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Reviews
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)
Very entertaining, but spoiled by some really unlikely bits
Well, the good news is, this is not as bad as 'Temple of Doom'. But it's no 'Raiders'..
Most of the reviews I'd seen of this gave it a thumbs down, so I was not too hopeful. To my surprise, I quite enjoyed it, but it did have several scenes in it which were so ridiculously implausible that it called for a lot more than suspension of disbelief.
So, plot summary: Indy and new sidekick 'Mutt' go off to South America in search of a) a crystal skull, and b) Mutt's mum and close buddy 'Ox' - with some stereotypical Russian baddies in tow, who also want to get their commie hands on the skull (because it holds awesome power, or something). The skull is from an alien, they find it and it gets returned to its rightful owner - The End.
Not the greatest plot, but then 2 of the first 3 films had the Nazis as the baddies, and they're always worth fighting against. One of the weaknesses of 'Temple of Doom' was that it involved mythical artifacts rather than legendary artifacts. We are now back to mythical artifacts - and no Nazis - so it's really hard to care.
The good bits:
Indy - he's a bit more talkative than previous films, but you know how rambly people get as they get older (while the rest of us are too polite to tell them to just "skip to the end"). He's still fairly agile though, and doesn't do much stupid comedy mucking about. His trousers stay suspiciously clean throughout - seriously, he looks like he's just stepped out of a department store changing room, trying them on for size.
Mutt - new sidekick, who is capable and not annoying and so hooray for that. All too often Indy's main sidekick is an annoying 'comedy' sidekick for most of their screen time - i.e. Marion, Willie, Short Round, Salaah, Henry Jones Sr and Marcus Brody etc etc. Mutt does not do much 'comedy' messing about and it's a refreshing change.
The so-so bits:
Marion - doesn't really do much of any note. Bit of a waste.
Cate Blanchett - a bit too stereotypical with the accent and the haircut - but then, it's probably hard to play a Russian baddie without a Russian accent so seems unfair to complain too much about that.
The crystal skull itself. Crystal? Surely, perspex stuffed with cling film? I'm surprised they couldn't have made it twinkly like a crystal tumbler, that would have been more special.
The rubbish bits:
Ray Winstone - once again starring in this film as Ray Winstone. Can he play any other character? Is he a double agent? Or a triple agent..? Do we care? No. Within 7 minutes of meeting him, he's switched sides. Too early!
The fridge scene. Oh come _on_. I could just about have accepted Indy surviving inside a lead-lined fridge at ground zero, but being blown through the air a mile or two away and surviving without a scratch - totally implausible. He'd be a pile of broken bones - and he'd be dead.
The good guys plunging over 3 enormous waterfalls (after already plunging over the edge of a cliff in a car) with nary a scratch. This was just.. stupid.
Time taken for the Russkies to get to the temple: After plunging over all the waterfalls (and thus travelling at least 2 miles or so), Indy and Co running away from the natives, unlocking the temple and running down the steps to the bottom, Cate Blanchett and co still got to the base of the temple about 8 minutes after Indy and Co did. How did they get there so fast, and how did they get down without the steps? This could be a genuinely big plot hole.
The Lucasfilm gophers. Yes, George, we already know you do CGI animals now - but you still can't do them very well. Please stop.
The 'Mutt swinging through the vines' scene. Already pretty unlikely, but adding the friendly monkey companions too? For quality of monkeys, see 'gophers' comment above.
The whole 'Alien' plot line, really. Why did 13 skeletons come back to life as a living single being? Were they dead or not? Surely the last time they were all together they could have flown off then? If it takes a crystal skull to get into the temple, how did the conquistador get in there and steal the 13th skull? Why did the alien kill Cate Blanchett, she just wanted 'information' like they freely gave to the Incas/Mayans/Aztecs whatever, didn't she?
I think what made earlier Indy films slightly magical was that Indy overcame the perilous odds by sheer good luck, nifty driving, daring-do, excellent horsemanship, a mean pair of fists, etc. He didn't survive these things just by not dying when by rights, he should have done (see 'fridge' and 'waterfall' moments above). This is really a bit insulting to the intelligence of the audience - you can't thrill us by having our heroes behave as though they were rubber supermen.
