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Ok…

Well…

Right…

It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these but I do believe it is time to break my silence.  What is bringing me to break my silence on film?  Well I’ll tell you… AVATAR!  Across Europe and America, James Cameron’s new film is getting on with audiences like a house on fire.  That is if the house was drenched in gasoline burned with napalm and then nuked just for good measure.  Basically, very well.

After just a month of being in cinemas Avatar has become the fastest film ever to reach the $1 billion landmark at the box office with only Cameron’s previous film having outsold it at this point.  And it has already reached number 35 on IMDB’s list of greatest films of all time.  Before I even begin this review I’m going to say that I didn’t dislike this film, but that’s not really my main point.

Visually, the film is quite impressive, I didn’t actually get to see it in 3-D because I was basically too lazy to get out of bed earlier but the CGI does look genuinely real at some points, with the action scenes incredibly inventive and adding an entire world of interesting creatures.  The only animals that didn’t quite make sense to me were the insects that flew in a similar fashion to a helicopter, but had their whole bodies spin around with the rotors so that it couldn’t look at where they were actually going.  In addition to the fact that the scene in which the main character ‘connects’ to the animal he is ‘riding’ was probably only in the film so that they could record and laugh at the audience’s reaction.

But even though the effects are obviously a step forward in terms of film making, I still have a problem with them.  No matter how many of the close ups on a character’s face look real, most of the shots encompassing space ships, lots of plant life and big battle scenes just don’t look real.  It’s not just a shortcoming of this particular film, because ‘Star Wars’ has done it, ‘I, Robot’ did it, ‘I am Legend’ did it and even ‘Star Trek’ did it.  The thing is that CGI just doesn’t look real when you try to use it on wide landscapes and just about anything metallic.  I admit that in the future technology will improve and CGI may actually begin to look real when applied to bigger tasks, but right now it doesn’t.  Granted that a film such as this is never quite going to be able to make every second look entirely real but there are so many solutions that could be used to make the film look entirely more convincing, such as using models for the spaceships like in some older sci fi movies such as 2001, the original Star Wars Trilogy (although this shouldn’t be copied for actual aliens) or the first 6 Star Trek movies.  Actually in ‘Aliens’ (also by James Cameron) some of the machines used are quite similar to those in Avatar and the ones that were actually built for ‘Aliens’ in my opinion looked far better than the CGI ones in ‘Avatar’.  This has actually worked more recently in Duncan Jones’ (Bowie’s son’s) debut ‘Moon’ when all the effects were done with proper models and proper sets when they couldn’t afford CGI, and because of that the whole film looks great with a fantastic character to the whole thing that simply wouldn’t have happened with CGI.

Moving away from that little problem that I have with most modern action films, the most important part to any film is the story, and this is my main criticism of ‘Avatar’.  Without giving anything away, the basic premise of the film is that a mining company is attempting to get a wonderfully aptly named mineral unobtainium which only exists on a moon called Pandora, which orbits a gas giant in the Alpha Centauri star system which is inhabited by humanoids which are more like 10 ft tall blue cats that are scarily in touch with nature and are only able to use bows and arrows as weapons and… ‘connect’ to animals to control them.  Our protagonist named Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) is an ex marine without the use of his legs who replaces his murdered brother in a programme in which people control the bodies of natives (avatars) that the military have grown for them in order to help them become more friendly with them.  Eventually Sully falls in with the natives and along with his friends in the Avatar project becomes accepted into their society.  This provides the humans with a foothold which may possibly allow them to make a deal with the natives so they can mine for unobtainium.  But eventually the big bad military says ‘bugger this’ and starts killing things, providing us with a completely not subtle environmentalist tree hugger theme that will probably be commended by many in years to come but I have heard before far too often.

So what bothers me about this?  Well firstly, I didn’t really find the characters to have that much depth to them.  Even though I can’t say that any of the actors weren’t convincing, I couldn’t really say that there was anyone that really made me go ‘wow’ and remember their character.  Above all that, I never really became attached to any of these characters, apart from Sigourney Weaver’s character although when I looked at her I only saw Ellen Ripley.  Although I’m pretty sure that even though Sam Worthington was in the monstrosity that is Terminator Salvation, this film will mean that we’ll be seeing a lot more of him.

But what really pisses me off is the complete lack of originality in the whole story which at 162 minutes is extremely drawn out and amazingly James Cameron has been working on since 1994.  I mean, you think that the concept of an incredibly rare mineral found on only one planet is new?  Read Frank Herbert’s Dune, or see David Lynch’s incredibly lush looking 1984 adaptation with imaginative characters, a massive universe full of strange creatures and people and also as an added bonus… Patrick Stewart in a role that was instrumental in him getting the job as Captain Picard.  Other than that, there’s the actual Avatar idea that has the obvious influence of one of the best sci fi movies of the past 20 years ‘The Matrix’.  Then you have the idea of a native race fighting against an invader with vastly superior weaponry, this one has been done in Dune again, if you want to be more obscure there’s Patrick Tilley’s series of books ‘The Amtrak Wars’ and if you want to be blindingly obvious there’s ‘Star Wars: Return of the Jedi’ with the Ewoks.

For plot holes, this film isn’t so bad, other than Sully turns from being classed as nearly entirely incompetent at the start to suddenly becoming a speaker equivalent to Martin Luther King Jr about half way through.  But I expect more from James Cameron who wrote some of the greatest Science Fiction films of all time, not just ‘Aliens’ as I’ve already mentioned, but also the first two ‘Terminator’ films which if you’ve read much of my other stuff you will know I am quite fond of.  These films managed to portray their characters in great depth and carry a message such as the self destructive nature of human beings (ie ‘Terminator) without boring you with it.  Even away from Sci Fi Cameron has made some great films.  He co-wrote ‘Rambo: First Blood part II’ which may not be quite as good as ‘First Blood’ but is still a great action movie.  Even Shitanic… sorry ‘Titanic’ which is only the biggest selling film of all time because half the people who were forced to… I mean went to see it were boyfriends, husbands or fathers of 12 year old girls who cried more than any female in the cinema after they realised that they had to spend £5 on a ticket for that film.  Today, these men now greet men who haven’t seen it with the immortal line ‘you don’t know man, you weren’t there’…  Sorry, even ‘Titanic’ managed to develop its characters and comment on the theme of class without making us bored.

Although, overall I have to say that I did enjoy this film, despite it being overly long.  I just don’t think that it deserves all the hype it gets, and it certainly does not deserve to have done better at the box office than ‘Return of the King’.  For me there are far better sci fi films out there that do not receive anywhere near as much critical and commercial success that do exactly what this genre should do, which is to push the boundaries of imagination and to provide a new way of looking at things that are already important to the world we live in.  I actually think that 2009 was extremely good for this, offering us Duncan Jones’ ‘Moon’ which pushed the boundaries of imagination by giving us an amazing character driven story in which a man meets himself, giving us a situation which we have all wondered about.  Then there was ‘District 9’ by Neill Blomkamp which offered us a visceral and exciting allegory describing the apartheid in South Africa but with a wonderful character development that keeps you guessing throughout the film.  But then we have the more disappointing side of sci fi such as ‘Terminator Salvation’ which given the hype ‘Avatar’ must belong to.  While it may be a landmark in terms of special effects, the story just isn’t up to scratch to warrant its status as a classic and its performance at the box office is thoroughly undeserved.

