive Godzilla Raids Again for not really knowing exactly how to handle the fight. There’s set piece moments but mostly the fight between Anguirus and Godzilla at the film’s midpoint involves the two creatures lunging at each over and occasionally rolling around a bit. Then they bite each other in a manner that the suit’s masks are clearly not designed to do. So it all looks a little silly really when compared to the serious and dry tone the film has up to this point. As previously mentioned though, the actual destruction effects are pretty well done and this allows for a decent amount of enjoyment to be had.

The first monster showdown in Godzilla film history! It’s decent.

So Godzilla Raids Again is not the near masterpiece Gojira was before it. Drama was traded for spectacle moments and the message was sidelined for, well… pretty much nothing. Is it still a decent film though? I wouldn’t say it’s a bad film. It has plenty of decent moments, although it does blow a few. Godzilla and Anguirus just kind of appear a few minutes into the film in broad daylight, for example. The film’s main problems stem from an attempt to put all they had into a handful of moments at the expense of character development and drama. The first film is filled with melodramatic moments but Godzilla Raids Again only has a few such scenes. It is a weaker film in almost all respects, but it is at least entertaining in its own, slightly shonky way. This film was almost the end of Godzilla as a potential franchise. Whilst the first film spawned many monster movies in the following years, Godzilla was put to rest for 7 whole years. The next film, I’ll be covering is the 1962 monster brawl showdown that is King Kong Vs Godzilla. That is really the film that set the direction Godzilla would take for the following 2 decades.

King Kong Vs Godzilla is a little bit of a big deal. It may not have been the most successful film of all time but it does hold the honour of having the highest box office attendance of all the Godzilla films in Japan. It also sent a message to Toho that big monster fights were a commercial draw and, more so that Godzilla Raids Again, it was this film that pushed the series in the direction we mostly regard Godzilla as having. The film almost didn’t happen. Back in 1955 Toho had put Godzilla on ice (That’s a pun you’ll get later) with no intention of making any new films. In the early 1960s the studio was working on making a Japanese King Kong film and intended to have Kong fight against another of their monster movie stars, Frankenstein. Frankenstein is 50 metres tall in Japan by the way. This was eventually scrapped when Toho learned they no longer had the license for Frankenstein and so they decided to defrost (also a pun) Godzilla after 7 years and create a battle of East Vs West with two of the biggest monster movie stars of the time. Click the link for my review.

Now, here’s an issue. The version of King Kong Vs Godzilla I have is the American version of the film. These days if a film is foreign film is released to Western audiences most often there will just be subtitles added and a day will be called. Even dubs have faded away from DVD releases in recent years. But King Kong Vs Godzilla was made in 1962. A time when studios didn’t think people would want to watch a film with words on the screen (similar to the idiot minority of today) and so Universal made a few tweaks. And by tweaks I mean shoot a whole load of extra footage intended to explain to their “moron” audience of the day what exactly is happening on screen. This seems to have created a little bit of a narrative problem for King Kong Vs Godzilla. The extra scenes take the form of a UN News broadcast updating the world on the current situation regarding Kong and Godzilla. Trouble is that the people making these parts didn’t seem to tell the people translating the actual film for it’s pretty ropey dub.

This manifests itself in two ways. First we have the issue where the UN appear to be filling us in on what’s going on, either side of scenes that they would not have been able to witness. The report is presented as if it were live and often the scenes in between these sequences are in locations where no military is present or on Kong’s home of Faro Island, a place where only the two Japanese leads and the staff of the pharmaceutical company they represent are visiting. The second problem is that the characters in the UN scenes appear to be completely oblivious tot he existence of Godzilla previous to this film. Now, you could argue that they presented this film as if it were a stand alone. Only trouble with that is that not only is does Godzilla first appear by escaping the iceberg (see, cos he was frozen!) he was trapped in at the end of Raids Again but the characters that witness him breaking free, who are American, recognise him instantly as Godzilla. This is further compounded by the Japanese characters being aware of who Godzilla is. To add to that the UN officials in the additionally shot material provide an origin for Godzilla that deftly sidesteps the nuclear testing issue that US audiences may not have enjoyed at a time when it wasn’t uncommon to hold a garden party in Nevada to watch nukes being set off for testing. So that’s all a bit of a mess.

