No. 257 : The Vanishing (2018)

 

The Vanishing at the IMDb

No, not the 1998 Dutch film of the same name or even the Jeff Bridges remake of that from 1993, this one is a bunch of Scotsmen on a lighthouse shouting a lot in a 2018 flick that had passed me by.

I found this in a charity shop for 10p and although it was probably worth that I’m glad that I didn’t invest more – apart from my precious time!

The film is based on the real-life disappearance of three lighthouse keepers from the Flannan Isle lighthouse in 1900. The official report concluded that the men were most likely swept out to sea, but that would be somewhat prosaic for a movie – so let’s have some gold and murder to spice things up!

I’m no puritan, but I have to say if these men were my relatives I’d be a bit upset at seeing them portrayed as a bunch of murdering psychos who swear for Scotland and have a Gollum type fascination for the shiny stuff.

The film opens with the three men taking over a remote lighthouse for a few weeks. We have Peter Mullen and Gerard Butler (Trinity House should be investigated if that casting is an accurate depiction of the men involved!) along with a young lad, there on his first stint. We get a brief idea of what’s involved with the light being cleaned and the foghorn tested before the action proper begins.

The men find a washed-up lifeboat with a body nearby. The body, in what becomes a recurring theme, doesn’t stay dead for long as the seaman wakes up and starts to fight the younger keeper. Our man manages to bash the salty tar’s head in with a rock, before the body and a mysterious box are recovered to the lighthouse station.

Mullen decrees that the box remain locked but within five minutes he’s opened it up and found it to be full of gold bars. He initially tries to keep the hoard to himself but soon the other two get wind of the treasure and the three plot to keep the loot. Butler suggests someone will come looking for the gold and he’s proven right within another five minutes.

 

The crew show themselves up to be inept liars, as the owners of the gold aren’t convinced with the lads’ tall tale that the box has already been handed over to the authorities. After a brief stramash our lads have another two bodies on their hands – wait, three as Butler carelessly whacks a young lad causing Paisley's finest no end of trauma and bad acting.

The three men now have a quandary – what to do with the loot and with each other as tensions and suspicions multiply.

This was an OK kind of film but it’s easy to see why it sank without trace. Mullen and a rather portly Butler play to form with a lot of shouting and swearing. Butler’s trip into mania and back again isn’t believable nor is Mullen’s relative indifference to the horrors unfolding in front of him. There are a lot of long pauses and drawn-out scenes that appear to be an attempt to show the malaise and isolation of the situation but it just looks like so much constipation.

The settings were good, but I didn’t buy into the tension or that these three men would turn to murder over a pile of metal – this is no ‘Treasure of the Sierra Madre’. It was a passable 100 minutes, but one that offered no insight into the true events of Flannan Isle nor a compelling narrative for a standalone feature.

THE Tag Line - Light's Out! 56%

No.241 : The Stranger (TV, 2020)

The Stranger (TV) at the IMDb

Based on the novel by Harlan Coben ‘The Stranger’ is an 8 part series made by Netflix. The New Jersey setting of the novel has been transplanted to the UK with the series filmed in and around the Manchester area and using a lot of familiar actors.

Solicitor Adam seems to have the perfect life - he has a nice house, two sons and is married to her off ‘Ballykissangel’. His life is turned upside-down however when the titular stranger shows up and tells him to have a dig about his wife’s bank account. He does so and finds evidence that her pregnancy, which ended with a miscarriage two years previously, was in fact faked. He confronts her about this and shortly thereafter she goes missing.

Meanwhile a teenage rave goes wrong when a doped up youth is found naked in the woods and a decapitated alpaca is dumped in the town centre. Elsewhere Jennifer Saunders, who runs a coffee shop, gets a couple of shots of her own - to the head - and the police are at a loss to tie all these events together. Adam’s full plate is in danger of tipping over as he tries to protect his client Stephen Rea from eviction at the hands of Adam’s estranged father, Anthony Head.

All the while The Stranger is demanding blackmail money from a variety of victims about whom she knows their most intimate secrets. Are her actions purely financial or does she have moral convictions at the heart of her schemes? As the series progress the disparate strands of the story start to come together, with the exposed secrets causing untold damaged to those involved and their families.

I wasn’t too sold on this show at first as it looked like one of those ‘event’ ITV dramas that usually end up being a lot of predictable guff designed only to advance the career of some non-entity that they foolishly signed a contract with. I was however drawn in by the complex story and the compelling drama that unfolded. There were perhaps too many plot strands with a few going nowhere and serving only to distract you from the main thrust of the story. I guess a bit of misdirection is par for the course in a mystery drama, and the pace was such that I never lost interest in the next development.

The story developed logically and the detection angle was good. Siobhan Finnernan stood out as the lead detective although her accent made me think she was a refugee from Coronation Street. Richard Armitage was also good as the father struggling to understand what was going on and Rea and Paul Kaye did well in supporting roles that ran deep.

I was less impressed with ‘The Stranger’ herself who didn’t have the menace or gravitas the role demanded. I see in the book it was a bloke and this failing may have been down to the casting director looking to mix things up by casting a young woman, when the role demanded something a bit more sinister.