My Rating: 3 stars out of 5

I liked: Great to look at, the success of this may bring us a new era of great sci fi after an amazing 2009

I disliked:  Overrated, unoriginal, not as good as the following science fiction films:  Moon, District 9, Star Wars Episodes 3, 4, 5 and 6, any Star Trek film other than 5, Starship Troopers, Robocop, Forbidden Planet, 2001: A Space Odyssey, 2010: Odyssey Two, Cube, Cube Zero, Planet of the Apes, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Escape From the Planet of the Apes, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, Solaris, Blade Runner, the original Godzilla, Terminator 1 & 2, Alien, Aliens, Alien 3, Dark Star, Total Recall, The Running Man, I, Robot, Mad Max, Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior, Mad Max 3: Beyond the Thunder Dome, The Day the Earth Stood Still (original), The Thing, The Fly, Quatermass 1, 2 and 3, The Time Machine, Back to the Future 1, 2 and 3, Village of the Damned, Superman 1 and 2, Spider-man 1,2 and yes even 3, X-men 1 and 2, Daredevil, Iron Man, Batman, Batman Returns, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man (yes super heroes count), E.T, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Tron, Dune, Brazil, Bad Taste, Predator 1 and 2, Akira, Jurassic Park, Demolition Man, Pi, The Bicentennial Man, Galaxy Quest, Pitch Black, A.I, Donnie Darko, Evolution, Vanilla Sky, Minority Report, Signs, The Butterfly effect, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, A Scanner Darkly, Host, V for Vendetta, Watchmen, Death Race 2000 and in about 6 months something else will probably come out that I could add to this list.

Ok, now that I’ve vented my anger on the subject of Tarantino films.  It’s time for me to talk about one of the greatest directors of all time… Stanley Kubrick.  From the outset, Kubrick was known for his obsessive perfectionism and attention to detail.  This meant that everything Kubrick made was extremely well thought out and incredibly believable.  But at the same time, what I think makes Kubrick great is that he was still able to look at the big picture and make sure that the film was still enjoyable.

As there are so many Stanley Kubrick films, I can’t review every single one of them.  But I think the only one that I’m missing out that people need to know about is Spartacus.  And this is because I haven’t seen it.  I wish I had, and it is definitely on my list of films to see before I die.  But I’ve chosen to review five, as that’s how many Tarantino films I reviewed.

So here they are…

Dr Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

The first time I saw this film was on an old videotape from about 1993 when the BBC used to give a proper intro to a film before the it was played.  It wasn’t really worth it because the videotape was shit, but I did find out that this was made in the same year as The Sound of Music, which beat this film to the Oscar for best picture that year.  Now that’s ridiculous decision for you.

I’d say that this is the ultimate political comedy and it really does capture the true nature of American paranoia during the cold war.  But even though this film is intended to be a comedy it is still pretty scary in places.  Not through suspense or dead bodies popping out unexpectedly but just how well it portrays politicians and their way of thinking.  Even though the cold war ended nearly 20 years ago now, this film still seems relevant today.

But this film does still manage to be really fucking funny.  The whole crisis begins with a dillusional general named Jack D. Ripper (Sterling Hayden) who orders a nuclear strike on the Soviet Union, believing that they are secretly plotting to contaminate American bodily fluids and prevent them from getting erections.

But the best part of this film is Peter Sellers, playing Captain Lionel Mandrake, President Merkin Muffley and Dr Strangelove himself.  These three totally different characters are all perfectly acted and are scarily convincing.  Other than that one of the most recognisable parts of the film is the war room, which has been copied in countless films and will be instantly recognised by people who haven’t even seen this film.

Originally, the film was mean to end with a pie fight in the war room.  But thankfully Kubrick decided that this farce ending wouldn’t be the most fitting ending to such a black and satirical film.  And I think the ending that is in the final cut is far better.

My Rating: 5 stars out of 5

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Watching this film now, the first thing most people will notice is that it’s set 8 years in the past.  But if you do a bit of research, there’s nothing that’s in this film that is completely unfeasible if someone put the money into it.  And once you see this film, you’ll just wish that someone had.

Here Kubrick worked with Arthur C. Clarke one of the best science fiction writers of all time.  This is the film where Kubrick’s attention to detail really came into its own.  The two of them together created a fantastic vision of what the future SHOULD have been.  Kubrick was so precise with this film that he even created a list of instructions for using a zero gravity toilet, which you only see for about five seconds in the film.  But they would genuinely work I will definitely write them down for the next time I’m in space.

I’ve never really been a fan of modern CGI effects and if you need any proof that models look better than CGI then you need to watch this film.  This film is 41 years old and still looks better than something like the new Star Wars Trilogy, which just looks fake.  Luckily Duncan Jones the director of ‘Moon’ (the best sci fi film in years) has gone back to what works and it looks bloody good.

Apart from being a visual spectacle, even after over 4 decades on the story line is incredibly thought provoking and intelligent.  2001 is split up into four chapters, the first in prehistory, the second on the moon where something strange has been discovered, the third on a space exploration trip to Jupiter, and the fourth… well I can’t describe it really.  Chapter four is something that is really open to interpretation, much like the final scene from the prisoner.

Chapter 3 is most probably the most memorable.  In this chapter we meet the super computer HAL 9000, who is a massive influence on just about every robot or computer since then.  HAL is a character that is rather hard to describe without giving any of the story away, but I think it’s safe to say that the final scene from chapter 3 is one of the greatest sci fi moments of all time.  The other great moment from this film is the sound of ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra’ which is a piece of music imprinted onto the brain of every person who has ever walked the Earth.

The only think wrong with this film is that Kubrick didn’t return for the sequel ‘2010’ made in 1984.  Which is a film that I quite like, but lacks Kubrick’s special touch.

My rating: 5 stars out of 5

A Clockwork Orange (1971)

Now this is a hard one to do justice to in a review.  If you’ve never seen this film before, then you’ll need to completely throw out of the window every single thing you think it might be.  Usually when people talk about this film, they usually refer to the extreme violence and disturbing scenes that are certainly very important to the film.  But the most important part of this film is the idea that morality compromises a person’s freewill.

The main character in this film is the narrator called Alex DeLarge (Malcom McDowell), who is the leader of a gang of teenagers who spend their time assaulting and raping innocent people.  However, despite this, Alex is an extremely intelligent character with a great fondness for classical music.  This film is most famous for being immensely violent, but where this film truly excels is when Alex is arrested for his crimes and enters prison.  Here he becomes very close to the prison chaplain and the bible (but only for its violent characters).  But the greatest part of the film is when a team of scientists wanting to test their Ludovico technique on prisoners visits the prison.  And in return they offer them release from prison in two years.

This is where the main point of the film comes into play.  Yes, the violence in the film really does make this film infamous.  But in my view, people that complain about films being senselessly violent are just trying to make themselves seem better than others, and in turn refuse to see a truly great film.  Which is one of the best of all time in my view.

