Things that go bump in the night

What’s this? A blog post? Madness, I know. Sorry for the lengthy hiatus, I’ve been busy either having fun or working and simply haven’t had the time to blog at all. The ironic thing is that in that last month or so we’ve had the brutal lynching of Gaddafi, cabinet ministers inviting friends along to confidential meetings and the European economy teetering on the brink of collapse because of massive debt accumulated by Greece. All in all, plenty to talk about if I’d managed to find the time. Unfortunately I didn’t find the time, although the Greek crisis is still happening, so I might say something about that next week. For now, I’m not really sure what to say about it.

While global politics is fun and all, last week was Halloween, and that is far more fun! I’ve always had a somewhat strained relationship with horror as a genre; while I really quite enjoy being scared by films, stories and even videogames, I’ve always found that many things simply do not scare me that much. I find that often the genre falls a little flat because the sole purpose of it is to unnerve the viewer/reader/player, rather than actually tell a story of any kind. The best horror almost always has an engaging story behind it that you can appreciate without having to have been especially scared by the rest of the stuff going on.

The reason I bring this up is that last weekend I watched two horror movies, firstly the original Wickerman (not the crap one with Nicholas Cage) and secondly, Antichrist, which might well be the scariest movie I have ever seen. I mentioned a few months ago that I watched Insidious and had been pretty effectively unsettled by it. Antichrist was by far worse. I think there are some fairly obvious reason why Antichrist was so terrifying, but also some far more subtle ones that are perhaps more telling.

I’ve long been a fan of Pseudopod, a weekly horror podcast that I’ve mentioned on this blog before. However I’ve never actually found the stories I listen to there scary per se. They’re often interesting, offer a fascinating insight into the human condition and take a revealing look at the darker side of culture and humanity, but they’re not necessarily all that scary. In fact, I often find that I’m more scared by the flash fiction stories that by the longer ones, possibly because they are far more punchy and to the point. I think that main issue is that the stories are purely in audio form. Horror tends to be very visual. I find it is images or scenes that most get into my head and affect me, so purely written or oral stories tend not to stick in my head and really get to me in the same way. I have to imagine the scenes, rather than seeing them, which makes it less effective. Shorter stories work better, perhaps, because I have less time to rationalise my perception of the scenes described. In fact, the most effective story I’ve heard on Pseudopod comes from Episode 203; Flash on the Borderlands IV, the third story in that episode, ‘Is this a Horror Story?’ is incredibly simply, conceptually, and probably more effective because of it.

I think the main reason why I tend not to get all that scared by horror in general, in any media, is that, for the most part, horror is simply not done all that well; having said that, it must be admitted that horror is very hard to do well. It is all too easy to overplay things like shock-horror, where things jump out and surprise you, which is not so much horror as simple shock, or gore horror, where the screen is filled the blood and gore and explicit depictions of visceral mutilation, which is not so much horror as faintly disgusting. There is nothing wrong with either of these things per se, but they must be used with extreme caution and in small doses. Indeed, Antichrist uses both shock and gore horror to great effect, because it’s used sparingly.

Two of the most effective scenes in Antichrist are the ones in which the female lead first breaks her husband’s penis with a wooden block and later cuts her own clitoris off. More graphic, you will not find. The thing that makes these scenes most effective, leaving aside the sheer horribleness of the acts themselves, is that these are the only two visceral scenes in the movie. There is scary, unpleasant and fairly graphic imagery elsewhere, but in terms of gore, that’s it. They stand out as by far the most visually unpleasant scene in the movie. The placement of these scenes is also very important. They occur at the beginning and the end of the third act; the dramatic climax of the film where all the threads running through the story come to a head. The gore in this case is very carefully designed to highlight the most dramatically significant scenes in the movie. This can be starkly contrasted with movies like Saw, in which gore is such a common, almost constant feature, that is loses all effect. We become dulled to the effects of gore because it happens all the time. Nothing stands out as important because there’s simply too much of it.

The scene of genital mutilation were not, however, the ones that stayed with me and have, in some senses, been haunting me all week. They were horrific at the time, but they soon fade. The thing about horror that makes it so scary is that it is often so close to reality. Even the great monsters of Gothic Horror are frighteningly human. Vampires, zombies, werewolves, Frankenstein’s monster, Mr Hyde and the like are all humans plus, or humans minus. The best horror does not happen in far-away fantasy worlds, or far-away places, disassociated in place and time from us, it happens in our back garden, just to the left of our world, in place that is haunting because it is so familiar and yet ever so slightly off. Antichrist takes place in just such a place; a place familiar enough that we can believe it, but different enough that it terrifies us.

The most haunting scenes in antichrist, then, are the subtle ones. The ones that you barely notice. Throughout the last third of the movie or so, it is slowly revealed that the female protagonist was already going insane, long before the events shown. The way this is revealed is particularly frightening, because it is so subtle. The male protagonist points out to his wife that their child’s shoes are on the wrong way round in a picture. She dismisses it as a slip of the mind that day. The next scene is the husband flipping through a collection of photos from the same album. In every one, the child’s shoes are on the wrong way round. Compared with genital mutilation, it may not appear to be much, but it’s a sequence that has stuck with me all week. It’s so subtle, so easy to miss – indeed the photos are shown to the viewer earlier in the film and there’s no way you could pick up on it – and yet such a terrifying thing when you explore the implications, both for the child and for the mental constitution of the mother.

I always find it interesting to watch people’s reactions to horror. Of course, there’s the covering of eyes, the squirms and noises of disgust; all the things you might expect. What you don’t always expect is the laughter. There is an odd link between horror and comedy, namely that it is very difficult to understand why we react in the way we do to each of them. Sure, there are some concepts that are funny or horrifying; we can understand why a joke is funny on some level, just as we can understand why a scene or concept is horrifying on some level. However so much of both are about delivery. A concept could be funny, or horrifying, but delivered so badly that it stops being funny or horrifying, indeed, sometimes it goes from being horrifying to being funny. I mentioned at the start of this blog that I also watched the original Wickerman, I’ve not really mentioned it because Antichrist is a much more effective example. However I mention it now because of the hilariously awful remake from 2006, which has been characterised by many as an unintentional comedy because it’s just done that badly that it is actually funny.

