I must admit, despite the fact it's a festival darling and a five-star film by all accounts, I have no intention of watching this.
The last time I braved a horror film, it was Insidious, a fairly lacklustre offering that delves into a mystical realm called 'the Further' to stop a boy from being possessed by a malevolent entity. Unlike Paranormal Activity where the foe is never seen, Insidious got brave and tried to create a new horror icon; a demon dressed in black with a a passing resemblance to Darth Maul. Anyway, one of the film's centerpiece moments revolves around a house alarm going off in the middle of the night, causing the family to leave their child alone. The other revolves around a grandfather clock at the end of a long corridor. So far, so pedestrian.
The next day, I was home alone, idly watching reruns of The Simpsons on a Sunday, when my neighbour's house alarm went off. Being the excellent, stand-up member of the community that I am, I took our spare key and ventured outside to investigate. The door was locked, so no forced entry here. I turn the key, let myself in and turn off the alarm. Then I see it.
At some point over the two years since I was there last, my neighbours redecorated. And at some point in time, they've inherited or installed a massive bloody grandfather clock at the end of the hallway.
So yeah, I am not watching The Babadook. Have fun with this one.
Around November time, I went to a screening of Thor: The Dark World in one of the bigger multiplexes. When Hemsworth stripped to the waist for the obligatory money shot, two teenage girls sat directly behind us broke into squeals of unadulterated glee. These girls, clearly ecstatic that they have just seen a human male outside of the Starbucks queue, continued to gush for several minutes until I turned around and asked for a bit of quiet. The fragile peace did not last long.
Talking during films isn't always such a taboo. Bruce Thomas' Fighting Spirit, a biography of Bruce Lee's life and work, touched on the plight of the Hong Kong film industry:
"Hong Kong audiences would openly jeer a film they didn't like, and were even known to attack the seats with knives if it was really poor."
In a slightly more recent example, this reddit thread came from an /r/movies contributor asking
about the concept of cheering and shouting during movies. As a Brit,
this is an alien and barbaric concept: despite the show of appreciation
and solidarity, you're clapping at a cast of people who can't hear you behind the magic window. But one commenter states:
"Watching a film in India is like attending a live sporting event."
The thread goes on to say that during a Bollywood picture, the claps and cheers are joined by dancing. Dancing. In some parts of the world, this phenomenon seems like a pretty popular part of the moviegoing process. But it's a distraction, and distractions, to a lot of moviegoers, defeat the point of immersion.
This certainly isn't the case with everyone, and it's not the case when it comes to all films. I will only watch Road House with beer in hand and a house full of friends to rip the performances of Jackie Treehorn and Crazy Swayze to shreds. But woe betide the individual who utters a word during a moment of pure cinemagic: talking during Mufasa's death scene is the cinematic equivalent of someone walking into your house and casually pimp-handing your mother. It's a violation.
Whichever side of the fence you fall, there is no denying that the claps and cheers have their place - cheering during a blockbuster is a bonding experience with a group of strangers, and nowhere other than the cinema does that happen.
One of the great things about Christopher Nolan's Batman is a sense that he exists in a real world. Gotham City is a tangible cesspool, almost a real place, and its vigilante inhabitant could almost conceivably exist. After all, he's just a man with money and time.
But how conceivable is his skillset? Looking at that clip above, as well as the finer points of various functional martial arts, chemistry, parkour, and advanced driving, one of Batman's most consistent skills is the ability to throw a well-placed Batarang. The design of Batman's signature weapon varies from boomerang to throwing star, but the Caped Crusader's unerring accuracy remains a consistent factor. And this is not a skill that is limited to the Dark Knight; discounting the ludicrous task of assigning some sort of reality to House of Flying Daggers, everyone from Jason Statham's knife-happy Expendable Lee Christmas, to the cast of The Hunger Games has the same keen eye for a thrown blade. So just how hard can it be?