My Rating: Another 5 out of 5

The Shining (1980)

This film is often cited as one of the best horror films ever made.  But personally I’m not really a fan of this film.  I agree that it is very good and extremely influential to many people and films since then.  But not one of Kubrick’s best.  Although it’s so famous and such a cult classic that I just couldn’t miss it out.

Here Kubrick adapted Stephen King’s novel of the same.  However, there are a lot of differences between the book and the film.  The basic premise of this film is that a family of three are taking care of a hotel during the winter months while it isn’t open.  However, the father Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) finds a little more in the hotel with them.

The Shining is famous for the ending chase, showing off Jack Nicholson’s perfect portrayal of someone completely out of their tree.  And it’s pretty hard to forget the moment when he sticks his head through the hole he has chopped through the door and shouts ‘HERE’S JOHNNY’.

What I like about this film is Jack’s descent into insanity and the weird happenings around the hotel.  In particular the scenes in room 237 are pretty chilling.  Danny Torrance (Danny Lloyd) also plays quite a harrowing character, who has some extra sensory abilities (the shining) to see some of the things that have happened in a certain place.  And some horrible things have happened in this particular hotel, so as soon as you hear Danny repeat the bizarre line ‘redrum’, you know something’s wrong.

But for me this isn’t one of my favourite Kubrick films.  I find that while it is definitely effective at what it does (being really weird) it just doesn’t have the fantastic atmosphere that other Kubrick films have.  Although I still think this is a good film and if any one else had directed it, they would have been projected into superstardom.  But Kubrick has done even better.

But the worst thing about this film is that the Simpsons ruined it in treehouse of horror 5…  That was annoying.

My Rating: 4 stars out of 5

Full Metal Jacket (1987)

This film is without a doubt the best war movie of all time.  It’s definitely a film of two halves, with the first dealing with the immense pressure that soldiers were put under during training before they were sent to Vietnam.  At this point the main character is Leonard Lawrence, who is an overweight, dim witted and unfit recruit, who is subject to extreme abuse from Sergeant Hartman who gives him the nickname ‘Gomer Pyle’.

As the film progresses, the rest of the training marines are punished whenever Pyle ‘fucks up’, the film’s protagonist Joker (Matthew Modine) is then given the task to take care of private Pyle.  From then on the other marines start to treat Pyle very badly, giving him a blanket party a few nights before graduation.  From then on Joker notices how Pyle becomes more and more detached from the rest of the platoon.  Eventually leading to a horrible climax to the first half of the film that has been parodied many times.

The second half of the film is my favourite.  Joker has become a journalist in the army and has reached the level of sergeant.  This part of the film starts with the classic line of a Vietnamese prostitute who walks up to Joker and pronounces ‘ME SUCKY SUCKY!  ME LOVE YOU LONG TIME!’  And a little bit of comedy even in a dark film like this goes a bloody long way.

What really gets me in this film is how Kubrick manages to portray how people are affected by the war and what it turns them into.  One of the most effective scenes in this film is the scene on a chopper where a crazed door gunner fires at every person he sees thinking that they’re all part of the Vietcong.

But Joker’s journey from being a normal innocent person to becoming a hardened soldier is what really makes this film great.  He eventually joins with Cowboy (Arliss Howard) from his training platoon.  In this platoon he meets the most interesting character in the film called Animal Mother (Adam Baldwin).  What’s great about him is his nihilistic outlook on life showing that he was literally ‘born to kill’.  Some of the most harrowing scenes from the film really work because of Animal Mother.  And if you’ve seen this film, just think about his Vietnamese friend.

By the end of the film, you do feel as if you really do understand why this war was so horrible, and in particular what effect horrible decisions have on this film.  What really sticks with me is the final scene where the troops move in on one particular village, with Joker eventually being left with a horrible decision that sums up the brilliance of this film in just a few minutes.

This is definitely my favourite Kubrick film.

My Rating: 5 stars out of 5

Sadly Stanley Kubrick died in 1999, shortly before the release of his final film ‘Eyes Wide Shut’.  And I feel that he is the epitome of what a modern director should be like.  A perfectionist with fantastic attention to detail.  But still having the ability to look at the big picture.

Because I did this as a follow up to my Tarantino article I had to choose the right director to follow it up with.  I chose Kubrick because he was exactly what Tarantino should be.  Tarantino does have the attention to detail, but since ‘Pulp Fiction’, he seems to have lost the ability to look at the big picture, while Kubrick did both so brilliantly.

But the choice in director was harder than you might think, because I think that the Coen brothers are fantastically good at attention to detail and making all round good films.  But Tarantino tries to switch between genres with every film, which the Coen brother do to an extent, but not as dramatically as Kubrick did.  So I think that’s what makes Kubrick so great and such a great model for how to make films.

Today if you ask people who the best director around today is. They will most probably come out with one of two names. Stephen Spielberg or Quentin Tarantino. Personally I wouldn’t choose either of them, but there you go. But looking at those two choices, I can understand completely why someone would choose Stephen Spielberg for this title. He has directed many classic films such as ‘E.T’, ‘Jaws’, ‘Close Encounters’ and my personal favourite ‘Duel’.

Before I start this off, I have to admit that I haven’t seen Reservoir Dogs. Although from what I’ve heard from others it’s pretty much unanimous that it is a good film. But I have seen every film he has directed since (his work as a producer doesn’t count).

In my personal opinion I think that Tarantino is the most overrated director in movie history and some of his films are just plain bad. Granted they’re not on the same level of shit as an Ed Wood film. But I’d still say that they’re rather bad. Anyway let’s start with a classic film…

Pulp Fiction (1994)

Ok I’m not gonna lie this is a fantastic film. It was even mentioned on my top 5 list (although not actually in the top 5). It is one of the best films of the 1990s, which in my humble opinion is when film was at its best.

The plot is expertly woven together through a series of short anecdotes that are told in non-chronological order to tell the story of two gangsters Vincent Vega (John Travolta) and Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) doing the bidding of an LA crime lord, and a local boxer Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis) who runs into trouble with the same crime lord.

Since this film was made many filmmakers have used the idea of non-chronological story telling. My favourites being Memento and Sin City (which Tarantino is credited as ‘Guest Director’, so he probably carried the bucket for the real directors to piss in). But what really makes this great is that the film borrows from nearly all parts of popular culture, particularly in “Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife”. The dialogue really steals the show, with Samuel L. Jackson’s wonderful line ‘A cornerstone of any nutritious breakfast’ or his wallet with ‘bad mother fucker’ written on it.

Personally what I love about this film is how well Tarantino creates a truly bizarre situation. For example the scene in ‘The Gold Watch’ with Butch Coolidge an Marsellus in the basement of a pawn shop or the entirety of ‘The Bonnie Situation’.

This film is extremely well acted and revitalised John Travolta’s career and gaining Uma Thurman and Samuel L. Jackson Academy Award nominations. But above all it proves that Tarantino is a fantastic writer and director, which makes these next films all the more painful to watch.

My rating: 5 starts out of 5.

