Robocop (2014)
I was not aware that there was much interest at all in Robocop (2014), the remake of Paul Verhoeven’s iconic film from 1987. The session I attended though, an early morning one on opening day, was quite packed. That interest will soon pass though, as the film is pretty terrible and will generate nothing in the way of positive word of mouth.
The film surprisingly starts out uber-political with a pre-credits sequence set in Tehran showing the U.S. utilising its robot weaponry (the word drone is dropped) on random searches throughout the Iranian capital. The film is clearly decrying the use of drones in warfare and saying some very timely things. It also touches on the hypocrisy of American policy regarding drones, with the government of this near-future country refusing to allow robots to be used domestically. Whatever your thoughts on the political line that the film is pushing, this is probably the best sequence of the film, showing off some quite slick futuristic design, both on the audio and visual fronts.
With robots essentially outlawed at home, those in charge of pushing the tech see an opportunity with our man Robocop. The evil organisation that creates all of this robotic military hardware sees him as a great public relations opportunity. Putting a man (in this case a Detroit policeman badly injured by a bomb that was meant to kill him) inside a robotic suit will hopefully sway public opinion toward approving of robotic military and law enforcement hardware. Unfortunately the film really starts to unravel when action shifts back to the States. The acting is clunky, the storytelling the same and the early nice design barely shows its face again (a shootout in driving rain a rare exception). Actually the plot is close to non-existent. Man becomes Robocop. Loses his emotional connections. His military bosses turn out not to have his best interests at heart. Robocop finds his emotions again. They throw in a twist literally no one in the world will care about. Robocop wins. The poor darlings throw in some setup for a sequel that will never get made. That’s it. The interesting themes and political point of view is still there… but only sort of. Essentially you have to inject them into the film yourself, rather than the filmmakers actually running with those ideas as I wish they had of.
Really there is nothing too surprising throughout this whole film. Actually that’s not true, the main surprise is the calibre of cast that they managed to attract to it – Abby Cornish, Gary Oldman, Jackie Earle Haley and Michael Keaton. They are all perfectly fine, managing to neither stick out as terrible whilst putting in what appears to be the bare minimum of effort and passion. As the titular character, Joel Kinnaman, fares rather worse. He is terrible in the beginning when he is just plain old Alex Murphy, Detroit detective. Once he Robocops up he is somewhat more bearable but never reaches any heights. The only actor who does reach any heights is Samuel L. Jackson, who has a small role as Pat Novak, a hilarious Bill O’Reillyesque right wing newsman. The film starts with him riffing on Ron Burgundy and his role is one of the very few delights that the film contains.
After a promising start, this film gets bogged down and just turns silly, annoying and predictable. The engagement with political issues of the day might be refreshing (depending on your point of view) but it is doubtful that it will make this feel worth your while. Though if you are a Samuel L. Jackson fan, then this is probably worth grabbing on blu-ray down the line so you can just fast forward to his hilarious scenes.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
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A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge
When discussing my love for Wes Craven’s A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), which I reviewed here, I was constantly warned by people that I should not bother with the sequels. They told me to either steer clear completely, or to focus on a couple of specific ones that were decent, generally those that Craven returned to direct. But I thought it would be fun to check them all out and track the evolution of the series, beginning with A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge (1985).
Craven chose not to return for this sequel, passing on the film after reading the script. Some of his concerns that came through in the film include the trashing of the mythology around the character of Freddy Krueger that had been built in the first film. In the first film, Krueger can really only cause damage inside dreams, but in this second entry he seems to have attained the ability to leave the dream world and hit up pool parties at will. It is a frustrating dilution of part of what made the first entry such an original horror story. Missteps such as that are even more annoying because there are some very good ideas contained in the script. Much of it concerns Freddy attempting to recruit a the main character Jesse, through intimidation and trickery, into murdering on his behalf. As the deaths start piling up, so does Jesse’s mental instability as he becomes more and more convinced that he is the one doing the deeds.
