News | A Scanner Darkly

Whilst these posters might not excite many people, I quite like them. They are bold, well cropped and are more of a tease than trying to portray anything but the feel of the movie.

And lets face it, the movie is gonna rock big time.

Click here to see the whole range of posters, thanks to JoBlo.com

DVD | Constantine

I received Constantine on DVD yesterday, so any plans I might have had for last night were out the window. I looked the kids in their rooms, sat down with the wife, lights out and settled in to see how well the movie had translated from big screen to DVD.

Let me tell you, it’s still as good as it was the first time. Sure, it’s diminished a little by the size, but lets face it, more and more people are buying bigger TVs and more of us are staying home to watch movies, so size isn’t the issue it used to be.

And what of the whole disc of extras? Well, you’ll have to wait for that, that’s my weekend job.

If you like spiritually significant, freaky supernatural-edge-of-your-seats thrillers, with deadpan acting by Keanu, then you’ll love Constantine.

If you don’t like that sort of thing, well, you should!!

DVD | Harsh Realm

Harsh Realm, part The Matrix, part Apocalypse Now was created by Chris Carter and dropped by Fox after only 3 episodes. Consequently it never made it ti New Zealand as a TV programme, but now 6 years later it’s arrived on DVD.

Basically, the story goes like this: The US Military have created a virtual reality world that mirrors our world, and have been using it to train their forces. But someone has discovered how to hack in to the programme and has taken over, so now the military must send someone in to take him out.

The storyline didn’t grab me either, but the first episode did. Being based in a huge virtual world much like the Matrix, gives the series huge scope and stops it from getting tired. It’s action packed and the characters are loveable, add to that some light cheese moments and you have the perfect sci-fi series.

Whilst it does suffer occasionally in the special effects department, the quality is great and shows no hint of dating despite it’s 6 year hiatus in Fox’s wharehouses.

Be glad that this has finally seen the light of day in good ole New Zealand.

DVD | Million Dollar Baby

Million Dollar Baby is one of those funny films. It’s not one that I would have picked, but there wasn’t a lot else available at the time. It’s also not a film that had me on the edge of my seat.

But the more I think about the movie, the more I like it. The way Morgan Freeman’s character narrates reminded me of The Shawshank Redemption. But Freeman isn’t the main focus; he’s more of a constant background piece. The main characters are played by the ever-capable Clint Eastwood, and Hilary Swank, who gives an outstanding performance.

Basically a story regret and looking for redemption, Million Dollar Baby brings two very different people with similar hurts and needs, together in a journey of acceptance, trust and commitment. Two characters who have let down or been let down by their respective families find in each other a family worth fighting for.

Fortunately Eastwood stays away from Hollywood clichés and delivers a knock out blow that you don’t see coming in the form a huge twist that changes the entire focus and direction of the movie.

And it’s a twist that I’m gonna stay away from as it will ruin the movie if you haven’t seen it.

As I said earlier, this movie didn’t keep me on the edge of my seat, but it did keep me thinking long after the movie was over. So if you’re looking for something to think about, a movie that’ gonna give your grey matter something to do, then grab a copy of Million Dollar Baby.

Quote | Scott Derrickson

“To me, the horror genre is the genre of non-denial. It's about admitting that there is evil in the world, and recognizing that there is evil within us, and that we're not in control, and that the things that we are afraid of must be confronted in order for us to relinquish that fear. And I think that the horror genre serves a great purpose in bolstering our understanding of what is evil and therefore better defining what is good. And of course I'm talking about, really, the potential of the horror genre, because there are a lot of horror films that don't do these things. It is a genre that's full of exploitation, but the better films in the genre certainly accomplish, I think, very noble things."

Scott Derrickson, director and writer; The The Exorcism of Emily Rose.

X-Box | Fahrenheit

You are Lucas Kane. You are sitting in a male restroom, your wrists had been hacked with a knife and you’re not completely sure who you are or where you are. Another man walks into the restroom and proceeds to use the washbasin. Suddenly you rise from the toilet and stumble towards the man. But you can’t control your actions; you’ve been possessed; your eyes are white, rolled back and your face expressionless. You’re floating above your body, watching as you lunge towards the man with the knife knocking him to the floor. Then you sit on the man and stab him on the restroom floor in a sacrificial killing. Suddenly, you are released from your possessed state, return to you body and realise the atrocity you’ve just committed. Shocked and stunned you drop the knife and panic quickly sets in.

