Most of the reviews in this post are for films I REALLY LIKE and this makes things difficult. I don't like giving spoilers and if I think a film is really good I try to avoid giving anyone too many clues as to what the film will be like. I generally find it's easiest to fill a review with the problematic elements and a good movie won't have so many of those.
So, to get things started I'm going to review Highlander III because I went into it already knowing it was going to be awful.
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Highlander III
I'd already seen this and I knew it wasn't great, but on a second watch it was even worse than I remembered. I think it probably helped that the previous time I watched it was only shortly after seeing Highlander II: The Quickening, which is possibly one of the most ridiculously stupid and awful movies in existence. After the second movie, the third couldn't help but look good by comparison.
One scene which was quite fun was where the bad guy (who has obtained sorcery powers) mirrors the old lady in the car scene from the first movie. He takes off the steering wheel and throws it around and drives the car straight towards various obstacles which turn out to be illusory. The problem is that because he's using sorcery you eventually realise that there's no real danger at all, so it doesn't really match up to the driving into oncoming traffic and playing chicken which took place in the original movie. While the bad guy plays his part with gusto he doesn't have a good reason for speaking like Batman (deep and low scary voice) this time.
In the first movie, the kirgan had a large gash across his throat from a previous attempt to defeat him, so his odd voice is somewhat expected. And there were all sorts of nice visual touches like that which made it stick in your mind. As well as the Kirgan's stitches across his throat he also had a sword made up on various pieces which slot together. Also the quickening effects were another aspect which looked much more impressive in the first movie than they do here.
Also, the suggestion that oridinary mortals can decapitate immortals kinda ruins the mythology for me. The Kirgan's gash across his throat in the first movie had been with him for centuries, suggesting that while the immortals are pretty much immune to ordinary blows decapitation by a fellow immortal is somehow different. We don't really know why, but it's part of the mythology. Yet in a flashback an immortal is executed by a guillotine without a fellow immortal operating it. Surely if a guillotine can do the trick so could a chainsaw? Suddenly the immortals don't seem anything like so imposing if a typical execution can do them in. And the original movie also involved a tradition of not fighting on holy ground (somewhat solidifying the idea that the immortals are somewhat vampire-esque), but in this movie it turns out that this is optional. Yet another piece of the mythology is thus thrown out on a whim.
Add to this the poor pacing, the poor acting, Christopher Lambert being as rubbish as always and a generally amateurish feel to the whole project and you've got a seriously bad movie. Basically, after the attempt at making an interesting story went massively pear-shaped in the second movie, this third movie provides the deeply mediocre sequel that we'd normally expect. And it does a really bad job of it too.
So why did I decide to re-watch this then? Well, some years after first watching it I was enjoying the silly but fun animated movie of "Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children". It made utterly no sense, but it looked amazing and the fight scenes were awesome. I was saying to a friend, where else are you going to find sword fights on motorcycles. His answer? Highlander III. Having re-watched the movie I have to say he entirely misremembered. I didn't see a single swordfight on motorcycles and I feel thoroughly p***ed off now. Hmmmph!
0.5/5
Children Of Men
Set in a future where there is no hope, Alfonso Cuaron adapts the P.D. James novel which imagines that humans randomly and inexplicably become unable to have children. The late Grace Jantzen, one of my favourite philosophers of religion, was quite struck by this idea that a world without birth is a world without hope. (She considered our society to be overly focussed on mortality rather than on natality i.e. the end of life rather than new beginnings. If you think about it, the pro-life movement are ironically guilty of this too. Concerned as they are more with the "death of babies" than with the conditions for growth and development in the future by those that are born.)
So yeah, a few friends of mine didn't like it when they saw it at the cinema, but the rotten tomatoes score is really high and the movie is on several "top sci-fi movie" lists. So I felt that I really ought to go and see it and I must say, I wasn't expecting too much. Certainly I've always found Clive Owen a little overrated and I don't know about American viewers, but I thought his American accent in Sin City was appalling. (Is this just because I was too familiar with his ordinary English accent or did he really mess up there?)