The action starts out rather originally with a set piece involving a school bus and a bus driver who turns out to Mr Krueger himself. I was pretty hopeful at that point, but most of the film from there on out is content to just hit the same notes as the first film – falling asleep in class, a gory death or two, doubt over who is doing the killing, boiler room showdowns and so on. When the film does try and do something more original, it does not do it very well. I have already mentioned Krueger being able to escape dreams in the film, which just confuses his menace. Add to that the film’s most bizarre sequence where the teenage protagonist Jesse goes to a leather bar, sees his bully of a gym teacher and then gets invited back to the school. Whilst he is having a shower, Freddy Krueger appears and kills his teacher in a really homoerotic fashion. It is totally absurd. I am not sure if there was meant to be a little commentary in there, but it definitely did not come through clearly. Also, I really hope that every film in the series is not going to finish with the same lame little coda/epilogue style sequence. I don’t mind some ambiguity or sequel bait, but the first two films both end in cheap little scenes that add nothing to the film and just serve to undermine the satisfactory (sort of) resolution of the main narrative.
There is something pretty timeless about the first film in this series. In comparison though, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2 is beset by 80s-ness. The wooden performance from Mark Patton as Jesse definitely plays into that. Luckily though both Robert Rusler as Ron and Kim Myers as Jesse’s love interest Lisa are much more comfortable and mitigate the bad acting somewhat. Actually the most surprising bit about this film for me was that the teen romance sub-plot between the two main characters was actually pretty decent. A shame it is wasted in this film. More disappointing than the poor acting is the change in genre. The first film was a really innovative mixture of supernatural horror and the slasher film. This film dumps all of that I think for what is basically a straight up supernatural film, with a few teen film subplots going on as well. Aside from a couple of moments, the stark and horrifying imagery that was all through the first film is also lessened a great deal here. Freddy still looks very cool and the scene where he bursts out of an old dude’s chest is satisfyingly gruesome. But there is nothing that really matches a couple of the great and gory kills that take place in the first film in the series. Especially not dogs with baby masks on. What the hell was that?
A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge has some really interesting ideas that if done right would have made this a worthy follow up to a true horror classic. Unfortunately though the film is not done properly and a combination of poor acting, the rubbishing of some of what made Krueger such a great villain and tamer kills make this pretty weak. Which is such a bummer, because the convergence of the characters of Freddy and Jesse is an idea that deserved to be pulled off much better.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
I’m going to be reviewing one of the Nightmare on Elm Street films every week for the next little bit. So I hope you enjoy reading the reviews and looking forward to hearing your thoughts on all of these films if you have seen them.
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Ben-Hur
Even though I am sure I saw it (or at least parts of it) growing up, putting Ben-Hur (1959) into my DVD player, I had managed to keep myself ignorant of the details of the film’s plot. As such, despite the arduous running time, I was pretty excited to get into one of the most celebrated American films in history.
The scope of the film is obvious right from the start, even with the very slow start to the film. The film follows Charlton Heston’s Judah Ben-Hur, a prince/merchant who finds himself a slave. His stock rises and falls throughout the lengthy film. Even though the film looks really sharp though, the feel of it is that of a dated telemovie about Jesus you would buy from an infomercial. That music! Argh. It feels in many ways like it is an adaptation of a play. A bad play though, because the film is so stilted and lacking in any of the searing quality of adaptations of really great plays such as the works of Shakespeare. There are a couple of sequences that manage to distinguish themselves from the tepidness of everything else going on. Most notably the subplot of Ben-Hur’s mother and sister being lepers and his insistence on seeing them. I actually found those sequences quite intense and difficult to watch because of the emotion involved, which is so lacking from a vast majority of the film. For me though, the much celebrated chariot race sequence is not one of those that does not manage to rise above the mire. There was so much build-up to it and then it was just all a bit meh. There was no exhilaration there, not to mention I have definite concerns around the welfare of the animals used to film those scenes. So much of it is totally lacking in excitement because it is just a bunch of horses riding along beside each other and even the final highpoint of the race lacks any punch.
