Ridley Scott | Wanderings and ... wonderings.

May 24 2025

Art, Cinema, Film, Movie, Movies, Uncategorized

Gladiator II (2024) is an abomination.

Pathetic, absolutely futile cinema, I was convinced for a torrid opening 20 minutes that this putrid imitator was an AI … thing. Embarrassingly, it’s a verbatim rendering of the first one, with an added siege lifted from Game of Thrones season four, episode nine.

In what passes for a story, which is an appropriation of better material out there, characters do and say the most trite things; there is even a rip-off of that scene from Ben Hur (1959) when creepy Jack Hawkins licks his lips at Charlton Heston’s oar action.

It’s a fucking ridiculously stupid, cynical, pointless and rubbish film and I can’t believe it was made.

Why does anyone still have dealings with this director? He needs banned from making movies.

Shite.

Tagged Cinema, Connie Nielsen, Denzel Washington, Film, Gladiator II, Images, Movie, Paul Mescal, Pedro Pascal, Ridley Scott

Nov 24 2023

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Architecture, Art, Cinema, Film, Monarchy, Movie, Movies, Uncategorized

Napoleon (2023).

I wish this would have just been about the Battle of Waterloo (1815) as it’s the only time this movie truly ignites, and that’s despite the battlefield inaccuracies and the atrocious performance of Rupert Everett as the Duke of Wellington, the ’90s throwback playing Wellesley as a snarling thug rather than aristocratic master of defensive battle.

The first 45 minutes are great, Napoleon awestruck by Joséphine and proceeding to act in the most hilariously childlike manner, a supreme baby smitten. It’s very funny and it’s a shame it didn’t stay this way, a couple’s domestic melodrama taken to the extremes of the world stage. Unfortunately, what follows is a series of scenes from your basic high school history lesson with nothing holding them together. Don’t expect a character study but a truncated telling of events. It’s an enigmatic performance from Phoenix and he’s always engrossing; the drama, however, is zilch.

Hurried, unfocused, and often boring, it’s a technical marvel with sumptuous visuals but a decent script would have helped. There’s no sense of the wider historical forces that enabled or expanded the Napoleonic Wars, or any concerted attempt to explore the lad’s mammoth fall. Here, it just … happens.

I’ll wait for the four-hour cut I keep hearing about.

Tagged Cinema, Epic, Film, Images, Movie, Napoleon, Photography, Ridley Scott, War

Feb 06 2021

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Cinema, Film, Movie, Movies, Uncategorized

The Counselor (or however the hell different folk spell it) needs counselling.

A truly ghastly, thoroughly horrible movie that I finally put myself through. I’d heard ominous things about it but figured it couldnt be that bad. Oh my, it’s fucking dire, an absolute train wreck of a film. Let me try and explain why in the shortest time possible: it’s shite. It consists entirely of schematic conversations without a modicum of interest or anything to do with the plot even on a metaphorical level. It takes itself way too seriously to the extent that even the occasional splatter of violence comes across as desperately pretentious.

Nothing in it made any sense and yet with every scene I could smell the smugness on display; I got the feeling that the cast thought they were in a peak Tarantino. So boring, so without merit, so painful to watch. Give me those actors and a mere £200,000 and I will make you a better film.

A few folk I know have said something along the lines of, “Oh, it’s Cormac McCarthy.” I have no idea who he is (I don’t read much fiction) but I can assure you that in the screenwriting realm he is on this display a talentless fellow who probably lives in a log cabin just for the existential kudos. And what in the hell happened to Ridley Scott? He seems to be dedicating himself to garbage these days. Someone needs to write him a decent script.

I hated this movie so much. It’s the worst I’ve seen in a LONG TIME.

Tagged Film, Movie, Ridley Scott, The Counsellor

Dec 30 2020

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Art, Cinema, Film, Movie, Movies

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.

Tagged 2012, Alien, Film, Horror, Movie, Prometheus, Ridley Scott, Sci-Fi

Dec 04 2020

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Art, Cinema, Film, Movie, Movies, Uncategorized

Why can’t they just leave their own films alone?

