#61: GODZILLA VS MEGALON

 

STARRING: Godzilla, Megalon, Jet Jaguar and Gigan as performed by Hinji Takagi as Godzilla, Hideto Date as Megalon, Kenpachiro Satsuma as Gigan, and Tsugutoshi Komada as Jet Jaguar. Human actors: Katsuhiko Sasaki, Hiroyuki Kawase, Yutaka Hayashi, Robert Dunham, Kotaro Tomita, Wolf Ohtuski and Gentaro Nakajima. Story by Shinichi Sekizawa, screenplay and directed by Jun Fukuda. Budget $1.2 million. Boxoffice take $20 million. Running time 81 minutes. Originally released in 1973.

When a series of nuclear tests cause massive earthquakes and destruction severely damaging not only Monster Island, home of Godzilla, but also the highly advanced underground empire of Seatopia its ruler Emperor Antonio sends two crack secret agents upstairs to Earth to kidnap the inventor of Jet Jaguar, Goro Ibuki, his little brother Rokuro and his best friend Hiroshi Jinkawa and sieze control of their man-sized robot. Meanwhile Antonio unleashes Megalon, the god of the Seatopian people to destroy Tokyo. But when Jet becomes sentient and grows to gigantic size he recruits Godzilla to help him fight the cockroach-inspired Megalon. Concerned his plan for world domination is beginning to falter, Antonio sends for reinforcements from outerspace and gets sent Gigan and so the stage is set for the biggest tag-team monster fight of all time as the four titans of destruction do battle, but only once the combined might of the Japanese military complex has been laid waste. 

Whilst it isn't big or clever it is nevertheless immensely entertaining and delightfully funny, this was the subtitled version and not the notorious sublime dub-version, which I have to say I was rather looking forward to. I've been a Godzilla fan ever since I first glimpsed a picture of him in my Octopus Book of Horror and a screening of Ebirah, Horror of the Deep back in the early days of Channel Four. And he's played a significant role in my imagination ever since and as such I have no critical facilities for the films of Godzilla, the Toho era. This was shot in three weeks, with a production time of six months, it reused footage from previous Godzilla films and introduced the Godzilla tail slide attack. Some of the practical monster and model effects are simply terrific, particularly the dam destruction caused by Megalon. 

It's on as part of a season of Godzilla films at the Barbican until Dec 10th and I can't wait to see both Son of Godzilla and Ebirah, which I'm predicting will both be 10/10s and I hate Minja, Godzilla's son. 

No room for discussion. This was 81 minutes of pure cinematic heaven 10/10 FACT!  

#60: DIE HARD 2: DIE HARDER

STARRING: Bruce Willis, William Sadler, Bonnie Bedelia, William Atherton, Reginald VelJohnson, Franco Nero, Robert Patrick and John Amos. Screenplay by Steven E. de Souza and Doug Richardson. Directed by Renny Harlin. Budget $60-70 million. Running time 124 minutes. 

It's Christmas Eve and John McClane (Bruce Willis) is at Dulles airport to pick up his wife, Holly (Bonnie Bedelia)who's flying in just ahead of a really big storm. Unfortunately for them, and all the passengers and crew of the Air Windsor flight, US Colonel William Stuart (William Sadler) has other ideas. He and his private personal army of ex-marines have taken over the airport's air traffic control to facilitate the rescue of corrupt South American military leader, General Ramon Esperanza (Franco Nero), who's being flown in to face drug charges. Now it's up to one plucky, NYPD cop to save the day.

What follows is a bombastic, loud, furious, action-packed and deeply violent action film of the sort that Hollywood used to do with great aplomb. Originally released in 1990 when action films weren't the shaky-cam blurs of frantic editing they sadly became. It was fantastically successful at the boxoffice, earning over $240 million worldwide, almost twice as much as the original film.

This is an utterly un-apologetic, un-reconstructed two-gun action film whose only crime was being a sequel, because while it's clearly not as good as the note-perfect 1988 Die Hard directed by John McTierran it's never-the-less a bloody good thrill ride.

Directed by Renny Harlin who made a name for himself with Prison and A Nightmare on Elm Street 4 before making this, and then rising to prominence thanks to Cliffhanger before crash and burning his bridges with one of the biggest boxoffice bombs of all times - Cutthroat Island. He'd go on to make both The Long Kiss Goodnight and Deep Blue Sea before a slow gradual decline into mediocrity with a series of low budget action films.