From my perspective there are two major issues that really affect this film. The first is the laborious pace. The film does not really seem to be telling a story that is truly that ‘epic.’ Rather, the scope that is teased early on by the film just turns into it taking so long to actually move anywhere. Think the opening 45 minutes of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012), only worse. The second issue is that the narrative itself is totally unfocused. I mean what is the core narrative of Ben-Hur? Killing that dude in the chariot race? Finding Christ? I mean it is all pretty oblique and not only that, none of these narrative strands are either particularly engaging for the audience or well done. None of these issues are helped particularly by the performance of Charlton Heston. Never mind the fact that for me (and I suspect others as well), I cannot see him in a film and forget his turn in Michael Moore’s Bowling for Columbine (2002). He manages to get across some of the emotion of the film, but overall I don’t think this is a very good performance from Heston. He is too rigid and can’t inhabit the role like is required and like he managed to do in The Planet of the Apes (1968).
For a celebrated epic from the golden era of Hollywood epics, I found Ben-Hur to be a strangely flat experience. Riddled with issues, it is one of those films that you should probably see just so you can say you have seen it (plus I guess you may love it). But at around 4 hours in length it is a big time investment for little reward.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
Progress: 99/1001
2014 Progress: 3/101
Now You See Me
The practice of stage magic is undeniably cool and has always aroused suspicion as well – what criminal means could shady magicians put their befuddling skills to? There is a great movie in that. A pity then that Now You See Me (2013), with an absurdly good cast, is definitely not that great movie.
It all goes pretty badly right from the start, with the film only ever slightly improving from its terrible and tacky start. The plot sees a band of top class magicians recruited by a shadowy unknown figure to pull of a number of (supposedly) spectacular heists that target the ‘one percent’. A cop, played by Mark Ruffalo, attempts to take them down, and the whole thing culminates in a craptacular twist that you will have either seen coming from way off, or you will just not particularly have cared enough to even think about. Oh and there is an absolutely terrible love story subplot that will convince no one. One of the major disappointments for me was the presentation of the actual magic tricks. Hearing that the entire cast had undergone extensive magic training I was psyched for some good old school trickery. Unfortunately they opted for the new school trickery of CGI, which simply does not work in this setting. If the story could not be told through tricks that could be performed practically, then the story should have been changed.
I am not really sure how, but the makers of this film managed to attract quite an incredible ensemble cast to what is a pretty miserable script. Jesse Eisenberg, Isla Fisher, Woody Harrelson, Mark Ruffalo, Dave Franco, Michael Caine, Common, Melanie Laurent and Morgan Freeman all feature. They all do at the very least reasonable work here, with material that rarely rises to the level of reasonable and I don’t think ever beyond. Eisenberg is perhaps the best of the lot. He manages to create a really fleshed out character, at various times neurotic, eccentric, controlling and seemingly a master magician. Brother of James, Dave Franco continues to show that he is a pretty gnarly dude and brings a real presence to his role here. Freeman and Caine are of course good, but their characters are two of the weakest. Freeman’s especially, which if it had of been well written, would have been a really intriguing window into the world of magic, is really disappointing. Utter rubbish such as this is much more enjoyable when performed by actors of this quality. Given how little I enjoyed the end product though speaks a lot to just how poor the material they were working with actually is. The direction and technical aspects of the film are totally bland and even worse, just by the numbers stuff which cannot elevate the film at all, whilst decisions such as those around the use of CGI actually leave the film a fair bit poorer.
One of the silliest films I have seen for quite some time, Now You See Me did pretty much nothing for me. There were some moderately intriguing plot points and a really good cast. But the bad definitely outweighed the good on this one. The film surprisingly went great guns at the box office and as such director Louis Leterrier will have the chance to improve on this tepid effort when a sequel shoots in 2014.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
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A Fortnight of Terror: Hell
Popping the DVD of Hell (2011) on, I was pretty apprehensive. Not my usual apprehension putting a horror film on. Rather the apprehension came from the fact the cover of the disc heavily promotes the fact that Roland Emmerich was heavily involved in the film as producer.
