LOOKS:
The Returned - this 8-part French supernatural series (that's not about zombies, despite what numerous lazy news articles claim - hint: the clue's in the title "Les Revenants") has been a real joy to watch. Beautifully crafted in all regards, it's a mystery that keeps on giving - so many questions, and thankfully numerous answers. There's the big central mystery that will go unanswered until the very end - naturally - but there are innumerable medium-and-mini mysteries throughout, which are either answered, or brought further into focus by small pieces of new information in each episode. There's always a sense of forward momentum, so the mystery never becomes frustrating or stagnant. Bring on series 2!
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Showing posts with label heat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label heat. Show all posts
Wednesday, 31 July 2013
Thursday, 12 August 2010
Triple Bill Mini Musings: One Pish, Two Good...
Year One:
I'm really quite glad I didn't waste money on this in the cinema. It didn't look funny from the trailers, and it certainly wasn't funny (bar one decent gag every fifteen minutes, pretty much) in its full form. Considering that this came from comedy icon Harold Ramis, the sheer dullness of Year One was most perplexing. Jack Black was on autopilot and Michael Cera was just annoying ... thankfully Ramis put in a decent cameo, and Oliver Platt was a hedonistic high point in an otherwise naff venture.
The Deal:
I'd never heard of it until it came onto Sky Movies recently. I saw that William H. Macy was in it, and that it was a "Hollywood satire", so that was interesting enough. It's not riotously funny, but it's far from bland - it was actually quite enjoyably silly. You're pulled along for the fun little ride, much like Macy's semi-suicidal filmmaker pulls Meg Ryan's stuck-up producer into his whirlwind world of blagging a way through. Worth a watch.
Red Heat:
I've always gotten Red Heat and Raw Deal mixed up until recently when they both turned up on ITV-4 ... note to them, by the way, stop showing 2.35:1 movies in cropped 16x9! Just stop it! ... and now I know how to distinguish them. Raw Deal is the cheesy, pretty rubbish load of old nonsense about an American cop (Arnie), and Red Heat is the arse-kicking proper action flick about a Russian cop (Arnie). While Raw Deal was an example of a movie being a bad representation of 80s action flicks, Red Heat is the exact opposite. Good action, good script, and good direction ... I do wonder why it's taken me all these years to finally get around to seeing it.
I'm really quite glad I didn't waste money on this in the cinema. It didn't look funny from the trailers, and it certainly wasn't funny (bar one decent gag every fifteen minutes, pretty much) in its full form. Considering that this came from comedy icon Harold Ramis, the sheer dullness of Year One was most perplexing. Jack Black was on autopilot and Michael Cera was just annoying ... thankfully Ramis put in a decent cameo, and Oliver Platt was a hedonistic high point in an otherwise naff venture.
The Deal:
I'd never heard of it until it came onto Sky Movies recently. I saw that William H. Macy was in it, and that it was a "Hollywood satire", so that was interesting enough. It's not riotously funny, but it's far from bland - it was actually quite enjoyably silly. You're pulled along for the fun little ride, much like Macy's semi-suicidal filmmaker pulls Meg Ryan's stuck-up producer into his whirlwind world of blagging a way through. Worth a watch.
Red Heat:
I've always gotten Red Heat and Raw Deal mixed up until recently when they both turned up on ITV-4 ... note to them, by the way, stop showing 2.35:1 movies in cropped 16x9! Just stop it! ... and now I know how to distinguish them. Raw Deal is the cheesy, pretty rubbish load of old nonsense about an American cop (Arnie), and Red Heat is the arse-kicking proper action flick about a Russian cop (Arnie). While Raw Deal was an example of a movie being a bad representation of 80s action flicks, Red Heat is the exact opposite. Good action, good script, and good direction ... I do wonder why it's taken me all these years to finally get around to seeing it.
Thursday, 5 November 2009
Public Enemies...
I'd wanted to see this in the cinema, but unfortunately I was far from mobile at the time (recovering from an operation), so I finally got to see it the other day. I was quite excited about it initially, being that it's the new Michael Mann movie, and it simply looked a lot better than what Miami Vice had been.
That said, I am willing to give Miami Vice another go at some point, and even though I was far from impressed by it at the time, I still found it to be a beautiful looking film with the same sense of drama, colour and love of architecture that you always find in a Mann film.
Public Enemies though, really is a lot better than Miami Vice, so that's good news to start with. Unfortunately, it's still not as convincing as the likes of Manhunter, Heat, or Collateral. There's just a little bit of something missing. We don't have the strong underlying relationship between protagonist and antagonist like those three aforementioned films all exhibited (profoundly in the case of Heat).
Dillinger's relationship with his lady is mostly perfunctory, and his cat & mouse dealings with Purvis are few and not particularly meaty. Still, Depp is always compelling to watch, and Bale's Purvis is a strong, decent protagonist - even if he is somewhat sidelined in favour of the romanticised Depression era Robin Hood-like Dillinger.