Comedy and horror, laughter and revulsion are gut reactions. We laugh before we’re realised why, we recoil in fright before we realise it’s scary. It’s impossible to rationalise comedy and horror because they both appeal to something that goes beyond our rationality and touches something purely instinctive. For horror, in particular, this can be scary in itself. No matter how much we rationalise something, it does not lose its effect because horror is, in itself, irrational. It’s an instinctive reaction to that which frightens us. This is part of what makes horror so difficult to pull off; you have to understand something that is completely irrational and work out a way to touch that nerve. It’s very hard to create something that will not only reach into the depths of people’s consciousness and terrify them once, but will do it again and again every time they think about it.

My Top Ten Writers

Given that last week was really rather serious, and next will be even more so (just look at the date). I thought I’d take some time out to present the successor to my list of top ten novels I wrote last May. While most of these writers write novels, I’ve not limited myself to novelist; there are writers here better known for non-fiction, or screen writing, and some that I know better from their short stories. So without further ado, my top ten writers in no particular order:

• Robert Jordan – Author of the epic-in-every-sense Wheel of Time Series. While the series does begin to drag towards the end and pacing becomes more and more inconsistent, the world building and characters remain absolutely incredible. Jordan put so much thought and work into creating a world that is even more detailed and varied than even Tolkien managed. He draws from so many different cultures and traditions around the world and blends them into his own unique world that is fascinating to explore. Into that world he inserts some fantastic, strong and still dangerously flawed characters. I’ve not yet read any of the additions to the series by Brandon Sanderson after Jordan’s death in 2007, but I look forward to seeing how he ends the series

• Tom Holland – While Tom Holland does actually write some fiction, I have only read his non-fiction. He is a superb narrative historian who makes the subjects he writes about both accessible to everyone and really thought-provoking. I don’t always agree with what he has to say, but it always gets me thinking, which is what good history should do. In addition, disagreeing with him helped me in my Oxford Interview, so I have to thank him for that!

• Tim Pratt – Tim Pratt also writes novels, but I don’t know him from those either. I know and love Pratt’s short stories, many of which have been podcasted on Escape Artists (in fact he is one of the few authors to achieve the Escape Artists Trifecta of having stories published at Escape Pod, Pod Castle and Pseudopod). He writes some of the strangest and most thought-provoking stories at Escape Artists, which is saying a lot. Some highlights include Terrible Ones and Unexpected Outcomes.

• JRR Tolkien – What can one say about the father of modern epic fantasy? I’m not going to pretend that Lord of the Rings is perfect, it’s not, but the precedent he set, the debt that modern fantasy owes him, in incalculable. Lord of the Rings might be somewhat limited in scope, it might be very much a product of it’s time, it might not be brilliantly paced, or terribly accessible, but it is very good story set in a wonderfully detailed and well thought-out world. Fantasy fiction would not be where it is today without his work.

• Christopher Nolan – I’ve spoken before a number of times about how incredible films like Inception, The Dark Knight and The Prestige are, and you can add Memento and Batman Begins to that list as well. Nolan is the best writer and director is Hollywood at the moment (despite not winning an Oscar). I cannot wait for his next Batman movie, or whatever else he chooses to make next. His stories are dark, complex and thought provoking. He knows exactly what makes a good character and what makes a good story and executes it brilliantly.

• Terry Pratchett – The Discworld is possibly one of the most incredibly, ridiculous and brilliant fantasy worlds ever created. Pratchett knows how stories work and explores that brilliantly. His exploration of human nature, language, fiction and the world in general is always wonderfully witty, impossibly clever and thought-provoking at the same time.

• David Gemmell – Gemmell is one of the best historical, heroic fantasy writers I’ve ever read. He stands himself apart from most historical fiction writers who tend to just retell events of history with a few of their own characters worked into the gaps, by actually rewriting history in his fiction. He takes an interesting period and uses that as a jumping-off point to tell his own story. His work with the Troy myth is fantastic, because it does not tell a story anything like the one that Homer tells, but instead tries to recreate a historical possibility that explains the mythology, without simple copying it.

• Stephen Moffat – Moffat is best known for his work on Dr Who, which is brilliant, but he also co-wrote Sherlock, a modern re-imagining of Sherlock Holmes, and wrote Jykyll, a modern re-imagining of Robert Louis Stephenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jykll and Mr Hyde, both of which were brilliant. As well as producing the previous and current series of Dr Who, Moffat wrote some of the best episodes from back when Russell T. Davis was producing, like The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances, Blink, and Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead. Moffat is superb at creating truly creepy and original monsters, like the Angels and the Empty Child, as well as some really fantastic characters. He tells wonderful stories that are both dark and clever.

• Terry Goodkind – More epic fantasy. Author of the Sword of Truth Series, which remains one of my favourite series of all time. It is heavily influenced by Ayn Rand’s Objectivist philosophy, which really influences the series. Unfortunately, Rand’s tendency to present two extremes with no middle ground also comes through, making things a little unambiguous. However Goodkind is also a fantastic plotter and creates some fantastic characters that really draw you in. The world-building is not on a level with Tolkien or Jordan, but that’s not the idea, the focus is on the characters and the plot, both of which are fantastic. Goodkind is also fantastic at pacing, so neither the books, nor the series as a whole drag. In fact, the books race brilliantly to a conclusion, making them very difficult to put down as each story draws to an end.

• Robert Harris – Robert Harris is a fantastic historical Fiction/thriller writer. His stories are always really well researched and well thought out. They tend to fall into many of the traps that thrillers typically do, but that’s ok, because they’re always very engaging and well written. His historical works, like Pompeii and Imperium are probably his best work, mostly because of how painstakingly well researched, and hence realistic they are. He really draws you into the historical setting, which is very important for a Historical Fiction writer.