That's what we tried to find out. Along with Filmclubbers and fellow martial artists Emily, Rogan, Nick, Stef, Carrie, Emma, Lucy, Maddie and James, I spent my Sunday afternoon being taught the finer points of throwing blades. None of us had prior experience. Any thrown weapon with three or more points is banned in the UK, so we settled for a more common, perfectly legal (lethal) alternative: throwing knives.
James being taught the correct grip.
Teaching us to throw is Toby. Toby holds two black belts in Kaiso Kickboxing and Taekwondo, and is self-taught in a variety of both concussive and bladed weaponry. He also owns two sets of throwing knives, including this three-piece Nakura set, along with balanced throwing spikes. Unfortunately, due to the lack of budget that this blog has in comparison to, say, Empire, we cannot afford to fork out for a target. A block of wood will have to do.
It turns out that this is difficult. The knife needs to be held tightly between thumb and forefinger, and thrown in a smooth motion while keeping the wrist rigid. Because the knife spins in the air, in order to have the knife stick in the block of wood the throw needs to be not just accurate, but timed in terms of the spin of the knife so that the point ends up facing the wood. This means that the good thrower needs to have two factors in mind when he or she throws: the distance from the thrower to the target (x), and how many rotations the knife must make in order to get there (y). This means the distance, and the thrower's judgement, has to be right on the money, which resulted in much shuffling about trying to find the right marker, while the knives bounced harmlessly off the block of wood we were using as a target. To shorten y, half-rotations are possible, which is achieved by the super-cool 'holding the knife by the blade' grip.
Having said all that, there is a very satisfying 'thunk' when the knife hits its mark.
Here's Toby showing us all how it's done by mercilessly slaughtering an innocent Strongbow bottle, while Rogan quotes Predator in the background.
Emily's throws.
In movie terms, this all means that turning around and chucking the knife in one smooth motion is about as likely to stick a thug as it is to miss, fly around the world and hit you in the back of the head. Ify doesn't match with x, the knife will bounce off the target's nose. Accurate as the Stath may be, the knife must make at least one full rotation by the time it reaches the target in order to be effective, and that requires judgement almost impossible in the heat of a firefight. With moving targets, the distance is constantly changing, so one must first estimate x from where the target is going to be, then estimate y accordingly. That's a lot of thinking to do while being shot at.
Batman makes things significantly easier for himself in the clip above by making Batarangs with two points. For those who have been following along, that means that judging y becomes much easier due to the fact that the weapon is twice as likely to stick. The more points that the weapon has, the more likely it is to stick, which is why ninja used stars instead of knives. So it's much more plausible that Batman would be able to disarm a thug than Jason Statham would stick a goon, but in final analysis, both require superhuman judgement and perfect aim. The likelihood that Batman would be able to pop one in the barrel of a gun really sort of speaks for itself; if the barrel of an M-16 is designed to fire 5.56mm bullets, to put a thrown weapon in there requires a level of accuracy obtainable only by robots.
To finish, here's a compilation of some of the most famous tossed knives in film. Happy throwing!
"At Pixar, when we have a problem and we can't seem to solve
it, we often take a laser disc of one of Mr. Miyazaki's films and
look at a scene in our screening room for a shot of inspiration.
And it always works" said John Lasseter, the head honcho at Pixar. Pixar's place at the forefront of Western animation is (or was, thanks to a string of impending sequels) unassailable: for every Toy Story, there's a Shrek 4, an Ice Age, and usually a Madagascar or some other interminable dross. But not since Disney's golden age has there been a string of home- runs like the Japanese Studio Ghibli, and the vision of the man behind it. At 73 years of age, Miyazaki has ended his legendary run with what looks to be one last masterpiece.