These lads of course have every right to fiddle to their hearts’ content with pictures they’ve made, but it’s getting out of control now. I don’t even know how many different versions of Blade Runner (1982) there are (I’ve only seen one), I hear there is now another edition of Apocalypse Now (1979), and I was yesterday informed that The Godfather Part III (1990) is now being re-released this month but with a completely different structure and with an alternate title. What is going on?

For me, the art that was produced at a specific stage is what it is (for lack of a better phrase) and all it will ever be. I have no time for tweaking, chopping, changing, re-editing, and periodic revisionism. Stop trying to fix what was at that moment your best or worst effort, move on, come up with a new idea. It’s got something to do with grasping for perfection, but the problem is that the films I’ve mentioned are far from perfect. Even the films I rate as ‘transcendental’ (The Third Man, Vertigo, Lawrence of Arabia) have giant flaws but that just adds to the appeal; I hate to appropriate an Oasis song, but true perfection has to be imperfect.

Dear directors, just STOP IT.

Give us something else.

Tagged Apocalypse Now, Blade Runner, Cinema, Film, Francis Ford Coppola, Godfather III, Movie, Ridley Scott

Mar 31 2018

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Cinema, Film, Movies, Uncategorized

Boris is not impressed.

IMG_20180331_121349230

Ridley Scott’s All the Money in the World (2018) is quite possibly the most boring film I’ve ever seen. I’d like to apologise to the cat for putting the traumatised creature through it.

Absolute shite. No characters, no drama, nothing to say, nothing to be seen. A film about nothing.

Tagged All the Money in the World, Cat, Cinema, Film, Movie, Ridley Scott

Sep 22 2017

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Cinema, Film, Uncategorized

Blade Runner (1982) is back.

Just think, Blade Runner (1982) predicted that by 2019 we’d have flying cars, replicants, and offshore colonies. We’ve got just over a year to go and your average human, i.e. me, still thinks doodling a cock on a steamed-up bus window is an act of comedic genius.

bladerunner-city

What did that seminal movie get right about the world we live in today? Rick Deckard’s hover car – No; Synthetic humans – No; Private-sector space exploration – No.

The movie does anticipate Skype, if only with the added surrealism of an interaction occurring in a bar. Skype in public? I’m too scared to answer my phone on the bus. There are exceptions in my neck of the woods. Only last week, for example, I listened with great curiousity to a bloke who appeared to be on methadone scream down the proverbial dog & bone at his girlfriend for a good five minutes, instructing her in meticulous detail to purchase chicken (“Any fuckin’ kind”) for din-dins.

video-phone-from-blade-runner

The movie nails a few things, though. The late 20th century question and present-day conundrum that’s still a wee bit off being ‘hot topic’ – the moral and ethical consequences of creating intelligent life forms and how we can treat ‘them’ considering the consciousness on display. We’ve had Dolly the sheep, and that appears to be the apotheosis as of writing.

From a purely cinematic standpoint, the movie still holds up. It’s more dense and packed with breathtaking imagery than a thousand motion pictures since. I find parallels with Taxi Driver (1976). Someone (I don’t know who) once said that big cities breed loneliness, and I agree with such a sentiment. Deckard is one sad individual with not an ounce of self-awareness who ends up falling in love with a robot. There’s a lot to be said about that – the modern male’s fear of isolation and introspection. It’s easier to put your energies into someone else than figure out what you are or wish to be.

blade-runner-2049-poster

Blade Runner 2049 (2017) is released next month. It’s been 35 years since Rutger Hauer chased Harrison Ford around those teary rooftops. I fully expect the real-life denizens of Earth circa 2049 to be driving cars using their eyelids and I also predict a gram of cocaine being a compulsory 50p breakfast choice (no more Weetabix). That’s my vision of the future.

Wanderings and … wonderings.

Tag Archives: Ridley Scott

Gladiator II (2024) is an abomination.

Napoleon (2023).

The Counselor (or however the hell different folk spell it) needs counselling.

Prometheus (2012) revisited.

Why can’t they just leave their own films alone?

Boris is not impressed.

Blade Runner (1982) is back.