This is where the game begins and you take control. But I use the term ‘game’ lightly as this plays more like an interactive action thriller. Kinda like those old school text adventures, but this time instead of typing ‘west’ you get to move your character around and interact with the environment and other people. But be careful, everything you do has a consequence.

Having only played a short demo, I’m hooked and can’t wait till it’s released. The graphics are beautiful, if somewhat dark and moody, but that sets the tone for the game

Fahrenheit is going to be one of the most original and addictive games of the year.

DVD | Cellular

Starting off a little cheesy, this popcorn thriller owes a lot to the very underrated Colin Farrell thriller Phone Booth, which is no wonder as Larry Cohen wrote them both.

But no matter how it starts, the ride gets fast very early on and turns into a very solid thriller, with some laugh out loud scenes just to let you know it’s only a movie. A great combination of elements makes for a very enjoyable watch that in the end keeps you hooked to the very last frame.

The funny thing is, the main bad guy, the ever capable Jason Statham seems somewhat out of place in a movie populated by faces your recognise, but no actual real players (unless you call Kim Basinger a real actress).

Trivia
The movie the kidnappers are watching is "Final Destination 2" Also there is an announcement at the aiport for "Volé Flight 180 to Paris," a reference to the original "Final Destination" Both are New Line productions, as was Cellular.

DVD | Finding Neverland

I like movies with Johnny Depp in them, hell I even enjoyed 21 Jump Street (in it’s day). He seems attracted to the unusual, challenging roles, and he usually nails them.

Finding Neverland is based on the experiences of author J M Barrie during the time he wrote the children’s classic Peter Pan. Coming off the despair of writing a major flop, Barrie meets a widow and her four boys one day in the park. He finds and instant connection and bonds with the kids, re-kindling his imagination, and helping him discover Neverland.

But the time he spends with the widow and her family has consequences he never dreamed of. (I’m not gonna spoil it for you, you’ll just have to rent/buy the dvd!)

Neverland is an enchanting movie, and the theme of unconditional love and acceptance of children really brought to life Matthew 18 where Jesus extols us to become like little children, and to welcome the children. It’s a sad indictment of adulthood that we often loose the imagination and excitement that we had as children.

Fortunately Depp brings his character to life and creates and believable oasis in a time and society that frowned on such unruly behaviour. Neither action packed nor edge of your seats, Neverland pleases in other ways. It speaks to the heart and leaves you with a feeling of hope.

Trivia
In the scene where the families are sitting down for a formal dinner, and Barrie is entertaining the children, behind the scenes the producers and Depp used a fart machine to make the children laugh more.

News | Some Movies Suck!

Thanks to Joblo for this tip off, but according to the New York Times, the reason that people aren’t going to the movies so much any more could be due to bad marketing, high fuel costs, or shock, horror, too many Hollywood movies these days are just not good enough.

Yep, it’s official, too many recent movies have sucked. Hhmmmm, but is this news to anyone, hell I commented on this fact a while back, but hey if the NYT says so, then it must be true.

Oh dear, poor Hollywood, they might just have to think for a change and start creating some truly interesting movies, now that would be something to look forward to!

News | Saw 2 Poster Banned

Ok, maybe it’s because I’m not American that I don’t get how that wonderful country works. Or maybe it’s just that regulating bodies around the world all don’t make sense – hell the Aussies decided to ban GTA:SA after nude sex scene became unlockable – so what about the thousands of games already sold? Does that make you a criminal for owning a copy? Ooops, getting off topic.

So, Lions Gate released a teaser poster for Saw 2, and the MPAA didn’t realise, at first. But now they’ve seen it, they don’t like it so they’ve banned it. Fair enough, we have to keep ‘unacceptable’ content off our movie posters don’t we?

