No.114 : The Colony (2013)

The Colony at the IMDb

 If you thought ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ lacked some mutant cannibals then this could be this film for you.

It is the future and it’s very cold. “The snow started and then didn’t stop” says the ominous voiceover - not sure how that would work but only the tops of street lights are peeking through the snow and no one has had their milk delivered for ages. We learn that most people are dead apart from small colonies living underground.

They manage to grow plants from their seed bank and have some rabbits but things are deteriorating fast. The rabbits have stopped shagging and Bill Paxton is on security detail. A recent flu bug killed 20 of the survivors and sniffles are now a near capital offence. Kindly leader Laurence Fishbourne puts anyone with a runny nose into quarantine and if they don’t get better they can have a bullet or a long walk into the icy wastes. Mentalist Bill prefers a bullet only prescription.

The colony keep in touch with other sites but Colony 5 have gone offline. Laurence takes a few men to check things out and warns Bill not to shoot anyone. The arduous trek across the frozen wastes takes about five minutes and fortunately for the budget Colony 5’s base looks an awful lot like Laurence’s Colony 7. No one answers the door and our heroes sneak in to take a look. They find loads of dead bodies and predictably one survivor who has gone a bit loopy.

A dig about finds a handy stash of dynamite as well as a recording of a transmission that suggests a thaw may be on the way. Sadly their luck runs out as they find a charnel house of mutant cannibals in the kitchen who are scoffing the colony’s former residents. After losing a few men Laurence and the young good looking one escape but with the cannibals in hot pursuit. Will they make it home and will what awaits them be worse than what they have fled? Will the climate reboot and will our heroes' values hold against a big man with pointy teeth?

This was a decent enough effort if you can overlook the thin plot and thinner characters. There is the usual gubbins about climate change but if you take this film as a portentous warning about what the future holds you are probably the kind of person who gets nutritional advice from Michael Moore. Essentially the whole film can be summarised as ‘group disturbs nest of cannibals and then gets chased home by them’. Not so much a movie plot as a game of tag.

The film does try to commentate on the human condition with the dehumanised Bill a foreshadow of the even more brutal cannibals. Towards the end when the gloves are off even those who seemed ‘normal’ end up chopping heads with a salad slicer. The gore is low key with the butcher house scene the worst although even that was so broad as to negate its impact. Fair enough cannibals can be sinister but these were the full leg waving chompers sitting amongst fires and piles of dismembered bodies. Subtle it is not!

Despite a low budget, that involved a series of endless tunnels which looked like a tribute to ‘Dr Who’, it was fast paced enough to keep me interested and the loss of a star after an hour signalled either a brave director or that the last few bucks had run out.

At a trim 90 minutes the film didn’t outstay its welcome and despite their ridiculousness I quite enjoyed the OTT troupe of permanently hungry people eaters.

THE Tag Line - Needs Heating Up  64%

No.113 : The Hill (1965)

The Hill at the IMDb

Sean Connery made this 1965, black and white drama immediately after he finished ‘Goldfinger’ presumably to show that there was more to him than Martinis and one liners. Well it worked - he can do shouting too!

Connery is one of five men who arrive in a British  North African army penal camp during World War 2. The four others are privates convicted for petty crimes whereas Connery is an officer charged with disobeying orders.

The camp is run by a team of sadistic guards who glory in running their charges into the ground. Their favourite torture device is the titular hill which, although quite small, breaks all who are set up and down it. Connery as a seemingly cowardly officer gets singled out for special treatment and this doesn’t sit well with his cellmates who are roped in too. These include Sandy out of ‘The Wild Geese’ Roy Kinnear and a spirited black chap who gets all kinds of racial abuse that seems outrageous by today’s standards.

The men are passed fit by an ineffectual medical officer and put in the grim hands of the evil Sgt Stevens. He reports to the blinkered RSM Wilson who in turn reports to the oblivious commandant. The brutal drills soon cause the men to faint and despite Connery’s knowledge of the regulations they get no respite. Only slightly fey officer Ian Bannen offers some support but the bullying climate keeps him in check.

