October 18th, 2007
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Ian W |
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Peter Lorre’s Kentaro Moto is part Sherlock Holmes (detective extraordinaire, master of disguise) part James Bond (snappy dresser, more than willing to mix it up with the bad guys). Ten minutes into this second Moto feature and he’s already displayed all of those abilities and that’s one of the big pluses about these films - they may be low budget and formulaic but they waste no time getting down to the good stuff.
Peter Lorre plays the part with conviction and, while we’re never fooled into believing he’s really Japanese, he shows a level of respect for the part that’s admirable. This is no cartoonish parody of an Asian, so often seen in the Hollywood of the times. Moto is (almost) always one step ahead of anyone else in the film and displays a wonderful sense of humour, albeit a touch black.
Here he’s out to foil some nefarious antique smugglers’ attempts to find the lost tome of Genghis Khan, along the way befriending Prince Chung, played by Philip Ahn, probably most famous as Master Kan in ‘70s TV series Kung Fu. Also on hand is John Carradine as a Spanish antique dealer, his first of two appearances in the Moto series.
This isn’t high art but it is a fun way to spend an hour or so and if you’re a Peter Lorre fan so much the better.
October 15th, 2007
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Ian W |
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A feel good movie that isn’t afraid to let a little reality in and even makes a social point or two, Tokyo Godfathers is the anime equivalent of It’s a Wonderful Life i.e. the perfect Christmas movie.
When three homeless friends find an abandoned baby they decided to find the mother and reunite her with her child. On the way all three have encounters with people from their past, as the journey changes them in unexpected ways.
The three godfathers of the title aren’t all male, in fact you could say only one and a half are. Gin a former family man now living on the streets comes to terms with troubled his past, Hana a transvestite looks up his “mother” and Miyuki, a young girl confronts her guilt over a traumatic incident with her father. The film constantly surprises not only in how it treats the main characters but also in the stories ultimate resolution.
This is the sort of animated feature it’s impossible to imagine Hollywood, or possibly anywhere but Japan, making. The film has a wicked sense of humour but it doesn’t shirk from showing the harsh reality of life on the streets, the scene where Gin is beaten up by a group of youths is particularly shocking.
Like his other films, Satoshi Kon has given Tokyo Godfathers a very cinematic look. It may be an animated film but in the way it uses camera angles, slow-motion and flashbacks, it feels like a real film. Adding to that is some first rate voice acting that combines perfectly with some breathtakingly beautiful animation.
October 14th, 2007
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Ian W |
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Oh my! This has to be one of the worst films ever made, it’s bad on so many levels - bad acting, bad writing, bad effects. It’s so bad its funny, a level that only the truly awful can aspire too.
It’s bad ‘70s SF meets’80s music video by way of Matrix style action that’s been taken to ridiculous extremes. Only William Fichtner gives anything approximating a performance and he seems to have stumbled in from a completely different movie, one not populated by fashion models striking posses.
Milla Jovovich can be pretty good in the right role, but here she doesn’t have a part, she’s just some generic action heroine. The bond between her and the kid that should be at the heart of the movie is nonexistent.
I quite enjoyed Kurt Wimmer’s Equilibrium and had hopes for this, even allowing for the uniformly bad reviews. It sets out to be a comic book film, the opening credits (the films highpoint) make that clear, but even comic inspired films need characters and a story, Wimmer’s film has neither. It’s hard to see where the $30m budget went as the effects would look sub standard in a video game.
The funniest part? After Milla slices and dices her way through a room full of ninja stormtroopers the only blood on display comes from a cut on her hand.
October 13th, 2007
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John Sturges classic take on the legendary shootout concentrates on the relationship between Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday. The first half of the film sees them go from dislike to grudging respect and ultimately friendship. Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas excel during the quieter, character building scenes and you really get a sense of the bond developing between the straight-laced lawman and the flamboyant gambler.
In the second half it’s off to Tombstone and the feud between the Earp’s and the Clanton’s that comes to a head with the eponymous gunfight. Lancaster has less to do here, his love interest, Rhonda Fleming, left behind in Dodge City but Douglas, and his abusive relationship with Jo Van Fleet, is very much to the fore. Of all the films about Earp and Holliday this one seems the most centred on Doc and Douglas fills the part well, showing the characters self hatred in the scenes with Van Fleet and his admiration (almost idolisation) of Earp, the man he would have loved to have been. If there’s a fault with Douglas it’s simply that he looks to damn healthy to play the ailing gambler.
Lancaster is less showy as but no less effective. His Earp is a man of few words but he conveys the man’s inner turmoil at leaving Fleming behind without need of them. His only outward display of emotion is when his brother James is killed but even that is subdued and in keeping with the character.
October 12th, 2007
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A low budget From Dusk Till Dawn knock off, cunningly disguised by having the strip club full of flesh eating ghouls instead of vampires. Devon Sawa, a few Big Macs down the road from Final Destination, plays a Spanish Fly smuggling slacker, Kelly Hu a government assassin and Ken Foree is a samurai sword wielding monster hunter, who all cross paths at the Devil’s Den bar.
The Film is as bad as it sounds but at least it’s never dull. The effects are reasonable (given the budget) and even the action isn’t bad but the film is so badly written all it can hope for is to be a good bad movie. It does score an extra point (with me at least) for having a fantasy sequence that features Zatoichi, the hero of a series of Japanese samurai films, facing off against the ghouls but with the exception of that scene this is an instantly forgettable affair.