So what’s the deal with the replacement? Hell, I can’t see how less offensive it would be, but then, I didn’t find the fist one offensive!

Spot the difference!

Trailer | Jarhead

Now this is looking like a damn funny anti-war movie, with some deadpan black humour a-la American Beauty. Could be a winner. Check out the trailer, like now!

What Movie Am I #21

My title is Yiddish for 'monster'.

DVD | Young Adam

I struggled with this movie. It’s so bleak and dark, and every second scene seems to have nudity or sex or both. The funny thing is it never felt like it was gratuitous nudity, rather another element in a sad spiralling life story.

The cinematography is wonderful, moody, well thought out, but still, because the movie is, so the scenery is too: bleak and dreary. You can probably guess at this stage that this doesn’t have ‘Hollywood Blockbuster’ or ‘edge of your seats thriller’ written all over it. In fact it moves at a deafeningly slow pace. But if nothing else, the acting is riveting, with Ewan McGregor translating the lead role with believable authenticity.

And I think that’s the point. And it’s the only point that I could grasp from this movie: life then was slow, bleak and depressing. So much so that our (anti) hero is so desperate for some life that he mistakes sex for fulfilment and wanders on a journey of regret from one women to another, not realising that he’s destroying himself and many others along the way.

A sobering look at the reality of sex without love.

News | Tsunami Movie

I guess we shouldn’t really be surprised at this news, Hollywoood after all only ever has one thing on it’s mind: profit. But is it just me, or does it seem a little too soon to be talking about a movie based around last year’s Tsunami disaster?

Writer/Director Michael Patwin doesn’t seem to think so. His low budget movie aims to have a ‘historical’ feel to it.

And what’s the main focus of the movie? The story of an American man who, in the aftermath of the disaster walks barefoot for seventy miles to find his wife and child.

Apparently Patwin was inspired to write the story after reading news stories of locals who had walked to find their loved ones.

Hhhmmmm, so why change it to a (presumably white) American, and not leave it as a local. Oh that’s right, if it’s not about Americans, it won’t sell. Hell, if we really want to make it into an American story, they should angle it some how to make Al Qaida responsible for the tsunami. Yeah, now that’s a movie even George W could get behind...

DVD | The Real Da Vinci Code

Dan Brown’s best seller The Da Vinci Code stirred up a storm of controversy when it was released, mainly due to the claims it made about the Holy Grail.

Ask most Christians and weather they’ve read the book or not, they’ll tell you that it’s a load of rubbish. Me, I’ve read the book. Interesting story, quite action packed in places, but a little too preachy for my liking. The thing that really irked me about the book though, was that at the start Dan claims that whilst the book is a novel, most of it is based on fact.

So it was with keen interest that I watched The Real Da Vinci Code last night. It was a bit of en eye opener. I’d grown up knowing about the traditional Holy Grail – the cup that Jesus drank from at the last supper, but I didn’t know that there was more than one version of this story, and that it was just that. A story. A novel in fact. One of the first works of fiction is the story of the Holy Grail. The cup of Christ is nothing but a best selling novel, written so long ago that most people take it for historical fact.

But what about the other stuff in Dan’s book? The secret societies, locations and even University departments. None of it is real. Sure, Dan did his research and found out about all these things that he wrote about, but what he didn’t realise (at least, let’s assume he didn’t realise) was that like countless people before him, he had been had. He’d uncovered stories that he either wanted to be true, or didn’t have the time to investigate properly.

And what of Leonardo’s painting of the Last Supper? What of the secret messages hidden in that? According to the DVD, there is likely a hidden message in it, but more of a shout out to the man who paid for it to be painted then any secret societal code.

But the question that doesn’t get answered by this DVD is who’s the biggest sucker? Dan Brown for not getting his facts right or countless readers who believed everything he said.

DVD | Criminal

Criminal is an interesting little movie about 2 con artists who meet by accident and decide to team up. The older, wiser one, mentoring the younger, less sure one. It starts slow and seems predictable, I mean it’s not rocket science is it – one of them is our to fleece the other, right?