I liked how the story threads weaved together and the fact that everyone’s secrets impacted on those about them. The ending wasn’t a great surprise given the clues seeded throughout, but it was still a satisfying conclusion to an excellent and compelling drama.

THE Tag Line : Secrets, Secrets Are No Fun…  76%

 

No.232 : The Klansman (1974)

 

The Klansman at the IMDb

Well, this should be good - a 70’s thriller starring Lee Marvin and Richard Burton. Actually no, this is probably one to avoid given that possession of a copy would probably be classed as a hate crime. The film has seemingly fallen into the public domain as the copyright wasn’t renewed, probably due to the potential embarrassment ownership of the film would confer.

Still we’re no snowflakes here at the Definitive Blog and censorship is never a good thing so let’s have a look. The film starts well with sheriff Lee Marvin driving along to a funky Stax Records soundtrack. Sadly he soon arrives  at the scene of a boorish mob cheering on a retarded fat black man who is pulling the clothes off a terrified woman. Rather than arrest everyone Marvin sends them home after making sure the simpleton gets his $1 pay day.

The Alabama county does however sit up and take notice when Linda Evans gets raped in her car by an unseen assailant. The Ku Klux Klan decide it was probably a black man who did the crime and they set off for a good old fashioned Southern lynching. They chance upon OJ Simpson and his pal and, although OJ gets away (again!), his friend gets shot up after a frankly pointless castration.

Meanwhile aged landowner with indeterminate accent Richard Burton is in bed with his sexy naked girlfriend. Richard looks the worse for wear but is wearing his natty pjs. His girlfriend wants to get married and isn’t happy that Burton is hosting an civil rights activist fearing that he’ll will be after her ‘chocolate milk’. Think he’s after something stronger, Love.

OJ is hell bent on revenge and dresses up as a Klansman to lure out and kill one of the good old boys. To further make his point the shoots the bloke carrying the flaming cross at his first victim’s funeral. Marvin knows OJ is the killer but is either a bit lazy or happy to let things sort themselves out.

Burton moves in Linda Evans after the townsfolk cast her out for getting raped and also helps the activist Loretta after she gets raped too. Bit of a theme developing here?

Eventually things come to a head and sides have to be picked. As a mass of walking bed sheets approach Burton’s mansion we have to guess who will survive and will racism be solved for good?

If you hadn’t seen this film you wouldn’t believe it existed. First off, the two leads are pissed throughout, with staggering and slurred dialogue the norm. There is one fantastic scene near the end where Burton, and his poorly matched stuntman beat up a tough with a variety of karate chops. It is laugh out loud funny but does distract from the drama somewhat.

Marvin’s motivation is confused throughout, with him looking on impotently as rapes and murders are happening all over town. He has a son going to West Point so he may be trying to break the cycle of local idiocy, but he’s too steaming to convey any emotion or impassioned pleas.

The politics are probably well meaning, with the Klan members depicted as a bunch of red necks. It is quite a broad brush approach however, especially when rape victim Evans gets the ire of the townsfolk when she dares to show her face in church after being raped.

There are plenty of murders and the pace is reasonable, but you really can’t condone a film where rape and murder are abundant but dwarfed by endless racial abuse. The baddies may get their comeuppance, at a price, but you’ll feel like a good scrub having sat through this whole cavalcade of horrors.

The TAG Line : How Not to Manage Race Relations 40%

No.221 : The Sinner (TV) (2017) Series 1-3

The Sinner at the IMDb

A second trip into the Definitive world of TV now as we look at all three seasons of the American show ‘The Sinner’. Each season deals with a single case and lasts for 8 episodes. This may seem like overkill for a single investigation but the format does lend itself to an exhaustive approach to the crime and the motivations behind it. It won’t be for everyone, especially if you need a lot of action, but fans of the police procedural will lap it up.

Bill Pullman stars as Harry Ambrose a bearded detective working out of a precinct in Dorchester New York. It’s a well heeled community and you get the sense that murders are the exception rather than the norm. Harry has a basket full of issues, with a troubled marriage, that is soon dissolved, and a few kinks of his own including paying fat hookers to beat him up. These edges start to disappear in the later series which are pretty much straight up investigations, with Harry’s quirks largely set to one side.

The three seasons broadcast so far deal with individual crimes although mentions of the previous events do crop up in later investigations. The crimes all involve unlikely murderers and Harry’s, largely self appointed, task is to understand the motivations behind them and whether they can be explained or justified.

The three seasons are named after the main subject with the first being Cora. Cora is a young mother who one day at the beach stabs a man to death with a fruit knife. It looks like an open and shut case and she pleads guilty, but Harry knows he has 8 episodes to fill, and starts to dig deeper. As he slowly unravels details of the case we learn of a larger conspiracy and a horrific back-story that begins to explain her actions.

In the second season a young boy poisons his two carers, with tea made from a deadly root. Again it’s an open and shut case, but why did he do it and what has the mysterious cult, in which he was raised, got to do with it all?

In the last season to date, a young teacher survives a car crash in which his friend dies. An examination of the timeline shows that the friend could have been saved,. Why was he allowed to die and what about these other murders that are cropping up?