Hayao Miyazaki's films change people. Most are beautiful, captivating fantasies that remain focused and intensely personal, visually arresting and emotionally striking. Miyazaki is one of those rare directors, when even his worst films (The Cat Returns) can't be called misfires, even if they do hit slightly left of the target. Miyazaki at his best (Spirited Away) is a mad, unbridled genius; he brings us worlds filled with blind Boar gods and obese Radish spirits. The visual mayhem leaves Western audiences slack-jawed, mouthing obscenities at the screen, but it ensures the right attention is paid to the film; the focus is then adjusted from the frogs running around the bath-house to the very simple story of a girl who can't get home. Spirited Away is essentially Alice in Wonderland, with Stink Spirits and dragons instead of Mad Hatters and March Hares.
Miyazaki's finest: Studio Ghibli binge-watch guide
Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind. Miyazaki's adaptation of his own manga comic series
kickstarted the creation of the studio.
Princess Mononoke. Fiercely intelligent and beautifully put together,
one of Miyazaki's true masterpieces also serves as a cautionary tale
against the industrial nature of humanity.
My Neighbor Totoro. Where would a Ghibli marathon be without
its cuddly mascot? This affable tale of two youngsters befriending a forest
spirit provides a welcome break from the intensity of Mononoke.
Spirited Away. It's the most popular and widely acclaimed of the bunch, and with very, very good reason. Watch it and rediscover yourself.
Miyazaki's latest and last ever film, The Wind Rises, is due to be released over here in the UK on 9 May. Based on the life of Jiro Horokoshi, a Japanese aircraft designer during World War II, the film is likely to be a very personal one; Miyazaki is obsessed with the winds and flight, and has very Tolkienian ideas about pacifism and industry. The juxtaposition of a great inventor who wishes to fly and his sorrow at his creations dealing death across the globe, The Wind Rises takes on a more melancholy theme than some of his earlier work; there will be no Totoros floating around here. Having already received rave reviews, this more complex exploration of Miyazaki's themes is due to be a fitting swansong. I'll be first in line to see it. And I'll be bringing tissues.
The Wind Rises is out on 9 May and stars the voices of Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Emily Blunt. In case you haven't guessed, it's directed by Hayao Miyazaki.
The
first three are my go-to movies when I'm feeling happy, sad, bad, glad,
mad, pleased or bored. I believe that the genius of taking a
conventional fantasy story and plonking it in space cannot be
overestimated, and although the prequels have their faults, they add to
and enrich a universe that has enthralled millions. And I am the sort of
person that owns not one, but two lightsabers.
Technically
three if you count that one of them is double-bladed. Therefore, when
the open casting call for 'an athletic male, 19-23 years old' came in
last week, I was pretty damn thrilled. I knew thousands would line the
streets for this chance, and I vowed to be one of them.
Queues
hold a special place in Star Wars history. I wish I was old enough to
have queued up to watch the originals. I queued up to watch Episode 3,
I'm going to queue up to watch Episode 7, and damn it all, I was going
to queue up to get my shot at swinging a real, honest-to-god elegant
weapon (from a more civilised age), despite my friends and family
dutifully informing me that I haven't got a hope in hell.
So, after some umming and ahhing and almost not going, me and the girlfriend, headshots in hand, dutifully queued up to take our chances.
I'll
be honest, as ridiculous as it sounds, I was actually pretty hopeful
that I was going to get a callback. I could quote Shakespeare monologues
on cue, and I have swordfighting experience thanks to a decade of
martial arts. I was going to crush it.
BOOM.
Job done, three film contract. Next.
We turned up at nine. That was our first mistake. This is a very accurate representation of my face when I saw the queue:
There were thousands
of people there, most of which were legitimate, honest-to-god actors
that had clearly won the genetic lottery, most of whom knowing very
little about the films. The security guys told us to 'move along' and I
was the only one who sniggered. There were also chancers like me,
hopefuls that hadn't done much acting, but would spend two days inside a
Tauntaun for the opportunity of a lifetime. We got in just before the
cutoff point, so whatever happened, we were in with a shot!