5 mini-reviews from a long-haul flight

You may remember that, about a year ago, I wrote a collection of mini-reviews of the movies I watch on my long-haul flight to Australia. Well, now my year is Aus is over, so I too another long-haul fight and watched more movies! This time there are only five of them, because I slept more this time around.

Sucker Punch

There are sections of this movie that are really cliché; a group of five Femme Fetale characters fight their way through a series of fairly well trodden fantasy and sci-fi scenarios, including a Medieval Japanese setting, a classic Epic Fantasy with dragons and orcs, a steam/cyber-punk WWII with zombies (yeah, seriously) and space opera. Sounds ridiculous, right? It does actually make sense in context, however. Sucker Punch is about the mental battles of young, mentally unstable girl who is sexually abused by one of the orderlies. Of course the she imagines herself and her friends as Femme Fetales, of course the setting her mind invents for her are fairly standard fantasy and sci-fi settings: she’s only a young girl who is slightly insane, there’s not likely to be a huge amount of subtlety or originality.

The sections that bind the bizarre action sequences together, themselves a fantasy where the main character is forced into a brothel and attempts to escape with her fellow prisoners, is really well done and holds the rather stranger parts of the plot together really well. Sucker Punch is a really well told story, set out in many ways like a video game and using the medium of film superbly to show what is happening, rather than telling it. There is almost no dialogue for the opening sequence, for example, as all is shown through the actions on screen. In addition, the soundtrack is absolutely incredible.

Sucker Punch is a fantastic film; dark depressing, with a very melancholy ending. It’s a fascinating study of the psychologically troubled and also really fun. Well worth seeing and possibly the best movie I review today.

Insidious

I don’t usually get all that scared or disturbed by horror. Even Paranormal Activity didn’t set me on edge too badly, but after watching Insidious, I had to watch three episodes of the Simpsons to unfrey my nerves. Insidious does not do the standard horror trope of spattering the audience with gore and cheap frights. There are some things that jump out of the cupboard at us, but the real horror in Insidious is the subtle and the understated. It’s not quite as subtle as Paranormal Activity, but that is actually to its credit because it allows for some more visually interesting horror. There are some seriously creepy parts of this movie and it left me feeling really rather disturbed.

Horror, especially supernatural horror, is all about mystery. What we don’t know most certainly can hurt us and it terrifies us more when we don’t know what it is. Insidious falls down a little when it over-explains the phenomenon. It would have been creeper if there were no explanation, or at least a much less satisfactory explanation for the horror we are experiencing. Despite this, it leaves enough unexplained that there is some mystery towards the end and has enough mystery in the early part of the story that we are drawn in nicely. The very and in particular is extremely creepy, simply because we’re not told what happens after the end of the movie. Our imagination is left to run wild about what might happen. I hope any sequel will not follow directly from this story, because I actually don’t want to know what happens after the curtain closes.

If you like horror, especially subtle haunting horror (like Paranormal Activity), then you should probably check this one out, because it’s well worth seeing. Maybe switch off for the bit where they explain exact what is going on, because the movie is better without it.

Paul

I don’t usually review comedies because there’s never much to say. I really enjoyed Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead; the two other spoof films by Pegg and Frost, and find their style a lot better than the usual movie spoofs like Scary Movie and Epic Movie. They tend to be far less silly and a bit more subtle. That being said, I didn’t enjoy Paul as much as the others. Don’t get me wrong, it was pretty good, I enjoyed the humour and had some good laughs, but it didn’t seem to have as many memorable moments as the other two. I think the fact that it was set in America meant that it did not feel as quintessentially British as the other two movies. Both Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead play on some very English clichés, whereas Paul felt very much more American. It certainly aimed it’s satire in the direction of the deep south and the American intelligence agencies, which didn’t work quite as well as when Pegg and Frost aim their satire at their own country.

Pretty funny, entertaining, but not as good as Hot Fuzz or Shaun of the Dead. Worth seeing, I suppose.

I am Number 4

Well I knew my run of quite a few films from long haul flights that were at least decent if not great was going to end eventually. This really was pretty terrible – a very standard set of characters, a predictable plot, and terrible bit of writing just at the end there. Very disappointing. As far as Sci-Fi goes, this was very unoriginal and used its tropes very unimaginatively.

Is noone in Hollywood sick to death of old teenagers arriving at a high school in which there is a hot, but unpopular girl, a nerd who gets bullied and some jocks who are popular despite being complete assholes, and befriending the underdogs before leading them on some weird mission in which they both display some unknown level of courage, while the jocks are either won over or given some unnecessary form of justice? There are literally hundreds of movies with that exact plot. Has noone thought to give that one a rest, or at least do something interesting with it? I’m also sick and tired of villains in speculative fiction being so blatantly characterised as evil, right down to their appearance. Surely the whole point of speculative fiction is that it raises questions and ambiguity, rather than making things so appallingly obvious that we are not forced to speculate at all.

I am Number 4 is, I am afraid to say, mostly a waste of your time. It’s entertaining enough for an hour or two, but it’s nothing special, nothing interesting, and nothing new.

Tron

I’d actually heard mostly good things about Tron, unfortunately these people clearly lied to me, or I got the wrong end of the stick. Or maybe they don’t realise I don’t give a flying fuck about visuals unless the story is actually any good. In Tron the story was pretty woeful and the writing was atrociously sloppy. It failed miserably to establish what on earth was going on and to establish why we should care, either about the characters or anything else. The pacing was really terrible, to the point where I was drifting off at the point where the plot should have been reaching climax, because it had actually slowed down after the rather excessively speedy start.

Ok, fine, it looked great. I mean really, really great. The kind of visuals that look good now and will still look good in 20 years, when technology has far surpassed what it is now. The sci-fi world in which most of the story took place looked fantastic and the action sequences were done superbly. It’s just a shame that there was nothing behind the visuals to actually make any of it matter or make sense.