For me the first two seasons were great with the third only being so-so. I liked the fresh approach to detective work, although it beggared belief that Harry would be given free reign to pick apart an open and shut case whilst, presumably, loads of other murders were going unsolved, The first series was the most satisfying in terms of revelations and detective work. Harry has no special powers apart from asking the right questions and reading people. At first his kinky life is a major factor in his character but that’s rightly sidelined as the series progresses. I know every cop show needs an angle but I don’t need to see my leading man get his face sat on, on a regular basis.

The second series involving the cult was good too and I liked how the conspiracy was all over the town with various worthies getting drawn in. The creepy kid was excellent as was Carrie Coon, who you’ll know off Season 3 of ‘Fargo’. It was also good to see ‘Mr Dresden’ off those old Orange Cinema ads as ‘The Beacon’.

The third season was still enjoyable but it stretched things a bit far in terms of the indulgences allowed to Harry and by him to his suspect. When he agreed to be buried in a grave to win his suspect’s trust you could almost hear the ‘whoosh’ as the shark was jumped.

Bill Pullman is likeable in the lead, as the sharp but laid back detective. He is given too much latitude in his investigations to be believable, but you give it a pass as it’s enjoyable to see him dismantle an unbreakable case.

At the start I thought there was going to e a supernatural element to the series but in the end it is down to nothing more than peoples’ minds and their motivation, which is ultimately more satisfying than a lot of paranormal gubbins.

The series has been renewed for a fourth season and I’d certainly recommend that you get on board before that comes out. All series can be found on Netflix.

THE Tag Line : Sinner’s a Winner 74%

No.220 : The Deceived (TV) (2020)

The Deceived at the IMDb

A change of pace for us now as we delve into the box sets section of the ‘My5’ app - Channel 5’s online offering. I’m sure this show would have broadcast on their main platform but it passed me by. I don’t watch much Channel 5 to be honest, as I largely dismiss it as a lot of tabloid nonsense and soaps. This sweeping view wasn’t totally discouraged as the inescapable ads that peppered this app viewing were for programmes about being fat and WWF Divas. ‘The Deceived’ may however be their attempt to get away from such risible rubbish (there was also a trailer about a show about what happens to your rubbish) as this was a pretty decent, quality production.

The series has only four episodes of about 44 minutes each so you could easily see it off in one evening, as we did. It’s debatable whether there is enough material to fill two and a half hours of viewing, but lubricated with a bottle of wine it passed the night in a decent, if largely unmemorable manner.

The film opens with Cambridge student Ophelia eyeing up her bearded lecturer, Michael. Michael has a beard that a bird could nest in and looks like Mac out of ‘Always Sunny’, but the girls all agree he’s dreamy. The two meet up in the time honoured fashion of her dropping papers and him helping to pick them up, and soon they are having awkward looking sex in his office chair. Michael’s wife is a successful author and he’s living in her shadow, but he does have a new book of his own coming out.

He seems to put it about though, and Ophelia gets warned off when she and a friend witness Michael fighting with another woman. He then disappears and after some detective work Ophelia tracks him to his remote home village in Ireland. It turns out that Michael’s wife Roisin has died in a fire and he has returned home to sort out the house and her affairs. His day gets even better when Ophelia announces that she’s pregnant.

She moves into the creepy, half burnt out, family pile and soon starts to hear strange noises coming from a locked room. She also gets attention from a local handyman and an overbearing mother figure who suspects that Ophelia may not be the literary agent that she claims to be.

As the episodes go by a young man appears looking for his missing sister and Ophelia starts to see and hear strange goings on. Why is everyone feeding her tea and what really happened to Roisin on that fateful night?

I quite liked this workmanlike mystery thriller. As soon as it got underway you knew where it was going and the only cliff-hanger was which of the obvious outcomes would the writers chose for the big revelation. There was more than a little of ‘Rebecca’ about the whole enterprise with it clear to us that Ophelia wasn’t going nuts, and that there were strange happenings afoot.

I’m not the sharpest at such things but even I cottoned onto the twist by episode two and it was a long 90 minutes wait to see things pan out in the predicted fashion. To be fair it was well made with rural Ireland and Cambridge both looking great. The cast was largely good with there being no big names to distract you. Emmett J Scanlan in the lead had most of the heavy lifting to do, and he carried it off well moving from charmer to…something else, with relative ease. I was less sympathetic towards Emily Reid as Ophelia who was a bit needy and annoying.

Overall I think this could have been condensed into a 90 minute film as there was plenty of padding and subplots, like that with the builder, not going anywhere. There was nothing you haven’t seen before, but as a lockdown time passer you could do worse.

THE Tag Line : No Mystery Here! 61%

No.210 : The Victim (2011)

The Victim at the IMDb

Michael Biehn, who you’ll know as Hicks from ‘Aliens’, wrote directed and starred in this offering, which I thought was terrible, but on reading up on it that may have been the intention.

Filmed in 15 days the film is Biehn’s attempt at a grind house film and although it doesn’t hit all the marks, it was good fun as a piece of disposable trash. At the start a ‘Based on True Events’ caption came up. Having seen the film that seemed an outrageous claim, especially as you’d ask who’s telling the story?, but a rewind showed that the word ‘Not’ flashed briefly in front of the caption. I was glad to have watched it thinking it to be a true story as every unlikely twist made it seem even more outrageous.