Anyway, in this case he's playing a Brit and the whole thing is set in the UK. I know that America has its own anti-immigration BS too, but I think the situation in the UK suits the story better. It also strikes me as a more subtle version of the situation in V For Vendetta where troubles are occurring elsewhere in the world and Britain declares that it will remain isolated and "superior". To name drop another philosopher, Slavoj Zizek reckons that immigrants are becoming the new underclass with countries all across Europe being quick to distance themselves from those further east. This culminates with the UK for whom anything across the English channel (i.e. the entire continent) is viewed as somehow "tainted".
Michael Caine is brilliant as the quirky friend keeping up a lust for life alongside a healthy cynicism. Julianne Moore, on the other hand, feels out of place as the terrorist leader and the protagonist's ex-lover. It's not just that she's American, but also that even though she's supposed to be infamous and widely hated, she does not seem to worry much about hiding from the public. She's not bad, but it's not her best performance and I was expecting more from her. Much more impressive, in fact, was the performance of the midwife by Pam Ferris (who people may remember as the mean aunt at the beginning of Harry Potter 3 and you might also have been fortunate enough to see her excellent performance as Miss Trunchbull, the only good thing about the movie adaptation of Roald Dahl's "Matilda"). And of course Chiwetel Ejiofor is always awesome in everything - with this being no exception.
What's especially impressive about this movie is the long continuous shots during the most active sequences. One such scene involves our protagonist wandering through what is, essentially, a war zone. Everything happening around him is very clear and it must have taken a huge feat of choreography to do these continuous shots.
The exploration of this future world is done very cleverly and thoroughly. If you've seen Y Tu Mama Tambien, you'll have some clue as to what this is going to be like (only without all the sex). That said, the one thing that will most likely let you down is the ending. That isn't to say that the ending is a let-down, but that there isn't any big twist waiting for us at the end. The focus is much more on the gradual exploration of this apocalyptic future over the course of the movie than wowing us at the end.
5/5
Re-Animator
ZOMG that was so much fun and so ridiculously over the top. It reminded me of Peter Jackson's "Braindead" (sometimes known as "Dead Alive"). I don't even know how to be even-handed with this one. It's absolutely brilliant and Jeffrey Combs is on top hammy form as the mad scientist. One of the best horror-comedies I've ever seen.
At the beginning I thought the central romance was going to be irritating (and the sex scene at the beginning seemed a little unnecessary). Some might recognise Jeffrey Combs as the mad inspector from Peter Jackson's "The Frighteners". He is absolutely fantastic every moment that he's on screen.
5/5
Return Of The Living Dead
I didn't think anything could top the awesome silliness of "Re-Animator" and then this managed to do just that. At the very beginning of the movie a subtitle comes up to inform us that the events portrayed in the movie were all real. You can tell from that moment that this movie is going to be very tongue in cheek.
Strangely enough this movie is the first one I have seen where the zombies actually say "brains". In fact they often say it quite well for people who are supposed to be dead. (Then again, walking around and biting people ought to be pretty difficult when you are dead too, so at least this is consistently unbelievable.) An explanation is given for the focus on brains in particular rather than just human flesh.
I saw a metal band a few years ago called "Send More Paramedics" where the band members dress up as zombies. I hadn't realised that the band name came from this movie.
There's one moment where the silliness means that a character called "Trash" randomly takes off all her clothes and it seems rather gratuitous, though we also have someone amusingly saying "Trash is taking off her clothes again!" Freddy's teenage (+5-10 years) friends are distinctly less entertaining than the adult characters who are often the most cowardly figures in the movie, but also try to give the impression that they have some control over what is going on.
This is a very different horror-comedy to the others I've seen. While there are plenty of moments which are genuinely scary, this is for the most part a comedy. This is essentially a spoof of the zombie genre and it does a fantastic job. Oddly, the movie actually manages to make the zombies seem quite endearing and there's a great sense of fun throughout the movie. I finished the movie feeling very satisfied and happy, which is not the feeling you normally expect after a movie about a zombie apocalypse.