There
were mixed messages in the queue. Some said it closed at three, others
said six. Some said twenty-five were going through at any one time,
others said thirty. This was the second day of auditions, and I had done
a bit of research beforehand. Thanks to that, and me asking some men in
hi-vis jackets that may have been working the crowd, but could also
have been some local builders screwing with me, I became the font of all
knowledge to my neighboring hopefuls.
However,
the weariness of the sporadic start-stop movement, and the sight of the
zigzagging droves of sheeple soon began to drag, and we contemplated
leaving the line for a steak.
After
four hours of numb feet, and listening to aspiring thespians tell me
the pointlessness of 'Star Wars nerds' being there, the queue began to
speed up.
This
was due to the casting director scouring the lines, pulling out people
he liked, and telling others to go home. After four hours, we were told
that the wait would be a further five hours. Soon after that, we were
told to go home.
Yep. The dream was over.
They had pulled just three
people out of our back two hundred or so: a Donald Glover lookalike, a
six-foot-plus young man with dark hair and a jaw that you could crack
nuts on, and a short brunette that bore a passing resemblance to Carrie
Fisher.
I reacted rather calmly to this.
On
reflection, it's probably for the best. I was thrilled to be a part of
the phenomenon, if only for a day. When I'm showing Episode VII to my
children, thirty years hence, I can point to Ben Skywalker or Jacen Solo
or whoever that character ends up becoming and say 'I was there. I was
part of it, and that could've been me'. That sense of community is what
makes Star Wars special. More so than any other franchise, it crosses
generations and brings people together.
We left that queue after four hours and fifteen minutes. The steak was okay.
Brent Hodge is going up in the world. Ridiculously photogenic and always insightful, the CEO of Hodgee Films is hitting the documentary scene hard, named one of BC Business' '30 under 30' to watch. His latest film, A Brony Tale, delves into the mythos of one of the most abused and maligned subcultures on the internet, examining not just a subversion of gender norms, but age norms as well. Welcome to the My Little Pony fanbase.
Since Hodge is above the kind of zookeeper mentality that, say, the UK's Channel 4 often falls prey to, it promises to be more than just a case of 'look at the nerds'. The use of one of the show's voices, Ashleigh Ball, as the focal point of the film could provide a unique dynamic, as both insider and outsider to the subculture. Could be a nice indie.
Fighting is ugly. Fighting is raw, claustrophobic, and intense, a knock-down drag-out burst of pure adrenaline that is over all too quickly.
The same adjectives could be used to describe Gareth Evans' martial-arts blockbuster, The Raid.
Two years ago, Welsh director Gareth Evans and Indonesian star Iko Uwais reinvented the martial arts film with a deceptively simple premise: rookie cop Rama (Uwais) and his SWAT team are trapped in a Jakarta tower block. The close-quarters nature of the beast and threadbare premise (fight your way out) played out like a videogame, Rama going from level to level focused purely on survival. But that is by no means an insult; no-one, and we mean no-one, watches these things for the plot. This is not Wes Anderson.
Chief amongst the factors that kept The Raid fresh was its approach to the fighting, and in this Uwais brought a new faction to the old schools of beat-'em-up cinema: traditional Chinese gung fu versus the 'Statham' mix of kickboxing, judo and headbutts. We've had Bruce Lee as Hong Kong's Superman, and Jackie Chan's Chinese Opera generation turning martial arts into elaborately choreographed dances. We've had all varieties of Westerners slugging their way through foes with pithy one-liners. But following in the footsteps of Tony Jaa's fabulous Thai boxing showcase Ong Bak, Evans pairs Western action-movie setting with Uwais' knowledge of Penkak Silat, an Indonesian martial art.
The economy of Uwais' fighting calls to mind, of all things, Christopher Nolan's Batman, but the similarity is there. Batman's discipline, a new martial art entitled the Keysi Fighting Method, shares roots with Silat. Vicious and economical, both arts take advantage of openings in a defense to break bones and work against joints, each action as tightly contained as the film itself. Everything fits.