Whilst thankfully Hell manages to avoid being a piece of Emmerichian dross, I did have my issues with the end product. Set in 2016, the film is a sci-fi/horror hybrid that for the most part leans toward the first of those two genres. Setting it in the (very) near future worked well I thought, giving it an immediacy that is lacking in so many sci-fi flicks. The earth has been scorched by the sun for whatever reason, presumably global warming, that has seen the temperature skyrocket. What is left is a dystopian wasteland where very few have managed to survive. The film has a similar atmosphere to The Book of Eli (2010) and this connection is reinforced by the sun drenched visuals. The daytime exterior shots with the extreme, over the top lighting to convey the blaze of the sun look really great, and it is a visual tick that I think should have been utilised more throughout the film. A small group of young people are making there way through this environment, scratching together water where they can and petrol for their car. A lot of the early going sets up the dynamic between the various parties, which includes a set of sisters. When the younger of the two is kidnapped, the action turns into a tense attempt to first find then rescue her. Eventually the elder sister finds her way to a commune/farm where she appears to find comfort and security, as well as hopefully help with rescuing her younger sibling. It is a flat start in many ways. The film meanders along a little, with little tension and not too much audience connection with the characters being built up.
Now my major issue with Hell (and I am going to veer into spoiler territory here) is that it is all set up and not enough meat. It is eventually revealed that the friendly farm folk that take in the main protagonist have actually resorted to cannibalism because there is nothing to eat. That is an awesome combo of sci-fi and horror in my book. But the reveal comes too late. So that all of the really cool narrative that comes after that is over far too quickly as precious screen time has been wasted building up too much detail that is ultimately just cast off in any case. The twist in the tale improves everything. The film automatically becomes more intense and atmospheric, you care more and interesting characters, such as a cannibal matriarch, start having a real effect on the action. It also does a good job of drawing out that age-old hypothetical of what, if anything, could lead you to eat your fellow man.
Overall Hell suffers from being too slow and also being unbalanced. It spends a majority of the time on the least interesting aspect of the narrative, in turn short-changing us on the cannibalistic tastiness. Competently, though rarely inspiringly made, this film definitely fell short of what it could have been for me.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
All this fortnight you have a chance to win a copy of Hush and Hell on DVD thanks to Madman Entertainment. Be sure to head here for all the details.
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A Fortnight of Terror Guest Post: The Pumpkinhead Series
This guest post of awesomeness comes from everyone’s favourite elusive blogging figure, The IPC. Some say he refuses to visit Australia because there are not enough animals that can kill you here. Some say that Mrs The IPC and Daniel Day-Lewis have never been seen in the same room at the same time. Some say that he considers Billy Bob Thornton’s performance in Sling Blade to be “tepid”. All I know is that he drinks moonshine for breakfast and literally put his head inside a pumpkin to bring us this killer post. And for that, I am exceptionally grateful.
Pumpkinhead (1988)
There’s a back-story to this movie that I’ve always found funny which I am going to share and hopefully you appreciate it. I’ve whined before about being an only child and sitting around moping and being depressed and such, but I did have one friend I more or less grew up with (even though I only saw him once a week or so). Anyway, we spent a lot of time at the movies as kids and by 1988 we were into our teens and going in separate directions in our lives. I was running off to chase chicks and drink beer and he was pursuing higher education. Anyway, this was the last movie we ever saw together and to this day, when and if we talk, we still argue over whether or not it was any good. I’ve always claimed I liked it and he thought it was total crap.