After one brutal drill on the hill one of the cellmates collapse and dies. Can the men find justice or will the metaphorical hill of threats and lies be too much for them to surmount?

Two hours of sweaty men shouting at each other may not be everyone’s cup of tea but this is an excellent film with a lot to say about discipline, the law and class. The injustices are plain to see but these are guilty men and there’s a war on. Where should our sympathies lie? Director Sidney Lumet answers this from the off with the guards onto a hiding as soon as Sean shows up with his book of rules. His character was well drawn with the truth of his imprisonment slowly drawn out of him.

When the man dies a near mutiny ensues but this is swiftly quelled with some selective punishment and the lure of some cheese. Sean isn’t so easily bought and gets a strong kicking for his troubles. Can he convince the weak medical officer and the simpering Bannen to stand up for what is just? To convince them we get a near half hour scene of the men yelling at each other as battle lines are drawn and alliances are forged and quickly recanted when the tide turns.

The cast is uniformly (!) excellent and the drama is well realised against a massive set with dozens of extras. It would work well as a theatre production and the director wisely chooses to use a lot of close ups and jerky camera movements to give an unsettling sense of isolation and disconnection.

There are some uncomfortable scenes especially when the black actor, Ossie Davis, has to endure abuse and spend much of the film in his oversized pants, but I’m sure what was portrayed was mild compared to the real life environment.

Overall this was a fast paced two hours with the focus on character and dialogue. Top notch acting and directing saved it from being a cheap melodrama and it’s certainly one that’ll live long in the memory.

THE Tag Line : Climb this Hill!   76%

No.112 : The Switch (1993)

The Switch at the IMDb

 Bill Lumbergh off ‘Office Space’  stars in this 1993 true life drama that has nothing to do with the spunk swapping we enjoyed back in number 95.

‘The Switch’ in this case is an on/off switch for a life support machine that our paralysed hero insists on having installed. Bill plays Larry McAfee who in the opening scene suffers a catastrophic motorcycle accident that leaves him paralysed below the neck. We witness his treatment which is intercut with a tampon advert’s of sport and bonding as Larry retreats into his memories. We also get to witness him going over the bars of his bike in glorious slo-mo.

We cut to a year later and Larry is mobile in a straw controlled wheelchair but his insurance cash is running out. His hapless parents find him an evil hospital in Texas where they aren’t very nice and give him his bed baths at night. These scene are well done with Larry’s POV giving us an insight of his helpless situation.

After 4 years he’s been bounced around various hospitals with his smart mouth and quick temper meaning his welcome never lasts long. He manages to engage a lawyer and proposes his patented ‘switch’ idea that will allow him to kill himself without anyone risking charges for helping him. His plight also gets the attention of a talk radio host who must be great as he has Beverly D’angelo as an assistant and wife.

Larry manages to get court approval for his switch but the publicity the case garners encourages the DJ to have Larry on the show and get him a straw powered phone. This new outlet for his thoughts helps Larry regain his will to live as do some quality days out in the park and some nice cleavage rich shaving with Beverly.

Despite these steps forward Larry is still keen on flicking the switch and the DJ agrees, despite Larry moving to a new state where his judgement doesn’t apply. After a strange night time car park handover the switch is obtained and installed. Will Larry make the three puffs that will stop his oxygen or is it just control over his own life he needs?

It’s the second one, and soon in an assisted living facility Larry is making friends and learning some new software that may allow him to get back to work. The other residents resent Larry’s switch that they think it makes it too convenient for able bodied folk to see their disabled friends switch themselves off. But soon his spirit and refocused energy wins them over. Can Larry make a life for himself and will the switch ever be used?

This was a pretty much by the numbers ‘triumph over adversity’ bio-pic with lots of setbacks followed by life affirming achievement. It was enjoyable however with a great and recognisable cast. Gary Cole is excellent as the lead although sometimes he moves a bit more than is supposedly possible when he gets anxious. There is a lot of sentimentality and it is clearly packaged as a tear jerker for the Lifetime Network.