The film opens with a nice POV walk in the woods…what’s this we find? A cute kitten? Some pixies? No it’s a man doing a hooker doggy style over a tree stump. She’s not being raped but not particularly enjoying it either. Her committed lover doesn’t like her lack of engagement in his dirty talk so he breaks her neck.

We then cut to Biehn getting his shopping and his trip home. This drive takes forever and it is either to demonstrate how far out into the woods he lives or to pad the run time which only amounts to 82 minutes in total. He barely gets his coat off when a woman in hooker gear appears at his door, begging for his help. He’s a bit of a hermit, but a gullible one too, so he lets her in and lets her tell her tale in flashback.

She tells him that she and her friend went to party with two policemen friends in the woods. The friend is the one from the opening scene, so we know it doesn’t end well. Anyway the murderous policeman calls his friend to help with the body whilst he gets it on with the door knocking lady, and amazingly he goes! The lady then overhears their plans for her and flees, ending up at Biehn’s cabin.

Back in the present and the two renegade cops are at the door and Biehn manages to shoo them away. The lady, Annie, who is a stripper, refuses to call the cops as this goes way to the top - the murderer is in line to be Chief of Police so she suggest they go and look for her friend’s body. Amazing Biehn agrees and after not finding it, the stripper and the aged hermit have gratuitous sex in many positions. Annie was played by Biehn’s real life wife so fair play to him for sharing. The murderer cop breaks in to the love shack, but is subdued and tortured into a confession. The happy couple then go to the promised location of the body but Biehn and Annie get captured by the cop‘s accomplice. 

Who will escape next and who will survive? - and what relevance are those serial killer reports we keep hearing?

This was a cheaply made effort that had some risible acting and dialogue but to be honest I quite enjoyed its honest rubbishness. Biehn shouts a lot, presumably because he has been watching the daily rushes. His wife was a terrible actress and I can only assume she got the job because of two things - that she was his wife and was punctual.

The ‘happier times’ flashbacks were pointless but good fun as the two stripper friends tried on a variety of skimpy costumes and watched seemingly irrelevant news reports.

The two cops lacked any menace or personality but to be fair they were given all of the worst lines of dialogue and the most ridiculous situations to try and make believable.

The violence was quite graphic with one head smashing particularly gruesome - at least his face healed up in time for the burial! Lot’s of clichés were in attendance such as the dirt thrown in the face during a fight. Old and hackneyed or a grindhouse tribute? You decide! 

I did like that the ‘victim’ of the title wasn’t the dead stripper but the idea that “you take life by the balls; don’t be the victim”. Fair enough, but coming from the murderer it can hardly be seen as sage advice.

It was clearly not a film to be taken too seriously which was just as well as it made no logical sense whatsoever. It was competently made for the most part, so it’s not on a par with ‘The Room’ but you will have to go far to see a more trashy and ridiculous offering than ‘The Victim’

The Tag Line : If You Go Down to the Woods Today…   51%

No.200 : The Quarry (2020)

The Quarry at the IMDb

This film has a clever title; it’s not just about someone being on the hunt for their quarry, but bits of it are set in a quarry too!

A priest is driving along an empty Texas road, whilst hammering the communion wine, when he sees a body lying by side of the street. He helps the man into his car and we see that it’s Nucky’s brother off ‘Boardwalk Empire’. The two don’t say much but the priest buys his new friend dinner whilst still swigging the wine.

He stops at a quarry - huge mistake - to sober up before heading into town. The two argue and the priest gets killed after being bashed on the head with a bottle. Our drifter cuts his hand and bandages it with the dead man’s shirt before hiding the body in a frankly piss-poor grave.

He rifles through the priest’s effects and learns that he is to take over as pastor in the small town nearby. Short of anything better to do he heads into town and parks his van at the lodgings next to the church and assumes the dead man’s identity. He meets housekeeper Celia who tells his to get his stuff out the van lest it all be stolen but he lays down for an early night instead. Next morning he finds his van emptied with even the wheels missing. Well, he was warned.

He contacts police chief Van Arlen who just happens to be bedding the pretty Mexican housekeeper. He makes some enquires and soon some local youths are fingered for the robbery. They turn out to be the housekeepers cousins - small world!

Having taken on the pastor’s identity our man is obliged to give sermons and, before you know it, he’s a smash hit offering both baptisms and funerals. Trouble awaits however as the priest’s body is found and the cousins know the drifter is not all he seems. They however get fingered for the crime due to the priest's bloody clothes being found in their home after their van heist. Van Arlen isn't convinced about the town's new pastor however and some clues may save the cousin from the noose. Will the correct person pay for the murder and will the wheels get back on the van quicker than they fell from this production?

This film was a real wasted opportunity with a ‘Boardwalk Empire’ cast reunion pissed away on a lacklustre offering that meandered along, with a go nowhere script and character development that didn’t make sense. The first half hour was good, and I was looking forward to the noose tightening as the drifter’s story fell apart. The whole ‘flowers in the quarry’ angle didn’t make sense nor did the murder confession or the eventual finale.

