The Bourne Legacy (2012)

Posted on June 7, 2013 by badblokebob

As Jason Bourne flits around London and New York making trouble for what’s left of Treadstone, a group of shady men go about safeguarding their own secretive activities. When Bourne exposes Treadstone, a series of convoluted join-the-dots links means it could bring them down too, so they set about destroying their risky initiatives, including killing a bunch of medically-enhanced operatives. What they didn’t count on was one surviving…

That basic setup covers roughly the first 30-40 minutes of The Bourne Legacy. Normally I’d hate to describe so much of a film, but it’s not my fault that co-writer, director and Bourne series veteran Tony Gilroy takes that long to get his story up and running. And it’s another 20 minutes before the real meat-and-potatoes of the tale begins.

And it feels it, too. About 52 minutes in I paused it and went to the kitchen. Not for any particular reason; I just needed a break. There, I saw a slug crawling into my dog’s water bowl, drinking the water or something, I don’t know. I’d never seen that before. I ended up watching that slug slowly edge around the bowl for 15 minutes or more rather than go back to the film. It’s that engrossing.

Gilroy has written or co-written every Bourne film to date, so you’d think he knows his way around the franchise — and he does, but perhaps too well. Each Bourne sequel has basically relied on the same formula: “the conspiracy was bigger than you thought, and now the next level up want Bourne dead”. That was fine in Supremacy — indeed, it took characters left dangling from Identity and wrapped up their roles. For my money, Ultimatum felt like it re-hashed this storyline, bringing in new characters to force a new level of backstory and hierarchy. (Clearly most viewers didn’t mind, as it’s widely regarded as the best Bourne film.)

And Legacy recycles this idea for a third time. Now, Treadstone and Blackbriar are just two of many such programmes run by the CIA and/or some shadowy higher organisation I’m not sure is real. On the bright side, they’re not after Bourne, but new escapee Aaron Cross. Not that it makes a huge amount of difference.

If such a repetitious story wasn’t bad enough, Gilroy spends a ludicrous amount of time setting it up. The beginning of Legacy overlaps with the end of Ultimatum, showing us in dully intricate detail what the numerous new CIA characters were doing during that time. And intercut with that we have our new hero wandering by himself across Alaska. For half an hour. This isn’t an art film meditation on isolation, it’s an action thriller — get a bloody move on!

What did Gilroy lose between Ultimatum and this? Well, co-creators. He co-wrote Identity and Ultimatum, and had two different directors across the first three films. Here he’s responsible for the story, co-writing (with his younger brother), and directing. He undoubtedly has some degree of talent, but maybe the other voices were essential to honing it. The other thing a fresh perspective could bring is fresh ideas. If Gilroy has rehashed the same basic plot three times now, surely they need someone with a new story to offer?

Perhaps also, after four films, he’s too close. Clearly that has advantages for remembering the intricacies of the timeline and continuity, especially with the trilogy’s increasingly complex web of conspiracies and conspirators; but maybe Gilroy has become too deeply embroiled in that. After all, he thinks it’s OK to spend the first half hour of the film connecting up the dots between the previous story and his new plot — who really wants that? That’s for geeky fans to do later.

And yet, for all that, the timeline doesn’t quite make sense. If we assume Identity is set in 2002, because that’s when it was released, then Supremacy is two years later, in 2004. Ultimatum is six weeks after that, so late 2004 or early 2005, and Legacy is immediately after that (as I said, the start overlaps). So, it’s set seven years ago? But a character finds a moderately key plot point on YouTube as if it’s the most natural thing in the world… but the very first YouTube video wasn’t uploaded until April 2005. I guess the films operate on a sliding timeline now, much like long-running superhero comics or the Bond films. That or The Bourne Identity is really a sci-fi film set in the Future Year of 2009. Considering the ‘science’ brought to bear in Legacy, perhaps that is the idea.

This is also the first Bourne film that leaves its storyline truly open. The other sequels had threads to pick up on, obviously, but if the series had stopped after either Identity or Supremacy, you’d have still had a complete tale (or Ultimatum, of course). It’s ironic, because this is also the first time I’ve been left with no desire to see a follow-up. The ending reminded me a bit of Saw IV, actually. For those who don’t know their Saw films, that takes place concurrently to Saw III, following different characters and a different storyline. At the end, the two films come together, adding a few seconds more story to what we saw at the end of IV, and ready to move on with unified purpose (well, sort of) in Saw V. Legacy feels like it concludes the same way: we’ve been introduced to new bad guys and a new hero, and the events that ended Ultimatum have been given a few seconds more development with a new twist; so now all is ready to rejoin where we left Bourne himself and continue afresh. Except Matt Damon seems to have ruled out that idea already. And, like I said, do we really want more of these characters and their increasingly ludicrous levels of conspiracy?

Legacy isn’t all bad. When it finally moves up to second gear (after a whole hour) there’s the occasional good action sequence. The requisite Bourne car chase is replaced by a bike chase, but I’d happily argue it’s at least the equal of any of the series’ other road chases — the only part of the film that can stand up to its predecessors, because the other fights and foot chases don’t have the same edge. Indeed, a rooftop/alleyway chase in Manila is just a rehash of Ultimatum’s Tangier sequence, but not as exciting. And through all that, the story remains resolutely uninvolving.

And don’t get me started on the cast. Jeremy Renner is fine as an action man but doesn’t deliver any other significant likeable qualities here (and I don’t think that’s his fault). Rachel Weisz is normally brilliant, but here is reduced to a snivelling plot piece. They’ve made her character a Clever Scientist, which is presumably supposed to make her a Strong Female Character too, but that’s not how it’s played at all. Edward Norton is wasted staring at monitors; Albert Finney is literally wasted, his one meaningful moment relegated to the Blu-ray’s deleted scenes section; Zeljko Ivanek gets a pivotal character but is underdeveloped and so his talents are wasted; and some actors from previous Bourne movies appear to be credited merely for use of their photos, until they turn up for ten-second cameos near the end that you’d rather weren’t there because it means someone is planning on a Bourne 5.

