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A Little Princess
is one of those small collection of films that is too good for kids. Based on the novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett, it follows 10 year old Sara Crewe who is forced to relocate from her colonial home in India to a New York girls school when her military father is called into service at the start of the first World War. Sara has a talent for storytelling, to improvise the details and to enrapt her audience and it’s this fascination with the power of story and imagination which is at the core of this captivating little movie.
When thinks get dark for Sara it’s her faith in imagination that allow her (most of the time) to rise above the indignity and hardships in her life…and that’s an inspiring thing to watch, especially when handled with a subtleness and restrained sentimentality as it is here. She’s also a figure who inspires change in others, much like Any Dufrane in Shawshank or Ferris Bueller himself, although there are two occasions when Sara needs inspiration herself. Fortunately the script, director Alfonso Cueron and composer Patrick Doyle are on hand with a rescue plan. Visually and audibly, India is used as a representation of ‘inspiration’ itself. Using vibrant colours and a powerful musical cue whenever something from India enters the frame (usually the kindly Indian gentleman living next door) it creates a profound impact on Sara, and through her, us the audience.
The set are rich in detail, the cinematography both lush and bleak as required, the performances subdued and measured…even the kids and Elenor Bron stands out as the wicked, cool and calculating Headmistress. The script is lean and like the Watchmen comic book possess an ingenious framing device, a story within a story of the God Rama, which mirrors the events in the main story.
Best of all it manages to communicate Sara’s sence of wonder to the audience which makes the film feel magical and enchanting, but never overly sentimental. Highly recommended, especially for grown ups, and even for blokes…as long as you can get past the utter girlie-ness of the kids school!
Radio Flyer is a little seen gem from mega director Richard Donner who is better known for blockbusters like Superman The Movie, The Omen, The Goonies and the Lethal Weapon series. Although it’s a story about kids (specifically two young brothers growing up in the 70’s) it’s tonally aimed at adults in an uplifting film about the power and importance of imagination. In this way it shares the themes of Peter Jackson’s The Lovely Bones and as with that film it could be argued that the dark subject matter (in this case child abuse) is not handled with enough weight.
Although not as tightly told as the superior A Little Princess it shares a quality with the magnificent Shawshank Redemption in that the story is framed by a haunting, powerful narration. In this instance, an unaccredited Tom Hanks plays the grown up incarnation of one of the children and recalls the story to his two children, both of a similar age to him at the time of the main story. The performances are uniformly excellent with Jurassic Park’s Joseph Mazzello and a very young Elijah Wood carrying the who endeavour on their narrow but very capable shoulders. Acknowledgement must also go to Firefly’s Adam Baldwin who get the difficult task of embodying the abusive stepfather in a role where his face remains hidden above the frame to allow him to become a bigger, inhuman, enigmatic menace.
It’s a richly told, touching and affecting tale that gets a touch abstract in it’s storytelling come the end, but which Donner and Hanks skilfully navigate us through.
Considering what a joy to behold (and a substantial global box office hit) Gremlins is, it comes as a surprise to find out that not everybody liked Gremlins at the time. Fortunately, their reasons for not liking it are the very reasons I’ve adored it for nearly 30 years; it’s subversive. Produced by Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment, Gremlins is dark fable, a blackly humorous fairy tale if you like, cautioning it’s audience with a Michael Critchton like warning of not fucking with mother nature.
Director Joe Dante and writer Chris (Home Alone) Columbus set the story up perfectly. It takes place in a perfect vision of American; houses with white picket fences, families are happy, people buy American, Hoyt Axton’s inventor represents the American Dream in action as he tries to get rich and young men fall in love with beautiful young women (the adorable beyond words Phoebe Cates). Layered onto this we’re presented with the perfect ideal of Christmas; pretty, perfect white snow covers everything and people are cheerful in a mythic, arabesque way (It’s A Wonderful Life plays on the TV). Even America’s preoccupation with consumerism (the climax takes place in a department store) and the wholesomeness of Disney (Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs) are exploited. Even the Mogwai are presented as the perfect American pet.
And then the Gremlins hatch which is the moment Dante’s eyes light up. The film desends into a mean-spirited comedy-horror where the cherished staples of American life are subverted and savaged. Riffing off 50’s B movies like Invasion Of The Body Snatchers (also referenced) Dante taps into that eras paranoia of the indefinable ‘them’ and ‘it’ that undercuts the perfect American existence. The feel good Disney vibe is replaced by a wacky, live-action Loony Tunes sensibility in which people die in ludicrously horrible ways in a mischievous and hilarious romp.
There’s tons of great gags, John Hora photographs everything with eith a rich warmth or a bleak terror, Jerry Goldsmith’s score remains a classic and it’s fun looking for all the movie references from Flashdance, film noir and The Wizard Of Oz. Clever, exciting and often side-splittingly funny, Gremlins still stands as one of Amblin’s best ever productions.