Well if I told you, It’d ruin the movie for you. But hey, it’s not as predictable as it might first seem. For the most part, you’re wondering who’s gonna fleece who, switching between the two of them from scene to scene as the movie progresses.

And then more characters come in, and you don’t know how the hell it’s gonna end, and it ends up being a really enjoyable movie.

The really weird thing is. Is that it’s unbelievably honest, right at the end of the movie, when you’re sitting back smiling and laughing, it fades to black and the words ‘Based on the movie Nine Queens’ appears. And you think damn, that’s weird. I mean have you ever seen a movie that admitted to ripping off another movie? I know a lot of movies are rip offs of other movies but do they ever admit to it? Hmmmmm, weird.

But a good little movie, and a far better thing to watch on a Monday night than say, Desperate Housewifes…….

DVD | Saw

I’ve been excited about Saw ever since seeing the teaser trailer with the lady and the contraption on her head. Sadly I couldn’t get to see it at the movies, but as the saying goes; good things come to he who waits.

I picked up an ex-rental copy of Saw from my local Video Ezy for only $12.50 this week and the timing was perfect, with my wife at a ladies weekend, I was able to watch it last night.

I can’t say too much about the story line, as I don’t want to risk ruining it for any one who is still waiting to see it, but let me say that the journey wasn’t how I had expected it. But man, what a ride it was. I was glued to the TV for the full length of the movie – no popcorn or coke required!

Visually spectacular, Saw keeps the heart rate going through plenty of gore – not just gore for gores sake, but twisted gore. Situations that any sane mind just couldn’t come up with – but that’s the point of the movie, serial killers are seldom sane of mind!

And the twists and turns are great, you never quite know what’s going to happen next, and you never see the end coming – definitely not a Hollywood ending!

The acting? You wanna know about the acting? Well to be honest no matter how excited I was about this movie, the cast left me with doubts. Danny Glover never excites me and Mr Princess Bride himself Cary Elwes, well he was great in The Princess Bride, but in a gritty, dark as hell, serial killer movie?

Well blow me down with a feather if Cary didn’t give the performance of his career – who knew he had it in him? And Danny – he was damn fine as well. It just goes to show that you don’t need the latest hot actor to make a great movie.

If you liked Seven, then Saw is for you. If you cried for weeks when Bambi died, better steer clear.

DVD | The Brotherhood Of War

Ok, I’ll admit, I love a good modern war movie. Saving Private Ryan and Band Of Brothers are my two favourite DVDs. Hell I even enjoyed A Very Long Engagement and that was more a love story.

But the Korean War isn’t a historical event that gets a lot of movie attention, so It was good to see a Korean movie that gave an honest approach to it.

Sure the story line revolves around two brothers, and this may have caused a few of the more unbelievable points in the movie, but you’ve got to remember that Korean culture puts greater emphasis on family and respect.

The first 25 minuets is used to get us familiar with the brothers, their families and their dreams. It’s a good ploy to get us personally connected to the main characters and feel for what happens to them. It shows the human side to war very well.

As well as showing the human side of war, the movie sets out to show how dehumanising war is. It’s a brutal war movie – very similar to the opening scenes of SPR in it’s cinematic carnage.

Brotherhood however goes much further than SPR, it takes us through the entire war, showing us how dangerous war is in dehumanising us, and creating an environment for atrocities on both sides of the conflict. Brotherhood doesn’t set out to say who was right and who was wrong. Rather it seems to be more of an anti war movie.

This isn’t a movie for the faint of heart, Director Je-gyu Kang leaves nothing to the imagination when dealing with the battle field or the atrocities of war. This is one of the most visually gruesome war movies that I’ve seen, but it has to be to make it’s point. War is hell, hell is ugly, war is ugly, this movie is visually and emotionally ugly.

But it does have a redemptive ending, and ending that gives us hope. And ending that is hinted at in the beginning, but comes by way of an unexpected journey.

All in all a great movie, showcasing Korea as a credible player in the world of movie making.

I’m not sure when this DVD will get released in NZ. I think it has a September release in Australia so sometime in October would be a good guess.