Watch it if you like giving your eyes a treat, but switch off the brain, because you don’t even want to try to follow the plot.

And there you have it, not as entertaining a flight as last time, but not half bad.

Thor

There are many things that I like in fiction, but two of the things I like most are modern retellings of old myths, legends, fairy tales and stories, and Superheroes. It is hardly surprising, then, that Thor was always going to strike a chord with me. There’s something about figures from ancient mythology re-imagined as superheroes that just sounds awesome. That’s not to say that Thor is actually that good. I mean it’s not bad, but it could have been so much better.

The thing about superhero stories in particular, the thing that draws me to them, is that they are character studies. The superhero is at the centre of the story and his/her development is what drives the plot. This is how I like my stories – character focused and character driven. It’s what makes me such a fan of Christopher Nolan films. It’s why I said The Green Hornet was not a Superhero film.

I said back then to wait for Thor if you want a superhero film. I was not wrong. Thor is, indeed, a very character focused film, with Thor’s development driving the plot. It’s not a character arc typical of superhero films; it involves a fall-from/return-to-grace more typical of heroic fantasy, but then, the mythology which underlies the story makes that inevitable. You see, most superhero stories start with an origin story and the character coming to terms with his new super-ness, Batman Begins a perfect example of this. Thor, on the other hand, does not need to explain how Thor became Thor because he always has been, he’s a God; it’s just what he does.

Instead the film tells the story of an arrogant hero who is banished from his homeland and stripped of his power for doing something monumentally stupid. During his banishment, the hero comes to realise his faults and becomes a better person, returning home to save the day from the consequences of the thing he did to get banished in the first place and regaining his rightful place as a hero to his people. Now, this is all a fairly typical character arc that does not present anything new. I’m sure we could all think of some story that employs essentially the same framework. Assassin’s Creed does it, for example.

Where Assassin’s Creed differs, however, is that Altair does not simply return to becoming a run-of-the-mill Assassin by the end of the story; we do not simply return to the status quo. Thor ends exactly as it begins. Thor is the prince of Asgard, heir to Odin’s throne. The only difference is that he is ready to become king. Unfortunately the Mythology of Asgard means that Thor will never become king. He will continue to wield Mjollnir in the name of Odin until Ragnarök. Of course this mythology is not set in stone – it’s a reimagining, remember, if they wanted, the writers could have had Odin die and Thor take up his throne, but that’s not what happened, so the ending ends up being rather unsatisfactory. Nothing monumental has changed in Thor’s life; things are not vastly different from how they were at the start. If the evens of the film had never happened, life would only be very slightly different for most people.

The only person for whom life has changes is Jane, the woman who Thor fell in love with in his short visit to earth. The problem is that we’re never really made to care about her. She gets some pretty rushed and unconvincing characterisation, which never really fleshes her character out enough for her to really matter. As a result, the romance between her and Thor is equally unconvincing, especially when we consider that they only really knew each other for a very short amount of time.

The disappointing thing is that, although Jane and the rest of the people on earth are fairly poorly characterised, everyone on Asgard is really well characterised. All the way down to the Heimdall, the gatekeeper. The focus of the film is clearly Asgard and the politics going on there. This is a problem, because the focus really should be on Thor, given that the film is all about him. It makes the development of the character seem to play second fiddle to the other things in the story. All the shadow-play between Loki and the Frost Giants, the conflict of Volstagg, Hogun, Fandral and Frigga between obedience to their king and support for Thor is very interesting, but it was overplayed in comparison to the really rather uninspiring scenes on earth. Thor really didn’t seem to go through very much personal torture or great soul searching to resolve his eternal conflict, nor did he and Jane really have enough screen time together to really make their love anything more than a typically tacked-on Hollywood romance.

Thor, then, suffers primarily from a misdirection of focus. It is a character driven story in which the character is not the focus of the story, making it difficult to really find him convincing. It spreads itself too thinly over ground that is perfectly good. While the character arc is fairly typical, there is no reason why that should make it inherently bad. In fact it would be a perfectly good basis upon which to build a very interesting story.

Where Thor does triumph, however, is the setting. Credit should probably go more to the original creators of the story at Marvel, rather than the makers of this adaptation, but to be fair to the latter, they do a fantastic job of portraying the universe in which Thor is set without falling into the obvious trap of simply telling us. Through the film we find out about Asgard and how it links with the world we live in a very natural way. There is some narration near the beginning, but this is only to set a bit of back-story in place and actually works because it’s supposed to be Odin telling his sons all about the war between the Asgardians and the Frost Giants.

Likewise the aesthetic is fantastic. Sci-Fi and Fantasy are combined really well to make it seem very believable and natural. Asgard feels simultaneously like the citadel of a highly advanced civilisation and the home of a bunch of Norse Gods. The film very much feels like a mixture between Fantasy and Sci-Fi, between science and magic.

Indeed the way in which Thor and Jane approach things is very interesting. Jane is striving to find the scientific explanation for the way in which Thor and co are able to travel between worlds and looks at everything from a rigidly scientific perspective. By contrast, Thor explains things very much in terms of magic and mythology. His explanation of the way the worlds are linked in terms of a tree, a motif from Norse Mythology is a typical example of this. It’s an interesting contrast, but in some ways a missed opportunity as it wasn’t really explored terribly well.

As I said earlier, the credit for the setting itself must go to the folks at Marvel, rather than the film makers, but even so, the idea that the Gods of Norse Mythology are actually other-worldly being of great power is simply incredible. The good thing is that Norse Mythology is not simply taken whole and unaltered. It is changed and switched around to fit the purpose of the story. For example Loki’s role is dramatically altered. This is a good thing; to simply take Norse Mythology and plant it into a sci-fi setting would be somewhat lacking in originality. The best reimaginings use the original as a basis and create from that, rather than simple taking from the original without adding to it at all.