5/5
So, to get things started I'm going to review Highlander III because I went into it already knowing it was going to be awful.
Highlander III
I'd already seen this and I knew it wasn't great, but on a second watch it was even worse than I remembered. I think it probably helped that the previous time I watched it was only shortly after seeing Highlander II: The Quickening, which is possibly one of the most ridiculously stupid and awful movies in existence. After the second movie, the third couldn't help but look good by comparison.
One scene which was quite fun was where the bad guy (who has obtained sorcery powers) mirrors the old lady in the car scene from the first movie. He takes off the steering wheel and throws it around and drives the car straight towards various obstacles which turn out to be illusory. The problem is that because he's using sorcery you eventually realise that there's no real danger at all, so it doesn't really match up to the driving into oncoming traffic and playing chicken which took place in the original movie. While the bad guy plays his part with gusto he doesn't have a good reason for speaking like Batman (deep and low scary voice) this time.
In the first movie, the kirgan had a large gash across his throat from a previous attempt to defeat him, so his odd voice is somewhat expected. And there were all sorts of nice visual touches like that which made it stick in your mind. As well as the Kirgan's stitches across his throat he also had a sword made up on various pieces which slot together. Also the quickening effects were another aspect which looked much more impressive in the first movie than they do here.
Also, the suggestion that oridinary mortals can decapitate immortals kinda ruins the mythology for me. The Kirgan's gash across his throat in the first movie had been with him for centuries, suggesting that while the immortals are pretty much immune to ordinary blows decapitation by a fellow immortal is somehow different. We don't really know why, but it's part of the mythology. Yet in a flashback an immortal is executed by a guillotine without a fellow immortal operating it. Surely if a guillotine can do the trick so could a chainsaw? Suddenly the immortals don't seem anything like so imposing if a typical execution can do them in. And the original movie also involved a tradition of not fighting on holy ground (somewhat solidifying the idea that the immortals are somewhat vampire-esque), but in this movie it turns out that this is optional. Yet another piece of the mythology is thus thrown out on a whim.
Add to this the poor pacing, the poor acting, Christopher Lambert being as rubbish as always and a generally amateurish feel to the whole project and you've got a seriously bad movie. Basically, after the attempt at making an interesting story went massively pear-shaped in the second movie, this third movie provides the deeply mediocre sequel that we'd normally expect. And it does a really bad job of it too.
So why did I decide to re-watch this then? Well, some years after first watching it I was enjoying the silly but fun animated movie of "Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children". It made utterly no sense, but it looked amazing and the fight scenes were awesome. I was saying to a friend, where else are you going to find sword fights on motorcycles. His answer? Highlander III. Having re-watched the movie I have to say he entirely misremembered. I didn't see a single swordfight on motorcycles and I feel thoroughly p***ed off now. Hmmmph!
0.5/5
Children Of Men
Set in a future where there is no hope, Alfonso Cuaron adapts the P.D. James novel which imagines that humans randomly and inexplicably become unable to have children. The late Grace Jantzen, one of my favourite philosophers of religion, was quite struck by this idea that a world without birth is a world without hope. (She considered our society to be overly focussed on mortality rather than on natality i.e. the end of life rather than new beginnings. If you think about it, the pro-life movement are ironically guilty of this too. Concerned as they are more with the "death of babies" than with the conditions for growth and development in the future by those that are born.)
So yeah, a few friends of mine didn't like it when they saw it at the cinema, but the rotten tomatoes score is really high and the movie is on several "top sci-fi movie" lists. So I felt that I really ought to go and see it and I must say, I wasn't expecting too much. Certainly I've always found Clive Owen a little overrated and I don't know about American viewers, but I thought his American accent in Sin City was appalling. (Is this just because I was too familiar with his ordinary English accent or did he really mess up there?)