Jackie Brown (1997)

It wasn’t until years after I saw Pulp Fiction that I saw Jackie Brown, and before that it was pretty much cemented into my brain that Tarantino was one of the great directors of all time. But when I saw this I was rather disappointed as many others were.

Jackie Brown (Pam Grier) is a flight attendant that smuggles drugs money in from Mexico to the USA for Ordell Robbie (Samuel L. Jackson). From there Jackie is caught in the act and is taken to prison until Ordell pays her bail and she is released. But then Jackie decides to take $500,000 from Ordell and then run off with it. And from there the plot focuses around Ordell’s efforts to retain the money and working out who took it from him.

On its own this film is mediocre. It takes its main influence from 1970s blaxploitation films, which is a genre that boasts such ‘classics’ as ‘Blacula’ or ‘Black Mamma, White Mamma’, or some even more ridiculous than that. The only acceptable film that arguably comes from this genre is ‘Shaft’. So already in going for this genre Tarantino is onto a major loser.

The plot and acting aren’t bad, but this film fails because it completely loses the feel and sheer spontaneous and exciting feel of Pulp Fiction. The only part that really does seem to grasp the true feel of Pulp Fiction is the ending with the scene been shown from the different points of view from the various characters. But still, it was better in Pulp Fiction and I got the feeling that he did just wedge it in there because it worked in his last film.

I wouldn’t say that this is a BAD film as such, but not a classic and for this reason starts the decline of Tarantino films.

My rating: 3 and a half out of 5.




Kill Bill Volume 1 (2003)

This film was a much better idea than Jackie Brown. Right away Tarantino returns to what worked in Pulp Fiction by separating the film into non-chronological chapters. And when I saw ‘Chapter One’ imposed on the screen after ‘Revenge is a dish best served cold’ I was expecting a lot from this film.

I have to say that the action sequences in this film are very good, and the cinematography is just plain great. This time Tarantino pays homage to Eastern Chanbara (Samauri to normal people) and Martial Arts films, which instantly improves on the idea of using blaxploitation as the basis for a film.

But where this one fails is when the order of the chapters makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. First Uma Thurman fights a woman in a scene where her character’s name is beeped out. Which isn’t clever and doesn’t make you laugh it’s just plain annoying. Then she’s in a hospital where a one eyed woman comes along with a sword, who is then told not to stab her by a guy on a phone and then she kills so many Chinese gangsters it should most probably be considered genocide.

Now at the end of this there is no real explanation as to why she has done this…

I am aware that it was always intended for there to be a sequel to this, but there should never be any film in which you haven’t missed anything or failed to understand anything and still think ‘WHAT WAS THAT?’ It’s not clever or inspired; it’s just bad storytelling.

Although I did like little parts in the film such as ‘Buck’. Who is a creation that does go back to the days of Pulp Fiction era Tarantino. And the fight scenes in the film were in fact so good that it really satisfied me and made me think of Tarantino quite positively.

Overall, I must admit that I liked this the first time I saw it. But sadly after seeing the second one and knowing how the whole thing panned out I really no longer enjoy this film. There is so much violence all over the place but nowhere does it explain why anything happening is happening. But volume 2 really made up for that.

My Rating: 3 stars out of 5


Kill Bill Volume 2 (2004)

This is the film where I really think that Tarantino took a nosedive. Whereas the first film spends so much time on violence that you don’t know what’s happening, this one spends so long on tedious back-story that you don’t even care and get bored.

After a very long opening scene in which Tarantino wedges Samuel L. Jackson into this film, something finally happens when it cuts to a guy in a trailer. This bloke who Is basically the main guy’s bitch manages to outsmart Uma Thurman and stick her in a coffin which she punches her way out of, among flashbacks to her training with her martial arts master. The one eyed woman then comes along, and there’s a fight and then there’s a really bad anti climax.

For me endings are extremely important, it’s the reason why I hate the critically and commercially successful 28 days later. But the ending to this film is just diabolical. I sat through two hours of film, enjoying the violence but not really knowing what’s happening. Then the next two hours I wanted to see more violence, but got bored of waiting and saw some really drawn out story which did not need to be there.

What really annoys me about these two films is that there is enough there to make a truly fantastic and fun film. It just doesn’t need to be four hours long. If it had been condensed down into one film and had the big fight scene at the end rather than having a stupid and boring technique to kill off the main villain I would have been happy. But it didn’t.

Why couldn’t Tarantino have changed this, I mean after all it was his film? Well it’s apparently because even though it was directed and ‘written’ by him. The actual story is stolen from the 1971 Japanese film ‘Lady Snowblood’ in which a woman takes revenge on the bandits that killed her father. The only differences in Kill Bill are that it’s the fiancé that is killed, the main character is American who visits the Far East, and that Kill Bill is four hours long and Lady Snowblood is 97 minutes long.

So really even though he basically just made an American remake of a film and tagged his own title on it, he still made it four hours long. That’s what I call idiocy.

My Rating: 2 stars out of 5


Death Proof (2007)


Tarantino’s most recent film is without doubt the worst. This time Tarantino rips off the Grindhouse genre working with fellow director Robert Rodriguez to recreate some over the top gory films much like what were seen in cinemas in the 1970s. Tarantino and Rodriguez made one film each. Tarantino’s was Death Proof and Rodriguez’s was Planet Terror (a zombie movie that was actually quite amusing).

Now after seeing this I think I have seen my very least favourite film of all time. The plot is basically needless with all characterisation of very little consequence to the rest of the film. Basically a former stunt driver arrives in a small town where he meets some slutty models in a bar who are very unkind to one girl in particular who he takes in a car who he kills with rough driving. He then goes onto drive straight into the car with the models inside after which you see a slight glimpse of gore.

You might accept this, but it takes about 45 minutes for this to actually happen, and most of the time what’s happening is a bunch of whiny pretty boys are begging the slutty girls for sex. It’s just boring. After that’s happened the film then goes to a group of normal girls who are just going on a road trip who are then attacked by the stuntman in his car. Then for the rest of the film there is a car chase where nothing really gets smashed and basically all that happens is that you see two cars driving side by side.

To make matters worse, in the first half you get the feeling that maybe this driver wants to punish immoral women, as he does take a very long time to talk to the slutty girls. But in the second half he never meets them until he drives straight into them, so that idea just goes straight out of the window.

What Tarantino says about this car chase is that he wanted to create the best car chase ever. But he seems to have totally missed the point of a good car chase. Things need to get smashed to pieces. And all that happens here is that two cars drive side by side and occasionally bump into each other. If this happened on the motorway the most you’d get would be a honk from the other driver and then you’d be able to lip read ‘fuck off’ from the guy through your window I mean compared to this, Junction 27 is like Death Race 2000. Although the majority of Spielberg’s ‘Duel’ takes place with only two vehicles, what makes that good is the development of the driver who becomes genuinely afraid of the other driver chasing him.

The film even fails to emulate a grindhouse film. The whole idea of grindhouse was that it would show very graphic images and off the wall ideas, showing dubbed martial arts films or extreme gore (such as George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead). But there is no gore, or graphic images in Death Proof. It’s just boring. Planet Terror on the other hand, had lots of gore and funny ideas (like a woman with a gun for a leg) it even mad the nice touch of cutting out a roll of film (much like grindhouse theatres often did).