Thor is most certainly a triumph of aesthetic and setting. It looks great. The problem is that it focuses too much on the setting of Asgard and everything happening therein to the detriment of the character at the heart of the story. While Thor and his actions ultimately drive the story, the focus seems to be more on what Loki does in his absence. Had the focus been on Thor and his relationship with Jane, the film would have been far, far better. Similarly, the ending should have been somewhat different – something should have changed by the end, rather than the status quo being returned.

Despite all my criticisms, Thor is actually a pretty solid film. It’s worth seeing, especially if you’re a fan of either superheroes or Norse Mythology. There are a number of other superhero films upcoming from Marvel in the next few moths, all leading up to The Avengers in 2012. I think it will be really interesting to see how Marvel knits together a number of different films and characters in a way that has not really been done on the silver screen before. We had a bit of a cross-over in Thor with a mention of Tony Stark. I think it will be great to see a superhero universe developing in film as it has done in comic books and, to a lesser extent, other mediums for a while now.

Incidentally, if you do like modern reimaginings of Norse Mythology, I encourage you to check out a short story on Pod Castle called Wolves ‘till the Wold Goes Down, by Greg van Eekhout. If you like that, then you’ll probably also like his novel based on the same sort of thing, called Norse Code.

Limitless

An unexpected (and free) cinema trip on Wednesday brings you all an unexpected (and still free) film review. Limitless is a speculative thriller starring Robert De Nero and Bradley Cooper, about a failed writer who has his life utterly turned around by a drug that allows him to access the eighty percent of his brain that is usually inactive, turning him from a useless slob pretending to write a sci-fi novel into an absolute genius in about thirty seconds.

Limitless wins two massive gold stars from me straight away because I am both a (failing) writer and fascinated by the idea of anything that allows us to tap into our latent creativity/brainpower. I suppose the two go hand in hand; artists are always struggling against themselves, writers block, the hassle of living and various other excuses, so an ability to magically do-away with those excuses and actually do all the things we want to do with our creativity is bound to appeal to us. I for one have about a dozen stories of varying lengths that I’d love to write and more being generated all the time, but only about half of them have even been started yet, let along are anywhere near completion. What I would give to be able to just sit down and write without getting distracted and without floundering over what exactly to write.

And that’s exactly the point. What would I give? The Fantasy podcast I plugged a month or so back,

PodCastle recently ran a story called State Change, which also touched on this in passing. The premise of the story was that each person’s soul was represented by an object individual to that person. One of the characters mentioned in passing had a candle for a soul, which she lit whenever she needed inspiration. Of course, burning the candle uses up some of it. We never actually see what happens when the candle burns down. Limitless imposes a similar catch – once you start taking the pill, you can’t stop. If you do, your body shuts down and you die. You can’t take too many of the pills, or go too long without food or drink excessively, or your mind goes into overdrive and you wake up having lost several hours/days of your life with no memory of what you did.

It would be nice if this dilemma was at the heart of the film. If the question of just how far you would go to continue being a genius was the conflict that drove the plot, but it wasn’t. As I said, it’s a thriller. You see, our hero, Eddie, doesn’t buy the pills, he steals them. And the people he stole them from want them back. Several other people also want them, because let’s face it, who wouldn’t? Of course, as a genius, he can usually handle them, until he starts running out and needs to find some more.

The film doesn’t even focus on what the pills mean for an artist and what they can do to inspiration. Eddie writes a novel in four days at the start of the film, but soon turns to the stock market and ends up working for Carl Van Loon (Robert De Nero), a powerful businessman. I suppose Eddie finds writing so easy after taking the pills, that there’s really no point in exploring it too much – there isn’t much left to explore. Even so, the turn to the world of finance does seem like a strange move for a failing writer to make. It completely and dramatically shifts the tone of the film in a way that is somewhat jarring. His entrance into finance is initially explained by the fact that he has a plan for something big that he needs money for, but that just gets left by the wayside.

Actually a fair bit gets left by the wayside through the course of the film. Eddie finds his ex brother-in-law dead, but there seems to be no hint of a police investigation into what, exactly, he was doing there. He’s also accused (possibly rightly) of murder, but nothing comes of that. After possibly killing someone and almost dying, he promises to come off the drugs, which he never shows any interests in doing. There were actually quite a few little plot-holes and loose-ends that were never really tied off, which seems very sloppy indeed.

In fact I would go as far as to say that, in parts, this story was pretty badly written. For a start, the first two thirds had one of the most pointless narrations I have ever heard. Almost everything that was told to us in the narration was shown to us onscreen at the same time. The little bit that was not immediately shown to us could have been, with a little effort.

I’ve mentioned a number of times that I really dislike narration in films, so it’s past time I explained why. Films are, at heart, a visual medium. We watch films; we don’t listen to or read them. When applied to film, the mantra ‘show; don’t tell’ means that, as much as possible, a film should use visual cues to show the viewer what we are supposed to gather from a certain scene, rather than telling them with written word or narration. The viewer is not stupid, (s)he can work out what is happening if those visual cues are done well enough. There are some instances were it is necessary, such as if there is some kind of story within a story being told, where one of the main characters is narrating the story over the top of the visuals. However, it should be used sparingly, as something that goes against the norm, rather than being the norm.

So, between pointless, patronising narration and unresolved plot-threads left unsatisfactorily hanging every now and then, Limitless is not a triumph of screenwriting. It is a triumph of cinematography, however. Once Eddie has taken the pill, the entire film literally lights up; the aesthetic goes from being a dreary, dull, colourless misery to being vibrant, energetic and colourful. This aesthetic shift is, in some ways, rather jarring, but it’s still very effective. Even more effective is the way in which the camera shifts to take in a much wider view and the editing becomes much sharper and faster. This builds up to the extremely impressive breakdown about half way through the film, which involves some fantastic and very confusing sequences.