After the muted reception Legacy got on release I was expecting it to be mediocre — or perhaps, if I was lucky, underrated — but I thought it was mostly just boring, worse than I’d heard, and not even close to any of the previous Bourne films. They’re exceptional examples of the action-thriller, of course, but this isn’t even good as a routine genre entry, because it’s quite spectacularly dull. I do believe they could have continued this series without the character of Jason Bourne — there’s potential in some of the ideas here. But this version just doesn’t work, as a compelling film or worthy successor.

The Bourne Legacy is on Sky Movies Premiere at 4pm and 8pm every day for the next week.

It featured on my list of The Five Worst Films I Saw in 2013, which can be read in full here.

Django Unchained (2012)

Posted on May 20, 2013 by badblokebob

Quentin Tarantino made his name in the ’90s with a series of dialogue-heavy gangster thrillers that provoked a storm of imitators. Since the turn of the millennium, however, he’s contented himself with a series of extravagant hyper-cinephilic genre homage/parodies. After tackling Japanese action movies in Kill Bill Vol.1, revenge thrillers in Kill Bill Vol.2, B-movie grindhouse fillers in Grindhouse/Death Proof, and World War 2 men-on-a-mission movies in Inglourious Basterds, here he sets his sights on a genre whose DNA is threaded through all his movies: the Spaghetti Western.

It’s 1858, two years before the American Civil War (which started in 1861 — a schoolboy error, a reference, or a Basterds-style flourish? Who knows), and a bounty hunter by the name of Dr. King Schultz (an Oscar-winning Christoph Waltz) acquires a slave by the name of Django (Jamie Foxx) to help him track down three wanted brothers. In return, he will grant Django his freedom.

But that’s not the end of it. This being post-millennial Tarantino, whose every movie is so long it has the potential to be split in two, Kill Bill style, that plot is just Act One. As Schultz and Django bond, the German learns about Django’s wife, Broomhilda (Kerry Washington), who was sold to the infamous Candyland plantation. Being a good German and feeling he must help this real-life Siegfried, Schultz and Django concoct a plan to rescue her…

It’s fair to say Django Unchained sprawls. But, unlike the chapterised character-flitting antics of Kill Bill and Inglourious Basterds, it has a straight throughline it follows from beginning to end, with only a few asides. In terms of length and scope, it’s perhaps not too much of a reach to evoke The Good, the Bad and the Ugly rather than any other self-indulgent lengthy non-epics. Some have tired of the film’s length (compared to the masses who have elevated it to 46th on IMDb’s all-time top 250, not many), but the prospect of an extended cut (mooted by QT as something he might offer later) excites me. Of course, the Kill Bill single-film edit still hasn’t made it further than Cannes or the New Beverly, so I won’t be holding my breath.

I’m going to offer pretty unrelenting praise for Django Unchained, but it’s hard to know where to begin. With the cinematography and its extraordinary range? From icy cold mountains to orangey warm Southern interiors, from homaging crash zooms and blood-splattered blossom to new perspectives on action, the work of DP Robert Richardson consistently shines. And I don’t believe there was any teal-and-orange or other such clichéd digital manipulation either. Beautiful.

Or how about those action sequences? Months of work training real horses to do things never before seen pays off (and Tarantino proudly displays the “no animals were harmed” notice right at the top of the credits), while the blood-drenched Candyland shoot-out is arguably one of the best pure action scenes in years. Those are amongst myriad other sequences, from the small and transitory to the epic and vital.

Or there’s always QT’s renowned music choices? He’s as irreverent but perfect as ever here, encompassing the cheesy title song from the 1966 original, some classic rock, a new song by Ennio Morricone and Elisa, and even modern hip-hop. Some of it jars at first (particularly the latter), but it all works to the intended effect. The only QT soundtracks I’ve bothered with actually buying previously were the Kill Bills, but this may join them.

Or the performances? Tarantino has really gifted his actors with some special roles here. Foxx arguably gets the short straw, though as heroes go there’s actually a lot for him to play in Django. He keeps it subtle amidst an array of large performances, and that’s no bad thing. As his mentor, Waltz earnt a second Oscar for a Tarantino role. Some have accused this of being the same performance as he gave in Basterds, but that’s not quite fair. They’re both Tarantino characters speaking Tarantino dialogue played by the same actor — they’re always going to feel similar. But there are subtle differences, which make Basterds’ Col. Landa a likeable villain and Django’s Schultz a likeable good guy.

Still, best served — and, perhaps, more deserving of the Supporting Actor nod — are villainous duo Leonardo DiCaprio and Samuel L. Jackson. For starters, has Leo ever played a villain before? He’s on stonking form here as Southern gent Monsieur Candie (who can’t speak French), a sinisterly welcoming fellow with a dark side that’s on constant display. He’s all smiles and all lingering threat and menace. Indeed, scenes are often at their most tense when he’s at his nicest. I think there’s an argument for him to go down as one of the great screen villains — he even has the obligatory cool dispatch. “I couldn’t resist” indeed.

And as for Jackson… He’s a QT regular, and so you’d expect him to be a mofo so cool he was rivalling the titular hero for biggest badass status. But no: he’s a rickety old house slave, with a ring of grey hair and always hunched over his walking stick. He commands respect, but is subservient to Candie… though, who’s really in control? There are some nice scenes and moments questioning that. And he’s completely menacing, but in a more subtle and insidious way than Jackson’s usual Jules-from-Pulp-Fiction-moulded villains.

Aside from the leads, there’s a host of recognisable faces in supporting roles — or even dialogue-free one-shot cameos: someone you might recognise from TV plays The Daughter of the Son of a Gunfighter, seen staring out of a window as Django and Schultz pass by. It does make you wonder if some of these people had bigger roles that got cut… or maybe there are just other reasons. However, one remaining cameo features perhaps the most satisfying use of “I know” since The Empire Strikes Back. And QT himself is in it, briefly, doing an Australian accent (I think?) and affording himself a striking exit.