We didn’t get much in the way of back-story to the drifter’s character so his struggles didn’t resonate and his moments of clarity seemed at odds with what we knew of him. You could tell he was conflicted, what with the dead priest showing up and telling him off, but his mumbly performance in court and the denouement in the boat didn’t ring true at all. Michael Shannon did his usual shouty starey bit but he was wasted here, mostly reacting rather than doing. There was no detective angle with things like the missing wanted poster and shirt sleeve bandage not being followed through.

I get that our man was on a path to redemption and salvation, or at least that was the intent, but in reality he was just a murdering scumbag who was not very good at covering his trail. I wanted to like this film, as it had good ingredients, but alas it fell well short of the sum of its parts.

THE Tag Line - Quarry Digs Self Into Hole 54%

No.163 : The Machinist (2004)

The Machinist at the IMDb

Christian Bale’s having a right hard time of it - he hasn’t slept in a year and he’s as skinny as Kate Moss’ recipe book. He plays Trevor Reznik, the titular factory worker who has a shaky grasp on reality.

He lives a dull existence enlivened only to his trips to see hooker with a heart Jennifer Jason Leigh. When we first meet him he’s trying to dispose of a body in a rug and much of the film is spent getting us back to this flash forward. Dead people always seem to be getting wrapped in rugs in the movies - I wonder if it ever happens in real life?

If I’m getting off topic it’s only because Bales started it. He stares at walls and goes on flights of fancy whilst trying to solve the hangman puzzle that keeps appearing on his fridge door. His poor attention span doesn’t end well for colleague Michael Ironside who gets his arm lopped off after Bale hits the wrong button with one of his pointy out ribs. It’s a shame as Ironside’s arms had only just grown back since ‘Total Recall’.

Bale doesn’t blames his bad diet or lack of sleep for his woes, no, it’s all a big conspiracy headed by Ivan. Ivan is a big man with dark glasses and a sports car who is always around but seen by no one else but Bale. It’s OK though, he’s got a photo of him to remind him he’s not going nuts.

He tries for a slice of redemption with his flirtation with a waitress at an airport diner. A few $20 tips get him a date with her and her epileptic son, but a visit to the rather graphic ghost train means the day doesn’t end well.

Will Bale’s weight down under 9 stone he hatches a plan to nail Ivan - get his address from his car registration plate. Sadly the DMV will only give this if he’s in an accident. One accident later he’s been smashed up and back on the dock dragging the body in the rug - who’s really the mad man here? It’s gonna be him for sure.

And it is! But in a rewarding kind of way that ultimately wasn’t that unexpected. It is a good but disturbing film. There’s a lot of scenes under buzzing electrical lights and the factory where Bale works is like something out of ‘Brazil’.

He constantly gets asked the question ’who are you’ and it’s clear there is something going on - doppelgangers? Schizophrenia or just plain old bats shit crazy? - you decide.

It’s really Bale’s show with his weight loss absolutely devastating to the point of being distracting. Of the second string I liked Michael Ironside’s character who sees the upside of having his arm chewed off and Jennifer Jason Leigh gives her usual, ahem, fully committed performance.

As the film spiralled to it’s conclusion I doubt if many were surprised at the twist but there were enough clues laced about to make it satisfying. The only thing that took me out of it was a ropy Photoshop job - why do old photos in films never look convincing?

All in all an interesting whodunit or more a ‘why did he do it‘.  Might put you off your nachos though - or put you on them, depending on your girth.

THE Tag Line - Machinist Screws Himself Up 77%

No.145 : The Invitation (2015)

The Invitation at the IMDb

Don’t you hate it when you get invited to a yuppie dinner party and it turns out to be a new age death cult?

That common occurrence is the subject of this horror / mystery which stars a few people you’ll know to see but you won’t know their names.

Our hero is Will, who looks like Jesus and who is heading to a party with his black wife, Kiara. There is a bit of mystery afoot as we learn that Will used to live in the house which is now occupied by dinner party hosts, David and Eden. There is some back-story to be had, but no doubt we’ll get that later. The journey is interrupted when Will runs over a coyote that he has to finish off with a tyre iron. I may be slow, but I think this is a metaphor for the rest of the film.

They arrive at the party and we are introduced to several of their friends who look like a Benetton commercial. We learn that the hostess, Eden , is Will’s former partner and that they share a sad history - it’s revealed later on had they had son who died. Eden has a new partner in the shape of David who is a bit intense and to add to the mix they have invited Sadie and Pruitt who are downright weird.

The party goes OK at first, but it seems a little off, a situation that intensifies when the gang are shown a video of a cult in Mexico where David and Eden met. The cult deals with death and healing and the video includes a women dying of cancer. As you’d guess this really helps the atmosphere. The crew worry that they are going to get the hard sell to join the cult, but that will be the least of their worries.

As things intensify Will does some snooping and finds a big pile of drugs and a video from the cult leader who says that ‘Tonight is the night’! Will it be a blood fest or is the troubled Will just imagining stuff? He’s totally not.

I liked this slow burner of a film that seemed a bit disjointed but ended up strangely satisfying. The awkwardness of social gatherings was well realised with Will initially appearing a paranoid loon ball when a couple of his accusations were disproved. Guess it’s safe to drink the wine then!