They did well to paint Larry as a bit of a dick but still likeable throughout. The uplifting musical cues every time a worthy speech was uttered did get a bit grating but give the guy a break, he’s had a tough time!

THE Tag Line - You Won’t Switch Off Either! 65%

No.111 : The Desperadoes (1943)

The Desperadoes at the IMDb

 
A crooked banker in a frontier town plans to rip all the townsfolk off for half their savings - how times have changed! Nowadays they wouldn’t be left with half! The scheme involves hiring an outsider to ‘rob’ the bank and then tell the folks that the banks will repay half their losses with the other half going to the crook. Unfortunately the hired gun fails to show and a local mob, hired on the rush, shoot the place up and kill three locals.

The original robber eventually shows up and is not best pleased to see that his  gig has been stolen. He thaws however when he finds his friend is the sheriff and the local floozy catches his eye. Meanwhile the bad guys get nervous as their employers turn out to be loose cannons and a lost fancy spur may spell trouble.

A local posse of well meaning idiots challenge the Sheriff, Steve (good name), to catch the villains and given he’s Randolph Scott he has little choice. For some reason he invests in the counsel of the evil Uncle Willie but we remain hopeful that the two former friends will triumph and at least get the top button undone on their overdressed wenches.

From 1943 this was Columbia Pictures’ first colour movie and it shows in the gaudy costumes and sets  which are clearly used to impress the audience who were still in black and white. It is a basic, unimaginative western with the usual good guys / bad guys motif with a saloon floozy thrown in for a bit of glamour. There is also a scene of two greased up men giving each other a massage only to be embarrassed when the saloon madam walks in - like I say something for everyone!

It does stand above a lot of its contemporaries in terms of locations and a couple of stars in the shape of Randolph Scott and Glenn Ford.  Scott is wooden and I can never see any star quality in him - he’s more like stern history teacher. Ford is better as Bill ‘Cheyenne’ Rogers who wrestles with morals and presumably with the buckles on Randolph’s corset. There isn’t much in the way of danger or menace although I was surprised to see three locals get shot in the opening bank raid - maybe they were just over enthusiastic extras.

The female leads do OK in the standard window dressing roles with plenty of fancy gowns to keep the ladies happy and to let the men play butch. There is also an ill-advised comedy bar brawl which was always going to happen when the saloon keeper says he’s selling up tomorrow. The usual pratfalls and dazed ‘Oh I’ve been knocked out’ expressions ensue but it was good to see a proto-Mongo who would later win the day in ‘Blazing Saddles’.

The early reveal that the late arriving bad guy was once a goodie with the will to reform was puny character development and it was no surprise at all when the two former friends put bygones aside to fight the common enemy.  The weasely banker was good fun as was the likeable and murderously traitorous ‘Uncle Willie’ who was played for laughs but a real bastard.

There was nothing in the way of social commentary and any hints of a moral tale above the standard good versus evil were dispelled early on. Of course it was the 1940s and there had to be something for everyone along with no sex and limited violence you can tell this isn’t going to make any top ten list.

It was competently made and had a lot to like in its naïve view of the world where good beat bad and the nasty banker got what was due to him. Are you watching Financial Crime Office? Probably not.

THE Tag Line : Bill and Steve Moderate Adventure  56%

No.110 : The Spoilers (1955)

The Spoilers at the IMDb

 This review of  ‘The Spoilers’ may contain spoilers. It was his childhood sled. There told you.

The spoilers in question aren’t movie reviewers with a heightened sense of their own worth but people who spoil things for other people - in this case gold miners.

It’s frontier time in Nome Alaska and the sluts at the local saloon are showing an ankle for two bits - well it is 1955. Whoremaster Anne Baxter has a new dress in every scene so there’s clearly cash in teasing the toothless prospectors with low cut tops that on closer examination appear to be flesh coloured flannel.

