Change Your Image
montur
Reviews
The Phantom of the Opera (2004)
Are paid critics the right people to criticise?
I sometimes wonder where film critics learn their trade. I believe that, if we are invited to read the opinions of someone who gets paid for giving them, then the very least we should expect is a reasoned, objective augment of the subject. It seems to me that many professional critics use their voice, not to make considered appraisals of the movie they have seen, but to give us all an exhibition of how well they can employ irony (often bordering sarcasm) in their writing. All too frequently however, they misjudge their audience. Rather than applaud their wit, we tend rather to lament their ignorance. Some critics of The Phantom of The Opera may serve as an illustration. One even went so far as to criticize the story. Gaston Leroux may not have been the most noteworthy of French writers but, as a rather excellent biography on this website will attest, he excelled at the genre of Gothic Romance. That's what Phantom is and we mustn't lose sight of that fact. One critic speaks slightingly of the gaslamp effects conjoured in the film. "So what?" he asks, suggesting that modern audiences expect and usually get so much more. If we go to the cinema to watch Gothic Romance then we must expect to watch something like Phantom or Frankenstein or Wuthering Heights. It is fatuous to criticise the story! And this movie is Gothic Romance par excellence. All the ingredients are there in abundance. The subterranean chambers, the gas lamps, the masques, damsels in distress and of course that hint of the supernatural. All enhanced by the music of that awfully repetitive and predictably tedious composer whose work is still being listened to on Broadway after eighteen years! Oh when will people wake up to the fact they are being asked to enjoy such kitsch as some critic from Chicago described the film? Something I have found critics singularly incapable of doing is suspending their disbelief. This impediment ensures that they also suspend their enjoyment. One dreads to think how some of them would approach Macbeth. Probably criticise the story.
55 Degrees North (2004)
Predictable but enjoyable, easy watching.
I'll go along with the cliché comment. Life is full of clichés isn't it? That's why they become clichés I suppose. To some extent we expect them, even anticipate them. The protagonist in this case is black, struggles with broken relationships and family trauma, is threatened and subjugated in the workplace, yet comes through triumphant. If we are prepared to suspend our disbelief we can nevertheless get satisfaction out of watching him do all these things. I agree, we know in advance that he will eventually liaise on a different level with the police solicitor, and that's part of our enjoyment; the dramatize irony built into the script allows us to know something that the protagonists don't. In the end we will be pleased that we were proved correct. Sit back and let it wash over you! Incidentally, I agree too with the Tyne Bridge observation, and have you noticed how lately every drama set in London has a night shot of HSBC Bank and the Isle of Dogs?
Top Gun (1986)
MiGs? What MiGs?
What do these US film producers take us for? A film with an abysmal script and predictable plot enlivened by some very accomplished airborne photography and clever editing - not to mention skillful flying - is reduced to a cartoon film strip by Top Gun flyer's identifying F-5 Freedom Fighters as MiGs! Oh for heaven's sake... we had to resort to such tactics when we made Reach for the Sky back in the 50s, surely we don't have to do it now. Having flown in the Royal Air Force for forty years, I can vouch for the fact that the average USAF jock's aircraft recognition skills can be suspect at times - to say the least! But the Best of the Best (Oh Really!) shouldn't be seen splashing F-5s!! It's bad for morale. I suppose any old jet will do, as long as they look different from Tomcats, their pilots have got black bone domes and look vaguely foreign.
Wrong Turn (2003)
A poor choice for Saturday night armchair entertainment
A vehicle for slashing, burning and revealing midriffs. Entirely predictable and almost entirely without merit. The Jasper Carrott (Brit comedian) lookalike slashers have some effective make-up but that's about it I'm afraid. Whilst I don't mind being asked to suspend my disbelief, I find it a bit difficult when supporting females are torn to shreds instantly whilst the lead bimbo is captured and spreadeagled on a table for no apparent reason other than to make us wonder if she's going to be ravished! The denoument in most movies sees the seventh cavalry arrive in helos with flashing blues and armies of police. Why does this one end with a solitary cop in his patrol car? I'll give you one guess!