With fantastic action sequences, the Skybridge shoot-out being the standout. Die Hard 2 upped the violence but sadly lost the humanity of McClane. Bullets are spewed at a rate that would humble John Wick, and blood squibs explode with glee in slow motion that would shame Zack Snyder. William Sadler makes a fantastic foil for McClane and his nude introduction is legendary. At the end of the day this was just an absolutely fun and very satisfying and visceral romp that delivered in spades. 

1990 was a great year for action films. Tremors, Hard to Kill, Revenge, The Hunt for Red October, Blind Fury, Blue Steel, Nuns on the Run, Total Recall, Another 48 Hours, Dick Tracy, Gremlins 2, Robocop 2, Wild at Heart, Darkman, I Come in Peace, King of New York, Marked for Death, Predator 2, and Robo Jox to name but a handful. It's sad to read a list of the films released in that year and compare them to the dreck we get these days, there was so much variety back then, and not just in action films. 

8/10

#59: THE LONG WALK

 

STARRING: Cooper Hoffman, David Jonsson, Garrett Wareing, Tut Nyuot, Charlie Plummer, Ben Wang, Roman Griffin Davis, Josh Hamilton, Judy Greer and Mark Hamill. Based on the book The Long Walk by Stephen King. Screenplay by JT Mollner. Directed by Francis Lawrence. Budget £20 million. Walking time 108 minutes.

Get ready for the funniest film of the summer! A film of hope, laughter, tears, and the strength of friendship. 

In the near future, America is struggling from the effects of a civil war that plunged it into financial ruin and poverty and under the boot-heel of a fascistic state that suppresses free-speech and liberty, so just a couple of years from now then. To distract the unwashed masses, an annual tournament is held that sees 50 randomly chosen young men set out on 'The Long Walk', a race with no end run until only one boy survives, his prize - untold wealth and the granting of one wish. There are few rules, the main one being don't walk slower than 3 miles an hour. You have three lives and if you lose all three you get shot in the head right there in the road and then and left to rot on the tarmac. Like I said, an hilarious laugh riot of a film filled with shits and giggles, seriously, and literally. The film follows the young men focusing on five in particular and over the course of the next 108 minutes you'll get to watch each and every one of them die at the hands of an indifferent, nameless gun-totting military escort lead by 'The Major' (Mark Hamill). 

And that's it. Friendships are made and young men die as they walk for five days and over 300 miles. Laugh, I nearly cried.

Bleak, nasty, relentless and depressing. It's a hard watch and yet again reminds me that Hollywood really hate the young. What is it about post apocalyptic fiction that features so many young people getting killed for the pleasure of the old? 

Another 'not a bad film', far from it, but it's a hard watch, well acted and staged but one of those films that you'll watch once and never again. Unless of course you're a masochist. 

7/10

#58: SPINAL TAP II: THE END CONTINUES

 

WRITTEN AND STARRING: Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Harry Shearer and Rob Reiner. Also starring: Valerie Franco, Fran Drescher, Don Lake, Nina Conti, Kerry Godliman and Chris Addison. Directed by Rob Reiner. Budget $22.6 million. Running time 84 minutes.

What is it with these legacy sequels? This one arrives 41 years after the original, ready and raring to go, filled with the vim and vigour that only men in the 70s can muster. 

Director Marty DiBergi (Rob Reiner) narrates and guides us along as he embarks on another rockumentary showcasing the exploits of the legendary heavy metal band Spinal Tap, this time charting and recording their reunion and last ever gig. No one is spared Marty's mellow, non-threatening interview techniques as he visits each of the three surviving members of the band, Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest), David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean) and Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer), their manager Hope Faith (Kerry Goldliman), daughter of the band's original manager and an assortment of secondary characters and we catch up with what they've all been doing since the band last broke up.

Then it's a very sedate stroll to New Orleons session studio as the band rehearse for their final show and audition a new drummer, DiDi (Valerie Franco). Then a series of somewhat amusing incidents happen that elicit a laugh, or smirk, or chortle, although these decrease as the music increases. The whole film poots along like a mobility scooter for four until the stadium show and a performance of Stonehenge brings the house crashing down. Along the way, the likes of Paul McCartney, Elton John, Lars Ulrich, Garth Brooks, Trisha Yearwood, Questlove and Chad Smith pop up for some shits and giggles.