This movie stars Lance Henrickson, who is one of my favorites, as a hillbilly farmer type who runs a general store in the middle of nowhere with his heavily bespectacled kid. One day some punks from the big city roll into town and accidentally run over the child so Henrickson gets a witch to call up the monstrous Pumpkinhead and avenge his death. Blah, blah, blah kids get killed and Henrickson grows a conscience and eventually almost everyone’s dead. It’s your typical monster story with Monster Man Stan Winston directing and there’s really nothing too remarkable about it (think 80s hairdos, outfits and music).
Verdict: Stubby of Reschs
But it’s a fuckin’ masterpiece compared to:
Pumpkinhead 2: Blood Wings (1994)
WHAT IN THE WORLD WAS THIS??? Did anyone even read the script??? This was TERRIBLE. At one point the sheriff and the CSI lady go into some barn / post office where some bald, fat guy was murdered. Well wait, this is how it went. The night before, fat guy is bopping some blond. After he – uh – is finished he sends her out to the truck for some more beer. As he is pulling up his drawers, Pumpkinhead roars in and rips him to pieces. The next morning (somehow) the sheriff and the CSI lady get news that he’s been killed so they’re at the crime scene investigating when the blond comes running and screaming out of a closet. Being the badasses they are, the CSI lady pulls a syringe out of bucket and tranquilizes her. “What’s happened here?? What’s happened here??” Talk-screams the sheriff. “Can’t you see??” CSI lady responds. “She’s in a fright induced coma.” *CUE CLOSE-UP OF BLOND’S FACE* “It’s one step away from being…. scared to death.”
In the first one, Pumpkinhead was a malevolent demon thing hatched from the pumpkin patch. This time he’s something like the mutated monster of some deformed kid killed 40 years ago. And the monster goes around drawing “red wings” in blood on the walls of his victims… because the group of kids that killed him were in a clique at the local high school called “The Red Wings”…. but he would never have ever EVER known that since he was a deformed kid living in some run down dump eating slop out of a bowl like a dog. Oh, and Punky Brewster is in this.
I know I run the SHITFEST but I always do try and find some sort of merit in the things I watch but there’s not much to go on here. I suppose the practical creature effects were decent enough but the rest of this movie is awfully laughable.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
Pumpkinhead: Ashes To Ashes (2006)
No matter how bad Number 2 was, this was measurably worse. I have to be honest and admit that, in order to get this done on time, I had to watch some sort of Nordic version of this on YouTube with Nordic subtitles and terrible English voiceovers (Christ you should search it out just to hear the treatment they give Doug Bradley’s voice). I also think this version is cropped for length. Either that or this is some of the shittiest editing I have ever seen. Either way, this is an awful movie and I’m not looking forward to number 4.
This time around, Pinhead Doug Bradley runs a funeral home, harvests live human organs to sell and dumps the bodies out in the swamp. Lance Henrickson (from the first) shows up as a ghost and a blond lady summons Pumpkinhead after Bradley “butchers her baby”. I could have missed something if this was cropped for run time but she didn’t seem to care about her missing baby until she sees its corpse. Huh? BLAH BLAH BLAH Pumpkinhead kills a bunch of redneck assholes… this movie was totally stupid. Oh yeah, there’s some pretty hilarious looking 2006 CGI in this too.
Verdict: Schooner of Tooheys New
Pumpkinhead: Blood Feud (2007)
BY GOD THIS WAS BAD. Filmed in Romania – using Romanian actors trying to pull off a deep south, American accent – boy – yeah, I uh,…. not good. I mean – it’s laugh out loud quality. And, Jeez, the acting is just pitiful. This was gory though – probably more bloody than all of the others put together but it was just awful. Thinking about it, the script could probably be done right – or better – if there was some money behind it but this end product is pitiful
In America there is an old folk story about two groups of families who have a “blood feud” for dozens of decades – the Hatfields and the McCoys. For some reason this version of Pumkinhead finds us dealing with those two families in modern day America. One of the Hatfields (I think) is in love with the McCoy daughter (a good looking English actress who really has a lot of trouble filtering out her accent). One night they are out by the wishing well making out when her McCoy brothers come out and accidentally kill the Hatfield sister. So, the Hatfield boy sets Pumpkinhead on them since nothing says I love you more than having a demon kill your entire family.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
Well – that’s over with. Aside from the first one this franchise is pretty bad. It’s OK if you have nothing else too do but -…. THANKS TIM for having me over again!! These weren’t great movies but this was good fun!