My advice is to see Planet Terror if you like a stupid films and don’t mind zombie films. But NEVER EVER see Death Proof. It is the worst film ever.

My Rating: Negative 5 out of 5.



These days Tarantino is a lot like Metallica. He used to be brilliant, but now he’s just awful. The difference is that a lot of people just refuse to see that Tarantino is now shit.

I think his problem really lies in the fact that he’s just pretentious, and tries too hard to be clever. For example he saw that people thought he was really clever with his non-chronological story lines in Pulp Fiction and tried to apply it elsewhere (for example Kill Bill) and it just didn’t have the same effect. His other problem is that he tries to genre switch, but switches to really bizarre and obscure genres that most people don’t know because they’re just not very good.

Personally I just think he’s trying to be Stanley Kubrick, who could switch from Sci Fi (2001: A Space Odyssey), to Horror (The Shining), to war (Full Metal Jacket), to political comedy (Dr Strangelove) or even film noir (A Clockwork Orange). This is a rare gift that Tarantino just doesn’t have. In his mind he’s trying to rub against the rave of the late Kubrick hoping that some day he may evolve into a likeness of him but in reality he’s neglected the fact that he can actually make a pretty good damn film and needs to stick to what he’s good at.

However, later on this month his new film ‘Inglorious Basterds’ shall be released which shall be a war film based in France. Sadly Tarantino says that this film shall be his ‘Spaghetti Western’ and will also be influenced by… wait for it… ‘French New Wave Cinema’. A war film idea wouldn’t be a bad idea but the other two really are bad ideas. I will review this film, and hopefully he will be like Metallica and after years of shit will release his very own ‘Death Magnetic’…

So as I’ve started writing reviews of films, I thought it’d be a good idea to stop for a bit and talk about some of my favourite films, so that people reading my reviews know what I like. Here I’ve written a list of my top 5 favourite films of all time. This list isn’t a countdown to the greatest cinematic achievements since ancient wizards gifted our modern scientists with the ability to make pictures move. Just the 5 five that have made me think or I’ve enjoyed the most.

Before I start here are some films that nearly made it onto the list that deserve a mention.

· Citizen Kane – often cited as the best film in the history of cinema by many experts, and not without reason. Orson Welles is without doubt the best director of all time and creates a fantastic human story. Very influential and way before its time (1941). When we make first contact with aliens, before they eat our brains and burst out of our stomachs, they must see this film.

· Pulp Fiction – For years I considered Quentin Tarantino to be the best director since Orson Welles. Sadly I’ve hated with a passion everything he’s done since this film, which is what keeps it out of the top 5. But this still remains a triumph for film, and is very cleverly made with complex and original story lines running through the film, no character left without their own story to tell.

· The Dark Knight – it’s a funny time we live in where films based on cartoons are becoming the best selling films of the year. But not without reason, and this is the best of the lot so far. Incredibly clever ideas and themes are interwoven with exciting action sequences and seamless effects. A modern classic.

· Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade – Spielberg at his finest along with a George Lucas while still he bothered to tell stories and didn’t rely on CGI to make up for a lack of story. This is the essential adventure film, exciting and amusing. With classic scenes that are imprinted into the minds of every person in the Western world. And Indiana Jones meets James Bond in this film

· 2001: A Space Odyssey – Stanley Kubrick at his best with astonishing effects that are still better than most CGI even now more than 40 years later. It is the perfect vision of what the millennium should have brought us. And here we are in 2009. By now we should have reached deep space and be having battles with Klingons while William Shatner flies through space with a crew he treats like shit

· Planet of the Apes – 1968 was a great year for Sci fi. Planet of the Apes starring Charlton Heston was released in the same year as 2001, but this time with a much darker story line with a truly horrifying outcome. Without doubt THE best ending ever.

· Full Metal Jacket – don’t worry this is the last one before the list. Another top notch Stanley Kubrick film, this time set during the Vietnam war. Definitely a film of two halves with the first dealing with the abuse of soldiers during training, and the second dealing with the horrors of the war itself. Far superior to the overrated and overly long Apocalypse now, definitely one to see while you’re still on this earth. Now read on and find the top 5. WHAT IS YOUR MAJOR MALFUNCTION?


5. Point Break (1991)

These days when you say Keanu Reeves most people think of the Matrix or Speed. But waaaay back in the early 1990s the only thing anyone really knew him for was Bill and Ted. Then in 1991 came Point Break… a film about surfing.

When I first saw this film I was with two friends in my bedroom after two solid days of movies as part of our three-day movie marathon. This was the last film that we watched before Die Hard. And by the time we were half way through that, I’d become so tired that I could no longer understand English.

The plot revolves around an under cover police officer named Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves), who is sent to investigate a series of bank robberies by a gang named the ‘ex-presidents’. Working under the idea that the robbers are in fact surfers Johnny falls in with a bunch of adrenaline junkies who live their lives in accordance to what brings them the most personal freedom.

. During the film Johnny slowly becomes a close friend of the leader of the surfer named Bodhi (Patrick Swayze). As the two of them become closer, Johnny is persuaded and intrigued by Bodhi’s activities, lifestyle and his philosophies. While this is happening, you as the audience are drawn into the social conflictions that Johnny experiences where he must do his job, but feels he must remain loyal to Bodhi.

To this day I believe that the Fast and the Furious would have been a brilliant film…

IF IT HADN’T STOLEN THE WHOLE IDEA FROM POINT BREAK.

But to be fair to it, there were cars in there. That makes all the difference.

Point Break is possibly the best action movie ever made. With gunfights to rival Scarface, parachute fights, and a guy that screams and then empties his clips into the sky… and if that sounds familiar, this is the film where Hot Fuzz got that from.

From start to finish this film demonstrates exactly what people love about Keanu Reeves. I admit that some people feel that his performance in the day the Earth Stood Still was just dire. But that was just an inferior film.

After watching this film the only thing that will stop you from running away from home to join the FBI and shoot at surfing drug dealers is what Simon Pegg said in Hot fuzz. ‘Such violence would require a considerable amount of paperwork’.


Also wins for being: the film with the best Richard Nixon joke ever made


4. Terminator 2 (1991)

What can I say about this film that hasn’t already been said?

Well to be honest I’m boring so nothing… but here’s what I think of it.

Before James Cameron made Titanic (the biggest selling film of all time), he was most famous for his Sci Fi films ‘Terminator’ 1 & 2 and ‘Aliens’. All three of which are now considered to be modern sci fi classics, and are certainly extremely influential on the science fiction we see today.

In 1984, James Cameron made the low budget film ‘The Terminator’ starring a then relatively unknown Arnold Schwarzenegger as an evil robot from the future sent back to kill the mother of the leader of the human resistance Sarah Connor. I do explain the back-story of the series in far more detail in my T4 review so I’ll get on with T2 in this one.

What really appeals to me about this film is that when James Cameron made this film, he made the decision to bring back Arnold Schwarzenegger to his signature role. But he was bold enough to take the risk to turn him into the hero of the film.