This complete mental breakdown from abuse of the drugs and the after-effects of it are really a turning point. Up until that point I’d been really enjoying the film. It seems as though Eddie had experienced the all-time low that shows him that something has to change. I would have expected some kind of realisation of his faults and a subsequent change in character. It’s one of the principle character arcs upon which a story can rest. However the arc almost got to the end then broke down. Rather than Eddie moving on and learning something concrete about himself from his experiences, he simply changed the way he was acting slightly, became somewhat more moderate and continued in the exact same vein. The plot stopped being driven by him and started being driven by other characters. This is where I really started to loose the story. I could forgive the pointless narration and the odd unresolved issue, if the story had given me a satisfying character study with a resolution that worked. The character development stopped, however and the film became a run-of-the-mill thriller with two dimensional characters and an uninspiring plot.

The ending of the film was particularly disappointing. Eddie seemed not to have really learned from his experience. The conflict that had underlain the rest of the story had disappeared without any decent resolution. Eddie had all the benefits, but none of the drawbacks, and he’d not had to really do anything to achieve it. The thing that had made the story interesting and the thing that had made Eddie an interesting character were both gone, but this all happened after the main story arc was over and done with. It was all done through a massive Deus Ex Machina that left a very sour taste in the mouth.

Limitless is worth seeing, especially given that there’s bugger all out at the moment, but it doesn’t get close to the list I posted last week. Excellent cinematography and a fantastic concept was let down by some poor writing and a really shoddy ending. The thing that bugs me about this film is that it could have been really excellent. With a very small amount of effort it could have at least been very good. As it is, it’s merely decent, not bad, ok, mediocre. It had a hell of a lot of potential, but really didn’t live up to much of it. So many missed opportunities and unexplored possibilities.

My Top Ten… Films

I’ve been deliberating over what, exactly, to write about this week. There are several things I could write about, including the situation in Libya, but I don’t have enough to say about those things at this stage to make a fully fledged blog post out of them. With any luck further developments in the next week or so will give me something more to say. In the meantime, it’s been a while since I did a top ten, so here’s a list of my favourite films, again, in no particular order.

• Inception: This is only the first of several Christopher Nolan films on this list. See my review for reasons why it’s awesome. A brilliantly written, brilliantly filmed, mind-bogglingly complex, character-driven sci-fi. Really incredible, deserving of the Oscar it didn’t win

• Shawshank Redemption: A classic. Really good study of the life of a prisoner and the problems facing them after they get out of jail, combined with a fantastic story of the dedication of one man to break out of prison. Wonderfully understated and subtle. Shame about the narration, but I guess we can forgive a few faults.

• The Dark Knight: Another Christopher Nolan film, possibly the best superhero film to come out in recent years. Incredible performance by the late Heath Ledger. See my review of this one for details (jeez, that’s going back a long way, I was a horrible person back then). I cannot wait for the next Batman film to come out. With Nolan directing, I expect it to be excellent.

• Lucky Number Slevin: One of the very few films in which Brice Willis in not trying to kill everything. He actually does a really good job in this one. Slevin is a fantastic Noir film that has a brilliant twist in the tale. Well written, beautifully stylish and really well acted by all involved.

• Lord of the Rings: Return of the King: One of the best book-to-film adaptations I can remember. The whole trilogy is a really good interpretation of the original work, stripping out a lot of the superfluous bits (Bombadil is awesome, but not needed), but keeping the essence of the work intact. The Return of the King in particular is a suitably epic finale. Outstanding film making on Peter Jackson’s part.

• The King’s Speech: I reviewed this one a matter of weeks ago. Absolute triumph of film making. Wonderful feel-good story that dealt with some fascinating characters and issues. Deserving of the Oscar in any ordinary year (but Inception still should have won it this year)

• The Prestige: Another Christopher Nolan film. A much older work, but still fantastic. Alternative History about magicians in the 19^th century. More brilliant twists and interesting characters. Typically dark and very stylish. I need to see Memento; another Nolan film. I’ve heard it’s also awesome.

• The Matrix: A truly incredible idea. One of those stupid ‘what ifs’ that kept on being explored until an idea for a film emerged. A superb existential idea, questioning the very existence of existence as we know it. From that, a piece of Sci-fi that is as bleak as it is far-reaching. Add in some interesting and deeply flawed characters and some inspired cinematography, and you have a really fantastic film. Shame they never made any sequels.

• V for Vendetta: If only for two of the most awesome speeches ever committed to film. Another brilliant superhero film, driven by the enigmatic V and his fascinating back-story. I have to say it, I’m a massive fan of dystopia and the one created in the graphic novel and faithfully reproduced in this film is wonderful. Another brilliantly shot film – parliament exploding to the 1812 overture? Incredible. Excellent philosophical points, as well.

• Fight Club: More Noir. One of those strange little mind-fuck films that leaves you reeling. One of Brad Pitt’s best performances to date. Really well written and really stylish. The twist isn’t quite as neat or as subtle as in Slevin, but it certainly changes the very essence of the film a lot more. It turns from a study of violence and violent protest into a character study of a deeply troubled man and his inner battles. Awesome.

The King's Speech

I keep saying that I should make an effort to go see more movies so I can review them, because I do really enjoy doing it and it’s a pretty easy way of making sure I have something to blog about. You saw what happens when I don’t last week. So this week I trotted down to the local cinema to watch The King’s Speech, which has been justifiably well reviewed by everyone. You might ask why I haven’t done this before, given that it’s been out for a couple of months now, and I would reply that the local cinema only started showing it a couple of weeks ago. And I’ve been busy.

The King’s Speech is, fairly obviously, about a speech made by a king; more specifically King George VI of Britain, father of the current Queen, and his speech at the outbreak of the Second World War. Actually it’s about a man trying to rise above the bullying and scorn of his youth and grow into the role to which he is destined. It’s also about the nature and necessity of Kingship in the modern age; the conflict between self-interest and duty; and the treatment of colonialists in Britain in the twilight of The Empire.

Most importantly it is about the man. Two men actually. Bertie: King George, and his speech therapists, an Australian failed actor, Lionel Logue. You see, Bertie has a terrible stutter. In the age where radio is beginning to be a world wide phenomenon, a stutter is a rather terrible thing for a prince to have. He is expected to be a public speaker, so must learn to speak.