Thanks so much to Mr Pictures Conclusions for taking part. Please head on over to Isaacs Picture Conclusions and get involved with some of the fantastic stuff he has going on over there.
Over this fortnight, you have the chance to win an as yet unconfirmed (but definitely choice) prize courtesy of Madman Entertainment, so be sure to get liking and commenting to go into the draw
A Fortnight of Terror: The Evil Dead
Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead (1981) is one hell of a beloved horror flick. Judging from blogs I follow and other things I read, I would venture that it is probably more beloved than any other horror film ever made. Which makes me worry how many people will be a bit bummed with this review, cause I did not particularly like this film at all.
There is no doubt Raimi and friends did a pretty exceptional job on the production front. You can tell this film was made on the cheap, but that never stops the creativity shining through. The creativity does not always work, the whirling camera first person shots for example, but it is an aspect of the film that you have to respect. And perhaps watching this for the first time in 2013 means that I am not able to appreciate just how big a deal the film was when it hit. But other classic horror films, such as Halloween (1978) and Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) that I feared might have lost some of their impact when viewed for the first time in the 2010s, still worked exceptionally well for me. The set up is pretty archetypical cabin in the woods stuff. Think Cabin in the Woods (2012). One issue is that, unlike Whedon’s film and the best of the genre, I think this film skimps a lot on the establishment of the characters. For whatever reason the film is in too much of a rush and I think that hurts the film later on. For me to care about the characters being killed, I need to have gotten to know them or connect with them… or at the very least be slightly intrigued by them. But here I wasn’t, so I was not particularly fussed when they started to be knocked off. Even just establishing them as clichés would have increased the effectiveness of the film a great deal. I think this rushed beginning also means that the creepy isolated house in the woods atmosphere that the filmmakers were aiming for was not entirely there.
There are a couple of other key areas where The Evil Dead falls down for me. Firstly, aside from the easy charisma of Bruce Campbell, I thought the acting ranges from the pretty stilted to the pretty terrible overall. I don’t think that is helped by a script that I definitely consider to be pretty weak. Another aspect of the film that I think pales in comparison with classic slashers (I am thinking particularly of Halloween here) is the soundtrack. In films such as Carpenter’s, the soundtrack plays a major role in enhancing and elevating what is occurring onscreen and is a major player in the setting of tone and more importantly atmosphere of the experience. I found the sparse soundtrack here to be more annoying that anything else, failing to really add anything and actually reducing the tension at times. I am sounding pretty negative, but The Evil Dead is not without its upsides. There are a couple of quite cool ‘bump in the night’ moments and for a fair section of the middle part of the film, it is really quite frightening as well. But I think as the action really ramps up in the film’s final act, at times relying on some terrible effects shots, the really frightening impact is lost. I did really like some of the stuff with the Book of the Dead and the tape recording though, and thought that was much more atmospheric than what the rest of the film was able to achieve.
As a personal view, I found The Evil Dead to be dated, much more so than other classic horror films of its vintage. I thought the pacing and manner in which the film ‘builds’ (or doesn’t) meant it was a bit of a let down for me. A slasher/horror film does not need to have stunningly nuanced characters. But the undercooked teen characters onscreen here really let the rest of the film down. I know a bunch of you guys absolutely love this film. So let me know (civilly of course) in the comments below what I am missing with it.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
Progress: 94/1001
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Fear and Desire
Things have been a little crazy for me lately. I am hard at work helping to finalise the features line-up for the Blue Mountains Film Festival which has been taking up all of my spare time usually set aside for writing. Also, for some reason the emails of new posts from WordPress have stopped working, so apologies if I have missed some of your posts. Anyone else had this issue with WordPress emails not coming through in the past week and a bit?
