Double Bill Mini Musings: Bonkers Action and Quirky Chuckles...

From Paris With Love:
Pierre Morel's film prior to this bonkers shoot 'em up, Taken, kicked arse in a serious way. This flick on the other hand kicks arse in a silly way. Travolta lets himself off the leash and promptly upon arrival on-screen paints the town red and white with blood and cocaine respectively. Again from the Luc Besson stable, it's not about a particularly deep or complex plot - there's some stuff about terrorism and covert government operations, but it's not extremely important as long as the gun play, car chases, and bickering comedy duo fun keeps on coming - which it does, so it's ideal bloke fodder. It's one of those films which is best viewed with a gang of mates, a steady flow of cans, and a take away.


Extract:
From Mike Judge, who also brought us (aside from Beavis & Butthead, and King of the Hill) the excellent Office Space and the under-praised Idiocracy, this is a gentle comedy more akin to the former. Jason Bateman plays the boss of a company that specialises in extracts, and he plans to sell the company on ... but his cash-out plan is derailed by a workplace accident, a con-woman, and a bizarre plan to entrap his distanced wife with the help of a gigolo. It's not a film about uproarious guffaws, rather more considered chuckles and gentle pacing, and while it doesn't live up to the high standard of the 'everyone can appreciate it' Office Space, it's well worth seeing if you enjoy Judge's particular brand of laid back humour.

Triple Bill Mini (and Cine) Musings: Amnesia, Ghosts, and Conmen...

Unknown: Cutting to the chase, 'is it like Taken?' ... well, not so much. For one thing, Taken was an 18-rated, hard-hitting Paris-set punch-up with Liam Neeson (as a highly trained weapon) kicking a million shades of the brown stuff out of scumbags behind a sex trafficking ring in a super cool, bone-crunching Euro-thriller. Unknown, rated 12A, features Liam Neeson as a Bio-Technologist whose identity is stolen and for some reason his wife doesn't recognise who he is. It's not really about rough & tumble, it's more of a espionage-ish low-key, high concept thriller. For the first half the primary focus is on the increasingly loopy story of Neeson's protagonist (you can't help but enjoy his performances), before the second half shifts gear and goes for more in the way of car chases and punch ups ... albeit softer and less frequent affairs when compared to Taken. Unknown was always going to be compared and considered in the same breath as Taken, but it's a different film (despite certain similarities in appearance), with an entirely different pace and sensibility. Was it great? No, but it was enjoyable enough and generally intriguing, and the third act twist does indeed make up for the mysterious plot that does begin to flag at the tail end of the second act. If you simply must consider it in the same breath as Taken - consider it a Lite Beer version suitable for a wider audience (indeed when we went to see it there was a range of ages of both sexes). Poltergeist: Many years ago, reaching back to when I was 11 years old, if memory serves, BBC1 were about to show Poltergeist and I was fired up to see it. However, my Mum forbid me from watching it for it was deemed to be too scary and grown up. Fast forward a year-or-so, and when around at a friend's house (where we watched the first and third A Nightmare On Elm Street movies), I was shown one stand-out moment (a man, in a horrific vision, tearing his own face off). Now, 15 years later, I finally got around seeing it - and on BBC1 to boot (although why on earth they insisted on cropping the image from the lovely Original Aspect Ratio of 2.35:1 to 16x9 is beyond me ... so that was bloody annoying as a ratio purist). Being that Spielberg was behind the story, script and production, it feels every inch a Spielberg movie. What the true story was behind the day-to-day production of the movie (Tobe Hooper is the credited director) remains to be seen, but there's no denying that the tale of an everyday middle American suburban family is the prototypical Spielbergian family unit (aside from lacking an absent/distracted father figure, that is). Before MGM's financial woes, this flick was scheduled for a remake, and I simply don't know what the point would be. The movie is as close to perfect as it can be, the only thing they could improve upon would be the special effects - but then the FX of today will look relatively quaint by comparison to those in 30 years, so who gives a crap about that? I rather dig the visual effects in this movie. Indeed the establishment of the family unit's way of life, and the overall pacing of the flick, are pitch-perfect with spot-on timing. Key scenes are directed (by Hooper and/or Spielberg, according to rumours) with precision that render the creepy plot genuinely un-nerving at times (a simple stacking of kitchen chairs off-camera being one particular stand-out chill), and the performances are all decidedly convincing. Round it all off with one hell of a one-two finale, a subtle sense of humour, and a surprisingly spooky vision (even 30 years on) all prove this to be a true classic. I just hope they don't get around to remaking it ... you can't improve on a Spielberg (and Hooper) classic. I Love You Philip Morris: A quirky comedy drama about Jim Carrey (as a gay conman) ending up in jail where he meets the love of his life (Ewan MacGregor), before embarking on a series of fraudulent activities to support a lavish lifestyle, and clever (but brief) escapes from the law. Carrey and MacGregor are both game and are able to dig into surprisingly deep emotional places when it's called for (for instance, one moment where MacGregor receives some bad news). It's not especially memorable, but it's far from naff ... it's a strange and humorous curiosity that's worth a watch.