Gold is in tham thar hills and so are claim jumpers, spoilers who try to make claims against the legitimate miners working on the legal precedent of ‘finders keepers’. To stop these carpet baggers a circuit judge is employed to vet the legal veracity of the claims. In Nome the Judge is due but so is Anne’s boyfriend and she tarts herself up in her finest duffel coat as the ship appears. But wait! Her beau Roy has hooked up with the Judge’s matronly looking daughter.

Happily for Anne she is not short of admirers and despite Roy’s protestations of innocence she’s soon showing an ankle to Alex, who is a dirty dog if ever I saw one. Roy’s mine is one of those challenged and he foolishly ignores his toothless hillbilly partner and turns his claim over to the Gold Commission for the Judge’s verdict. Alas this is delayed 90 days meaning the mine could be stripped clean by the time they get it back.

This can’t be good old American justice and of course it’s not as we soon learn that the Judge and ‘the Gold commission’ are a bunch of big fakers. What follows is a predictable sequence of bar fist fights and shoot outs before a toy train falls over and honour is restored. Roy gets a kiss on his dirty face and could that be a bit of real cleavage as the credits roll? Oh I’ve come over all faint!

This 1955 effort was a remake of a film from the 1930s - God knows what the bar room sluts looked like in that! Here they were a gaudy technicoloured bunch of hefty hoofers but no less fun for all that. Clearly no one could look nicer than Anne Baxter who shined in every scene - mostly due to intense lighting and a costume budget that would match King Kong’s.

The film skirted a thin line between comedy and drama with the drunken yokel and drunken maid playing it for laughs that never came against some pretty nasty schemes and murders. There was of course no doubt that right would prevail but I have to admit being wrong footed when the judge was revealed to be bent - can’t trust anyone these days!

The sets and costumes were as you’d expect with the location work kept to a minimum. There was a horse shit free main street and a basic mine set but you could tell the western was on the way out when the whole bar set was smashed up at the end in a scene reminiscent of ‘Blazing Saddles’.

It’s clearly an unsophisticated film made for simpler times with goodies versus baddies and no one catching syphilis. I quite enjoyed it for the most part but I doubt it’s one that I’ll ever revisit or even remember after this beer. Cheers!

The Tag Line : Not Authentic - It’s twoo, it’s twoo   57%

No.109 : The Raven (2012)

The Raven at the IMDb

John Cusack stars as Edgar Allen Poe in this film, which isn’t so much as a bio-pic as a sexed up fantasy depiction of the writer’s final days.

We open with the Victorian era Baltimore police breaking into a locked apartment. They know a killer is in the room as the door was just locked, but find no one apart from a couple of dead bodies. After scratching their heads a young detective finds a hidden switch on a nailed down window frame, which causes it to open and reveal the killer’s means of egress. The detective reveals his moment of inspiration came from a book he’d read, but who had written it?

Meanwhile Poe is having a hard time. His newspaper editor refuses to print his review, the barman denies him credit and the father of his new love chases him off with a gun. It could be worse though - he could be the bloke getting chopped in two by a fragging great pendulum.

With the bodies piling up the detective realises that someone is killing people in the manner of deaths from Poe’s books. He enlists the help of the manic author and the two manage to deduce the likely location of the next murder - the masked ball hosted by Poe’s lover’s father - good old Brendan Gleeson, on moderate shouty form.

Things don’t go as planned and the mysterious killer achieves his true aim - to kidnap Poe’s love in a bid to coax more works from him. What follows is a series of clues that lead to more deaths and dead ends. All the while Poe’s lover is buried underground and only Poe’s daily stories in the paper can keep her alive until the puzzle is solved.

I quite enjoyed this film despite it being really farfetched. It was almost like CSI Victorian Baltimore with a steam punk Poe in the lead. I always had Poe down as a quiet bookish man but how wrong I was - he chases villains on horseback while shooting his pistol gangsta style!

The film opened well and like I liked the central idea of a killer employing Poe’s macabre methods of death to gain the scribe’s attention. It did however go downhill once the kidnapping took place and towards the end it was like a ‘Comic Strip Presents’ version of his life with Hollywood demanding more heroics at every turn.