Now be careful guys. that castle is pretty old. I’m sure they’ve got it under control.

Did I mention that the two Japanese leads, Osamu Sakurai (Tadao Takashima) & Kinsaburo Furue (Yu Fujiki), are off to the Faro Islands to capture Kong to help promote their bosses pharmaceutical company because the berries found on the island hold intoxicating properties? In the Japanese version it’s medicinal. Kong’s size, due to eating these berries, is seen as a prime advertising chance by the company’s boss Mr Tako (Ichiro Arashima). This medicinal quality is played down because the idea of Kong getting drunk on berry juice is funnier than them just having the side effect of knocking him out. To be honest, the idea of Kong beating up a giant octopus and then getting drunk is kinda funny. So while all that island nonsense is going on Godzilla is on his way to Tokyo because reasons. Kong escapes his bonds on the way back to Japan and is drawn towards Godzilla for other reasons.

Here’s another odd element to this film. For “some reason” King Kong gains extra strength from electricity. Now that’s not me being flippant. The scientific expert, who earlier told us Godzilla was a hybrid of a T-Rex and a Stegosaurus, says that “for some reason Kong gains strength from electricity”. That is his expert opinion. No theories as to why. He just says “for some reason”. The real reason was due to the film’s origin as a Frankenstein film. In the Japanese Frankenstein films the monster gets extra power from electricity. The team making this film must have figured that it wouldn’t work in the established canon of Godzilla and so they transposed that element to King Kong, likely because someone was too tired of rewrites to figure out an alternative to the Kong getting shocked scene in the climatic battle.

That climatic battle is easily the film’s highlight. There’s a few smaller clashes and action scenes but nothing matches the majesty of the final battle. It’s built up to slowly. There’s time for Kong to do a little lady kidnapping before the fight kicks off too. Once the fight is in full swing we get the sort of fight that makes the fight with Anguirus in Raids again look pretty silly. The man inside the Kong suit was bit of a brick shit-house named Shoichi Hirose. He was known for being very strong and an adept practitioner of Judo. In one sequence he forcibly throws Godzilla over his shoulder with suit actor Haruo Nakajima in the suit. That’s a fair old bit of weight to throw without the use of wires. The most infamous moment in the fight is easily when Kong stops fucking around and straight up shoves a tree into Godzilla’s throat. Seriously, he rips it out the ground and forces it in there roots first. It’s awesome. The climax is pretty darn cool but it does end rather abruptly. In fact the whole film ends suddenly. No conclusions for the human characters or moments reflecting on the aftermath of this huge battle. The film just ends when the fight is over.

That tree scene. Man. Masterpiece.

Whilst there is a distinct step up in the quality of the effects work, mostly due to the budget being multiple times larger than either of the previous films, there is one nasty smear on the visual veneer. The Kong suit is easily one of the most laughably bad Gorilla suits in film history. The proportions are all off. The face looks like it was made by a drunk child. The fur seems to have been picks off the street. It is more of a disaster than any amount of the citywide destruction seen in the film. Toho got a lot of bad feedback for the suit, and yet they still used practically the same one in King Kong Escapes a few years later. Maybe, just maybe, the suit is so terrible that it begins to gain some level of charm for its awfulness. But even then it would still be an awful suit. By contrast the redesigned Godzilla in this film looks pretty great. The tiny ears are gone from the head. The snout is made a little longer. The dorsal spines are larger and much more dramatic in appearance. This is pretty much the archetypal Godzilla appearance. The spines do wobble about a fair bit though, but that’s still more tolerable than looking like a Gorilla designed by a blind man.

