Category Archives: Britain

I.D. (1995).

This was shockingly not crap. Which was a bit funny. A decent wee movie.

You’d call it The Football Factory (2004) of its age, that and a who’s who of almost-made-it British acting talent. Spot Jay’s dad from The Inbetweeners in that snap.

The tale is what it is, to adopt the cliché. Ah, the ‘90s – when swaggering gremlins (sans Gizmo) on the sauce kicking the fuck out of each other in boozers and the terraces for no reason were bonding through a bit of the ol’ fisticuffs. How we’ve grown up since ….

And the bloke from Corrie who was based on the Lord Lucan-wannabe John Darwin plays the protagonist. He’s very good here and I’m mildly surprised he hasn’t been in anything better.

#Shadwell. 

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FairyTale: A True Story (1997).

Harvey Keitel and Peter O’Toole in the same movie piqued my interest, and it’s all innocent and charming enough, the fairies a countryside escapism from the horrors of late modernity, WWI ruining the illusion for everyone.

It should be far more engrossing but it isn’t and just ends up being awfully British – rudimentary camerawork, score from a Sunday church service, barely competent actors who’ve littered a hundred other mediocre British films.  

Why I’m being so harsh on such a nothing movie aimed at kids I don’t know. 

That’s enough for today. 

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Epic History TV.

This channel is what the Internet was made for (aside from cat videos and staged pranks). The wealth and detail of info in these vids, the animation, the music, the narrator and his redoubtable voice.

https://www.youtube.com/@EpichistoryTv/videos

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Croupier (1998).

Atmosphere from the gods here.

It doesn’t even matter what the subject matter is – this is ridiculous in that it’s just Clive Owen narrating a few events. It’s so magisterial in its framing, the shot syntax, the subtext of the bare-bones screenplay, that I was kind of engulfed in it all despite not actively being engaged in the story. A brooding exercise in style.

Casino (1995) is the best movie about a casino, but this casino-based film isn’t about a casino; it could be set in a Lidl.

If that makes any sense. 

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Escape to Victory (1981).

How does this even exist? The cast is something out of a piss-up, a charades gone wrong. Sly, Bobby Moore, Michael Caine, Ossie Ardiles, Pelé, Max von Sydow. Erm, what? And to boot it’s made by John Huston.

Less interesting is the movie, a run-of-the-mill affair, the footy action shot with all the imagination of your random YouTuber.

But it still fascinates merely by its existence. And that’s why it hasn’t been destroyed. It’s a testament, a relic, if you will.

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The Courier (2020).

The pull of this being a true story is enough for one to recommend it, but it does have more than that, capturing the fear and suspicion of the time in impressive ways, the claustrophobia seeping from every room. The casting and performances also elevated it above your standard spy fare. The premise appeared ripe for the pedestrian BBC-style treatment, but it was a surprise to see a riskier exercise in the spycraft genre.

The actor Merab Ninidze who plays Oleg Penkovsky. He needs to be in more movies. He’s simply excellent here.

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Enduring Love (2004).

The acting from the leads wasn’t bad but the supporting cast – the usual stock array of minimally talented British actors – were just grating as hell every time they appeared, mostly at these ‘dinner parties’, blurting out the kind of dialogue that nobody in reality ever says. If it’s not a convincing milieu then I’m not taking the movie seriously, which wouldn’t be an issue aside from the fact it takes itself very seriously.

It all feels like a wasted opportunity given the striking opening scene, which is pretty much the premise and the poster. With a half-decent script and director, it could have been a contender (sorry). The thriller elements just weren’t necessary, and it would have been an infinitely better film if it dispensed with them by the 40-minute mark or completely, focusing instead on the trauma and survivor guilt.

Another pointless excursion into mediocrity.

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