The A-Team...

As a big fan of the original television show, when I first heard that an up-to-date movie adaptation was in the works, I wasn't exactly stoked. "How will they screw this up?" I wondered, what with there being so many slapdash remakes, re-imaginings and whatever you fancy, that haven't been up to snuff - or that have simply relieved themselves all over the source material.

Then the first snippets of information - notably, the cast list. Hannibal - check - Liam Neeson is generally awesome, but he was doubly-so in the kick arse action flick Taken, so I knew that was a good choice. Face - check - Bradley Cooper wasn't a particular name of note until The Hangover came along and he was good in that, and I could see him portraying the womanising charm of Templeton quite well, so that was another good choice.

Next up Murdock - check - I'd only seen Sharlto Copley in District 9, which was a great film, and I knew Copley would be able to bring out Murdock's lunacy. Afterall, he'd managed to turn a farty, pencil-neck bureaucrat into an arse kicking, metamorphosing hero in District 9. The only sticking point was Rampage Jackson, the UFC Fighter, as B.A. Baracus - hmmm - it was going to be a hard role to fill anyway, what with Mr. T being so iconic in the role.

Then the first footage came out, and then trailers, and still Rampage Jackson as Baracus was a sticking point for me - and others - his preview clips just weren't convincing, and it was starting to shape up as a properly fun time except for his involvement.

Then came the incessant advertising that was drawn out over months and months and months. It was cheeky enough that we in the UK were almost the last country in the world to get our mits on it, a full month after its native America got their teeth into it, but the endless trailers and Orange tie-in adverts in the cinema were just mind-numbing. A couple of viewings of the trailer is all I'd need as an average cinema-goer, so why on earth with the saturation?! It was an absolute relief to finally watch the actual movie, I can tell you!

Ah yes, the movie itself, thankfully it turned out as a good, solid fun time - Rampage Jackson included. Turns out in the context of the entire movie, and the other cast members, he was a good choice to bring Baracus into the 21st century. What relief indeed. The filmmakers might say "we told you so", but to be honest this sort of turn around is rare ... annoyingly your initial reactions are confirmed once you've stumped up your cash and endured the onslaught of car and vodka adverts (an odd sandwich of advertising, wouldn't you think?)

Adaptation wise, it's good. The transfer from Vietnam to Iraq is seemless, and the pre-amble showing how the team came together works well to introduce us all (franchise fans and newcomers alike) to the new breed of A-Team. Although more of the famous van would have been nice, but considering the plot it's understandable that it's not on screen for all that long. The filmmakers have done a good job of weaving in various nods and winks to the original show, while not being precious or cheesy or disrespectful about it - a nice balance is struck pretty much throughout, and like The Losers from a couple of months ago, this is a good slab of action movie fun and I look forward to seeing it again on DVD ... most of all so I can see the post-credits sequence featuring the original Face and Murdock.

When we went to see it in the cinema they put the big lights on part-way through the credits, which suggests that there's nothing more to see, so finding out there was another scene for the hardcore fans out there was most annoying. I'll just have to catch it on DVD - speaking of which, I hope we get a proper DVD release, not some half-arsed near-vanilla bit of old cobblers with sod all extras ... that's what happened to Kick Ass, a movie I really enjoyed, but which got a rubbish DVD and a solid Blu-Ray - and not being on the Blu-Ray bandwagon (can't afford it, plus the TV and surround to make it a worthwhile experience ... plus I don't like being bullied into a new format, nor do I like a DVD being half-arsed when I was ready and waiting to put down good money on it - well done movie studios, you lost yourself some money by screwing the DVD majority over on your releases!)

Anyway, rant over ... The A-Team was a welcome jolt of action movie fun and here's hoping the DVD is a quality release.