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Thank the Dutch for Paul Verhoevan! Without him the late 80’s and 1990’s would be very, very dull indeed having provided us with delights such as Starship Troopers, Total Recall and Basic Instinct. His first U.S. effort was a classic straight out of the gate. RoboCop is an ultra-violent, darkly satirical, science fiction, crime thriller that is pretty unique amongst films the preceded and followed it….and that includes the disappointing sequels and TV shows. In what is basically a Jesus Allegory Android tale, the tightly structured origin story follows Police Officer Alex Murphy as he is gunned down on duty and resurrected as a robotic law enforcer for a corrupt and all powerful corporation.
RoboCop is fast paced, very funny (in a mean-spirited, black humoured kind of way), is filled with exhilarating, self contained action sequences and has a touching central plot of a man trying to re-establish his identity. On top of this Frankenstein’s monster tale of vengeance you’ve got layers of razor sharp satire which are highlighted in the commercials that punctuate the TV airwaves and in the politically correct way that Robo is programmed. It presents a decaying urban landscape where greedy corporations exploit every level of society via fraudulent government weapons contracts to partnerships with the local crime bosses as well as lowest common denominator television and a society on the brink of anarchy. It’s not far off the truth to be fair.
Peter Weller gives a soulful, introspective performance as the title character while Ronny Cox and Kurtwood Smith are never better as the two punch villains of the piece. Basil Poledouris’ score shouldn’t be under estimated either as it gives the darkness a much needed larger-than-life feel which feels into the over the top gore and twisted humour on display. An out and out classic that the 2013 remake is going to have try very hard to try and measure up to.
John Landis has made some of my favorite films including Trading Places, Coming To America and American Werewolf in London. Although The Blues Brothers will always remain my top Landis movie thanks to its intoxicating mix of rhythm and blues musical and absurdist comedy, I think that National Lampoon’s Animal House will forever be his best, out and out comedy. Seen through the eyes of a pair of college freshmen, Pinto and Flounder, it’s the loose tale of the anarchic Delta fraternity house during a year on the Faber College campus as the schools management team with an opposing frat house to bring them down.
What follows is a collection of crazy, crude and absurd gags as the Delta House guys drink, cheat, party and road trip their way to a good time.The gags and set-pieces are flawless whether it’s toga parties, the odd musical number (Shout courtesy of Otis Day and the Nights), food fights, equine related pranks or the wily scheming of Dean Wormer. The cast are on perfect form whether it’s the charismatic Tim Matheson, the naïve Stephen Furst, the Leslie Neilson straight faced approach of legend John Vernon and the inescapable genius of a magnetic John Belushi. His appearance throughout the film may be little more than a glorified cameo, but he steals every scene he’s in.
Silly, low-brow, stupid, splapsticky and anarchic Animal House is a text book example of how cinema can translate to great comedy.
Quentin Tarantino has been part of the movie establishment for two decades now and I love everything he’s done but his debut feature Reservoir Dogs stubbornly remains his best work.
The main story following the gathering of thieves following a bungled diamond heist, is essentially a stage play confined to the four walls of a warehouse. It’s focused, claustrophobic and intense experience as Tarantino skilfully mounts the tension as the on-edge crew try and work out which one sold them out to the cops.
The sparky dialogue as delivered by the perfect cast of Keitel, Roth, Buscemi, Madsen, Tierney and Penn is raw, hilarious and explosive as they work their way through fear, paranoia, anger and a shit load of macho posturing. As with all Tarantino films there’s a timeless, 60’s / 70’s retro look to the film which is reflected in the iconic soundtrack (Little Green Bag by The George Baker Selection…oh yeah baby!) and brief moments of ultra-violent amongst the banter….although there’s more left to your imagination than you might realise.
Still an intense ride about the code and loyalty between criminals that has a tragic friendship at its core. Perfect cinema.
No one ever thought it would happen, but nearly 20 years after the completion of his ‘dead’ trilogy, director George A Romero returned to the zombie apocalypse one more time with Land Of The Dead. Backed by a mythos that had transcended into the mainstream consciousness, Romero was able to secure a decent budget from Universal Pictures for his fist studio (and only) studio release of the franchise. The result is as smart and as splattery as one would have hoped.
Pushing even further into the future, mankind has drawn a line against the masses of zombies in the city of Pittsburgh, protected by the river system that surrounds it. In his most obvious, but also arguably his most effective piece of social satire yet, Romero establishes different classes of inhabitant to this far future America; the team mass of brainless zombies outside the cities, the poor, urban city folk struggling to scrape an existence and a small but privileged wealthy class living in the skyscraper at the city’s core. It’s smart, subversive stuff playing off the fear and corruption existing in a post-9/11 world.
Visually the film pushes into Mad Max territory with the centrepiece vehicle, the Dead Reckoning, and the action is on a scale never seen before in this series. It’s drenched in atmosphere, has underwater zombies (cool), memorable performances from Dennis Hopper, John Leguizamo and Robert Joy as well as the never sluttier Asia Argento.
What else could a grown zombie fan need?
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