I did enjoy it. But as my summary says - I think it was a bit ruined by the really ridiculous bits above. They could have left these out, or not have had them be as far-fetched and it would have been a better film for it.
Alien³ (1992)
Vastly underrated - a great film in its own right
I've never really understood why people don't like Alien³, because I think it's a great film - easily as good as anything else David Fincher has turned his hand to. I'll happily concede that the alternative version in the Alien Quadrilogy boxset is superior to the original theatrical cut, so if you're going to watch it, watch that version. It just makes more sense, plot-wise.
The first 3 films are all very different films and I suspect that Alien³ is unpopular because people expected a sequel to Aliens - more colonial marines, more wisecracking, more guns. More Newt and Hicks. Alien³ doesn't deliver this. There are no supermen, fewer gags, and no guns at all. Hicks and Newt are shown as corpses in the opening titles. I wouldn't have objected to a bit more Hicks, I'd had my fill of whiny Newt by the end of the scene in the Aliens Directors cut where she screams her head off in her parent's tank. So, hooray for killing off Newt! I like the look of Alien³ - it's dark and gloomy, just as any decent sci-fi/horror crossover film should be. Ripley's companions on this round are for the most part, criminals. It has a decent cast of established British actors in it, who all do a good job of making you care about them as characters - despite the fact they're all rapists and murderers.
So, there are no guns, just grubby prisoners in the middle of nowhere. There's also just the one alien, which works well as it restores some of the element of suspense which was so prominent in Alien and almost completely absent in Aliens. Ripley gets impregnated by a super-facehugger and is carrying an alien queen. This is a natural progression in the series, but a good one at that, as we finally get some idea of how it must feel to have an alien growing inside you, from someone who knows it will eventually rip its way out through her chest. From the moment we discover this, we know this film can't have a happy ending (and it doesn't - it led to Alien:Resurrection, which really is a turkey). This also ties up the theme of Ripley and motherhood - we know her daughter died of old age while she was floating out in space. Her 'adopted' daughter Newt dies when they crash land on Fury 161. How sad that her only 'child' turns out to be an alien queen. I thought it was a nice touch that for the first time we are shown that the Alien isn't just a brainless killing machine - it won't kill Ripley because it smells that she has an alien inside her.
If I knock off a star, it's because I found the final chase sequences with the doors and the lead works a bit too long. Other than that, I think it's a good film - just not a cheery no-brainer popcorn flick.
Superbad (2007)
Only film I have ever walked out of. Terrible.
I don't think I watched enough of 'Superbad' to be able to review it fairly, if I'm being honest. I lasted until just after the section that recounted Seth's childhood obsession with drawing dicks, and realised "hey, it's sunny outside, I'm in swingin' London.. I have literally got better things to do than sit here and watch this". Congratulations to 'Superbad' on being the first film that I have ever walked out of.
Big slaps in the face to intelligent media like the Guardian for hyping this up as a rip-roaring comedy. I liked previous Apatow films, but this just wasn't funny. At all. It was incredibly dull, nothing but end-to-end euphemisms for breasts, vaginas and shagging with no actual dialogue inbetween. Not a single laugh was heard in the half-full cinema up to the point where I left. Not one single giggle. Does that sound like a rip-roaring comedy to you? I gather after I left, there was some plot and character development, and it actually got funny, but the first half hour was just too stinky for me to sit through, to get to the better bits. Ah well.
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006)
Painfully boring
I really disliked this film. The main reason? It was boring. Terribly terribly boring. Apparently it was 150 minutes, but it felt like 400. Lots happened. Too much happened, really - it was as though they stuck a collection of unrelated possible plots and action sequences into a tombola machine and then pulled several out at random, and glued them together end to end. With so much going on, it should have been exciting and entertaining but was instead, confusing, complicated and not engaging. Ah, if only as many hours had been spent on the script and the plot as were apparently spent on the CGI.
The only real 'character' in it this time is Norrington, who is now a bitter ex-Commodore and all the grubbier and more interesting for it - but everyone else from the first film is back, in the same old roles, but with no further character development at all. Come on Hollywood, have you forgotten? We need personalities! It's hard to care about one-dimensional characters.