Action wise though, similar to Heat, it's all guns blazing. Deafening cacophonies of gunfire erupt frequently throughout, and even though Mann has never done a gunfight better than the street battle outside the bank in Heat, Mann on less-than-tip-top form is far better than most.
At the best part of two and a half hours long though, the lack of meat between the main characters does lead the film to drag a bit. While Heat is a long film, the characters are so dense in personality and motivation that the length is required. In Public Enemies you start feeling a bit short-changed, never really getting to know any of the key players deep enough to really, really care about them.
This said, Mann has always had a knack for spine-chillingly tense and dramatic endings. Heat's Moby-scored ("God Moving Over The Waters") airport gun-down, Collateral's urban train ride at dawn, and even Miami Vice's Mogwai-scored ("Auto Rock") all stick out, and Public Enemies has a similar flair for the dramatic with a tense build-up to the inevitable. In Mann's world crime ultimately doesn't pay, but that's no excuse not to go out memorably.
So not his finest work, but he's put out worse, and like Mark Kermode said a few months back when the film first opened, even Michael Mann on a less-than-stellar day is better than most directors on a great day.
That said, I am willing to give Miami Vice another go at some point, and even though I was far from impressed by it at the time, I still found it to be a beautiful looking film with the same sense of drama, colour and love of architecture that you always find in a Mann film.
Public Enemies though, really is a lot better than Miami Vice, so that's good news to start with. Unfortunately, it's still not as convincing as the likes of Manhunter, Heat, or Collateral. There's just a little bit of something missing. We don't have the strong underlying relationship between protagonist and antagonist like those three aforementioned films all exhibited (profoundly in the case of Heat).
Dillinger's relationship with his lady is mostly perfunctory, and his cat & mouse dealings with Purvis are few and not particularly meaty. Still, Depp is always compelling to watch, and Bale's Purvis is a strong, decent protagonist - even if he is somewhat sidelined in favour of the romanticised Depression era Robin Hood-like Dillinger.
Action wise though, similar to Heat, it's all guns blazing. Deafening cacophonies of gunfire erupt frequently throughout, and even though Mann has never done a gunfight better than the street battle outside the bank in Heat, Mann on less-than-tip-top form is far better than most.
At the best part of two and a half hours long though, the lack of meat between the main characters does lead the film to drag a bit. While Heat is a long film, the characters are so dense in personality and motivation that the length is required. In Public Enemies you start feeling a bit short-changed, never really getting to know any of the key players deep enough to really, really care about them.
This said, Mann has always had a knack for spine-chillingly tense and dramatic endings. Heat's Moby-scored ("God Moving Over The Waters") airport gun-down, Collateral's urban train ride at dawn, and even Miami Vice's Mogwai-scored ("Auto Rock") all stick out, and Public Enemies has a similar flair for the dramatic with a tense build-up to the inevitable. In Mann's world crime ultimately doesn't pay, but that's no excuse not to go out memorably.
So not his finest work, but he's put out worse, and like Mark Kermode said a few months back when the film first opened, even Michael Mann on a less-than-stellar day is better than most directors on a great day.
Tuesday, 8 July 2008
LA Takedown...
Indeed, the TV movie practice session for Mann's 1995 triumph Heat. What's it like then? Pretty crap to be fair, the plot feels undercooked (as does the script), heck it outright takes massive leaps and bounds in the overall story arc. It feels cheap, it's lacking coverage, the performances are mostly over-the-top or even wooden ... it just feels relentlessly cheap and half-done pretty much.
But then again, maybe it was a totally necessary practice in order to achieve the sheer brilliance of Heat, the proper full-on film version (not made for TV at all, of course) which continues to blow socks off to this day - indeed, Kane & Lynch as well as GTA IV have both recently riffed on Heat's famous bank heist sequence.
At times, yes, you can see Mann's talent seeping through in some of the shots and some of the dialogue, but like I've said, it smacks of lacking, mainly in the resource department.
When you've already seen Heat, it's damn hard to sit through LA Takedown without glancing at the clock a few times. Perhaps my thoughts are overly harsh, and yeah there are some redeeming qualities to it ... but to be honest, it is pretty naff now.
But then again, maybe it was a totally necessary practice in order to achieve the sheer brilliance of Heat, the proper full-on film version (not made for TV at all, of course) which continues to blow socks off to this day - indeed, Kane & Lynch as well as GTA IV have both recently riffed on Heat's famous bank heist sequence.
At times, yes, you can see Mann's talent seeping through in some of the shots and some of the dialogue, but like I've said, it smacks of lacking, mainly in the resource department.
When you've already seen Heat, it's damn hard to sit through LA Takedown without glancing at the clock a few times. Perhaps my thoughts are overly harsh, and yeah there are some redeeming qualities to it ... but to be honest, it is pretty naff now.
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