This starts well, as we meet the lead characters, now all engaged in new activities be it running a cheese and guitar shop, curating a glue museum or writing music for murder podcasts, and all the surviving characters from the original film are interviewed, the jokes are funny, and amusing, easy jibes about age are avoided as the trio try to get the mojo back, but something's stopping them, and it's an unspoken feud between Nigel and David, although its revelation later in the proceedings arrives with all the fanfare of a silent fart. Sadly the film seems far more concerned with watching the band perform and that's when this sort of loses it's verve, the sad fact is, they're just not that good and the lengthy musical interludes drains the film of it's humour. 

Luckily things pick up when during their final gig, Elton John emerges from the floor of the stage to take on lead vocals on Stonehenge and the henge itself is lowered from the ceiling, this time full size. 

This is by no means a bad film, and it's certainly not terrible, it's just a little too sedate, Harry Shearer seems to have been shortchanged and it's left mostly to Guest and McKean to hog the limelight. If only it had focused more on the humour and a little less on the music. It's amusing rather than hilarious and mumbles when it should have roared. 

6/10

 

#57: CAUGHT STEALING

STARRING: Austin Butler, Rgina King, Zoë Kravitz, Matt Smith, Liev Schreiber, Vincent D'Onofrio, Benito Bartinez, Ocasio, Griffen Dunne. Movie score by Rob Simonsen and Idles. Screenplay by Charlie Huston. Directed by Darren Aronofsky. Budget $40 million. Running time 107 minutes.

Billed as a dark comedy crime thriller, this has all the hallmarks of a 1970's thriller but as envisioned by Darren Aronofsky and as such it's about as funny as a positive cancer diagnosis. Set in the 1990s and featuring a furious punk score  and a magnificent soundtrack and featuring a truly impressive cast of actors this was an intense, vicious, nasty and deeply mean-spirited thriller.

Austin Butler is Henry 'Hank' Thompson a high school baseball star with a future as a professional in the majors, but a drunken car crash obliterates his right knee (not that you'd know it) and catapultes his best friend face-first into a telegraph pole. 11 years later and Henry's now a border-line alcoholic bartender working in New York bar and in good relationship with EMT nurse, Yvonne (Zoë Kravitz). However one day Hank's next door neighbour, Russ Binder (Matt Smith) - a British ex-pat punk rocker dumps his cat, and litter tray on him and jets back to London to look after his father who's had a stroke. The next day, the Russian mafia come calling looking for Russ and kick Hank almost to death, rupturing one of his kidneys in the process. Then the police in the guise of Det. Elise Roman (Regina King) come calling and disregard Hank's protestations he's an innocent man. Two days after having his kidney removed he's running for his life from two orthodox Jewish gangsters, Shmully Drucker and Lipa Drucker (Vincent D'Onofrio and Liev Schreiber), the Russian mafia AND an ultra corrupt police office who all believe Hank has something of great value, which is news to him. From there on things go from bad to much much worse, horrifically worse, almost to the point of ridiculousness for Hank, and that's probably enough for the plot.

I was fully engaged with this up until the killing started, the violence which is never anything less than full-on, builds and makes the whole film deeply uncomfortable, Hank's dilemma just keeps growing and to a degree which is frankly laughable (perhaps that's what 'they' meant by 'dark comedy'?) but which leaves you feeling there would be no way he'd ever be free, add to that the sense that if only he, at times would just try and explain what was going on then things wouldn't have gotten so bad. I also had some issues with the horrific knee injury that Hank sustains, which we witness repeatedly throughout the film. As some one who has suffered two major knee injuries that resulted in surgery the film lost me once Hank is seen doing a full-on Tom Cruise run, not once but twice and suffering not one single jolt of pain, and just days after he's had a kidney removed too! 

I can't fault the acting, the direction and the look, but I just couldn't get behind the utter mean-spiritedness of this and the death of one of the main characters was just gratuitous and callous and not remotely warranted that the film totally lost me. This starts strongly, but starts to telegraph its ending and the keen-eyed of you should be able to work out the conclusion. 

It's by no means a bad film, far from it, but its nihilistic, bleak, and relentless viciousness lost me as a fan, but boy is it well made.

8/10  

#56: THE LIFE OF CHUCK

STARRING: Tom Hiddleston, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Karen Gillan, Mia Sara, Carl Lumbly, Benjamin Pajak, Jacob Tremblay and Mark Hamill, and narrated by Nick Offerman. Based on The Life of Chuck by Stephen King. Screenplay and directed by Mike Flanagan. Running time 116 minutes.

