Initial Conditions

If Science Fiction that makes you think is your thing, then go see this! It’s really very good..

[sorry for the brief review- I didn't want to spoil it at all!]

I remember when I was in Prep School (age 11-12) that the other boys would often ridicule me because I hadn’t seen any films rated 18 (and also 15, but that’s not relevant to the point I’m trying to make here).  This was largely because I went to bed at a reasonable hour, there was no way on earth my parents would take me to see one at the cinema, and at the time we had one TV in the house, so there was no chance of me watching one without my parents finding out (and, if I’m honest there weren’t any I particularly wanted to see). Clearly, this ridicule was part of the Alpha male behaviour one can usually find in pubescent boys at posh schools. But I digress.

I’m in my mid-twenties now and I’ve only seen two 18-rated films in the cinema (because of  lack of interest and the relative rarity of them these days): the first was Wanted two years ago which I only saw because there wasn’t much else, and the other is Quentin Tarantino’s mis-spelt World War II film Inglourious Bar Stewerds (I’m not one to use naughty language. Well not on the internet anyway).

There are two strands two the story: one is of a Jewish girl in France who seeks revenge on the Nazis (particularly the vile Hans Landa) for killing her family, and the other is of a group of soldiers (the titular Bar Stewerds led by Brad Pitt), most of whom are Jews (apart from a psycopathic German defector) who also seek revenge. And a lot of people die on the way, very violently. But this is Tarantino we’re talking about, and he’s not one to skimp on the blood. Or the historical accuracy (but of course, that’s not the point. Don’t go and see it if you want a history lesson). Or brevity. It’s a bit long, but that’s not to say it’s boring: the talky bits take the heat off the violence (although they usually end in it). If you do find it boring, you can keep yourself entertained by watching without reading the subtitles and working out what is being said in French/ German/ Italian. Or admire Brad Pitt’s moustache or wait for the exciting dénouement.

Anyway, as films go, it’s alright, I enjoyed it but I don’t think it’s worth waiting to turn 18 for.

Not much to say really, some guys get drunk in Vegas on a stag do, lose the stag and spend the remainder of the film trying to find him. It’s very funny though, and highlights the dangers of having a stag do two days before your wedding. Mike Tyson has a pretty funny cameo too.

First Transformers and now this- Hollywood’s fad of making films out of 80’s toy franchises and cartoons continues unabated [edit: apparently GI Joe predates the 80's, but it was most definitely a cartoon in that decade] and to be honest, they’re all pretty much the same.

The plot (if you look hard enough) is that the bad guys (led by Christopher Eccleston whose accent sounds like Noel Gallagher doing a bad impression of Billy Connolly) have made some biological weapons and want to launch them at (surprise, surprise) Washington and Moscow to Eccleston to become ruler of the world, and the good guys (the GI Joes) have to try and stop them. There are a couple of pretty tedious back stories thrown in too, but the main point of the film is that things get blown up. A lot. There are many, many similarities with Team America World Police, most of which, I presume are unintentional.

If you’ve seen the trailer you’ll know that one (rather large) thing in particular gets blown up (in fact, 90% of the film is things getting blown up). This isn’t a problem in itself, except an extended section of the movie revolves around them trying to stop the aforementioned happening. Of course, you know what’s going to happen so all that feels a bit wasted, pleasant as it is to watch curious movie geography in action.

It’s definitely better than Terminator Salvation and Transformers for me, but at the same time, it’s not very good. It’s quite funny in places, though probably not intentionally (one particular bit where somebody has to speak “celtic” is highly unintentionally amusing). It’s been set up for a sequel now too, so we’ve more of this to look forward to. Yay.

I hope this ’80s revival doesn’t last much longer, or else we’ll have Polly Pocket, Thundercats, M.A.S.K. (though no-one other than me seems to remember this) and My Little Pony movies as all of these things would be terrible.

It was bound to happen sometime. So far this year, I’d gone to the cinema five or six times and not seen a bad movie. Monsters vs Aliens was a bit meh, but at least I wasn’t massively disappointed by it.

Which will probably lead you to believe I didn’t really like Terminator Salvation all that much, and you’d be right. I think back to The Terminator and Terminator 2 and I think of great movies that will both go down in history as two of my all-time favourite movies, and then I realise that this, compared to those, has about as much longevity as the losing Project Manager of week one of The Apprentice (note to self: don’t derive comparisons from TV shows you don’t watch in future).

For an action movie, it’s pretty boring. It rumbles on with an occasional action sequence to keep you on your toes, but the main story (essentially John Connor looking for his father, or the not-so mysterious identity of Marcus Wright) isn’t really gripping enough to keep me awake. Even the appearance of a familiar face at the final battle (with some convenient use of mist) is extremely underwhelming, and the ending just doesn’t leave me wanting more at all. They even contrived to throw an “I’ll be Back” line in there, but it seems so forced that I swore I saw John Connor tucking a crowbar into his backpack after he said it.

Overall then, it kind of falls between two stools. Those who have enjoyed Terminator I & II (Terminator 3 isn’t canon to this particular film, nor is the TV show) will probbaly feel a bit let down, and those who haven’t seen them probably won’t understand all the references, which, sadly are kind of necessary. It’s really not very good at all.

As a side note, I’m starting to get annoyed by all these movies that are putting vital plot twists in the trailers. What’s the point in spending an hour and a half watching a movie to see a twist that you know is going to happen? I’m sure it isn’t hard to avoid!

I went to see this last week, largely because I could do so for free and my flatmate and I wanted to see a 3-D film.

I don’t see many kid’s films in the cinema, because I am neither child (in the age sense- of course everybody is somebody’s child!) nor parent (in any sense. unless you count ideas.) and as such, it was difficult for me to make any kind of judgement as to the quality of it.

I did laugh a few teams, largely because the blue blob character was quite funny (and reminded me somewhat of a much nicer Horrible Gelatinous Blob from Futurama), but the plot (Monsters are put in hiding in order to not scare the public but are freed so they can fight the invading aliens, with various sub-plots) was paper-thin and it was really obvious what was going to happen. But then kid’s films aren’t known for their complex plots or twists.

There were a couple of unnecesary political messages too (unnecessary for a kid’s film), but really, there’s nothing really memorable about it. However the kids in the cinema seemed to like it, so you probably can’t go wrong if you’re looking to spend a couple of hours in relative quiet. But if you see two twenty-something guys there together, please don’t give them funny looks…

It was very good, and actually had a lot more humour than I expected. Go see it!

So I turn the TV on this morning and High School Musical is on. Having ribbed my good friend Davo multiple times about his obsession with this film, I thought it was about time I gave it a chance, largely since I had nothing better to do, and I needed distraction from the frightening Ravenholm level in Half Life 2.

So, what did I think of it? Well, I can see why kids the age that it’s meant for get into it. The songs are catchy and not annoying, and appear in the right place (Sound of Music, I’m looking at you!), the actors go pretty well together and there’s not really an “in your face” message about morals.

That said, there’s so much sugar in it that I felt I had diabetes, and the plot was somewhat paper-thin, with the characters being extremely one-dimensional. However, Star Wars (epsiode IV) had similar issues, without the music, and I enjoyed that, so that’s not really a bad thing. It does put a smile on your face, I’ll give you that.

So on the whole, it was alright, but I think I’ll wait until I have kids the right age for this before actively seeking it out again.

I enjoyed this, hopefully you will too.

Spoiler alert!