One thing that provoked some comment and controversy was the violence, and the juxtaposition of humour and violence. Personally, I think Tarantino nails it. There’s horrific stuff done to slaves, most of it by Candie and his acolytes — but, what, you thought the slave trade was cushtie? There’s no lingering on gore like you’d find in a Saw film — there are bits where he could have, if he’d wanted, but that’s not the point. Are the scenes still shocking? Yes, but that is the point. These are Very Bad Men who do Very Bad Things, which I can well imagine are historically accurate, and Tarantino exposes that and, through it, well earns the explosion of vengeance that forms the film’s multiple climaxes.

There are flashes of humour throughout, making for welcome contrast, but the one that provoked the most discussion is an extended sequence with a gaggle of proto-Klan members. I’m sure you read about it: they can’t see out of their hoods. Some decried it for being silliness involving a gang who were viciously cruel and shouldn’t be the subject of humour. Tosh and piffle, I say. One of the best ways to skewer many an evil institution is to make them a laughing-stock, to take the piss out of them, and that’s exactly what Tarantino is doing. These aren’t likeable, funny people who are Klan members; they’re incompetent fools because they’re Klan members. The resulting scene is hilarious and deservedly one of the movie’s most memorable moments.

There’s a lot to say about Django Unchained, and a lot to praise about it — it is two-and-three-quarter hours long after all. But points of discussion are often the mark of a good film, and praise obviously is. As a marriage of homage and B-movie to historical comment and some satisfying justice, albeit only cinematic, Tarantino’s Spaghetti Western homage is an entertaining, occasionally thought-provoking, rewarding, and thoroughly cinematic experience.

Django Unchained is available in the UK on DVD, Blu-ray, and via various on-demand services, from today.

It placed 2nd on my list of The Ten Best Films I Saw For the First Time in 2013, which can be read in full here.

The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Posted on May 14, 2013 by badblokebob

After The Dark Knight’s runaway success, this trilogy-closer would inevitably disappoint some. It is imperfect, featuring a story so grandly complex that even the extensive running time fails to give it breathing space, and an occasional leap or fudged point requires audience thinking (which too few are capable of, apparently); but it also has its share of greatness.

It’s undeniably notable for being An Ending — superheroes don’t get endings. There’ll be a reboot, naturally, but no matter: Nolan’s Batman ends.

Whatever the flaws, there’s a rewarding experience here, albeit more comic-book-y than the real-world crime-thriller aspirations of its beloved predecessor.

The Dark Knight Rises placed 6th on my list of The Ten Best Films I Saw For the First Time in 2012, which can be read in full here.

In the interests of completing my ever-growing backlog, I decided to post ‘drabble reviews’ of some films. In the future I may update with something longer, but if I don’t, at least here’s something for posterity.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, a drabble is a complete piece of writing exactly 100 words long.

I have much more I could have said about The Dark Knight Rises, but damn I’m fed up with still having films from 2012 on my to-do list! A fuller piece may well accompany a re-watch in the future. For now, there’s always my initial thoughts.

Green Lantern: Extended Cut (2011)

Posted on May 9, 2013 by badblokebob

“Hype” has to be one of the biggest factors in how we view films these days. Technically it’s defined as “extravagant or intensive publicity”, I suppose thereby meaning something to “positive expectation”, but I think it also works the other way: if you’ve heard nothing but awful things about a film, its weakness has been ‘hyped’. It’s this latter point that applies to Green Lantern, which has an almost insurmountable degree of negative expectation attached. To summarise the headline points, it’s got a woeful rating of 26% on Rotten Tomatoes and took just $220m at the international box office, which might sound a lot but barely covers its production budget. So I expected to despise Green Lantern, or at least roll my eyes or twiddle my thumbs at its constant awfulness, but I actually quite enjoyed it.

And that’s why I talk about hype, because my expectation that the film would be irredeemably awful is at least partly why I found it surprisingly enjoyable — a bit like XMO Wolverine, which I didn’t like nearly as much when I watched it again a few years later. I’m not going to try to argue Green Lantern is a great movie, or even that it doesn’t contain significant flaws, but as a comic book-y two-hour diversion, I found it passably entertaining.

For those not in the know, the plot concerns Hal Jordan (Reynolds) finding a dead alien and a ‘magic’ ring that inducts him into a sort of intergalactic police force, the Green Lanterns. Stupid name and concept, attributable to it being a genuine magic thing before being reinvented as alien tech at some point, and perhaps it was the very daft datedness of the idea that (in part) put a mass audience off. But I digress. Cocky jocky Hal is whisked off to the other side of the galaxy to learn how to be a Hero and use his ‘magic’ ring, which can conjure stuff up, then returns to Earth to save it from some menace(s). As superhero origin stories go, at least it’s got a couple of differences.

Hal’s character arc — the cocky guy who’s actually got fears and insecurities due to the death of his father — is actually quite a good one; a neat twist on the usual hero archetypes. So many superheroes have a version of the “loved one died when I was young” thing, but for most it’s motivation to fight rather than a worry that holds them back. But that arc is underplayed almost to the point of being unnoticeable, so when Hal overcomes it in order to save the day, you barely register that he’s overcome anything. Which is a shame, because there was potential in that. You don’t necessarily expect depth of character from a blockbuster, but it does hold it back.

However, the film’s primary problem (at least for me) was a lack of threat; or, rather, a lack of urgency. There’s a great big devourer of worlds out there, but we never get the feeling it’s doing much harm to anyone. I mean, it is, but we don’t feel it. Even at the climax, when it sets course to Earth, it’s more of an understanding that our hero is going to save the planet, rather than a genuine sense of peril that Earth is under assault. Perhaps this stems back to characterisation: some of the cast are likeable enough; the others are bland enough to not be unlikeable; and that leaves us wanting for someone to root for.

There are positives. The action sequences are good, which is a definite plus in this kind of film. The inventiveness with what the ring can do is fun. There’s a lack of relation to the sketchily-drawn characters that stands in the way of us truly engaging with them, and there’s a certain brevity and lack of scale that undersells the alleged threat to Earth (it’s a giant evil space-cloud that can barely cover a few city blocks, let alone the entire planet) — but, that aside, they’re entertaining enough. That said, much as the film pulls its punches with characterisation and threat, so it does with awe and spectacle. The Lanterns’ planet Oa doesn’t have the same impact as Asgard in Thor, yet we’re told several times what a spectacular place it is.