In the end King Kong Vs Godzilla is a lighter and enjoyable enough adventure but there is a constant feeling, with this American dubbed version that large amounts of the film are missing in order to accommodate the entirely pointless extra scenes. The film becomes incredibly disjointed with regards to its narrative and as a result you just cannot care about a single one of the human characters. There is no drama to match Serizawa’s internal conflicts with his morals in the original Godzilla. If you’re just after spectacular fights between giant creatures you’ll likely get what you need from this. Otherwise, you’ll be left with a very poorly stitched together film lacking in true cohesion and character. That tree scene though…

Why yes that is the poster for the Americanised version of Mothra Vs Godzilla. For some reason they opted to called it Godzilla vs The Thing and decided to hide just what “The Thing” was. Hell, looks like it’ll be some tentacle monster there. God bless the Hollywood B-Movie studio system of the 1960s. Anyway, this film is Mothra Vs Godzilla and it’s about Mothra fighting Godzilla. Well, there’s some stuff about an egg and some crooks… also some tiny little ladies… but mostly it’s about a giant moth fighting a giant dino-lizard guy. Click the link below to read what I hilariously call a review!

I guess I should elaborate on the plot somewhat. As the film opens a typhoon is battering the coast of Japanese fishing town. When the storm has died down a giant mysterious egg is found to be floating out at sea. A local businessman named Kumayama (Yoshifumi Tajima) uses local salvage laws to claim the egg as his own by paying the local fishermen that recovered it. He plans to open, what could be, the least exciting the short term theme park attraction in the world with the currently unhatched egg as it’s centrepiece. You’d think that considering 2 different Godzillas, an Anguirus and a King Kong have trashed multiple cities throughout Japan in the last decade that you’d want nothing to do with any sort of giant creature, but hey, business is business, right? News reporter Ichiro Sakai (Akira Tarada) and photographer Junko Nakanishi (Yoriko Hoshi) team up with Professor Muira (Hiroshi Koizumi) to find out what they can about this egg. Soon they encounter two tiny women (they’re so beyond midget, like 6 inches tall) who inform them that the egg belongs to a deity like creature called Mothra. They beg for the eggs return but when Kumayama refuses to let it go they leave with Mothra to allow the larvae that will hatch from the egg to trash Japan. Soon it is discovered that Godzilla washed up on the beach too, buried by the sand, and it is up tot he three protagonists to head to Mothra’s island and convince its natives to let Mothra come to their aid to defeat Godzilla.

At this point in the Godzilla series the big lizard is still very much the antagonist. He doesn’t actually appear until around 45 minutes into the film, the only clue of his arrival being a radioactive scale found on the beach during the film’s opening scenes. There is likely a reason for his late arrival though, and the clue is in the title. Earlier drafts had Godzilla appearing much earlier, but his late arrival actually serves to up the drama in a massive way at just the right time. The looming danger of the egg hatching and its larvae trampling Japan in its search for food is magnified by the sudden arrival of Godzilla. His reveal scene is one of the best monster reveals in the entire series. After realising the scale was radioactive Ichiro, Junko and Muira head back to the beach to warn of the radiation. They spot a little movement on the sand. Then a lot of movement. The sand undulates ominously until suddenly a tail bursts through and Godzilla rises from the ground like a zombie. Remember that his fate was left as a mystery after his defeat at the hands of King Kong in the previous film. For all we knew he was dead. This reveal is so supremely cool and hits at exactly the right moment.

Yep, that’s a moth alright.