As I grew up after this film was made, and didn’t see it until 10 years afterwards. I wasn’t too shocked about Arnie being the good guy, because as with every great film, there are so many jokes about them in the Simpsons and other cartoons that give away the story to kids that have never seen the film. But for fans of T1 going to see T2 in 1991 (assuming that their friends didn’t ruin it for them) they had no clue that Arnie was the good guy.

While the first film deals with Sarah Connor, being chased by a something completely alien to her. In T2, John Connor has been taken away from his mother and has been convinced that what she preached to him about the terminators and the apocalypse is bullshit. And when the terminator shows up John is immediately thrown back into his memories of rejection at being different to all the kids at school who were ‘all into Nintendo’. As this happens John develops a loving relationship with the terminator in a father son relationship.

But while this happens Sarah Connor still fears the Terminator due to its resemblance to the unstoppable machine that tried to kill her 10 years earlier. Severe conflicts occur during the film and emotional tension leads to a heart-wrenching ending that will always live on in the minds of anyone who has seen this film. TRUE MEN CRY AT T2!

Along with all of the emotional tension, expertly created by James Cameron. He also creates greatest villain in film history in the form of the T-1000. This machine can transform to make itself look like anyone it wants to and did I mention? It can STAB people with its hands. Adding to this he doesn’t half have a way with words. He KNOWS what hurts.
Sadly this film is tarnished by its own success, and even though the end to this film is pretty conclusive, the many fans of this film demanded a sequel. Sadly James Cameron did not return to make another sequel and Jonathan Mostow made T3 and McG made T4. both were horribly bad films which I advise you never to see.

Ironically this is the best sequel ever made by James Cameron the master of all sequels. Even though we’re still waiting for Titanic 2.

However, this film still remains one the all time great sci fi classics without becoming so cerebral that mainstream audiences can’t appreciate it. This is an immensely thought provoking but at the same time exciting film and people will watch this throughout all time. The best sci fi movie ever.

Also wins for: being the perfect example of a film that really shouldn’t have had a sequel.


3. Fight Club (1999)

I don’t think I was alone in thinking that Brad Pitt was a pretty boy before I saw this film. And sadly some people still do think of him in that way. But this film is a true gem that shows off his acting abilities as possibly the best actor of his generation. Not forgetting his interaction with Edward Norton to make a wonderful film full of anti establishment messages and excitement.

Edward Norton plays an insomniac employee of an automobile company who feels trapped in the world he lives in. While trying everything to escape his horrible life and to cure his insomnia he attends every single help session he hears about until he meets the mysterious Tyler Durbin (Brad Pitt) on a business plane flight who leads him to his derelict house right after he beats the crap out of him. Norton slowly realises that if his escape will come through releasing his stress in fighting.

He and Tyler Durbin then set up a secret fight club where other men with problems come to fight one another. From here the film descends into a tale of self-discovery and mystery as Norton begins to feel that he is losing his mind.

Filled with memorable lines that will unite fans of this film no matter what their colour, creed or religion. It is a film that is becoming more and more popular and needs to be seen for it to be really understood.

Yes it is VERY violent but don’t let that put you off, it is a brilliant film with an ending that I genuinely did not see coming. Now go see it before the Simpsons ruins the ending for you.

Also wins for: being the film that I really have found hardest to describe without really giving it away

2. Blade Runner (1982)

Remember when I said that Terminator 2 was the best sci fi movie ever???

I LIED!

Based upon Phillip K. Dick’s novel ‘do androids dream of electric sheep’ I think (even though it is entirely different) that this is the best film adaptation of all time. Even though Harrison Ford will always be remembered as being Han Solo and Indiana Jones, to me he seems right at home in the position of Deckard.

Set in the very far future of 2019 after a nuclear war that kills most animal life and causes night and rain constantly. Humanity has expanded to colonies away from Earth and has produced the technology to create cheap labour in the form of human replicants. However, due to how advanced this technology actually is the replicants start to gain human emotions after a few years and have to be given a 4-year lifespan in order to stop rebellion. Due to the development of human emotions and the possibility of rebellion, replicants who wish to extend their lifespan are illegal on Earth.

In order to hunt down any replicants that make it to Earth, the police forms a new branch of law enforcement where special detectives called ‘Blade Runners’ hunt down the replicants. Deckard is one of these ‘Blade Runners’.

Director Ridley Scott gives this story the amazing backdrop of a dystopian Los Angeles with amazing high rise buildings and flying vehicles, which still looks amazing even to this day. But in my opinion the thing that really gives the film its distinctive feeling is the soundtrack. Brilliantly well composed and the most atmospheric sounds I have ever heard.

Our main character in this film shouldn’t really be seen as a hero as such. As throughout the film, Ford’s performance beautifully portrays Deckard’s reluctance to hunt down replicants that only want to have more time to live. Likewise even though the other characters in the film see them as villains, the replicants provide an amazing emotional point of view that doesn’t turn them into heroes, but cleverly helps you sympathise with them, while at the same time not making you turn on Deckard.

Possibly the most interesting part of the film, is the replicant known as Rachael. She is unaware of the fact that she is not human due to the memories implanted in her brain before she was awakened, and as a consequence has no idea what she has actually experienced in her life or what others put into her mind.

These days Hollywood is devious in trying to make you buy the same dvd (or if you’re as fancy as me blu ray) over and over again by sticking ‘director’s cut’ or ‘special, extended or ultimate edition’ (but sadly no ‘penultimate edition’). Well the film you really have to thank for that is Blade Runner. Whereas the original has a voice narration by Harrison Ford, the director’s cut does not. But the main difference between the two versions is just a 5 second scene, which will almost completely pass you by when you see it. But by the end of the film and the credits roll, there are two completely different feelings at the end. Never before or since have I seen anything where the director’s cut has worked so well.

But when you have watched the film and reached the final scene, you will truly see how the future SHOULD be. Seriously, screw all these high tech electronics, computers and HD tv. We should be living our lives in a constant atmospheric night-time with cars flying above our heads and androids running on our streets. But I suppose it’s still 10 years to 2019, we still have time to pull our socks up.

Also wins for: just being plain ace

And finally, here is my favourite film of all time…





1. Jacob’s Ladder (1990)

Right now the likelihood is that you’ve never heard of this film, or that you’ve heard OF it but haven’t seen it. And as well you’re probably a bit confused as to why I’ve put it as my number one film.

Well this film is usually described as a psychological horror or as a war film. Personally I don’t think it’s either of those two. But I do feel that it is very influential in the horror genre, particularly in modern horror such as ‘Saw’, which is one of my favourite horror films.

The story begins in Vietnam, and Jacob Singer (Tim Robbins) is an American soldier as part of a platoon that suddenly comes under attack from the Vietcong. From there Jacob’s Platoon is slaughtered and Jacob himself runs off into the jungle and gets lost, where he is stabbed in the chest by an unseen attacker. The film then cuts to Jacob’s life in 1975 where he lives with his second wife having been divorced after his son died shortly after his return from Vietnam.

As Jacob tries to live his life as normal, he finds that wherever he goes he is followed by mysterious figures that appear to have no faces. While Jacob tries to live his life, the film cuts between the present day and Vietnam. In the present day, Jacob becomes ill and begins to hallucinate increasingly violent and disturbing scenes while he is only able to find solace with his chiropractor who works on some of the injuries he sustained during the war.