This portrayal of Rama as a death-dealing machine is in stark contrast with Uwais' everyman looks and slight build, possessing neither the iron jaw of Van Damme nor the fierce intensity of Bruce Lee. It makes the torrent of violence all the more shocking, but it's not the violence that's new. By taking an action movie as old as the hills and presenting it with new leads, new moves and a very un-Hollywood respect for the genre, all the old tropes have a new spring in their step. This newfound joy is there in every punch and kick.
Evans' ambitious follow-up to The Raid looks to provide a slightly more Asian take on cinema, taking a step back from the claustrophobia of the previous film to breathe, exploring more of the underworld, some very painful-looking knifeplay, and introducing new craziness from characters like Hammer Girl. I'll be definitely first in line to watch it, providing action's hottest double-act keep themselves grounded in what made The Raid as fresh as it was.
So, to recap: should be good. Not for squeamish. Go and see. Not Wes Anderson.
Bofur posing a little like Marilyn Monroe during the iconic barrel sequence.
Peter Jackson and Sauron were both people with vision. Few
could have realised, upon first glance at a slim three-hundred page
children's tale, there would be room to expand it into a sprawling
nine-hour epic. But, wisely or unwisely, Jackson did it anyway, and this
second chapter of the series has been beefed up by the director to make
for a veritable rollercoaster of a picture, even if the heart of the
source material is left in its wake.
The film picks up mere moments after An Unexpected Journey,
with Bilbo, Thorin and the gang still on the run from Azog and his Orc
pack, until the latter is called away by his mysterious master in
Mirkwood. The first film's ponderous nature has been stripped away; if
Jackson's love for Middle-Earth let AUJ drag because Rivendell
felt like home, his guiding hand is much more forceful here. This
installment is a race to get to the dragon, and it's all the better for
it.
And the dragon is impressive. The titular Smaug,
realised in mo-cap by Benedict Cumberbatch, is a glorious technological
achievement, easily taking the crown of Best Movie Dragon from the heads
of Sean Connery and the Dreamworks team. Cumberbatch's malevolent purr
is perfect for the role, bringing to life the famous scene where the
dragon and Bilbo exchange puzzles. It is perfection. Smaug is old,
powerful, intelligent and cunning, a fifty-foot-tall lizard Loki, and
the magic-makers at Weta convey this beautifully, with stirring,
recognisably human facial expressions crossing over a reptilian face.
Indeed,
there is so much buzz around the introduction of Smaug, the return of
Legolas, the mystery of the Necromancer, and an elf-elf-Dwarf love
triangle that has prompted a whirr sound emitting from Tolkien's
grave, that one could almost forget the title of the film. Martin
Freeman shines in a comic masterpiece of a performance that gives Desolation of Smaug,
in danger of suffering from George Lucas-esque CGItis, some genuine
humanity (Hobbity?). In such a bloated film, the idea that there is so
little room for the main character seems laughable at best.
This highlights DOS's
main problem. It doesn't pause for breath. It hurtles along at a
hundred miles an hour, constantly moving in an attempt to retain the
attention span of the Playstation generation. While Dwarves bounce in
barrels, and Legolas and new character Tauriel do their best Neo and
Morpheus, little character evolution is made due to the film's
overstuffed nature, and combined with the almost cartoonish visual sheen
given to the whole production, anyone over fifteen may find their
attentions begin to wane.
The beauty of Lord of the Rings
lay in building suspense, in pauses, real locations and practical
effects, and Jackson's attempt to prove to both us and himself that he
had enough material to justify the extra film means that these lessons
lie forgotten. It's a phenomenally exciting return to Middle Earth. It
feels like coming home again. But also, in the words of Bilbo Baggins,
it feels 'thin, sorted of stretched, and like butter scraped over too
much bread.'