Told in reverse order this is the life of Chuck, hence the title. Told in three chapters - 'Thanks, Chuck', 'Buskers Forever' and 'I Contain Multitudes'  and charting Chuck's (Tom Hiddleston) life from his death from a brain tumour to his life as an orphan living with his grandparents - Albie (Mark Hamill) and Sarah (Mia Sara) in a supposed haunted house. 

Of the three chapters, the first: Thanks, Chuck is by far the most satisfying and emotional, offering up, as it does, the end of the world, but not in a Roland Emmerich stylee, this is an altogether more slow burn affair, with California slipping, unseen, into the sea, the death of the internet, massive sink holes, and the stars in the firmament literally popping out of existence, but what does that have to do mysterious billboards and TV adverts declaring "Charles Krantz: 39 Great Years! Thanks, Chuck!"? And yet, somehow rather than be depressing this sequence is genuinely touching, told from the point of view of a newly divorced couple, teacher Marty Anderson (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and nurse Felicia Gordon (Karen Gillan) who reunite to watch the world end, while other lost souls find solace in each other's company, it's rather and profoundly moving.

The second chapter follows the aforementioned accountant Chuck taking an evening off from a convention, when the music of a busker playing the drums inspires him to leap into an impromptu dance routine with a perfect stranger that nets the drummer a tidy tin of tips. Here we learn a little bit more about Chuck, before he returns to the status quo of his life and then the final chapter begins  and we witness the boyhood Chuck living with his grandparents in an old Victorian town-house that may, or may not be haunted and if you've been paying attention the whole film's hidden centre reveals itself to you.

This is an emotional film, beautifully performed by the cast from a witty literate script by Mike Flanagan who also directs, from a Stephen King short story, incidentally this is his third King adaptation after Gerald's Game and Doctor Sleep. This near two hour run time flies by and engages you on a deep emotional level, you come to like these characters and feel for them, and as the ending draws near, their fates come into focus. To help us on the journey, and this film is ALL about the journey, it's narrated by the excellent Nick Offerman offering us the voice of the writer, which gives this film a whole new level and it makes you wish that more films had narration. 

Playing like a 21st Century It's a Wonderful Life, this feels like a Frank Capra film to its core and the cast are exceptional, and how great to see Mark Hamill acting again, it's been too long.

Despite winning some major awards The Life of Chuck has been sadly dumped on audiences almost unannounced, too early for Oscar Season and with little or no fanfare. The chances are you won't get to see this at the cinema, which is a shame, but when it finally lands on TV do yourself a favour and watch it, it's a bitter-sweet, heart warming and life affirming film that will leave you moist eyed and smiling. Well, it did me.

10/10   

#55: THE ROSES

 

STARRING: Benedict Cumberbatch, Olivia Colman, Andy Samberg and Kate McKinnon. Screenplay by Tony McNamara. Directed by Jay Roach. Budget $60 million. Running time 105 minutes.

Theo and Ivy (Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman) meet up, fall in love and move to America to pursue their dreams, he to become a renowned architect and she too maybe, one day, open up a little restaurant, but until then she's happy to be the stay-at-home mum bring up their two twins on her own. Theo quickly becomes successful and buys his wife a down-on-its-heels seafront establishment she renames "We've Got Crabs" and he builds an eccentric and cutting edge maritime museum which promptly collapses during a hurricane, on the same night Ivy's restaurant gets rave reviews and their fortunes change in one night. He becomes unemployable and she becomes the toast of the town. He stays at home bringing up their insufferable children to become fitness obsessed freaks, while she's flying around the world building an empire of fast-food establishments. After 10 years, he's a weak useless and failed husk of a man and she's the brightest star in the culinary firmament. Desperate for her husband to rekindle his passion she bank rolls his dream of creating a cutting edge family home overlooking the sea and that's where the rot sets in...

This is a remake of the vastly superior 1989 War of the Roses movie starring Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas and directed by Danny DeVito.

Although it starts very strongly, it sadly doesn't have the teeth to nail its landing. The film wins brownie-points for its cast, and for also taking time to show the life of Ivy and Theo's marriage but it doesn't seem prepared to go the whole hog when it comes to the nastiness of their marital decline. It sadly lacks the bite needed to elevate this to something more savage, something the original film did brilliantly. Here you laugh politely at the couple's antics but you don't recoil from their bile or hate. Indeed, there's never a real sense that they ever truly hate each other, they just seem a little peeved. That said, it's an absolute delight to watch Colman and Cumberbatch acting together. 

