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Reviews
Alone in the Dark (2005)
Oh dear...
Okay, let's get one thing straight first of all...
This movie S.U.C.K.S.
The acting in particular is merely the second most awful thing in the film. Slater is Slater on a shoestring budget, as is Dorff. But TARA REID cannot act and is entirely miscast as the anthropologist curator-type person. Page One, uwe Boll, if your lead actress can't pronounce her character's occupation without being laughed at, you're in trouble.
Which leads me to the worst thing: Director Uwe Boll. House of the Dead stank to high heaven. But what i am wondering is this - can we really trust a guy who puts "An Uwe Boll Film" in the opening credits to figure out intelligent or creative input into his movie? And what about that 1 and a half minutes of scrolling narrated text at the beginning of the film. It's as if he wants to bore people before it's started. It's completely unnecessary.
However, I do believe there are a lot more worse goings-on than all this. I am thinking that, with Alone in the Dark, there may be some money laundering going on. It reminds me of Mel Brook's producers - if you make a bad production and shut it down, perhaps you can make a killing. Is it pessimistic of me to suggest that the $20 million spent on the film is done so to create a failure of a movie by shooting in cheap Vancouver and deliberatley ruin a movie by miscasting, both behind and in front of the camera? Are there ulterior motives at work here? At the time of writing this the movie has generously opened at #14 in the charts on its hopelessly unchallenging first weekend in January and has scraped a mere 5% of it back. By the time it hits video stores, it will recoup most of it, no matter how viciously ripped apart it gets from the critics.
I mean, come on, there must be *some* explanation for this incredible miss-step of a movie.
And now I hear that Uwe Boll is making Bloodrayne and Farcry - two more movies that are taken directly from video games. It's clear to me that such a talentless team helmed by an even more talentless director haven't learnt a damn thing and show no signs of improving. How can they continue to work and produce this crap in such high volume? There must be some explanation.
There definitely must be an apology.
1/10
Fat Slags (2004)
Vapid, unfunny, uninspired nonsense
This is about as low as the British Film Industry can get. I could have told those involved that this was a bad idea even before conception - and well before a script materialised. Surely someone, somewhere, throughout the entire shoot must have realized that this movie would turn out to be unfunny and a complete waste of time. I am simply at a loss for words. It amazes and, indeed, infuriates me that the British film industry is in the dolldrums and utter rubbish such as this still manages to fart itself out and splatter all over the big screen. For crimes against celluloid, Fat Slags deserves a life sentence - at the bottom of the smallest shelf in the smallest video store in Hell. And it can consider itself damn lucky, too.
Bridget Jones's Diary (2001)
The Devil is Miss Jones
It's funny the way these British Richard Curtis comedies come out: dead in the shower of Late April, every other year. First it was Four Weddings (the biggest grossing British film in the, then it was Notting Hill (the next biggest UK grosse)r, and now it's Bridget Jones's Diary
the next biggest grossing film in the UK. Then next year it'll be Hugh Grant in `Floppy Hair, Floppy D**k Donkey S**t': the next biggest UK grossing film
Bridget Jones is in her thirties. She's all on her own in much the same way William Thacker was in Notting Hill: everyone's trying to get her a date. But instead of falling for an American movie megastar, she is faced with a yucky-looking Colin Firth. But then, whilst working at her journalist job, she starts to fall for her boss, Hugh Grant. I'd like to be able to tell you the name of their characters, but you see, I can't remember them. I only remember Renee's character's name because it is eponymous. So, who's she going to end up with? Both of these men have their own quirks and vices: of course, one of them is a sad mummy's boy and the other is a charismatic a**hole. Such is the choice of everyday English men today. So, whilst hypothesising, drinking more wine, eating Tesco's Alpen cereal and generally making a right a**e out of herself (both with her friends and people she should be impressing) she dilly dallies around thinking she's made the right choice when, of course, she hasn't
then she cries about it, makes a half-witty gesture, screws up some more and cries a bit more (usually in that order) until finally she ends up with someone some ninety minutes later.
But being fair Bridget Jones's Diary does have its merits. It's reasonably funny in places and the acting is generally very good. The direction by the practically unheard of MacGuire (a woman directing a box office smash? First for the record books!) is good, but a little flaccid in places. The film starts off with text on the screen describing how much Bridget weighs, smokes and drinks - something which I hope would have continued. There's also a nice `f******k' subtitle in one scene when she discovers she may have `f**ked up'. I thought those were nice touches. However, those touches and the direction of the film gets sloppy about half way through. Like its namesake, you can practically read the story of Bridget like a diary: girls like this have to end up with the right guy and be happy, otherwise nothing is achieved.
So, on to Renee herself. She makes an adequate English woman: her accent is fine and if you didn't know she was American then, A: you'd be fooled and, B: no-one in America would have bothered seeing this. Renee, in terms of superstardom, doesn't and probably won't ever have the bums-on-seats-guarantee of Julia Roberts or Andie MacDowell. Why? Because she's not got the drop dead gorgeous look to her, unfortunately. But that's not necessarily a bad thing, really: I think Renee was an inspired choice bearing in mind that an American had to have played her: a B list star is usually better than an A list in terms of quality. But why oh why couldn't we get an English woman playing Bridget? Keeping to the true text of the book, I would have rather Sally Phillips played Bridget Jones: we already know she's a terrific comedienne and actress (I'm Alan Partridge, Smack The Pony) and I firmly believe that Zelwegger and Phillips would've been better off swapping roles. Just a thought.
