December 2nd, 2007
Posted by
Ian W |
DVD Viewing Journal |
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A couple of weeks ago I watched The Jacket, a time travel tale that cared nothing for the method of travel or even the potential repercussions, it was all about the characters and damn the consequences. Primer is the anti-Jacket , it’s a film that could well make your head explode trying to keep track of who went where when. It’s also bloody brilliant.
Four guys are trying to come up with a breakthrough invention that will make their name and their fortune. When one of them makes an unexpected discovery he teams up with one of the others to explore its potential, shutting the other pair out. Little do they realise that what they discover will lead to them building a time machine.
Said time machine lacks the fancifulness of H.G.Wells or Back to the Future though, consisting of some tubes, wires and…well it’s basically just a metal box. Once it’s operational the film poses the question - what would you do if you could nip forward in time? Our protagonists initially decide to use their invention to make some cash but they are also mindful of what could happen if they bump into themselves. Of course things go pear shaped when they deviate from the routine and the pair’s friendship is tested to the limit as they desperately try to put things back in order.
The cast of unknowns are convincing as the nerdy wiz kids with David Sullivan and Shane Carruth spouting technobable like it means something (which given Carruth’s engineering background it probably does).
December 2nd, 2007
Posted by
Ian W |
DVD Viewing Journal |
one comment
Major Dundee details the hunt for renegade Apaches but in truth the film is far more concerned with the conflicts that occur within the mismatched band of soldiers than with the resolution of their quest.
Union officers, black Union soldiers and a bunch of criminals, both civilian and confederate, make up the group, so it’s no surprise that things don’t run smoothly. Being a Peckinpah film there are no white hats or black hats here, with the characters displaying a complexity not often seen in westerns of the period.
As the obsessive Major Dundee, Charlton Heston is excellent, he’s arrogant and pigheaded but not without his softer side as displayed in the scenes with Senta Berger and the actor captures all that and more. Heston’s tendency to strike a pose for the camera just adds to Dundee’s egotism.
As the leader of the confederates, Richard Harris is far more flamboyant. A man out of time, with his sense of honour out on step with the war that has just ended, he constantly finds himself at odds with Dundee. Heston and Harris allegedly didn’t get along onset, but rather than detract from the film it just adds to the onscreen antagonism between the two.
James Coburn steals most of his scenes as the one armed scout Samuel Potts and Michael Anderson Jr. does a reasonable job as bugler/narrator Tim Ryan. Only Jim Hutton seems out of place, with his performance too comedic and his character too thinly drawn.