The relationship between Bertie and Lionel is fascinating. It begins as a purely professional one; any intimacy barred by the impenetrable walls of class that existed in 20^th century Britain. Bertie is an aristocrat and Lionel is not even British: he’s an Australian, a colonialist, a nobody. There should be no way, in such a society, that they could be anything but professional acquaintances. The Prince knows this. Lionel chooses to ignore it. He constantly and persistently pushes the bounds their relationship. He suffers Bertie’s temper numerous times, but persists in his attempts to become friends with him.

As the story progresses, Bertie realises that he not only can be friends with Lionel, but that he must in order to find his voice. He’s lived a friendless, isolated life, and Lionel is the only person to whom he can actually talk about his past. His stutter has made him an object of mockery, particularly at the hands of his brother, egged on by his father. Only by opening himself up to Lionel, can he acknowledge the fear and resentment that have stolen his voice.

However in the act of opening himself up, he leaves himself open to being hurt. Lionel is frank, crass and forthwith. Princes are not used to being treated as Lionel treats Bertie; as an equal. This is the main cause of the conflict between the two; Bertie repeatedly fails to accept Lionel’s treatment of him. The thing is, this problem never goes away. Lionel repeatedly provokes Bertie, even up to the scene towards the end in Westminster Abby prior to his coronation. Everything does not end perfectly; they do not get on completely. Their friendship overcomes the conflicts which arise, partial, from Lionel’s attempts to provoke Bertie (he doesn’t stutter when he’s angry), and, as all friends must, they learn to live with each other’s imperfections.

The King’s Speech really is a wonderful study of a relationship that must develop and grow, but is consistently stunted by assumptions and conflict. Both of these must be overcome in order for The King to deliver his speech. However it is so much more than that.

One of the main themes of The King’s Speech is the relevance of Kingship itself. Bertie keeps coming back to the paradox of kingly authority in Britain. He is in the paradoxical position of having huge responsibility and absolutely no power. He cannot make laws, raise taxes, or declare war. He is a figurehead; the voice of the nation. But he has no voice. He is there to inspire, to lead, and to rally. With war looming, such responsibilities are becoming ever more important. Yet he is still just a figurehead. Bertie’s feeling of helplessness is all the more poignant because he doesn’t have a choice. His stutter wouldn’t be much of a problem if he was an ordinary person, but his birthright puts him in the terrible position of needing a voice, but not having one. Bertie wrestles with his responsibilities and curses his lack of tangible power, but ends up accepting the inevitable and rising to it.

By contrast Lionel must deal with the problem of being a nobody. He is constantly reminded that he is Australian – despite his perfectly good English accent (or maybe I’ve been down under too long and cannot pick the difference any more!). He is looked down upon simply for not being English. The underlying racism is dealt with wonderfully because it’s never really explicitly mentioned, but constantly colours people’s attitude towards Lionel. He battles this, not by raging against the establishment, but simply by ignoring it. He ignores customs and conventions, speaks to all as equals and treats all as people, not as Englishmen, princes, or anything else. The way in which Lionel is treated asks the viewer questions about our own prejudices. Those who treat Lionel with distain are not acting out of malice or reasoned contempt; they are simply acting on unspoken assumptions. In retrospect we can see the flaws in their behaviour. The unstated nature of those flaws makes us wonder what unspoken assumptions we might have and how they might effect how we treat others.

I’ve not even mentioned the other characters yet. Bertie’s brother, Edward, was king for about a year, before abdicating. His reason for abdicating: his desire to marry a double divorcée American. Apparently you’re not allowed by be King and marry divorcées, which seems terribly unfair on divorced people. He doesn’t want to be King. He’s forced by birth into a job that he doesn’t want, and one that forces him to renounce the woman he loves. We’re not supposed to like Edward; he’s a bully, and an arrogant, selfish fool, but we do have to feel somewhat sorry for him. His unsuitability and lack of desire for rule begs the question of why should someone be forced to do a job they don’t want because of their heritage? Moreover, why should someone be forced to renounce the person he loves because of a duty to people that he doesn’t seem to care about?

As you can tell, I was rather a fan of The King’s Speech. It was a wonderful story that was wonderfully told. Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush were fantastic as the leads, and the supporting actors and actresses were pretty flawless too. Ramona Marquez will never fail to be utterly adorable in a role, and Michael Gambon was suitably austere and commanding as King George V. The writing was superb, witty and sincere at the same time, without trying too hard at either. One part stands out in particular. One scene flows flawlessly from a discussion between Lionel and Bertie about Bertie’s past, to Bertie reeling off long strings of swear words (watching Collin Firth striding around a room spewing expletives might just be the most entertaining thing I see all year), to a scene in which the two argue about kingship through foggy London. The film transitions seamlessly between dead serious, side-splittingly hilarious and fiercely dramatic in the space of a couple of minutes.

Another feature that really stood out for me was the use of actual footage, both for George VI’s coronation, and then, more importantly, scenes from The Triumph of the Will, a propaganda film about the Nuremburg Rally. While the transition was somewhat forced, the contrast between the stuttering George VI and Adolf Hitler was incredible. Seeing Leni Riefenstahl’s brilliant piece of propaganda fills me with a mixture of dread and awe every time I see it. The line that will stay with me for longest from the film, being a historian and all, comes from this scene. Bertie is asked by one of his daughters what Hitler is saying. He replies ‘I don’t know, but he seems to be saying it rather well.’

The King’s Speech will, no doubt, be fighting it out with Inception for Best Picture at the Oscars (and a whole load of other awards as well, but who cares about those?). If you’ve not already seen it, I suggest you do so, because it’s well worth it. Probably not one I’ll see twice (unlike Inception), but worth seeing once. I say I’d like to do more movie reviews, but both True Grit and The Black Swan have passed me by, it would seem, and I’m not all that interesting in seeing any of the films either out or upcoming until Thor at the end of April. So much for that plan.