The cast were mostly good although I didn’t buy into crazy Sadie. The only recognisable face for me (apart from ‘The Wiz' off Seinfeld as the cult leader) was John Carroll Lynch as Pruitt who gave good value as the head mentalist. You probably won’t know his name but he is recognisable from ‘The Founder’ and ‘Veep’ amongst others.

The film piles on the intensity in the last twenty minutes and it was good that a few familiar tropes of the ‘killer in the locked house’ scenario were dropped. I was sure he was getting up again!

There was plenty of blood and a few wrong foots that, although not unexpected, made it good fun. Several genres merged, especially towards the end and we almost broke into another franchise altogether - The Purge anyone?

You’ll find this one on Netflix and it’s well worth 100 minutes of your time.

THE Tag Line : Don’t drink the wine! © Blackadder 73%

No.127 : The Voices (2014)

The Voices at the IMDb

The ubiquitous Ryan Reynolds stars as Jerry, a likeable chap who hears ’the voices’ and unfortunately, does ’the murders’

Jerry is a new recruit at a bathroom factory, a nice place to work where the uniforms are pink and the pizza is free. We get the sense early on that Jerry has a history as his job comes via a rehabilitation scheme. No one seems too bothered and Jerry gets put on a committee to arrange the works’ party.  At the first meeting he meets the lovely Fiona (Gemma Arterton) who reluctantly agrees to a date with Jerry before standing him up - huge mistake!

After a lonely Chinese dinner Jerry meets up with Fiona and her broken down car. She  accepts a lift  and things go OK until they hit a deer and Jerry puts it out of its misery with his handy huge knife, after having a conversation with it. Unsurprisingly Fiona makes a run for it before Jerry falls and plunges his knife into her belly - was it an accident or was it murder? We’re left uncertain - but not for long!

Back at his home - a converted out of town bowling alley - Jerry confides with his pets - a kindly dog called Bosco and a foul mouthed, Scottish accented, cat called Mr Whiskers. The cat is downright evil and tells Jerry to go back and get the body and cover his trail. Jerry doesn’t need much convincing and soon Fiona’s head is in Jerry’s fridge and her body decanted into dozens of Tupperware tubs.

We get to learn Jerry’s troubled backstory via flashbacks and visits to his psychotherapist and it’s pretty miserable stuff. Jerry gets persuaded to return to his meds and the voices stop and his home changes from its pristine, imagined state to a dank killer’s lair - which is really is. Fiona’s head also stops talking and becomes its true rotted self - time to bin the pills then!

With the cat’s encouragement Jerry takes up an over keen Anna Kendrick’s offer of a night out, and soon the fridge is getting busier, as the payroll department gets quieter. Can a happy ending be found for anyone in this grim, comedic tale?

This is an oddity of a film that I tried hard to like and despite some choice moments, it comes across as a tonal mess. It tries to be a dark comedy but the killings are all so brutal and terrifying for the victims it’s hard to sympathise with Jerry, despite his mitigating background.

The talking pets, voiced by Reynolds, are good fun but we are left in no doubt that it’s all Jerry as they go mute when he takes his pills. Gemma and Anna are both lovely and gamely play along with what must have been an objectionable script.

I did enjoy large parts of the film but any investment you build up is lost when Jerry goes homicidal. I’m all for a slasher pic but when it’s married with funny animals and pretty young women getting butchered it’s very jarring.

Reynolds does well in an increasingly random role but doesn’t really convince as a sane worker who can woo all the top totty yet live in a charnel house and talk to the animals. One co-worker says he’s a bit weird but that seemed like an afterthought. I guess they’d say he’s a classic schizophrenic - a bit like the film.

The whole enterprise is somewhat redeemed by a cracking end sequence with the reunited cast - and Jesus - singing a banging ‘Sing a Happy Song’. Again tonally this is all wrong but it’s great fun and the best end credits scene since ‘The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai’.

If you hear the voices telling you to watch this you’d do well to take their advice.


THE Tag Line : Sing a Happy Song - might cheer you up
Definite Rating : 60%

No.85 : The ‘Burbs (1989)

The 'Burbs at the IMDb

Off to the suburbs now as we take a look at this horror comedy staring Tom Hanks and directed by ‘Gremlins’ helmer Joe Dante. Sounds a sure fire winner? ‘Fraid the ‘Burbs isn’t worth the effort.

Hanks plays  his usual likeable every man character, who on this occasion is called ‘Ray’. He’s married to Princess Leia and is looking forward to a week off at home. Leia is worried he’ll go nuts in their quiet cul-de-sac but we’re pretty sure all sorts of exciting stuff is going on behind the net curtains. They don’t show this exciting stuff however and rely on a dog shitting on someone’s lawn to get a feeble laugh - two if you count the man trodding in the mess five minutes later.

The neighbours are your predictable collection of kooks with Bruce Dern leading the way as a military nut with an unfeasibly attractive wife. For your money you also get Corey Feldman off ‘The Goonies’ and some other assorted and forgettable oddballs.

