Taken – 2008, Pierre Morel
Have you seen any of the films Steven Segal has made in the last five years? They tend to be shot in Europe and Segal plays an ex cop/special forces type who’s daughter is kidnapped and he has to kill a lot of bad guys to get her back. The problem with Steven Segal is that once principal photography has wrapped, he tends to refuse to take part in any post production or re-shoots no matter how necessary. This is why some Segal films end up with a narration by Segal’s character provided by someone doing a bad Segal impression, then the poor director has to edit together an incomplete film, knowing that if it wasn’t going straight to video before, it is now.
But back to Taken. It’s basically has a plot as described above but instead of Segal, we have Liam Neeson, doing his best Jason Bourne impression. The result is a good action flick set in Paris (que top notch car chases). One little thing annoyed me though; the whole reason his daughter is in Paris in the first place is to follow a U2 tour around Europe. Yeah right.
K-Pax – 2001, Iain Softley
This film has its fans, but I’m not on of them. Spacey is playing that same character he always plays but slightly crazier and Bridges is trying to out subtle Spacey. The whole ‘guy who thinks he’s an alien’ storey sounds a bit like a Robin Williams film.
Kung Pow: Enter The Fist – 2002, Steve Oedekerk
Steve’s labour of love is very hit and miss, but when it hits it hits the funny bone hard. He basically took couple of old Kung Fu films that featured many of the same cast and edited them into one film(which was a common practice among distributors in the 70s) and then digitally pasted himself into some of the scenes along with shooting a few new ones. The humour comes from the dialogue which he dubbed himself. Well worth a watch. A sequel is in the works apparently.
Outland – 1981, Peter Hyams
After the success of Alien, realistic space films were all the rage, and Peter Hyams was well heeled in such films. Sean Connery plays some kind of Space Sheriff posted to a mining colony where some suspicious shit is going down. The premise and the production are good but the film is let down by an awful third act.
Outlander – 2008, Howard McCain
Not to be confused with Outland. Lazily but accurately described as Lord of The Rings meets Alien, this Viking Sci-Fi Monster romp is quite good in my opinion. Given the quality of the cast and the creature effects it’s a shame that this film wasn’t given the distribution it deserved.
The White Ribbon – 2009, Mickael Haneke
I watched this German film at the Cornerhouse cinema in Manchester. I watched it with a German who was studying for a PhD in Social Sciences. The film was introduced by another German who was some kind of expert on German cinema and the films of Mickael Haneke. In her intro she said that the director had said that this film, set in rural Germany just before the outbreak of the First World Wall, was an attempt to explain the mindset of the German people that would eventuality lead to the rise of Hitler and Nazism. After the film, the German student said the stuff in the intro was a load of bollocks.
Anyway...This film is ok I guess...I’d like to see it again to make my mind up as at first viewing it is a bit slow and seems to hammer home the whole ‘weren’t people oppressed in Germany/Prussia before the wars’ point a bit much.
The Thin Red Line – 1998, Terrence Malick
An excellent film every bit as good as any other highly praised war film. Nick Nolte should have had an Oscar nod, but he already had a nomination that year for ‘Affliction’. That said, everyone is good, and every lingering shot of blades of grass or trees blowing in the wind is justified.
Rather than repeat it all here I recommend you read the Wikipedia entry on this film. I will mention that the original cut was 9 hours long and Billy Bob Thornton was completely cut from the final version after recording 6 hours of narration.
A Serious Man – 2009, Ethan and Joel Coen
A Coen brothers that does not include blackmail or kidnap or murder. Although it’s still very much a Coen brothers black comedy exactly as you would expect. It’s still good though, light hearted rather than dark.
I’m not sure how much of it is based in the Coens childhood; was one of them stoned at his Bar Mitzvah? Annoyingly it has an ambiguous ‘make your own conclusion’ ending like ‘No Country For Old Men’
North By Northwest – 1959, Alfred Hitchcock
Saw this for the first time on the big screen as part of a small re-release of a new print. It was one of the best cinematic experiences I’ve had. Apparently this film has been projected at Mount Rushmore and in the corn fields where they shot the sequence with the bi-plane. It is excellent and I want to be Carey Grant. I also really hope that it was Cary Grants actual handwriting on the book of matches near the end.
Awesome opening titles ahoy.
Nineteen Eighty-Four – 1984, Michael Radford
Doesn’t really do the book justice, John Hurt is good though.
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