The Blu-ray’s Extended Cut adds exactly 9 minutes and 39 seconds of new content (as ever, details can be found here). This is almost entirely a prelude sequence, showing the death of Hal Jordan’s dad. The sequence serves to flesh out the relationships between Hal, love interest Carol and future-villain Hector a little, but there’s not a lot gained that isn’t learnt elsewhere. It also breaks up the flow. I only watched the extended version in full, but I imagine it’s a smoother transition in the theatrical, rather than pinging back and forth between intergalactic goings-on and bits & bobs on Earth. The only other extension comes when Hal has a chat with his 11-year-old nephew. Conversely, this scene plays much better in the extended cut, and I’m not entirely sure why they felt the need to cut it.

Indeed, I’d say the Extended Cut doesn’t go far enough, with some of the disc’s deleted scenes meriting inclusion. However, the main one occurs on Oa, meaning an effects-heavy scene that hasn’t had CG work done or all the voices recorded, so couldn’t just be dropped back into the finished film as-is. I imagine that’s why it wasn’t. That said, even if they’d done such work, those scenes are minor points, not game-changers.

What an extended cut of Green Lantern should really have done is build character and emotional impact. The plot is decent enough, but the film rattles along and sticks purely to story — we never feel it. It is nice to have a blockbuster effects movie that comes in closer to two hours than three, but they used to be able to make those and have us care. Where’s that ability gone? The only relationship that gets any real screen time is the romantic one, and that’s a damp squib.

I quite enjoyed Green Lantern while watching it. I felt quite positive afterwards. But the more you think about it, the more you spot the lack of depth. Maybe that’s OK — maybe it’s fine for a film to just give passing pleasure while it’s on. It wouldn’t be good if every film operated at that level, but it’s a painless experience now and then. Still, I think there’s a better film lurking in Green Lantern, and it’s a shame it didn’t get the screenwriter(s) or director(s) required to bring it out. It’s even more of a shame that worse films than this have received a kinder critical consensus or huge box office. That leaves some suit feeling vindicated and churning out the same rubbish again, whereas with a bit more effort Green Lantern 2 could’ve been worthwhile.

Ted (2012)

Posted on May 3, 2013 by badblokebob

The first film from Seth MacFarlane, creator of Family Guy and American Dad!, part-time Oscar host and Proms singer (I kid you not), is the story of a boy and his teddy bear. Lonely little John Bennett gets a teddy for Christmas when he’s eight, makes a wish that the bear will come alive, and so it does. It’s sweet and lovely, because it’s a teddy. Then it becomes famous and grows up and turns into a foul-mouthed pot-smoking layabout living with a thirtysomething John (Marky Mark Wahlberg) and his girlfriend (Mila Kunis). But he’s still a loveable bear. Kinda.

If you put together that plot description with “from the creator of Family Guy”, you get a pretty fair idea of what Ted’s like — and whether it’s for you or not. Sadly many people can’t do such simply maths, as evidenced by the swathes of bad reviews on LOVEFiLM, shocked by the film’s content. One moron even sat their little kids down in front of it, thinking it was a cute film about a cute talking bear being cute. Why do some people not research the films they show their kids? Even checking the certificate would’ve revealed it’s a 15 and not suitable for your 6 year old. But I digress.

Family Guy’s stock in trade is two things: non-sequiturs, which Ted replaces with a plot; and an edgy, borderline-offensive (or, to some people, offensive) sense of humour, which Ted retains, and in some cases pushes farther, unrestrained by the demands of US network TV. Personally, I like it, by and large. Some jokes cross the line into distasteful, but that’s par for the course. Some will find it all terribly juvenile. I was going to say you shouldn’t be expecting QI, but then they’ve been known to get sidetracked into some smutty laughs on occasion, so that may not be the best example.

The film’s low point is its plot. It’s stock rom-com territory, in which a happy couple (spoilers!) break up and (spoilers!) get back together, with a climax-providing subplot lifted from Toy Story 2. If you’re looking for an original or thought-provoking story, Ted won’t be the place to find it, though it makes a good fist of telling it. But really, the draw is the talking teddy, and how he relates to the world in a teddy-like fashion. So what if the main story is a rehash? Plenty of comedies do that every year without bothering to add anything original, at least here the reality of what would happen if a teddy magically came to life is considered, and quite nicely handled too.

Without meaning to spoil any laughs, standout segments include a running involvement of the ’80s Flash Gordon film, which long-term readers of this blog will know I love at least as much as John and Ted, which culminates in an amusing trip; a hotel room brawl between John and Ted (if you watch it on Blu-ray, the five-minute Teddy Bear Scuffle featurette is worth a look for how they did this); and a minor array of cameos, from who’s doing the voiceover to someone who turns up twice without a single line of dialogue.

Wahlberg performances swing between excellent (The Departed, I ♥ Huckabees) and awful (The Happening, Max Payne), seemingly at random, but here he’s closer to the former. MacFarlane voices Ted (as well as directing, co-writing and co-producing), which years of experience have left him very good at, even if he has to lampshade the fact he does sound rather like Peter Griffin. Among the rest of the cast, Mila Kunis is kinda unremarkable and kinda endearing, but either way surely beloved by teenage boys; Giovanni Ribisi turns up as a creepy loner (what else is new); and Patrick Warburton plays The Part Patrick Warburton Plays (what else is new).

(Incidentally, there’s also an unrated version of Ted, which is so shocking that in the UK we gave it a… 15. It’s about six minutes longer and includes some alternate material as well as extensions. I went with the theatrical version because, well, I did. As ever, there’s a full comparison here, or a simple list on IMDb if you prefer. For the dedicated, the Blu-ray also includes 15 minutes of deleted scenes and 10 minutes of alternate takes, but I don’t know if there’s any overlap between that material and the extended version.)