The film’s story focus is solely on Mothra for the most part and it’s entirely justified. Unlike King Kong Vs Godzilla (or at least the US redub) there is a message being conveyed throughout that asks people to be less selfish and unkind. It is the selfishness of Kumayama and his boss Jiro Torahata (Kenji Sahara) that prevents the egg from being returned and the belief that no amount of public outcry could change their minds that leads to Mothra and her Shobijin (The 2 tiny women) friends deciding that the people of Japan need to learn from their error of judgement. Kind of harsh, but this is Japan where they have a demon or ghost for pretty much every thing you could possibly do wrong. And many demons that just do shit for giggles. On top of that Mothra’s island home of Infant Island has been decimated by nuclear bomb tests over the years and is a desolate wasteland except for a small fertile area that is the only source of sustainable nourishment for the island natives. This is not a particularly subtle way of saying “nukes are bad and will probably kill us all”, but it’s effective. The film may not deliver its message with the same level of impact as Gojira did but at least it is delivering some sort of message. What message did Man of Steel deliver I ask you? This is a film about a giant moth fighting a lizard and it delivers a more relevant message than what passes as popcorn entertainment these days. It’s also an hour shorter. I like that.

Performances don’t have the naturalism of the first film but the series was gradually moving towards a more light entertainment mood at this point. There’s a lot less of the forced comedic gurning of King Kong Vs Godzilla, and thankfully no monsters are getting drunk. Mothra Vs Godzilla remembers to drag things down to a dirty place from time to time, for example, the deaths of Kumayama and Torahata is pretty much Shakespearean in its pathos. The villains end up being more pathetic than you could have expected as they fall over each other to get away with their money. One interesting character is Junko who, for the time in Japan, was a very assertive female character. She speaks up against her superiors when they do her wrong. Points out they don’t get her respect by default. She even takes command of the odd situation. Consider that in the same decade as this film was released Michael Caine was sending Marget Blye back home because their job was too dangerous for a mere woman to be involved in. Junko is quite a progressive female character for 1963, especially for Japan. This is even identified in her more modern Western dress sense and hairstyle. She’s modelled after the fashionable looks of the early 60s American woman.

Well, they’re smaller than I’m used to… but I think I can find a use for them.

When it comes to the film’s score I feel as if this was the film where Akira Ikufube’s compositions really soared to a higher level of grandeur. The Godzilla theme was brought back and given some extra bombast. On top of that the battles are scored with some suitably dramatic pieces. There was a story that he wanted one scene in the film to be left without music but director Ishiro Honda disagreed and added one of Ikufube’s pieces anyway. Apparently this led to the only disagreement these two men had in all the years that they worked together on this series of films.

Mothra Vs Godzilla is a charming and genuinely fun action adventure film and so far (in this series of reviews) the only film that has come close to being as good as the original, albeit for entirely different reasons. There’s the odd effect that has aged badly, but mostly the film’s effects stand up as well as you can expect anything from the period to. The film has pretty high production values all around with possibly the largest number of sets and locations used up to this point. I have mentioned before that I haven’t seen every Godzilla film before starting this crazy marathon run of reviews, but I really think I’ll be hard pressed to find one that is better than this film in terms of overall quality. Everything just meshes together really well making for a thoroughly enjoyable monster flick. Next up is the first film to feature Godzilla’s greatest foe, Ghidorah, The Three Headed Monster!

Notice a trend with the last few Godzilla film’s I’ve reviewed? He still hasn’t been given top billing in any film made since 1955. Ghidorah, The Three Headed Monster isn’t even the last of these early films to keep this trend up either. The next film is Invasion of the Astro Monster. After that is Godzilla Vs The Sea Monster, except that’s the US title. The actual title is Ebirah, Horror of the Deep. After that is Son of Godzilla, where he’s playing second fiddle to his irritating offspring. It’s not until 1971s Godzilla Vs Hedorah that we get a definite film where Godzilla gets top billing. It is kind of strange for the main attraction of these films to never get his name in the title. None of that really matters though. I was just trying to find something to fill this opening paragraph with before asking you to click the link below for my review of Ghidorah, The Three Headed Monster.

Ghidorah, The Three Headed Monster can easily be cited as the moment when the Showa era Godzilla films really started to change. Science fiction elements start becoming stronger. There’s a few more wacky moments. The tone is all over the place but there’s a clear shift in certain scenes to a lighter approach. There’s a scene where Rodan and Godzilla play volleyball with a big old boulder. Most of the shifts in style happen in the film’s final act. Perhaps the director, Ishiro Honda, wanted to ease people into the more comical approach later films would have. The key change that does occur in this particular film, though, is Godzilla turning from heel to face. If you’re not a wrestling nerd like me, that means he becomes the good guy.