At 60 minutes, Stanley Kubrick’s Fear and Desire (1953) falls into that no-man’s land between a short and a feature (though technically it is considered the latter). Which made it a perfect film for me to quickly watch and review. If Kubrick had his way, you would believe that his feature career started with Killer’s Kiss (1955), so much so that throughout his lifetime he suppressed Fear and Desire, publicly deriding it and encouraging it not to be screened. To be totally blunt, I can sort of see where he was coming from. The film functions as a curiosity piece based solely on the fact that its director went on to become one of the all-time greats. However it has very little to recommend it outside of that.
The film follows a group of soldiers who find themselves behind enemy lines in an unnamed conflict. The film begins with a rather pretentious voiceover that says things like the soldiers involved have “no other country but the mind”, and it is a pretentiousness that plagues much of the rest of the film actually. It feels a little too much like a student film that is taking itself far too seriously. The plot, a pretty secondary concern to be frank, sees the soldiers attempting to make it back to the friendly side of the battlefield. Along the way they get a little distracted by the close proximity of an enemy general who they consider taking out. Kubrick became very well known for his war films – Paths of Glory (1957) which I consider to be probably the greatest film the genre ever produced, and Full Metal Jacket (1987), a film I am not particularly fond of but that is widely beloved. But there is none of the immediacy of those two films that would really allow you to consider this a ‘war film’ as such. The themes that Kubrick would touch on in those later films are here, but only found in pretty minute quantities. Fleeting consideration is given to the notions of cowardice and military duty, but both of these were much expanded on in Kubrick’s later work.
Unlike many first films from great directors, Fear and Desire gives very little indication of what is to come in the career of the person in charge. Much of it is simply, at times blandly shot. The disconcertingly average cuts from one close-up/medium shot to the next that looks pretty much exactly the same, shows a lack of inspiration that is distinctly un-Kubrick like. There are a couple of scenes where his visual flourish gets an early career work out. One slaying in particular springs to mind. But overall, there is little indication that the man directing this film would go on to become the master that Kubrick did. Many of the film’s flaws though are not Kubrick’s fault. The script, which was not written by him, is no good at all. It seems enamoured with arty flourishes that just come off as both pretentious and meaningless. Some of what it is aiming for, the consideration of war’s effect on the psyche, would later be examined much more successfully by Apocalypse Now (1979). The dialogue also fails to give the film any real momentum at all as it crawls along. Managing to rise above all of this in the chief highlight of the film is the performance of a young Paul Mazursky as Private Sidney. Even when the material he is working with is decidedly uneven which could have easily seeped into his performance, he delivers a really quite assured and creative depiction of a man crumbling under the stress of the situation he finds himself in.
Fear and Desire contains a few highlights, chief amongst them the performance of Mazursky. But there is very little here that is worth your time. So unless you are a Kubrick completist (a stance I could definitely appreciate) I think it is safe to say you can afford to give this pretty wooden film a miss.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
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High Plains Drifter
High Plains Drifter (1973) is the second film in Clint Eastwood’s rather auspicious filmography as a director. This is the first to explore the genre of the Western, where Eastwood made his name, after the contemporary surrounds of his first directorial effort Play Misty for Me (1971).
The film starts really promisingly as a lone rider emerges from a haze of heat on a wide open plain. It is beautiful and iconic image to kick things off. The lone rider is The Stranger, played by Eastwood, who rhythmically rides into town with the eyes of all the townsfolk transfixed on him. It does not take him long to make an impression on the place either. He guns down three heavies who are bugging him in the barbershop before raping a woman in a really troubling scene. I was a big fan of proceedings up until the rape scene. Eastwood with his hat pulled very low and a beard is an iconic image of the West. The scene where he shoots the three men is a cold, brutal one. He gets the first of them right between the eyes. The rape scene jarred a lot though. It comes somewhat out of nowhere and whilst it is addressed somewhat later on, it just didn’t sit right with me. The notion of rape as a form of revenge was troubling to me, but I don’t think the film made it out to be particularly troubling, if that makes sense.