Ted is pretty much a walking talking definition of “not for everyone” — which is fine. If you like Family Guy, it’s definitely one to try (LOVEFiLM has plenty of “I love Family Guy but hated this grrr!” reviews too); if you dislike Family Guy, probably one to avoid; if you’ve never seen Family Guy, what can I say, that’s the standard reviewer’s barometer here. It is rude, is crude, and is mostly very funny. But, whatever you decide, don’t leave the kids with the movie about the talking teddy.

Ted joins the Sky Movies Premiere line-up today at 4:25pm, is on again at 8pm, and several times daily thereafter, as well as on all their on-demand services and whatnot.

Ip Man 2 (2010)

Posted on April 28, 2013 by badblokebob

aka Yip Man 2 / Ip Man 2: Legend of the Grandmaster

Picking up more or less where the first film left off, this sequel sees Ip and his family settled in Hong Kong, struggling to get by as he attempts to set up a Wing Chun school against opposition from the existing establishments.

The main thing to note about Ip Man 2 is that it has stunning fight sequences, especially a large sequence in the fish market and a one-on-one tabletop challenge. The latter sees star Donnie Yen take on legend Sammo Hung, which I imagine was a treat for genre fans (though it’s not their first encounter). For those of us less well versed in this world, it’s still a bloody good fight scene.

The first Ip Man was about considerably more than just action, but that’s where its sequel sets its focus. Human drama remains, but it doesn’t ring quite as true and perhaps isn’t trying to be as much of a feature as before. Ip Man’s relationships with his wife and with his students are hinted, told with plenty of shorthand — she’s pregnant, goes into labour just before his big fight (not that he knows), that kind of thing. They’re quickly tucked away as something for those really interested, rather than playing an essential part.

The only major downside comes when the Brits turn up for the final act. Stereotyped and poorly acted, presented with palpable jingoism and xenophobia, their presence and storyline drag the film down.

Still, at least it’s all wonderfully shot. Dismissing the clichéd desaturated look of the last film, here we get something a little more colourful, though never close to garish, with well chosen angles and superlative editing.

Ip Man 2 doesn’t have the same majesty as the first, but there’s an enjoyably pulpish sensibility in its place. Fast-moving and literally action-packed, on that level it entertains.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012)

Posted on April 4, 2013 by badblokebob

So here we are: nine years after his last tour of duty in Middle-earth, and after a Guillermo del Toro-shaped attempt at not having to serve again, Peter Jackson returns to the world of hobbits, dwarves, elves, orcs, and the rest, to tell the tale some have been clamouring for him to make since Fellowship of the Ring turned out to be a film of landscape-changing brilliance over a decade ago. Well, a version of that tale, anyway.

The Hobbit, as I’m sure you know, sees a younger Bilbo Baggins (Ian Holm in The Lord of the Rings and a prologue here; Martin Freeman for the bulk of the film) coerced by the wizard Gandalf (Sir Ian McKellen again, of course) into joining a party of dwarves setting out to reclaim their gold and/or homeland, stolen by the dragon Smaug (that’s Smowg, not Smorg). In this version, emphasis is firmly on “homeland” rather than “gold”, and there’s a bunch of other stuff drawn in from the masses of appendices and associated material that J.R.R. Tolkien wrote about Lord of the Rings. In the process, Jackson and co have mutated The Hobbit from a simple tale of adventure that happens to take place in the same universe as The Lord of the Rings and has some shared characters and locations, and turned it into a film (well, a trilogy) that is both standalone adventure and grand prequel to his already-made epic.

There’s endless discussion to be had about the choices Jackson and co-screenwriters del Toro, Fran Walsh, and Philippa Boyens have made in this transformation of a beloved novel (and there’ll be even more in future parts, I should imagine, when they start introducing new characters they’ve created themselves). I can sympathise with those who wanted a single-film, straightforward, faithful adaptation of the novel (I sincerely hope there’s a fan edit to adequately fulfil that desire once the trilogy is complete); but there’s also so much in Tolkien’s world, much of it with direct (if inessential) relevance to Lord of the Rings, that it might have seemed a shame to miss this opportunity to get it on screen. And, I have to say, as someone who hasn’t read the novel since primary school, I couldn’t spot the joins. I could take some guesses, but not many, and considering how long the film is I’m sure there must be quite a lot added.

Putting aside questions of adaptation (others have already discussed that at great length and with much more authority than I), how does it survive as a film in its own right? The reviews have been mixed, but I would say it fares very well. It may lack the epic world-changing grandeur of Lord of the Rings, but as an epically-scaled action-adventure fantasy I found it to be most entertaining. It treads a tricky path mixing action, humour, world-building, politicking, legend, and plot, and some would assert some elements dominate more than they should, or are mishandled — I’ve heard the humour called too childish, the action too like a videogame, and so on. For me, the balance worked. It’s not perfect — it takes forty minutes for the cast to leave the opening location of Bag End, which is fine in a fan-pleasing extended edition but feels excessive in a theatrical cut — but it ticks enough boxes and hits enough bases to entertain. And at the end of the day, it is an entertainment.

I have to wonder if viewing at home affects one’s perception of The Hobbit’s length and pacing. For one thing, from a personal point of view, I saw all of the theatrical Lord of the Ringses in the cinema, and the Extended Editions only on DVD — coming to The Hobbit first on DVD, am I automatically associating it with the extended experience? Even as I write it, I think that’s a pretty spurious argument. More so, however, there’s all those factors of the home viewing experience that are often cited in its favour over the cinema: you can start when you want (no trailers!), pause for a snack or the loo or just the hell of it; and it’s also commensurate with, say, marathoning TV shows, where you might watch several hours in one go anyway. As it is, I didn’t pause The Hobbit once, watching it right through in one go as per the cinema — but I could have, and knowing you can do something makes all the difference. There’s also the little timer on the Blu-ray player, which means I can know that it took forty minutes to get out of Bag End rather than just thinking it feels like it. Does that somehow make it more palatable? Would I have been as bothered as others by the film’s length and pacing had I seen it in a cinema initially? It’s tough — nay, impossible — to say, because while there are those other subliminal factors, I also felt like I flat out enjoyed the film for itself, not just for my potential ability to escape it. But it is long and it is episodic, so maybe the association of watching individualistic episodes of TV back to back feeds into the acceptance of that? It’s a circular argument, so we’ll leave it there.