The film’s plot is largely utter nonsense. Police Detective Shindo (Yosuke Natsuki) has been charged with protecting Princess Selino of Selgina (Akiko Wakabayashi). Unfortunately her plane is destroyed by a bomb planted by her nations rival political party, looking to take over in the event of her death. This all happens at the same time as a meteor shower. The princess turns up a few days later, lacking all her memories and claiming to be a prophet of doom from Venus, and why not? She warns of impending doom, although is always vague when it suits her and accurate when it’s dramatic. Eventually we get to the point when Rodan hatches from an egg, Godzilla comes out of the sea and King Ghidorah, a monster responsible for the destruction of the Venusian race 5,000 years ago, bursts out of a meteorite that landed during the meteor shower. Mothra is called upon to convince Godzilla and Rodan to team up and help defeat Ghidorah. So yeah, not the gradual build of tension and assortment of interesting characters the previous film had then. Well, the monsters don’t appear for about 40 minutes into the film, so I guess there is some sort of build… it’s just not tense.

What you can’t see is the bottle of Diamond White they’re dancing around.

Essentially the entire film is selling itself on the promise of a 4 way monster brawl. It certainly features 4 monsters having a scrap but the fight itself kind of falls flat. This is mostly due to the limitations of the monsters involved. Rodan makes sonic booms as he flies by but up close is pretty much limited to pecking his enemy’s head. Mothra is in larval form and is therefore limited to spitting silly string at his foe. King Ghidorah has no arms and his three serpent heads seem to be puppeteered by a group of people outside the building told only to keep pulling on these ropes. Basically his heads wobble about all over the place, occasionally coming quite close to knotting themselves up. This all leaves Godzilla to carry the brunt of the fighting weight. He tries his best but, look what he has to work with. In later films Toho did figure out how to make fights like this work better with the same monsters involved. We can put the scrappiness of this film’s final battle down to being a learning experience.

The film also suffers from a lack of interesting characters or stand out human based scenes. Mothra Vs Godzilla had Junko and her progressive attitudes and the tiny details worked into her character. The two criminals were also responsible for one of the film’s best scenes. The characters in Ghidorah, The Three Headed Monster are pretty much entirely forgettable. There’s a moment or two where Shindo and his sister Naoko (Yoriko Hoshi) share a moment of sibling banter and rivalry but they are largely just blank slates. Professor Muira (Hiroshi Koizumi) returns from Mothra Vs Godzilla but he is pretty much there to be all analytical and stuff. Also he seems to find no problem with giving a potentially mentally disturbed woman shock therapy. Well, I suppose it was the 60s. Even a group of assassins sent to kill Selino are lacking in any real characterisation. Although one of them does do this funny little arm flick thing before picking a lock. I liked that.

Ghidorah wrecking all kinds of shit.

In the end Ghidorah, The Three Headed Monster doesn’t manage to maintain the momentum built up by Mothra Vs Godzilla. It is lacking the details and the tone is so inconsistent that, even following a impromptu game of rock volleyball, seeing a larval Mothra convince Godzilla and Rodan to be good, all translated by the Shobijin girls, seems a little silly. This scene comes about 10 minutes after a near shock treatment and subsequent shoot-out scene. At least the film is consistent in its inconsistency. The thing that’s worrying me at this stage, 5 films into this series of reviews, is that I haven’t hit what many regard as the worst period of Showa era Godzilla films. Whilst this film isn’t bad, it isn’t remarkable either. This is the debut of Godzilla’s greatest foe and it falls flat. That is just kind of sad. The next film features another first that became a common Godzilla film trope. That being the appearance of alien invaders. It only seems like a few days ago that I was praising a Godzilla film for how grounded it was.