There is a strange shift in tone and sensibility a little way through the film. The townsfolk are fearing the return of three convicts who have just been released from prison and who are presumably on their way back to town to gain revenge on those who put them away. Very High Noon (1952). The concerned residents, impressed by The Stranger’s skills in murdering the three men in the barbershop, decide to hire him to protect them. After some brief reluctance, he accepts, on the proviso that he can have whatever he wants in the town. From this point the tone lightness as he gets a merry band of men together and goes from shop to shop being a jerk and getting free stuff. He also promotes Mordecai, a local dwarf, to the dual role of mayor and sheriff. After such a strong, if imperfect, start which traded in the bleakness, grit and lawlessness of the West, this all feels like a bit of a jaunt. I don’t particularly like my Clint Eastwood quippy. James Bond makes quips, not Clint. It is just all a bit silly.
Then, just abruptly as the first shift, the film gets bleak again. Eastwood forces himself onto another woman (the treatment of women by the film was a little troubling overall) and then paints the town literally red and renames it hell so he can exact his revenge on the three men riding into town. Who it is revealed through the film have done something in their past to very much wrong The Stranger. It is no spoiler to say he has his revenge too. The hellacious image of The Stranger brutally whipping a man to death, surrounded by huge flickering flames is surely the film’s defining image. It is also one that does not really match up with so much that has preceded it though.
The uneven tone and questionable attitude to the treatment of women helped to make High Plains Drifter not that enjoyable for me. Which is a shame, because I like Eastwood as a director and the early parts of this set it up to be something far better.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
Progress: 90/1001
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Silent Film Week: Within Our Gates
Within Our Gates (1920) directed by Oscar Micheaux is the oldest surviving film by an African American director. Indeed, being responsible for directing, writing and independently producing 40 films in his lifetime, Micheaux can lay claim to being one of the most prolific African American filmmakers of all time.
The film ambitiously weaves together a number of narrative threads. These include a love triangle, a woman attempting to raise funds for the survival of a school for African American children in the South, a crime story or two and numerous broader explorations of African American life in the early 20th century. Indeed it is useful to think of the film in this way, as a broad exploration of the conditions and racism of the time. Personally I found that trying to follow the individual narrative strands left me a little lost as to exactly what was going on. I did find this quite frustrating, not knowing exactly what was happening. And perhaps that is more a criticism of me as a viewer rather than the film itself. But I think that the fact I was struggling to keep up meant that the film did not grab me by the throat early on, leading me to be pretty unengaged throughout.
The thing that the film succeeds most in doing is rendering a portrait of just what life was like in the U.S at this time, a country starkly divided into North and South. A place where even in the more hospitable north, there was still the “occasional lynching”. This is no sugar-coated view of the world, even in this version, which apparently had to undergo numerous cuts before the Chicago censors of the day would allow it to be released. There is some confronting violence against women depicted along, with almost continuous racism. Stylistically the film is very sharp, Micheaux was clearly a highly talented filmmaker (his style was reputedly derided in the 20s). Whilst I have criticised the coherence of the narrative, which I do maintain is probably the major weakness of the film, the editing of Within Our Gates is really quite excellent. It is impressive in the way it manages to weave the different narrative strands together, occasionally juxtaposing images side by side to great effect.
There is a lot of really intriguing stuff to see and admire in Within Our Gates, both as a historical document and as a piece of film art. But overall, it just does not hold up for me as a cohesive whole. This means it is relegated a little to the status of important film history curiosity, rather than fully fledged classic.
Verdict: Schooner of Carlton Draught
Progress: 79/1001
You can check out the entire film here, to see if you agree with my thoughts:
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