When the film jumps back to Vietnam we find Jacob’s memories of the bloody battle in which he was stabbed in the chest and his return to the United States where he sees his first wife and his dead son come to greet him.

By the time you’re about three quarters of the way through the film you’ll feel as if you’ve worked it all out. Although I’m quite sure that no one has ever managed to work this film out before the very end. And when the film does come to its very clever end, I think this is where the true greatness of the film comes across and everything snaps into place.

So why is this my favourite film?

Well it clicked with me. Adrian Lyne directed the film to make it look very stark, with most of the scenes shot outside being overcast. This is far more important than it might seem, as you begin to relate to it more and more as Jacob’s sanity seems to leak away throughout.

You will probably never see this film in any list of 100 greatest films. It is either omitted from or at the very end of any list of films involving Vietnam and is basically seen as a minor part of Tim Robbins’ career. But this is a truly great story and really it makes you think.

I don’t think that this film will ever be considered a classic, and I don’t know why but it seems to have already been forgotten about after 19 years since its release. But my advice is to see this film and you’ll see what I mean.

Also wins for: being great but obscure enough to still be able to make your own interpretations about without people repeating what loads of critics have said…

And the Simpsons won’t ruin it

Ok, let’s look at transformers for what it really is…

It’s a film based on a line of Japanese toys. That’s it. But after all that it’s one of the most loved series around, with millions of fans (mostly guys) around the world. Most cult series with massive followings such as Star Trek or Star Wars, if you admit to someone else that you’re a fan, your social status automatically drops to the level of a mutated and diseased squid.

Transformers is different. In the respect that every man under the age of 35 loves transformers and will always respond to their war cry ‘ROLL OUT’. Optimus Prime and his autobots represent the ultimate cool toys, and no other toy line has ever and will ever surpass the transformers.

In 2007, producer Stephen Spielberg and director Michael Bay made the first live action adaption of the transformers. Some fans had been waiting 20 years for this to happen and I think most of us could admit (even though Megatron is a gun and not a plane) that it didn’t disappoint. Even though I usually hate CGI effects, the movie looked great. Cars turned into robots… AND IT LOOKED REAL!!! I do hope I’m not alone in being rather heartbroken to get home and realise that no matter how much I poked my dad’s car that it wasn’t going to transform into a 12 ft tall robot called bumblebee.

With Revenge of the Fallen I have to say that this movie was great too. Even though we only saw some transformers in passing there were so many new ones around, my only complaint being that soundwave wasn’t as involved as I would have liked. But then again ravage was really cool.

But the film has been critically panned, and I mean REALLY panned. Complaints have been made about it being too long, the humour too vulgar, the destruction of some monuments uncomfortable and some transformers representing black stereotypes.

In favour of a few of these things the movie is 2 and a half hours long, and to a 40 year old guy that was never got to play with the world’s greatest toys in his childhood, they won’t really understand the film and two hours must seem like torture. With the humour in the film, it is stupid I have to admit and not exactly what your grandparents would call ‘good taste’.

Although who is this film for? Well it is for the old fans, but then again it’s for kids. No old fan should go in there hoping for a cerebral sci fi movie because that’s never what it was. A child’s sense of humour is pretty silly and deep down every Transformers fan loves the same sort of silly humour. On the subject of it being too long I never felt bored during that film at all. And if I was, you’d know about it.

Without giving away any of the film, there is a scene where the Transformers destroy part of the pyramids. Some critics have said that this was wrong to destroy such a famous monument. In my opinion this is ridiculous, have these people ever seen independence day where the whitehouse is destroyed, the day after tomorrow, deep impact or any disaster movie where plenty of famous monuments are destroyed. But just because those are American that makes it ok I suppose.

On the subject of the racial stereotypes. These are robots, they are not black, white or any colour whatsoever when a joke is made it’s not meant to make fun of any colour at all and when I laughed at the two transformers in question I never thought ‘this is funny because it reminds me of black people’. I’m sure that these people must just have had this sort of thing in mind when they made this observation and I think it says more about the critic than it does about the film.

I have few complaints about this film as I really did enjoy it. But just to nitpick I didn’t like the idea of megatron not being the highest decepticon. As to be fair he is the most badass villain ever to grace a television screen. However, he does blow a lot of stuff up and in one word it looks GREAT!

Other than that there is only Starscream that annoyed me. In the series he was constantly trying to take power from megatron and only kept in place because at the end of the day Megatron was just seriously hard. But in this film, even though there are similarities to this idea, the only thing that could have made Starscream even more of a pussy would have been if he’d worn a gimp mask throughout the film.

All in all I believe that the critics that hate this movie are wrong on this occasion, as it looks to be the biggest selling film at the box office this year, so the the autobots must have done something right. And it has, this film is funny, exciting, full of explosions and full of Megan Fox.

If you were born before 1975 you just won’t understand this film and don’t go to see it because I’m sure you make up the vast majority of the critics that gave it such bad reviews. But if you were born after 1975 go see it and just remember what it was like to be a kid watching Transformers, Beast Wars or any series since. Then sit down in the theatre with your popcorn, your drink and your beloved optimus prime action figure and let the film roll out.

Rating: Four and a half stars out of Five

I liked: Cars turn into robots, great effects, great cinematography, Megan Fox

I disliked: Lack of Soundwave.

The Terminator… one of the best sci fi movie franchises that has ever existed. I think it’s fair to say that 1984’s original Terminator was a masterpiece by director James Cameron made on a shoestring budget of only $6 million. After the films release it quickly became a cult classic, with a massive following all over the world.

Then Cameron did a brave thing and made a sequel to this cult classic. We all know that if you do make a film like The Terminator, with so many fans. You open yourself up to criticism for becoming too mainstream or losing what you tried to say in the first film.

But Cameron did it. In T2 he took possibly the most menacing villain from any film ever and turned him into a hero. The film is just as much as a masterpiece as the original, going further into the emotional side of the characters and yet still retaining everything that’s good about the original.

Then in 2003, tragedy struck. Jonathan Mostow took over from James Cameron in the franchise and released the monstrosity that is Terminator 3. Which proved to be possibly even more disappointing than Alien Resurrection (another franchise Cameron played a major role in).

It sucked balls (in a metaphorical sense), destroying the key themes of non-fatalism and destroyed the Terminator that audiences fell in love with in T2 who was able to take a sideways look upon humanity and eventually come to terms with our values even better than we do. To top all that off it didn’t even explain why the events in the film even took place. After the whole fight to destroy Sky net in T2, the T3 script-writers were unable to think of any way round the destruction of Cyberdyne, other than one line… ‘Judgement day is inevitable’… PURE GENIUS GUYS!

So now it’s 2009. Most of us have gotten over the pain of T3, which was only second to the agony that was the Phantom Menace. Under a new director, taking the franchise in a totally new direction. T4 is basically a reboot after the disappointment of T3, with another two movies to come to make a new terminator trilogy.