The deaths were pretty good although the majority were only seen after the fact. The unmasking of the villain didn’t make a lot of sense and you have to wonder where he got the means and indeed time to set up his elaborate murders.

I felt Cusack was miscast and too tall and dashing for the role. His usual mania was present and correct and although he was playing a drug addled drunk, I never got beyond the feeling he was hamming it up. Gleeson was a bit better, but his character’s 180 degree turn in his feelings for Poe was misjudged. The Detective character needed a bit more presence and again he went from contempt to hero worship in his feelings for Poe in 30 seconds.

The effects were largely OK although I don’t know why they needed a ‘follow the bullet’ shot that seemed incongruous with the rest of the film. That said it was directed by ‘V For Vendetta’ helmer James McTeigue which also explains the shot of the baddie jumping from the roof which was lifted wholesale, hat and all, from that much better film.

‘The Raven’ is a decent enough distraction but it fails to be the equal of its parts and the whole thing seems more than a bit silly long before the end.

THE Tag Line : You Won't Rue (Morgue) Watching It  - 65%

No.108 : The Reef (2010)

The Reef at the IMDb

 You know all those films you’ve seen about a group of sexy youths stranded at sea and who are plagued by a big shark? Well, here’s another one.

A group of four Australian twenty-somethings take off in a fancy boat to have a look at an idyllic island off The Great Barrier Reef. Their slightly older deckhand, who looks like Moxey off ‘Auf Wiedersehen Pet’,  does the heavy lifting as the two guys and two girls frolic about on the sand for five minutes. They quickly realise that their boat is in danger of running aground due to the tide but manage to get back on board in a scene that offers no peril whatsoever but a few bikini shots for those so inclined.

They decide to head back but as night falls they are all awakened as the boat capsizes due to the hull being ripped open by the coral reef. They all manage to escape the craft and soon assess their options from the upturned hull - stay with the boat or swim for safety. The leader of the group wants to swim but Moxey who “knows these waters” advises caution. I think he was trying to sound like a wise old sea salt but looked more like he was missing from a German building site.

The four pretty people decide to leave Moxie in the boat with the distress beacon and head off on the ten mile swim with a cut in half boogie board between them. As you’d expect things quickly go wrong as a portentous dead turtle signals trouble ahead. Can you guess what it is yet? Well if you’ve looked at the poster you’ll have gathered the trouble is in the shape of a big fraggin’ shark.

True to form the four youths are slowly whittled down by the shark who is either reading the script or just a bit hungry. Who will survive? Will that woman ever stop screaming and is the boat insured?

This was an OK ‘Based on True Events’ film but I bet my synopsis is longer than the plot pitched to the studio. If you’ve looked at the poster you’d be able to guess almost every event and there is really nothing here to recommend it over the superior ‘Open Water’ or even ‘Open water 2 : Adrift’. The attempts at characterisation were perfunctory at best with one pair a brother and sister with the added baggage of a former pair of lovers reunited for the trip. There were some touching moments of bonding and sacrifice but for the most part you are tapping your watch waiting for the shark to show up.

The five members of the cast were fine but there wasn’t much for them to do apart from scream a lot. The leader, who looks like former Rangers striker Nacho Novo, had the most to do in keeping the group together but the two womens’ scripts must have read ‘Aaaaarrrghhhh!’ for 20 pages.

The shark was well realised and the IMDb states it was a real one. You can see the joins as it bashes through our heroes however and the kills were a bit soft, mostly happening underwater with a change of the water colour the only clue that you are one more body closer to the end.

The film ends somewhat abruptly with a couple of captions serving to end the story and whether this was due to budget constraints or the magic 90 minutes being hit I’ve no idea - I’m not that bothered either way! It was competently made and had enough to have me stay to the conclusion but it was just so familiar and unmemorable that I’ll probably see it again in a year and be unaware I’ve been there before.

THE Tag Line - Don’t Lay Your Hands On a Copy. 45%