Besides issues of faithfulness and length, the film’s other big controversy (as if it didn’t have enough!) is the whole HFR argument, which seemed to plague all previews and early reviews. I can’t enter into that, but I can say it hasn’t filtered down to the Blu-ray experience — if it should look clearer and sharper and less motion-blurred-y, it doesn’t to any extent that stops it feeling like a Movie. The whole thing looks gorgeous, as you’d expect, though I won’t credit that to the cinematography lest Christopher Doyle comes round and gives me what for. In other technical fields, the make-up, models and CGI are all as up to snuff as you’d expect from this team. They’re probably exceptional, in fact, but hamstrung by the fact we expect them to be. If they’d fluffed something people would have noticed, but what could they do to stand out? Gollum may be better-realised than ever, but he was so good before that few will notice; other sequences, like the fighting rock giants, are awesome but perhaps get lost in the mix.

Howard Shore returns to deliver another fantastic score. After he composed the iconic Fellowship theme for, um, Fellowship, I thought he could never muster anything else as monumental. And, in fairness, that theme is still the defining aspect of the series’ score (its absence here is at times felt, by me at least); but he produced another excellent motif for Two Towers (Rohan), and Return of the King (Minas Tirith), and once again here, this time related to the dwarves. Much like John Williams on the Star Wars prequels, Shore is charged with retrofitting his score to begin before but ultimately dovetail with the following/preceding trilogy, and I think he pulls it off (as much as a musical dilettante like me can spot such things). Locations and characters familiar from Lord of the Rings come with their musical cues intact, which blend seamlessly with the new material. I hadn’t bothered to pre-order the soundtrack CD, but I hopped online to get it as soon as the film finished.

The Hobbit film trilogy will long remain a controversial subject. It was always going to. The book is a light children’s adventure tale, while Jackson is making the film in the context of a successful blockbuster epic set in a dark/realistic fantasy world — he couldn’t have made it too whimsical and still had it gel with the existing films. Plus: if he’d done a straightforward adaptation in a single film, would it have felt underwhelming? Does it need a ramped-up sense of the epic in order to compete with its chronological sequel? For Tolkien fans, no; for a mainstream audience, perhaps it does. And for the latter it clearly worked, taking over a billion dollars worldwide, albeit aided by 3D ticket prices.

Without the breadth and world-changing story of The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit was always going to be a somewhat smaller experience. By emphasising the backstory of the dwarves’ stolen homeland and the hints of war-to-come that will ultimately lead in to Rings’ story, Jackson has made it considerably more epic — for good or ill. For me, the whole experience clicked. I don’t think it’s as good as Lord of the Rings, but it is the next best thing.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is available in the UK on DVD, Blu-ray and via on-demand services from Monday 8th April.

My review of the Extended Edition can now be read here.

* According to the BBFC, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey runs 32 seconds longer on disc than in cinemas. I’ve no idea why. ^

Prometheus (2012)

Posted on March 29, 2013 by badblokebob

With all the furore this week over the (supposed) behind-the-scenes problems with attempts to launch Prometheus 2, it’s about time I posted my review of last year’s intended franchise-starter…

Ridley Scott’s not-an-Alien-prequel-honest Alien prequel is nothing if not divisive, with critics and fans alike declaring it to be a revelatory masterpiece, irredeemable faux-profound slop, and every point on the spectrum in between. I did my best to remain spoiler-free throughout the four months between its theatrical release and disc debut (crikey things reach DVD quickly these days!), though I did read a leaked plot description in advance that was reportedly decried as rubbish. I wish I could remember where I found it because I’d love to know if it matches up. Sadly I can’t remember the details, but obviously something stuck — and therefore it was right — because I was singularly unsurprised by the majority of Prometheus’ story. But that doesn’t necessarily matter if the film is any good, and Prometheus… well…

The first half is quite good, in a slow, meaningful kind of way. Even at that point there’s doubts: some of what occurs is just unnecessary detail; shots and scenes that seem consciously designed to give it a slow pace rather than stuff we actually need to see.

The second half is batshit crazy. It abandons the thoughtful Serious Science Fiction trappings for schlocky body/creature horror, and in the process abandons the semblance of making sense. Plot holes glare at you. Characters make unfounded leaps of logic. It feels like whole scenes or sequences are missing. Indeed, quickly scanning through the disc’s description of some of the deleted scenes, it looks like they might explain some of the film’s gaps. I presume there’s a good reason they were cut though… right…?

And then, to top it off, it doesn’t have a real ending! They may as well slap “to be continued” on screen, such is the obvious lack of conclusion. It’s immensely frustrating, only to be topped off with a “in case we don’t get the sequel” bit of connective tissue to the Alien series. Mysteries and unanswered questions aren’t a problem in and of themselves — there are plenty in Prometheus’ franchise forbears, the first in particular — but they’re not the kind that require answers: their stories work as a discrete unit; who the Space Jockey is, or how the aliens came to be, and so on, are set dressing. Conversely, the gaps in Prometheus are in the primary narrative. There would be an argument for it being a thematic point — a Bergman-esque ‘silence from the Gods’ — but the starkness of that ending, as clear a cliffhanger as either of the first two Lord of the Ringses, undermines that. It fairly screams, “there’s more to come! See the next film for the answers!” And that isn’t on, because that isn’t what we were promised — this isn’t Prometheus: The Fellowship of the Prometheus, with Prometheus: The Two Planets already shot and scheduled for next year, and the trilogy-forming conclusion Prometheus: The Return of the Alien for the year after that; it’s just Prometheus, full stop, the sole definitive article. But it isn’t.

The sense that everything’s been cobbled together in the current blockbuster fashion of “keep writing even while shooting” extends right down to things like character development; even to individual scenes. Take Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green), for instance. He’s a dick. I’ve no sympathy when it all goes wrong for him because he’s not at all likeable. What’s somewhat ironic is that the deleted scenes note at least one sequence was re-shot to try to make him more sympathetic. And, funnily enough, I remember during that scene in the film thinking it was about the only time he seemed even vaguely appealing (even then, only relatively). Just one of many such apparently-bungled elements in the film.