Luckily, to stop the English public from running out of the cinema, the film is BLITZED with cameos an stretched-cameos (not quite constituting bit parts) from literally dozens of well known British actors and comedians. We've got Salman Rushdie as a book enthusiast, Jeffrey Archer makes an appearance as a crowd member, Lynne from `I'm Alan Partidge' plays Bridget's co-worker, Sally Phillips pops her head in now and then, David Cann from `Jam' pops up as a cameraman, `Drop the Dead Donkey's Robert Duncan shows his face as a TV director and Jim Broadbent plays Bridget's father to name a few. Even Honor Blackman is in it for about 3 seconds. It's a shame really because for the most part all of the above are grossly underused and are giving very little to play with. With the possible exception of Rushdie and Archer, I would've liked to have seen these fine British actors in the film more.
As it is, Bridget Jones's Diary is a big sloppy, mush-riddled mess. None of the characters have any space to develop. But the excruciatingly fatal mistake in the film is totally exposed: none of us give a flying monkey about Bridget. Sure, she's had it tough, she's a bit ditzy and likes to think everything will work out. Well, sorry to be a party pooper but EVERYONE is like that. So, essentially, is Bridget Jones' a chick flick? Yes. None of the men who watch this, like her co-boss, will want to know her unless she gets satisfies her `Fitzherberts' and gets those jubblies out. As such, Renee is decked out in very, very risque costume for most of the time anyway: at one point she wears a bunny outfit and, lastly, the final scene just has her in knickers. Splendid. Bridget Jones is like a porn film with two alterations: the actors are great and there's no sex. And I'm afraid women will just find this Jones exercise a waste of time especially when you arrive at the last five minutes.
Now I'm hearing that they're planning a sequel? Trust me, one is plenty. The only way you'd get away with a sequel was if you named it `Bridget Jones Gets Killed in the Temple of Doom'.
4/10
Understanding Jane (1999)
I don't understand why...
Understanding Jane is one of those films that wants to analyse relationships and depict realistic characters in reasonably plausible predicaments. It does so merely satisfactorily. The plot involves two male losers (both "losing" in their own unique way) calling up date adverts in the hope of finding someone special. They do this together and, before long, happen come upon two scheming girls. One of the girls is clearly more scheming than the other. Thus we embark on a series of mishaps and relative insights on how this foursome get on (or don't) with each other, made all the more difficult by Curtis' "Dallas" character. That's the plot. Does this work for 90 minutes? Yes and no.
My first quip with this film is ... people go to see a film to "watch" it, not listen to it. This film is so blatantly influenced by the narrative protege of Trainspotting and Human Traffic but can't quite achieve this because the budget is very limited. The film is made up with a series of vingettes involving the characters talking an and analysing anything from blowjobs to Star Wars (Nowadays, if you're dealing with a character-driven relationship film, you have to include why Return of the Jedi is better than Empire Strikes Back etc.) This soon wears out and becomes tiresome. This film would do just as well if it were a radio play - perhaps even better. Why better? Well, because - and to be honest (there's no denying this) - the film's image quality is very poor - it appears to have been shot on 16mm stock that's been resting in an oven for fifteen hours and the sound quality is reasonable - not that it means much, as the film is shot entirely on location and most of the background noises intrude on what otherwise might have been the perfect edit.
On the whole, Understanding Jane's bad qualities half ruin the brilliant ones: a first rate performance from Curtis as the bitchy Dallas is ruined by hammy dialogue and a sense of character that wouldn't mind any outcome. John Simm is horrible wasted - a pre-toxic excursion on his character in Human trafic, except slightly less funny, witty and interesting. Ultimately, I cared little for any of the characters in the film because A: the ones we care about are not only established almost instantly, but get what they want in the first 20 minutes, and B: the characters we're not supposed to like don't care anyway about what happens to them.
Ultimately, Understanding Jane is a wildly amibitious film that wants you to care about characters who don't care about themselves, made in a tiresome and uninteresting way, shot lousily by first time director Lindsay, from a cheesy melodramatic and extremely sporadically funny script by first time screenwriter Mummery. The only saving graces to be had are the performances. Understanding Jane is worth watching. But only just.
4.5/10
The Stuff (1985)
Fascinating, priceless and utterly pointless
The Stuff is one of "those" movies you saw or saw the poster of as a kid and have still never forgotten about. What did it for me was the artwork: that gaping mouth with distraught and scared eyes. (Although the US version is slightly less of an impact than the British one.) So, what did I think of the film when I finally saw it? Hmmmm.
Michael Moriarty is very good. So is Paul Sorvino. Oh, and Marcovicci (although she's a singer). Plot.... good, until the film was written. Plot structure? I don't think so. Humour? Tantamount to zero. Satire? Fair to good. Special FX? Rotten, bad, still frightening. Okay Okay, I'll stop!
Basically, this film is a good idea kind of wasted. I have noted considerable comparisons between this film and 1950's horror flicks. The only thing that seperates this from them is the satire. I love the commercials - I love the stabs at consumerism and the fact that if it were not for the fact that we watch TV or listen to radio, we would all end up as 'stuffies'. Cohen is perhaps one of my most favourite (and influencial) director's of all time. And I don't think anyone will top him. Check him out and admire the man who comes up with this stuff... we're not gonna have another one after he's finished. Long live the notion of B-Movie!! And B-movies aren't that bad - Kevin Costner made Waterworld five years ago, and that's a C movie - in both senses of the word.
The Trick (1997)
An unbelievable state of mind
This short is really rather interesting. There's on talking, very little music, and held together by expressions on impressionist faces. The basic plotline is about three talent scouts auditioning for the best eponymous 'trick'. After kicking out a magic chef type, a guy comes in who unfolds a magic door from a pen and ... well, you'll have to see for yourself. Excellent camera work and lighting, and pretty neat performances - especially from Steven 'Spudgun' O'Donnell. Worth a watch if you can locate a copy.