The first film had 2 strong, interesting characters - Jack and Barbosa. This one still has Captain Jack, but he's far less entertaining than he was first time round, does less, says less, has fewer gags and doesn't come across anything like as forcefully as he did in the first film. It's a minor point, but costume wise, he's cleaner, his clothes are less tatty, he's got whiter teeth and very neatly-rolled dreads. Continuity?
Other things that grated: Will and Elizabeth were, if possible, even more wooden than last time. The film lacked the humour and originality of the first film, and was almost completely chuckle-free - and any jokes were re-cycled, less-funny versions of jokes from the first film. The gratuitous CGI monsters were a half-human, half-seafood mess and looked ridiculous rather than what was (presumably) supposed to be scary. Why does "Davy Jones" have a Scottish accent? If they have to give him a regional accent, shouldn't it have been Welsh? :>
I probably shouldn't let a throwaway summer blockbuster annoy me so much, but I simply was not entertained by this in the way that I was entertained by the first film. It's a very poor followup.
The Libertine (2004)
Dull and pretentious
I had high hopes for this. Johnny Depp, Samantha Morton, John Malkovich, lots of good things said at various film festivals... but the lack of a widespread release should have been a hint. This film isn't very good at all.
It will mark me as a philistine to say so but I thought about 7/8 of the film was pretentious rubbish. Much of the dialogue was authentically 17th century, but it was hard to listen to because the sound mix was bad, and the print was so grainy it looked like a pirate DVD. Perhaps not being able to clearly see or hear the goings-on was intentional, but the lack of plot didn't give us much else to concentrate on. There was lots of artful focusing and un-focusing which just appeared as though the cameraman didn't know what he was doing. But most obvious of all was the fact that it was all pretty boring and everyone was acting their little socks off in it to make it "worthy". There are several scenes between Depp and Morton where he coaches her to be a better actress. These scenes drag terribly, they are unmoving and long-winded and slow the film to a virtual halt.
I will give credit where it's due and say that Johnny Depp in a long curly wig, eyeliner and cocked hat was worth seeing. The servant character was excellent. And to be fair the whole boring shebang massively improved about 20 minutes before the end. At this point, the Earl gets syphilis, becomes horribly disfigured, loses control of his bladder and has to start wearing a strap-on metal nose when his real nose rots away. He also gives a jolly rousing speech in the House of Lords which makes us actually care about him for the first time in the film. If the whole thing had been anything like as engaging as the last 20 minutes it would have been an excellent film. As it is, our Christmas and Thanksgiving turkey has been served up early.
Still, worth going to see if only to witness John Malkovich's 'English' accent. You'd think he'd know better after starring alongside Ted Theodore Logan in Dangerous Liaisons, but no.
Tank Girl (1995)
Appalling.
I was a fan of the Tank Girl comic in Deadline magazine for many years, and got very excited when they announced they were making it into a film. I don't think I've ever been so disappointed with anything in my life.
Even taken as a separate film, it's a complete chore to watch - the plot is minimal, the story jumps around and the characters are so badly developed that you find yourself not really giving a hoot what happens to any of them. Most of them are irritating, especially Tank Girl herself who is thoroughly punchable (and as many people have already pointed out, she spends the whole film making uncomfortably unfunny wisecracks).
As an adaptation, it stinks. Tank Girl should be a nihilistic loudmouth Australian, burping and farting and starting fights, not a yappy perky American who likes little kids. Sub Girl and Jet Girl are nothing like their comic counterparts and neither are the kangaroos. I imagine if they'd tried to portray all the characters as they were in the comics, they'd have never got the script past the studio execs.
I foolishly paid to see this in the cinema and came close to walking out - I only stayed to see if there was anything good about it at all. The only things of note were the sand showers, the little machine that sucks water out of people as it kills them and the Bjork song on the soundtrack.
A few years later I tried to watch it again, hoping that maybe I was wrong first time round. I turned it off after 20 minutes, I couldn't stand any more than that.
If you are one of the tiny number of people that used to buy Deadline in the early 90s and somehow missed this film, save yourself and don't bother. It'll only spoil your memories of Tanky.
If you're a passing filmgoer, watch something else. Anything else.