What Movie Am I #20

Way back in 1986 I had Meg Ryan and Anthony Edwards play husband and wife, but more importantly this movie was the breakout role for my main star who went on to such roles as a Nascar Driver, a Samurai and more recently a dad.

X-Box | Doom 3

Ok, so this is where I admit I’m not a hardcore gamer. Sure I’d love to spend more time playing games, but I have a job, way too many DVDs to watch and more importantly a lovely wife and three beautiful daughters to spend time with. You can probably judge from this that I’m probably not that good at games either. Hell, whilst I’m being honest I’ll admit to only ever fully completing 2 games – V8 Supercars 2 and Brothers In Arms (easy setting!).

So what’s a useless some-time gamer like me doing with a copy of Doom 3? Well I saw it in a bargain bin. And it was the special edition metal case version. And to be honest once again, it was the cool metal case that made me buy it. Sure I had wanted to play the game ever since seeing the screen shots and reading about it, but I’m crap at FPS, and I tend to go for the more ‘realistic’ ones like Rainbow 6 or Brothers In Arms. I don’t really see the need of playing a game where alien scum are hell bent on killing me. I also like the fact with the aforementioned games you get other men to send ahead of you. Obviously I’m a wimp.

So anyway, there I am Saturday night (well, technically it was Sunday morning), kids have been asleep for hours and the wife has just taken The Da Vinci Code to bed, so I fire up the X-Box, grab the headphones and turn off the lights. I decide to go for the standard skill setting – not going to try and be a hero, or take it to easy. The first thing I notic is how damn good the graphics are. Then there’s the way you walk, with a little bit of a head bob/body sway. None of the standard FPS gliding here. And the sound, my footsteps echoed down the metal hall, whilst various announcements blared at me from various speakers and the static hum of machinery buzzed around me. This was a game that took emersion seriously – I was hooked, hell, I was THERE. I was in the game and the game hadn’t even really started.

First I had to get my orders and then get armed. My first mission was to locate an AWOL scientist on one of the lower levels. I met various people on the way, and was temped to test out my sidearm on most of them, but figured I might need the bullets later. It was a freaky enough trip getting down there – not being quite sure if there were any monsters waiting for me. There wasn’t

I found the missing scientist and he wasn’t too pleased to see me – through again of testing my gun, but held on to self-control. I should have popped one in his head as it turns out. Suddenly all this freaky light and sounds start happening around us, and then as soon as it’s died down. The scientist comes at me with a rather unsettling I-want-to-kill-you look in his eyes. I’m not too sure if I’m allowed to kill him (I obviously don’t have killer instincts) but when he starts laying into me I decide to put a couple of rounds into him, and then a few more.

I’ve got new orders now – orders are being screamed over the intercom to re-group. There’s also a whole lot of screaming and dying going on over the airwaves. I’m not looking forward to the journey ahead of me.

I start off down a familiar poorly lit corridor, gun in had, freaking-my-ass and wondering what’s ahead of me when some one - make that something – starts shooting at me – no problem, I’ll shoot back. To cut a long story short, I never made it back to the top. I dispatched all manner of ‘men’ and monsters and picked up a few spare weapons along the way, but I wasn’t quite up to the task. And when I died, instead of having another go as I normally would with any other game, I ripped the headphones off and turned the light on.

I was emotionally exhausted and physically drained. I’d been fully emersed in the game for about 20-30 minuets – a short game session even by my standards, but I’d had enough excitement for one night. I will be having another go next weekend, no doubt about it. And I will get to the end of the level. I will.

But if it’s not the freakiest most enjoyable ‘realistic’ game I’ve played, I don’t know what is. Sure GTA SA is a heap of fun, but it’s a cartoon compared to Doom 3, and Brothers In Arms is a realistic journey, but Doom 3 was full on, no rest, relentless action fest that left me breathless.

But it’s not perfect. No game ever will be. It suffers like all FPS from the very linear play. You HAVE to go here to get THIS to go THERE. Sure there’s plenty to find and places to go that you don’t have to – but game play is VERY scripted. But this wasn’t a biggie for the short period that I was playing, and like I said, I’ll be back with vengeance next weekend to give it another go.