In part one (found here) I told Clint Eastwood's Hereafter to go and sit in a corner and have a long, hard think about what it had done. Part two's films are not as rubbish as that utter waste of space, and should you spend your time with one of them you'll probably go, "Hmm. Yeah. That was OK." But that's all you'll think. You won't buy a cool T-Shirt featuring iconic images from the film, or be compelled to re-enact key scenes with your friends, or force a future romantic partner to watch it as part of a complicated series of tests to see if she is worthy of your time.
Here are the films that, this year, were merely 'OK'.
Unknown
Liam Neeson runs around, wondering who he is and getting increasingly cross when no-one will tell him. He thinks he is Liam Neeson, obviously, but then he has a car accident, and then everyone says "No - you're not Liam Neeson. This other guy is." Except they don't call him Liam Neeson, they call him whatever the character is called. I can't remember what the character is called, and neither can I be bothered to check on IMDB. If you care so much, you go check. It doesn't matter, though, because the only thing we care about is that this is Liam Neeson, and we all really enjoyed watching him in Taken, killing everyone in France, and we're hoping this will be similar.
Anyway, so, Liam Neeson isn't Liam Neeson. There's this other guy doing Liam Neeson's job and going out with Liam Neeson's wife, and generally pretending to be Liam Neeson even though he isn't Liam Neeson, he's this other guy. So Real Liam Neeson gets all cross, and does some top level shouting and hitting things, and it's all quite exciting, and has a pretty clever plot. Although everyone but me says they worked out what was going on really quickly, which means either a) I'm thick or b) they're a bunch of liars.
Cowboys and Aliens
What's up with Harrison Ford? In the 80s he was the single coolest thing in cinema, inhabiting Han Solo, Rick Deckard, John Book and Indiana Jones. He made every boy want to run around shooting stormtroopers, or fighting nazis, or chasing replicants, or erecting a large barn with some Amish people in a symbolic act of communal strength. He was great at playing action heroes, imbuing each role with wry, intelligent humour and real film star presence. And then... nothing. A bunch of insipid romantic leads that failed to turn him into Cary Grant and instead left him looking like someone's grouchy dad who has wandered on screen by mistake.
Don't get me wrong, Ford's contribution to the films of my childhood earns him love and respect forever, no matter what he does in future. But it's just really annoying to see him now, seemingly unable to enjoy playing at pretend like he used to. Did you see that horrible 'Red Carpet' interview they kept showing in the run up to Cowboys and Aliens? Ford stares at the interviewer, clearly wishing he was somewhere else having a sandwich or patting a horse or something, and says nonsense like, "It's a really interesting... entertainment... there's a lot of... action..." Really Han Solo? Is that what it will be? An interesting entertainment? That's not even a bloody sentence! You can type that shit, Harrison, but you can't say it.
Despite Ford's ungrammatical assertions, The film is not that interesting, and only sporadically entertaining. Some aliens come to steal some gold, and some cowboys shoot at them with guns for a bit, and there's a lot of noise. It's kind of enjoyable, but takes itself far too seriously for such a daft premise, and thus ends up leaving you feeling a bit 'meh.' It should have either gone Evil Dead 2 bonkers, which would have been silly and fun, or headed the other way and been Robocop hard-as-nails, with gore and nudity and unbelievable violence. As it is, it's just... alright.
Fright Night
3D is good for one thing, I have decided. It is good for little fiery cinders, floating around in the air after a vampire explodes. When it comes to depicting the frazzled aftermath of a staking, 3D is your man, creating beautiful, fascinating visuals that really help you understand what it might be like to stand in the middle of a cloud of ashes that used to be an evil bloodsucker from hell.
But that's it, for 3D. The rest of the time it is a massive distraction that utterly takes the viewer out of the story and, frankly looks crap. Ironic, given all the wittering about how immersive 3D is, that the overall effect is to distance the spectator from the image, making it far less real.
Fright Night actually has a lot going for it, not least a couple of great performances from David Tennant and Colin Farrell. Tennant basically does Doctor Who with swearing, and is clearly having a lot of fun, and Farrell makes an enjoyable, mean bastard of a vampire. The effects are pretty good and there are some decent set pieces - most memorably the tense escape-from-the-vampire-house sequence and a nice Near Dark-esque final showdown.
Its main problem is one of pace. The basic premise - what if you had a vampire living next door - is thrown away too quickly and the film reels about trying to find a coherent direction for the second half. The level of threat posed by Farrell's vampire seems to change depending on the requirements of the plot, and the motivations of everyone involved never quite feel right.
That said, it was a decent watch, and given the choice between watching it again and walking up a really steep hill, I'd probably do the first one.
Love and Other Drugs
The good: it has lots of nudity in it. Hurrah! And I laughed about four times.
The bad: it has literally no idea what kind of a film it is. Light hearted Rom-com? Serious issues film? Apatow style slapstick comedy? Tragic exploration of love against the odds? It has a stab at all of these, and scores a few laughs along the way, but ultimately leaves you unsure as to what it was trying to achieve.
Still. Nudity, eh?
Tower Heist
Or, as it is called in Northern Ireland, "Tour Haste". This is very nearly a good film, and I had a lot of fun watching it. Eddie Murphy is quite entertaining, and there's a nice ensemble of actors getting together to perform the titular robbery. We have some 80s style over-the-top set pieces and a strong central premise. But it's too long by about half and hour and, also like a lot of 80s films, it doesn't fully commit to being a comedy, playing its thrills as serious action-movie stuff. Hard to pull off, and not something which really works here. And absolutely no nudity.
So there you are. Watch these films if you want. They will entertain you a bit.
Wonder if that's the sort of quote that gets you put on posters?
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