The pressure of suburbia soon gets to our principals, but while they are at each other’s throats they realise that the new neighbours who moved in a month ago have yet to tend their yard. This mild observation leads to more suspicions and paranoia and before long the gang are convinced a fully fledged cannibal cult have moved in.

They get little satisfaction from the householder but that’s little surprise given he’s the lead Nazi from ‘The Blues Brothers’. With the mania reaching fever pitch our heroes plan a mission to break in to their home and investigate the weird goings on while Feldman hosts a house party so he and his friends can observe the doubtless wacky conclusion.

This was a really dull effort that only succeeded if its intention was to show how dull life in the suburbs can be. The slow build up lasted a full hour and the tension never got above ‘don’t care’. It was clear from the off that the mysterious happenings would have a reasonable explanation and once it all goes explosive it’s equally predictable that a wrong foot is on the cards, otherwise our heroes will end up in the clink.

Part of the issue for me was that the film never left the same few houses. Of course this claustrophobia is part of the plan but it just makes the whole enterprise seem small scale and unimportant. The plot where the foreign neighbours were thought to be eating people was absurd from the off but not in a funny way. Why Hanks didn’t spend his week off getting Leia out of her frumpy outfits and into her ‘Jabba’  bikini instead of raking through bins was never explored.

Bruce Dern was passable doing his usual ‘mania’ bit but Hanks phoned in his performance from very far away. The plot was too thin to sustain the film and although the last half hour brought some explosions and a some surprises they felt unearned as all empathy towards the characters had been lost long ago.

The seismic shift in pace towards the end and the unfolding revelations looked like frantic rewrites that failed to save this laugh and gore free horror comedy.

THE Tag Line ‘ ‘Burbs Fails to Disturb or amuse  45%

No.80 : The Brotherhood (1968)

The Brotherhood at the IMDb

Off to 1968 as Kirk Douglas tries to shoe horn is as many Mafia clichés as he can in 90 minutes - will he break the record? Fagagettaboutit!

We open as a plane begins its decent into Sicily with our focus on a nervous young man. He is rebuffed by taxi drivers at arrival when they hear his destination but one cabbie agrees to take him. He must have flown Ryanair as it takes ages for him to arrive at his destination. Meanwhile a moustachioed Kirk Douglas is also making a journey and taking his gun along for the ride.

The two meet at a ruined castle and quickly embrace - Kirk tells the guns wielding torpedoes to settle down as this is his brother. The two men have a good old chat but Kirk’s wife warns him that ‘they will send someone’ as his brother unpacks his own gun in his bedroom.

We then go into flashback mode to see how things ended up as they have.

This section of the film opens with the younger brother, Vince, getting married. He’s fresh out of the forces and asks Kirk if he can join the family firm. Kirk is made up about this but we can see that the never smooth running world of the Mafia is creaking at the edges as different factions at various tables spend the whole time glaring at each other.

Some sections of the mob are keen to modernise with a lucrative deal in electronics appealing to the new guard. Kirk is more old school and is cautious to stay in scams that he understands, which unsettles the other Dons.

Meanwhile a canary is executed and as always in these films everyone is wondering who is squealing to the Feds to save their own skin.

After some pretty complicated double crosses Kirk decides to make a stand and kills a suspected snitch. This sends him into exile to Sicily and we are quickly back where we started. With the two bothers reunited can they resolve their differences and satisfy the mob? Will ties to the Mafia supersede family loyalties?

For a film concerned with the mafia this was a dull affair with too much talking and not enough action. As the title implies ‘brotherhood’ and loyalty are closely examined but as with all mafia films they all come across as a bunch of nutters looking out for themselves. The plan here to corner the electronics market was hardly exciting, and this was borne out by Vince showing Kirk lots of accounts to demonstrate how lucrative it could be. Call me old fashioned, but I was longing for a bit of honest to goodness leg breaking instead.

The film was hung on the central relationship between the two brothers and it didn’t work for me. Kirk was the fiery, headstrong one while Vince was more thoughtful and measured. This may be to show they are chalk and cheese but I didn’t see any real passion and that followed through to the denouement where the big decision was made without a second thought.

The locations in New York and Sicily were great but the cast was chock full of dull old stereotypes and the script was plodding at best. Overall how they managed to wring such a dull non-event out of the subject matter was an achievement indeed!

THE Tag Line : You won’t see this, Right?   56%

No.74 : The Reckoning (2002)

The Reckoning at the IMDb

Off to the Middle Ages now on the Definite Article Blog with this tale of actors, murder, child abuse and some illicit sex - well they didn’t have the internet back then.

We open as Paul Bettany gives himself an  impromptu haircut with a sharp rock. We jump back and forth to hairier time, when he was a priest giving a sermon. He catches the eye of a buxom wench and we assume he’s been defrocked after being caught in the act with the temptress. He chucks his priestly robes in the river but keeps his crucifix in case it might come in handy later.

He wanders the woods until he happens upon a travelling troupe of actors. He witnesses one murder another but quickly accepts it was a mercy killing and asks to join up - clearly he wasn’t put off by their grievance procedure.

