Prometheus (2012) revisited.

When this came out nine years ago I must confess I was blown away and wouldn’t accept any criticism of it. The arty-farty Ridley visuals and production design did it for me as well as the religious and philosophical themes at work. I figured it a sci-fi horror that actually asked probing questions, though offered no answers.

Another viewing and I think I was a bit (very) wrong about this movie. It still holds up remarkably well on a technical level and does indeed comprise a few of the mankiest scenes you can imagine, especially a rather gruesome moment featuring an incubator, Noomi Rapace, and a squid … thing (you know what I mean). But it’s just so utterly stupid. Not just the premise but the incomprehensible characters and the daft things they do. I’ve frequented many a supermarket so know there are legit dumbbells out there, but the folk in this are dumber than a box of rocks. Everything they do is nonsensical. And they’re meant to be scientists and geologists and engineers and pilots!

I was so frustrated with the mass idiocy on display that I put a dent in the laptop. I could go on for a million words but it’s all best summarised by this classic Honest Trailer:

That’s brutal. But correct.

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A Most Wanted Man (2014). Crikey!

For years, I forgot this existed. Then someone sent me a snap of Hamburg and I remembered a rather excellent wee spy thriller set in the city. Philip Seymour Hoffman, or THE HOFF, was magnetic in everything he did but with The Master (2012), this is his masterpiece. There’s something so sincere and likeable about his ability to get real, and what I mean by that is a gift to portray what one would deem as flawed character traits, warts and all, what humans are actually like.

Hamburg on film is a daunting task. This film really does capture the international feel of the city. I just remember it being absolutely fucking freezing. I went for a jog around the port one afternoon and ended up in a political rally. It was cinematic. Anyway, to Hoffman. You were the best.

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Martin Scorsese’s The Big Shave (1967) is quite the thing.

One might deem it ‘the genesis’, a foundation of style and themes. There’s a sacred quality to the pre-digital age and this is why they are better movies – one had to really think about how to construct the visuals and it wasn’t a case of throwing the camera around and waiting for something to happen. It’s a basic non-point to make but films today are beyond pathetic because they are so far from artistry it’s a 1,000-crewed ‘collaborative effort’. There have been several exceptions but almost everything is identical, every film conforming to the same storyboard.

It’s a terrifying experience firing up Netflix.

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Screaming “DRAGO!!!” at the top of a Pentlands’ hill wasn’t as cinematic as I imagined.

Because I looked up and saw a bigger hill. But I couldn’t be bothered spending another two hours moving my legs. I got a semi-decent snap out of the endeavour, though. ‘Z for Zachariah’ came to mind, the only book from school I can ever remember that was about something. I don’t wish to read it again as it will probably turn out to be total shite, like much you revisit from yesteryear.

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World War Two on … YouTube.

This is the best thing on YouTube and exactly what the internet is for.

I’m not here to plug the channel and I don’t know anything about the production or its team at all but the show is so well put together it needs to be shared. The depth of research is up there with your contemporary historians and, rather than a simple retelling, the makers actually dig into everything and ponder the what-ifs. I’d take this form of accessible media over a dry academic piece any day, and it’s the intro for anyone interested in the topic; back in the day, all we ever had was the same old insipid, badly researched and produced textbook material regurgitated on the BBC.

We’re up to winter 1941 now and even to this day it’s utterly shocking how close the Wehrmacht made it to Moscow despite all of the setbacks. It’s the greatest and worst event in history. The age of extremes, aye.

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Who is this?

Just off Glimore Place, Edinburgh. I don’t know who it is and it is starting to vex me.

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Mank (2020) is absolute scenes.

A time machine quality swirls around this flick. Whether it’s the throwback cinematography that apes Gregg Toland or the peculiar sound recording that could be lifted straight from the seminal Citizen Kane (1941) or merely the endlessly fascinating subject matter – Kane’s production history, its bonkers cast and crew. The movie was a joy to watch. It captures ‘Old Hollywood’ like no other; not that I was there, but it’s how I’ve always pictured the era. The sleaze, the smoky rooms, the shameless greed, the debauchery, the magnates and barons mixing with screenwriters and journalists, a glorious melting pot with movies the rarefied outcome.

It’s not just a portrait of an untouchable epoch, though. The … tribute is married to actual human stories, the individual struggles that inspire and spark creative output, the roman-à-clefs that writers as omniscient as Herman J. Mankiewicz soaked up like a sponge. When you read into types like this – Ben Hecht also comes to mind – you can’t help but admire the way they dipped into Bohemian Grove.

This might also be the most unusual movie David Fincher has made. I will have to view it again for I did not detect any ‘Fincherisms’.

Further reading:

https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2559818/mank-historical-figures-from-david-finchers-netflix-movie-explained

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/nov/06/mank-review-david-fincher-gary-oldman-citizen-kane-herman-mankiewicz

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