I wish the film had been able to play up the nasty aspects of the breakup, but it feels unsure how far it can go, something the original had no qualms about. This lacks the misery, the wanton vandalism, and glorious escalating violence of the former. And it's another of these modern so-called 'black-comedies', that's more a  sort of subtle charcoal grey amusement. 

The film also has a strange visual quality that feels artificial and despite being set in the US, the landscape feels more like Devon, plus the use of CGI backdrops makes the whole feel very fake. 

In the 1989 version, Jonathan and Barbara (the original couple) fight over the house and its contents of valuable antiques and because it, the house, plays such a dominant role throughout their lives together you understood and accepted the stakes, and you brought into the drama, sadly not so in this. The house doesn't even get built until the third act and as such it never feels as if means that much to them both, her in particular. When they finally confront each other over the arbitration table, I found myself thinking the only reason that Ivy wanted the house wasn't because she'd invested anything of her self in it beyond her money, it was just to deny him any ownership. In contrast, all he wants is the house, he's not after her multi-million dollar business empire and yet she refuses to accept the deal and that just doesn't make any sense to me, she openly hates the house, and save the vintage Julia Childs oven she installs in the kitchen she has nothing of herself invested in it at all.

Despite all that, I enjoyed the film I just didn't love it. It has some genuinely funny laugh-out-loud moments, but sadly not enough, The supporting cast is amusing, and I loved the performances, and enjoyed the breakdown antics, but I just wanted more of that, I wanted the japes to get darker and more dangerous, I wanted the stakes to keep rising and sadly they didn't and so when the ending arrived it just sort of  rolled to a halt, while the original crashed to it's conclusion.

7/10 needs arbitration.

     

#54: JAWS

 

STARRING: Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw, Richard Dreyfuss, Lorraine Gary and Murray Hamilton. Screenplay by Peter Benchley and Carl Gottlieb. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Edited by Verna Fields. Produced by Richard R. Zanuck and David Brown. Music by John Williams. Running time 124 minutes. Budget $9 million. Box office $486 million.

The father of the Summer Blockbuster and one of the greatest films ever made. Directed to perfection by a 29 year-old Steven Spielberg and edited by the legendary Verna Fields who would go on to win an Oscar for her work on Jaws. Indeed it's her masterful editing that helps to elevate this film to the level of a masterpiece. 

The film, whose plot must be known by every living person in the world, sees the New England island of Amity terrorised by a 25ft, three tonne Great White shark over the course of an Independence Day weekend, forcing the town's ocean-phobic sherif Chief Brody (Roy Scheider) team up with an oceanographer Matt Hopper (Richard Dreyfuss) and professional shark hunter, Captain Quint (Robert Shaw) to set sail on a rickety old boat called the Orca and hunt down that smiling "son-of-a-bitch" and kill it. What follows is a two-hour masterclass in suspense, drama and tension. It's a film that manages to not only give our characters story arcs, but in the case of Brody, create a very moving and utterly believable portrait of a family man desperately trying to do his best in the face of powerful opposition. In between the shark attacks the film still has time to offer moments of humour and introspection and the scene at the dinner table between Brody and his son is very moving. There is one scene in particular, that even today, still has me holding my breathe in anticipation and tense, and it's when the two fishermen thrown an uncooked Sunday joint off the the pier in an attempt to catch the shark.

I have lost count of the number of times I've watched this, I first saw it in the ABC Cinema in Ealing with my family at the age of 12 and was traumatised, particulary by the death of Robert Shaw's 'Quint', and genuinely believed that he had actually been killed by that shark. It always been a part of my top ten films of all times and despite knowing each and every line of dialogue and what's about to happen next, I'm not ashamed to admit that both my daughter and I jumped in our seats when Ben Gardener's head bobs into view. I seriously cannot think of a single thing that I don't like about this film and consider that if this was ever remade, it would be an hour longer and we'd get not only the back story of Brody, Quint and Hopper, but also the shark who we'd discover is just trying to protect its family.

The film has a visual quality which is not only unmatched, but helps to make this film utterly timeless, it might be set in the 1970s but manages to look as fresh as a daisy today. Spielberg's choice of avoiding big name actors in casting of the lead roles and of using actual inhabitants of Marta's Vineyard to fill the cast helped to create a convincing air of believability, add to that John William's deeply iconic soundtrack and you simply what is one of the greatest films ever made. 

This weekend in America Jaws took over $8 million and claimed the number #2 slot at the boxoffice beating out three new releases. Not bad for a film celebrating it's 50th anniversary. 

Let's raise our glasses and toast a timeless classic that has lost none of its bite. 10/10