October 11th, 2007
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This lightweight sequel to Tony Rome starts with the Miami detective finding the body of a woman at the bottom of the ocean. From there the film takes in mobsters, Raquel Welch and ‘Hoss’ Cartright but never offers much in the way of surprises.
While the plot may not be up to much at least the scenery is nice with Welch looking lovely in a succession of wigs and designer outfits but as Mr Rome himself says “You’d look good in a paper napkin.” Miami doesn’t look bad either.
Dan Blocker could have made a pretty good villain, his opening scene shows he could have been quite an intimidating bad guy, but the film settles, rather unimaginatively, for using him as comic relief.
The film’s biggest failings are the script, which tries so hard to be witty it almost feels like a spoof of detective movies and the score. I doubt Rome has one conversation throughout the whole film where he isn’t being a wiseass; it’s so overdone he becomes a caricature of a shamus. Hugo Montenegro’s score is so inappropriately light and fluffy that it adds to the feeling that this is more comedy than drama.
A better director might have made something of this but Gordon Douglas allows Sinatra too much freedom. Having already made Robin and the 7 Hoods and the original Tony Rome with him he obviously didn’t want to upset his meal ticket.
October 9th, 2007
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Animonday’s a little late this week, because having watched this drivel last night I really couldn’t be bothered writing it up and went to bed instead. So 24 hours later here it is.
A madman’s looking for the fountain of youth (they call it something different but that’s what it is) and out to stop him is the impossibly buxom warrior woman, Julia. That’s about it for plot, which would be fine if the visuals were up to snuff but while it was only made in 2000 this looks like 80s Saturday morning kids animation, with added tits and gore of course.
While it’s an 18 certificate this is anything but adult, the humour is of a juvenile nature and the action violent and gory but cartoonish, the less said about the nudity the better. The heavy rock soundtrack featuring Pantera, Queens of the Stone Age and Billy Idol amongst others, is ineptly used, with the songs mixed to low to be really heard and yet loud enough so you can’t hear anything else clearly. They’re also dropped in at inopportune moments.
Anything good? Well Michael Ironside is wonderfully over the top as the villain, Tyler and Billy Idol surprisingly effective as an alien priest. Still it’s hard to imagine this appealing to anyone, except perhaps teenage geeks too shy to spank the monkey while watching real, three dimensional women.
October 7th, 2007
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This East German/Polish coproduction from 1960 is interesting from a historical point of view but not a great film, although it does have its moments.
When a recording is found from a crashed spaceship from Venus a manned mission to the planet is organised. The crew is made up of representatives from the world’s most powerful nations, Russia, America, Japan, China and others. With only part of the message deciphered before take off the crew works to decode the remaining portion. Are the Venusians friend or foe? And if they’re the latter can the small crew do anything to stop them?
While American science fiction films of the period were obsessed with the communist threat, it seems that behind the Iron Curtain the fear of the atomic bomb was the primary concern. The Hiroshima bomb is an important element of the relationship between the male American and female Japanese crew members (she’s unable to have kids because her exposure to radiation would cause them to be born deformed).
The potential for global annihilation is the films message with the fate of Venus a warning for the human race as a whole and only the united world powers, in the form of the crew, able to avert disaster.
While not in the same league as Hollywood films like Forbidden Planet or This Island Earth the film has an impressive visual style, particularly the scenes on the surface of Venus, in fact the look put me in mind of Mario Bava’s classic Planet of the Vampires. It was nice to see the “one world” message as well, although the American’s were depicted as unwilling to allow anyone to go on the mission.
October 7th, 2007
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Ian W |
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Not the action fest the title might lead you to expect, this is actually a rather dull melodrama with nothing original or exciting on display.
Charlton Heston plays a returning Confederate officer, who, after a ridiculous whirlwind romance with Anne Baxter, marries her and heads back to his ranch. Baxter is a dancehall girl who passes herself off as a lady to snare Heston (gee, never seen that before) and inevitably someone from her past appears to throw a spanner in the works.
The films main focus is on the Heston/Baxter relationship but it also finds time for that western staple, the feuding brothers. Having lost an arm in a childhood accident, Tom Tryon resents older brother Chuck and is looking for some payback. Only the loss of an arm sets this apart from any number of westerns featuring squabbling siblings and Tryon fails to make anything special of the clichéd part.
The most interesting story element is the government attempting to steal land from the Texas ranchers but that’s a barely explored subplot in James Edward Grant’s screenplay, with the conclusion feeling rushed and unbelievable.
Not only are the three central characters not particularly interesting, they’re not even very violent. Heston made some enjoyable westerns but this isn’t one of them.
October 6th, 2007
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More a whodunit than a horror film, this centres on The Theater du Mort of the title, a French playhouse specialising in the macabre, and on a series of vampire like murders taking place close to the theatre.
Christopher Lee chews the scenery menacingly as Philippe Darvas, the theatre’s writer/director and one of the chief suspects in the murders. Other possible candidates include Julian Glover as a surgeon whose hand was injured in a car accident leaving him unable to operate, and Lelia Goldoni, a recently recovered mental patient now appearing in the latest production.
The film keeps you guessing right up to the end, with a twist I didn’t see coming and a fitting fate for the revealed murderer. While the film is a UK production it dearly wants to be Italian, but it lacks the style of a giallo. Italian filmmakers like Mario Bava could get away with leaving plot threads untied by dazzling the audience visually; Theatre of Death’s director Samuel Gallu lacks the ability to blind the audience to the plots shortcomings and leaving the viewer a little unsatisfied.
The main appeal of the film is Lee, but it’s a very over the top performance, overly theatrical and not one of his best. Worth a look on TV but not a recommended purchase.