Anyway, in this case he's playing a Brit and the whole thing is set in the UK. I know that America has its own anti-immigration BS too, but I think the situation in the UK suits the story better. It also strikes me as a more subtle version of the situation in V For Vendetta where troubles are occurring elsewhere in the world and Britain declares that it will remain isolated and "superior". To name drop another philosopher, Slavoj Zizek reckons that immigrants are becoming the new underclass with countries all across Europe being quick to distance themselves from those further east. This culminates with the UK for whom anything across the English channel (i.e. the entire continent) is viewed as somehow "tainted".
Michael Caine is brilliant as the quirky friend keeping up a lust for life alongside a healthy cynicism. Julianne Moore, on the other hand, feels out of place as the terrorist leader and the protagonist's ex-lover. It's not just that she's American, but also that even though she's supposed to be infamous and widely hated, she does not seem to worry much about hiding from the public. She's not bad, but it's not her best performance and I was expecting more from her. Much more impressive, in fact, was the performance of the midwife by Pam Ferris (who people may remember as the mean aunt at the beginning of Harry Potter 3 and you might also have been fortunate enough to see her excellent performance as Miss Trunchbull, the only good thing about the movie adaptation of Roald Dahl's "Matilda"). And of course Chiwetel Ejiofor is always awesome in everything - with this being no exception.
What's especially impressive about this movie is the long continuous shots during the most active sequences. One such scene involves our protagonist wandering through what is, essentially, a war zone. Everything happening around him is very clear and it must have taken a huge feat of choreography to do these continuous shots.
The exploration of this future world is done very cleverly and thoroughly. If you've seen Y Tu Mama Tambien, you'll have some clue as to what this is going to be like (only without all the sex). That said, the one thing that will most likely let you down is the ending. That isn't to say that the ending is a let-down, but that there isn't any big twist waiting for us at the end. The focus is much more on the gradual exploration of this apocalyptic future over the course of the movie than wowing us at the end.
5/5
Re-Animator
ZOMG that was so much fun and so ridiculously over the top. It reminded me of Peter Jackson's "Braindead" (sometimes known as "Dead Alive"). I don't even know how to be even-handed with this one. It's absolutely brilliant and Jeffrey Combs is on top hammy form as the mad scientist. One of the best horror-comedies I've ever seen.
At the beginning I thought the central romance was going to be irritating (and the sex scene at the beginning seemed a little unnecessary). Some might recognise Jeffrey Combs as the mad inspector from Peter Jackson's "The Frighteners". He is absolutely fantastic every moment that he's on screen.
5/5
Return Of The Living Dead
I didn't think anything could top the awesome silliness of "Re-Animator" and then this managed to do just that. At the very beginning of the movie a subtitle comes up to inform us that the events portrayed in the movie were all real. You can tell from that moment that this movie is going to be very tongue in cheek.
Strangely enough this movie is the first one I have seen where the zombies actually say "brains". In fact they often say it quite well for people who are supposed to be dead. (Then again, walking around and biting people ought to be pretty difficult when you are dead too, so at least this is consistently unbelievable.) An explanation is given for the focus on brains in particular rather than just human flesh.
I saw a metal band a few years ago called "Send More Paramedics" where the band members dress up as zombies. I hadn't realised that the band name came from this movie.
There's one moment where the silliness means that a character called "Trash" randomly takes off all her clothes and it seems rather gratuitous, though we also have someone amusingly saying "Trash is taking off her clothes again!" Freddy's teenage (+5-10 years) friends are distinctly less entertaining than the adult characters who are often the most cowardly figures in the movie, but also try to give the impression that they have some control over what is going on.
This is a very different horror-comedy to the others I've seen. While there are plenty of moments which are genuinely scary, this is for the most part a comedy. This is essentially a spoof of the zombie genre and it does a fantastic job. Oddly, the movie actually manages to make the zombies seem quite endearing and there's a great sense of fun throughout the movie. I finished the movie feeling very satisfied and happy, which is not the feeling you normally expect after a movie about a zombie apocalypse.
5/5