Ok, let’s think about this. Reboots have worked before, in fact very well recently. After Batman & Robin, Christopher Nolan returned to the gritty Frank Miller style Batman that was closer to Tim Burton’s original Batman. I think I speak for the vast majority of film fans when I say that both films were tremendously good. Then more recently we have Star Trek; a huge franchise that was nearly destroyed by the two turkeys of Star Trek Insurrection and Star Trek Nemesis. The reboot took the series in a new direction, giving old fans enough nostalgic references to the classics, but not taking itself too seriously to alienate the general audiences.

So thinking about it, a reboot for The Terminator series sounds pretty good. It’s a chance to see into the future depicted only in brief sections of the first two movies, which I have to admit, were pretty cool. It’s also a chance to get to grips with John Connor as an adult. Throughout the series we hear about the John Connor the leader, which we can now see, as well as many other characters that we haven’t seen before.

The first thing that gave me worries (other than the fact that the guy directing this film calls himself McG) was that the certificate given to the film was a 12A. Usually this is incredibly superficial, as there are fantastic U films and SHITE 18 films. But here’s my point.

What do we love about the Terminator films (the first two I mean)? It’s the fact that the films are very character based, with most shots focusing on the actors/actresses. These characters are then set up against a terminator that is incredibly tough. With only the occurrence of a miracle being able to destroy it. More than any theme of time travel or robots, the great thing about the films is how our heroes manage to deal with their foes. But apart from that what do we love?

It’s the stuff like when Arnold Schwarzenegger returns to his motel room and tears out his eyeball. Or when he marches into a police station and ruthlessly kills every cop in the building. It’s the bits like when Robert Patrick disguises himself as the floor and kills a man who he stabs through the eye with his finger. Or the moment where Arnie tears off his skin to prove to Myles Dyson that terminators exist. These graphic images are more important to the films than you might think, giving us a perfect way to see how inhuman and strange these machines are.

You can’t put this stuff in a 12A film. The producers have wanted to target younger audiences as well. But you just can’t do that because it removes the violence that brought excitement and suspense to the films.

So after all these things have gone through my head I sit down in the cinema not really knowing what to expect. And the first thing that really strikes me (other than the lack of original theme tune as in all reboots) is the cinematography. John Connor fights against huge machines that look more like Megatron than a T-800. And I’ve already said that one of the best things about the classics is how personal it is. You’re never really going to get Megatron to follow Michael Biehn and Linda Hamilton through a factory are you? This alone made one side of my mouth droop a tiny bit. So then as the film goes on you start seeing resistance fighter jets chasing round HKs through mountainous regions. Giant robots, combined with fighter jets chasing futuristic looking aircraft doesn’t really make me think of Terminator. It makes it seem like a cross between Transformers and Independence Day.

You also have to wonder that after a nuclear war that must have finished about 10 years or so before this film. How the FUCK does the resistance who are a tiny band of humans (who are fighting against machines that probably took out any military complexes before anything else) managed to get hold of fighter jets in the first place?

The next thing that bothers me is that when the new character is introduced into the film Marcus Wright a terminator with a human heart and brain (Sam Worthington) he walks straight up to a terminator with a bloody MACHINE GUN attached to its arm and shouts ‘hello’. And when the young Kyle Reece (Anton Yelchin) comes to his rescue, it’s not the boy that has managed to survive with only a small child as a companion that asks the obvious questions such as ‘are you a fucking retard for walking up to that?’ or ‘how could you possibly have missed the nuclear holocaust that destroyed most of the world’s cities and population?’ it’s the clueless Marcus Wright that manages to get Kyle to tell him everything about the last 15 years without question.

Then we move onto our main character, the military leader John Connor (Christian Bale). You’d expect that the writers of the script would have at least dedicated some time to developing the character that has obviously changed since most of the world’s population has been destroyed. But no, Connor’s character is left paper-thin with no insight into why he would make certain decisions other than some of the very few references to the earlier films. I find it hard to imagine that Hollywood writers could possibly think that you can leave out characterisation just because there have been previous films. Did no one ask them the obvious question ‘what if someone hasn’t seen T2 or T3?’

Connor also seems to have a girlfriend, who I can only assume is Catherine Brewster from T3, whose only role seems to be to get Christian Bale to say ‘I’ll be back’ for a few smiles in the audience.

Even though I do find it implausible that Kyle Reece would not ask questions about him, I am of the opinion that Marcus Wright was actually an extremely good character. Even though when it is revealed that he is actually a terminator it had been blindingly obvious. He does provide the driving force of the story line and the main theme of what makes someone human. Then they kill him off… in possibly the most ridiculous ending ever. Watching the film I really got the feeling that someone imagined a machine like this, and the rest of the movie was built around this idea.

One of the best scenes from the first Terminator films is where, the adult Reece falls asleep under a bridge and dreams about his life in the future. What is shown is starving families trying to get warm by burning old TV sets and feeding themselves with dead rats. In this film we never see this side of the future, all we see is explosions, idiotic characters and rubbish terminators. At no point is there any scene where we are able to empathise with how difficult life must be in the future and how much suffering actually goes on in this time.

There are also a couple of unintentionally hilarious moments. Particularly when Reece and Wright arrive in a petrol station filled with a small group of resistance fighters and are then ambushed by a 50 ft tall robot that makes a gigantic buzzing noise when it moves and causes near earthquakes when it takes a step. Or when the unstoppable terminator rides a bike and is taken down by a bit of nylon wire. And who could forget when John Connor breaks into the prison and leaves the door open and an Ethernet cable is left hanging from the control panel that a terminator walks straight passed the open doors (easily able to shoot Connor in the back) and decides that the leader of the resistance is not really worth his time and walks away.

I do have to commend the effects of the final scene, where a functioning T-800 finally appears. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s face is blended in perfectly to create the image of a new terminator, the endo-skeleton is perfectly depicted and really gives the sense that it truly is an unstoppable machine that puts the human race in extreme peril.

But while I do notice that the Y-800 was amazing and for me boosted the film immensely the actual Sky net facility it covered with control panels that are obviously there so that anything with two arms and five digits on both hands can operate the release of a prison cell. Doesn’t that seem a little pointless when Sky net is a computer programme that is hooked into everything it makes and is therefore able to open the cells remotely?

Well every villain needs a ‘foil the plan’ button I suppose.

But above all what the filmmakers do seem to have totally ignored is that the Terminator films are characterised by Arnold Scharzenegger and Linda Hamilton. Those two are responsible for providing the whole point of the franchise with the themes of non-fatalism, the dangers of machines, along with the problems with the destructive nature of humanity. As soon as Linda Hamilton rejected her part in T3 the franchise was finished. And now Arnie has become the Governator, there seems little hope of getting him back.

All in all I have to say that even though there were things to like about the film, it was not good enough as a sequel to the classics. If Mcg had wanted to make this film he should have created his own franchise where he was free to create his own universe rather than clawing at James Cameron’s genius.




Rating 3 out of 5

I liked: Good effects, Marcus Wright making a very interesting idea and character, t-800 portrayed perfectly.

I disliked: Inappropriate cinematography, predominantly undeveloped characters, large plot holes, shot as a day time film when the others were reliant upon the night for their atmospheres.