No character is fully developed. Some barely register, suggesting too big a cast, while others suffer from being plain stupid, or doing inexplicably stupid things, or just piss-poor acting. There’s some thing made about Shaw (Noomi Rapace) being religious or a true believer or something, but it’s not properly explained and doesn’t go anywhere. David (Michael Fassbender) and the way he’s treated by the other characters are both very interesting areas, and clearly of huge thematic resonance, but he acts inconsistently for no obvious reason, and despite the horrendous things he does to Shaw at one point, she just gets on with him again in the next scene, and… well, that’s far from being the film’s only plot hole or inconsistency.

At one point a character escapes a situation only to be killed off in a different one. If that sounds like a reasonable thing to do, that’s because I’m trying to avoid spoiling parts of the climax. It’s not a particularly reasonable thing to do, though; it plays as “here’s a cool death”. I’ve not read multiple versions of the script or read interviews with the writers or listened to their commentary (yet), but one does wonder if Damon Lindelof was brought in to pull back on some of the Science Fiction (with a capital SF) and build up the blockbuster-y elements, because that’s what said cool death feels like: a film constructed from “what would look cool? What haven’t we seen?” rather than “what are we trying to say?” I have no problem with the former in its rightful place (Tomorrow Never Dies has the awesome bike chase because it was the antithesis of GoldenEye’s tank chase, for one ready example), but a film that sets out its stall around Concepts is not the right place.

The daft thing is, I think a lot of people would’ve been happy if it had chosen to just go all-out as a schlocky alien horror movie. That’s what Alien is: an exceptionally well-made haunted house movie in space. There’s no shame in that (well, maybe in cinéaste circles, but pish.) But that’s not where Prometheus pitches itself. There’s too much other stuff for it to be just that; stuff that’s apparently aiming to be Profound. So when the horror does turn up, it doesn’t belong.

It does all look bloody gorgeous, from the real landscapes to the CGI. It was shot by Dariusz Wolski, whose previous credits include all four Pirateses and not much else that would suggest a remarkable skill. But sod a pixel-generated tiger, these vistas surely deserved recognition. (But then I’ve not seen the tiger movie, so…) I didn’t see it in 3D, obviously, but it certainly looks like it was shot for the format. Not because there’s stuff poking out at you, thank goodness, but look how light it all is, especially compared to the original Alien. I’m sure the scenery had lovely depth.

A side effect of such format-hopping is a debate on the correct aspect ratio: it was reportedly shown at 1.66:1 on IMAX, 2.00:1 on IMAX Digital, and 2.35:1 otherwise (the Blu-ray remains at 2.4:1 throughout). I have no idea whether the IMAX was opened out or cropped, though I’d imagine the former, which does make you ponder why they didn’t just use that everywhere, especially on home formats. I guess 2.4:1 must be Scott’s preferred ratio… but is that OK? Should we lament the missing top and bottom? I dunno. More interested parties than I have debated this at length, if you fancy scouring the web for it.

Prometheus is a funny old beast, then. There’s lots of good stuff in there, but also lots of baffling decisions and confusing shifts of tone, emphasis, style… Considering it was made by an experienced master-filmmaker, who was presumably granted all the time, freedom and money he wanted to craft the film he desired, it’s baffling how it ended up feeling like such a hodge-podge. Many fans have blamed Lindelof, brought in late on to re-write the screenplay; but considering Scott ruined Robin Hood by ditching an innovative, exciting screenplay for a stock this-is-real-history re-telling of the legend, perhaps the blame lies at his door. He’s reached a point where he can order anyone to change anything and it will be done (writers have no power in Hollywood, after all). Perhaps, at 75 now, he’s lost the ability to spot a good script; or perhaps he just tinkers because he feels he must, because he’s the director and he’s in charge.

Whatever. Here he’s turned in a scrappy, confusing, but not meritless movie; one that will probably endure thanks to its franchise connections, its moments of clarity, and its intense controversy. It’s not a good film, but it’s kind of a fascinating one.

The Raven (2012)

Posted on March 18, 2013 by badblokebob

2013 #30
James McTeigue | 106 mins | TV | 2.35:1 | USA, Hungary & Spain / English | 15 / R

John Cusack stars as literary giant (figuratively) Edgar Allan Poe in this wannabe-Victorian-Se7en from the director of V for Vendetta.

Set in the days leading up to Poe’s death (a period in the author’s life which is apparently shrouded in mystery), the film sees a serial killer recreating horrendous scenes from Poe’s tales, leading the police to rope in the author in the hope he can help solve the case. A game develops between the killer and the writer, as they race against time to stop more deaths and all that palaver.

Dark and gruesome with the killer having a clear line to follow in his murders? Wannabe Se7en, see. Unfortunately, it doesn’t follow up on that notion too well. Screenwriters Hannah Shakespeare (helluva name to live up to) and Ben Livingston don’t seem to know what to do with Poe’s tales, so there’s no rhyme nor reason to the killings — they’re plucked at random, possibly from the killer’s most favouritest stories, possibly just the ones someone thought would be the most cinematic. And whereas Se7en’s gore is shocking because it’s used sparingly, is kind of plausible, and is set very much in the real world, here we get a kind of gothic horror feel, complete with copious CGI blood at points.

That said, I got the feeling that The Raven is sort of an R by default. (Note that it received a 15 over here, which is also the stomping ground of harder-edged PG-13s.) There’s gore and the odd swear word, but none of it is lingered on. Most of the obvious blood ‘n’ guts is constrained to one scene, and I believe I counted the PG-13’s requisite single use of the F-word. That they didn’t tone it all down just a smidge to match, and so go for the box office-friendly PG-13, is a surprise in these days.