The actors include such luvvies as Brian Cox, Willem Dafoe and the always lovely Gina Mckee. They take on the errant priest to fill the minor roles in their production despite some sensing he has more to hide than he lets on. They are soon on the road and arrive at the fakest looking hilltop castle this side of ‘The Holy Grail’. The town is empty as the villagers are all at the trail of a local woman accused of murdering a young lad. She is found guilty but we know she’s innocent as she’s so darn pretty.

The actors stage their production of ‘Adam and Eve’ to lukewarm reviews and after being refused a burial for their dead colleague by the local vicar our once priestly friend agrees to do a comeback gig to plant the stiff. There are however rumblings in the town and it can’t all be down to the stew. The villagers think the condemned woman is innocent and Dafoe thinks recreating the murder may be a money spinning idea to get the troupe’s cart fixed. They bribe Simon Pegg’s overacting jailer to get access to the woman for plot tips and start to piece together the mystery. A exhumation confirms their worst fears and we have to wonder if the woman will be saved and if those responsible will meet justice.

For a medieval murder mystery this was pretty good stuff. It’s no ’In the name of the Rose’ but it had plenty going for it, not least a top notch cast. OK Dafoe’s accent is all over the shop and I’ve no idea why we had to keep seeing him do stretches in his pants but he’s always a strong and likable presence. Brian Cox does his usual blustery outrage shtick and for one performance he dresses up as Darth Maul - maybe he’s hoping for a gig in the new trilogy. I was sorry not to see more of Gina, but Bettany was excellent at what he does best - the oddball religious character. He should try and broaden his range - he was really convincing as a Pro tennis player in ‘Wimbledon’, then again…

The detection angle was well done with the gristly exhumation a real stomach turner. It was clear from the off that Ewen Bremner’s sneering monk would be involved as would the man seen peeping out his windows a lot . The finale where the actors utilised their skills to convince the thick townsfolk of the real villain was well done and although low budget they did capture the grime and smells of ye olde world shit hole.

The main twist was that we had a priest trying uncover child abuse rather than be involved in it, but the resolution was great and well earned. One thing I would have changed was the non-descript title - maybe ‘Luvvies Vs Nonces’ was already taken?

THE Tag Line : Luvvie to See You   76%

No. 61 : The American (2010)

The American at the IMDb

George Clooney stars in this decent but somewhat predictable thriller.

We open with a bearded George in a log cabin, next to a frozen lake with a beautiful lady. So far so Roger Moore James Bond. A romantic walk in the winter landscape is interrupted when they spot some footprints in the snow, and pretty soon the happy couple are taking fire from a frankly rubbish sniper. George shows he’s not to be messed with when he shoots the shooter before taking out his girlfriend with a shot to the back of the head - guess she shouldn’t have eaten the last croissant!

 After clearing out the rest of the hit squad George gets onto his handler, one of those stereotype softly spoken bad guys who operates out of a café. He tells George to head off to a remote village, but showing the kind of caution that has kept him alive George ditches the Boss issued mobile and heads off on his own.

So begins a short round of the fish out of water scenario as the gorgeous one tries to blend in using his ‘photographer’ story as flimsy cover. He’s quickly befriended by a well meaning but flawed priest who sees that George isn’t what he seems. After checking in with the Boss we learn that George is a gun smith and he’s been given a new job of preparing a custom sniper rifle for a female assassin.

All the while George is boffing a lovely prostitute who quickly falls for his silvery charms and starts to see him ‘off the clock’. As the relationship deepens the always nervous George becomes the target of some assassins, none of whom can match our hero’s guile. As the weapon nears completion George begins to plan his exit strategy.

We all know you can never walk away from the bad guy organisation but will the hooker with a heart and his gunship skills see a possible way for him to reach redemption?

I quite enjoyed this film but it’s really nothing new or inventive. Early on you get the sense that George is doomed and you just wonder how he got so old and grey in such a trigger happy organisation. His past isn’t really touched on apart from a ‘Marines’ tattoo and it seems a strange vocation to be drilling bullets for assassins given his skills set.

Part of the problem is George’s trademark look that doesn’t falter throughout the film. He’s certainly not after the ‘chameleon’ tag, with his look in this film indistinguishable to his in ‘Michael Clayton’ ‘Up in the Air’ and, if you draped an untied bow tie around his neck, all of the ‘Ocean’s’ films. It’s not necessarily a bad thing as he clearly plays to his strengths but given he lives in Italy you are left to wonder if they filmed this when a spare couple of weeks came up in his diary.

The twists were seen a mile off and when you hear that the assassin’s target is a mystery and you see George making her bullets it’s not hard to put two and two together. The film was filled out with a ropey priest with a sex scandal past - is there any other kind?! The romance also didn’t ring true at all with the hooker at first refusing to kiss, but once George gives her a good seeing to, she’s ready to run away with him five minutes later.

The locations were pretty good but somewhat restricted to a small town which again gives the air of a tight production with little scope. George is as reliable as ever and his girl friend certainly brightens up the screen. The lady assassin didn’t convince as a ruthless killer and she even looked a bit ham-fisted when she was ‘expertly’ handling her weaponry. The closing scenes play out pretty much as you’d expect and although somewhat unsatisfying there was enough to keep my interest to the end - mainly to see if I’d guessed right - I had!

Best Bit : George spends his hard earned ‘relaxing’. 68%