Setting aside comparisons to Fincher’s masterpiece, I’ve read that one critic described The Raven as “Saw meets Sherlock Holmes”. Obviously I maintain that my allusion is better, but I can see where they’re coming from. However, apart from one murder inspired by The Pit and the Pendulum and someone being (temporarily) buried alive, it’s not that Saw-like; and it lacks the humour or action of Ritchie’s Holmes, or the deductive reasoning of any version. But, y’know, aside from that… Additionally, the climax is somewhat reminiscent of A Study in Pink. Might be coincidence, but on the other hand that episode did go out nearly two years before this was released…

I don’t know how historically accurate this tale is, but I imagine not very — I expect we’d know if Poe had been involved in a headline-making murder investigation that led to his death. But that’s fine — it’s the embodiment of the notion that a fiction film is an entertainment, not a history lesson. As for the author’s characterisation, I don’t know much about Poe, but can’t imagine Cusack is an accurate interpretation. He’s solid as this interpretation, though: a charming, roguish figure, living hand-to-mouth through his fondness for alcohol and dramatic wooing of a woman whose father hates him.

The rest of the cast are from Hollywood’s usual go-to for period tales: Brits; if not entirely then mostly so. (The film was shot in Hungary and Serbia, so I suppose our thesps have the additional advantage of being geographically favourable to Americans.) You know you’re getting a level of quality there, then, though for me Kevin R. McNally lets the side down (again). He’s only a supporting character and is fine most of the time, but there’s one bit when he’s talking to the lead detective and just rattles off his line… It’s not the world’s greatest speech, but you can hear there was meant to be more nuance and quiet in there.

That could be the fault of the director, of course. A first assistant director for the Wachowskis in the days of The Matrix trilogy, James McTeigue graduated to feature directing with the adaptation of V for Vendetta, which I think is a very good film. He followed it with Ninja Assassin, which by all accounts is dreadful (I have, by one way or another, wound up with the BD, so someday I’ll find out). I think The Raven suggests his first film may have been fluke, or was at least aided by his mentors (who were also writers and producers on V). The actual direction-y directing here is mostly fine, although on the whole the film is too dark; sometimes literally too dark to see what’s going on, and that’s not aided by occasionally clunky editing.

I’ve not even mentioned the inappropriately modern title sequence (doubly bad as it comes after a rather sombre ending), or that the neat use of a raven in the film’s logo on the poster remains the entire project’s strongest aspect.

Se7en is probably my favourite film ever made, but criticisms that it’s quite a standard detective mystery are not invalid. It’s enlivened by Andrew Kevin Walker’s writing (great dialogue, engrossing structure, etc), some top-drawer performances (Freeman, Pitt, a loopy-calm Spacey), and, probably most of all, David Fincher’s inestimable touch. In making such a comparison it’s easy to see that The Raven lacks any of these, which renders it a solid period mystery, but no more.

The Raven is on Sky Movies Premiere at various times this week.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)

Posted on March 5, 2013 by badblokebob

Shortly after I watched Tinker Tailor, it was announced that they (“they” in this instance being Working Title, I think) are planning a new film adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s perennially popular novel Rebecca. This news was greeted (at least on the websites where I read it) with cries in the comments along the lines of, “you can’t remake Hitchcock!” Such is the power of an adaptation to overshadow its original work, at least in some quarters — here in the UK, I’d say the novel is at least as well known as the film, and has already been re-filmed at least twice for TV.

I mention this because Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy elicited a broadly similar reaction, thanks to the beloved 1979 BBC miniseries starring Sir Alec Guinness as quiet but fiercely clever spy George Smiley. How dare anyone re-make that? Well, perhaps because it’s 30 years old (enough time to afford a new perspective, potentially) and was originally a novel — and those are ‘re-made’ all the time. Just ask Pride and Prejudice, or Oliver Twist, or dozens of others.

Personally, I watched the Guinness version just a month or two before I saw the new film, and it unavoidably colours my reaction to it. In that situation, one can only enjoy the new adaptation to an extent, while memories of the previous one crowd in. Distance is required for anything more objective. So changes between TV and film leered out at me, such as a radically different opening mission, and a radically re-arranged structure in places, and a few performances that weren’t up to the same level, and a marginally less effective denouement.

Yet, for all that, the film is excellent. It may not match the TV series in places, in my subjective opinion, but in its own right it shines. Gary Oldman does the impossible and offers a Smiley that is neither an imitation of Guinness’ nor a deliberate counterpoint, but stands apart as an equally proficient rendering of the character. The rest of the cast are equally up to task, with the exception of Kathy Burke, who stands out like a sore thumb in my opinion.

The TV series took about seven hours to tell the same story that this achieves in just over two. Interestingly, without cutting anything major, the film version still feels leisurely paced. It’s also equally as complicated — it’s an intricate plot, and both adaptations assume the viewer will keep up with it. This seems to have caused some viewers problems, particularly in America (anecdotally, at least). It does demand one’s attention, but it is possible to follow. Equally, I had a leg-up from watching and understanding the TV version.

All that said, the four-way mystery about who the villain is never seems much of a mystery. On the one hand, I know the answer; but on the other, I guessed it on TV too. I won’t give anything more away, though the shortened running time means one of the four suspects gets even less screen time than their already-minimal role in the series, and consequently downgraded casting in both instances. It’s an unfortunate side effect of a big-name cast that it helps your audience second-guess plot developments, but it’s equally unavoidable.

Another noteworthy advantage of the film is that it’s gorgeously shot. The TV series actually has its own appeal in this area, with a realism that is quite pleasing. The film occasionally goes grander (look at the depiction of meeting rooms in The Circus for a major example — while the TV series goes for any old room in Whitehall, the film offers stonking soundproof ‘pods’), but it works in its own way.

I must confess, much like my recent drabble reviews, this TV-version-centric review of Tinker Tailor was not what I had in mind, because the film has many praises to sing in its own right. But, in fairness to the blog’s stated mission of seeing a film for the first time and then reviewing it, the Guinness iteration did factor large in my reaction to the film. Now distanced from the series, I look forward to watching Tinker Tailor again with a fairer eye. Yet for all my talk of negative comparisons, I was still mightily impressed — enough to rank it in my top five films I saw in 2012, and enough to give it full marks.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy placed 5th on my list of The Ten Best Films I Saw For the First Time in 2012, which can be read in full here.

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