The Green Hornet/The Tourist

People who tend to become superheroes usually fall into one of three categories; nerds (like Spiderman), dark, gritty individuals who have suffered personal tragedy (like Batman) and aliens from another world (like Superman). It is not often that a frat boy who spends most of his time partying and doing stupid things because they think it’s cool becomes a superhero. Well Seth Rogen seems keen to change this with his portrayal of Britt Reid, a rich frat boy who spends his youth partying and witling away his father’s considerable fortune, before inheriting his wealth and turning vigilante, mostly by accident.

Thus he becomes the Green Hornet, possibly the least capable superhero ever to have donned a mask (well maybe apart from Kick Ass, but that was the whole point). If not for his martial arts expert, coffee making genius, weapons designer and mechanical maestro Chinese sidekick, the Green Hornet would have been dead within a week of starting his new job. Still it’s nice to have a superhero who is most certainly human; without the power to sling webs, or have a utility belt that means he can do anything. Although that does raise the question of what makes him terribly super. A mask does not a superhero make. If anything his sidekick is much more of a superhero, given that he can slow time, but then the film isn’t really about him is it.

As I’m sure you’ve guessed I’m reviewing The Green Hornet today. I know! A film review! Stop the presses! Two film reviews actually, because I’ll find some way of segwaying onto The Tourist once I’m done with the Green Hornet.

The astute reader will have noticed from my previous reviews of films that I really don’t like action films and with that in mind allow me to say that The Green Hornet is a very good action film. There is lots of the fun explosions and car chases and absurd fight scenes, just as you might expect from an action film, however it is actually held together by a decent story and some well rounded, if a little unsophisticated characters. Both of these elements are given enough time to be developed so that they form a competent support for the action.

I’ve said on a number of occasions that there is nothing wrong with a film being more than an hour and a half long. If you needed any proof of this assertion, watch The Green Hornet. Were it only an hour and a half, rather than two hours I would most likely be slamming it as a typical action film in which the plot is simple a very thin window-dressing. As it is I’m giving it a cautiously positive review. The luxury of time allows the film to have all the high energy, very expensive and usually gratuitous action sequences that define the genre, as well as dedicating plenty of time to develop the characters of both the protagonists and the antagonists, and giving the plot enough to meat to carry it all along.

While the protagonist were mostly fairly dull caricatures who were predictable and rather bland (although somewhat amusing), the antagonist stood out for me as a really interesting and well thought out character. I love my villains to have an element of the crazies about them – in turn I really hate villains who are just evil for evil’s sake – and Chudnofsky (played brilliantly by Christoph Waltz) was a fantastic psychopath. In fact I’d love to have seen a lot more attention paid to the villain, because frankly the protagonists got a little dull after a while. I suppose that, as with many superheroes (especially Batman), the villains are often more interesting that the heroes.

Some of you might be wondering why I’ve insisted on calling The Green Hornet an action film, rather than a superhero film. I went into the film expecting and hoping to see a superhero film focusing on the character of the superhero and his attempts to thwart the efforts of some criminal or other. Instead I got a rather fun but not particularly serious action film in which the heroes wore masks. I suppose this is why I was somewhat disappointed with the film. As a big fan of superhero films I was expecting the wrong thing. Superhero films are character studies of the hero in question, usually from their genesis, through their initial errors and to their eventual victory and coming of age as the hero. There were only the vague trappings of this in the Green Hornet; a thin veneer of character development masking a fun, but unsophisticated action film.

If you want a superhero movie than I suggest waiting for Thor to come out, because that looks like it might be a bit better in terms of actually being a superhero film. In the meantime re-watch Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, because that’s how it’s done. If you want an action film then go watch the Green Hornet; it’s exactly how a good action film should be. 2 hours of really good, clean fun that actually works as a film. Do not, however watch The Tourist if you want an action film. Do watch The Tourist is you want a really stylish, slow-boiling, slightly Noir thriller.

Set in Venice, The Tourist follows a woman (Angelina Jolie) following mysterious instructions from a former lover and wanted criminal trying to shake off the police sting operation on her and a gang of Russians lead by the English Gangster from whom he stole several billion pounds so that they can be reunited. Part of this evasion is to try to convince the police that someone else is actually the man they want. That someone else is an American tourist (Jonny Depp), who, inevitably falls in love with the woman. And I’m sure most of you can guess what the big twist was.

Luck Number Slevin this film is not, but I don’t think it was trying to be. The twist is fairly obvious, but the way in which the story is told is a real strong point. I mentioned stylish a while ago and that really is the word. The Tourist is beautifully filmed in a really majestic setting (I really need to go back to Venice some day; my 11 year old self was too young to appreciate it). The story is told so well that it makes up for some of the writing deficiencies.

There are writing deficiencies though. For example it is made pretty obvious that Depp’s character has fallen in love with Jolie’s, so we don’t need to have him say it to no-one in particular. Less is more when it comes to films like this; the more you can show visually, the better. Jonny Depp was an interesting pick for the male Protagonist as well, although I can hardly blame him for trying to associate his name with something other than the train wreck that is the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. His style of acting is not exactly suited to the role and Captain Jack Sparrow did make the odd unwelcome appearance. That being said Jolie does a fantastic job, as she usually does.

There’s really very little else to say about The Tourist. It’s a victory of style over substance. There’s really not much to the film or the characters, but all of that can be overlooked because it’s just executed so well. Usually I’d be criticising the lack of deep characterisation and the somewhat predictable plot, but there’s just enough of both of these for the film to work.

So if you want a strong story with a focus on characters, go watch a Christopher Nolan film, because neither of these films will satisfy your desires. If, however, you fancy the best action film made in recent years, go watch The Green Hornet; it’s a lot of fun. If you’re looking for something a bit more reserved with some fantastic examples of good film making, go see The Tourist.

But if you want to enjoy some really good stories from the comfort of your own home for absolutely free, then you should try listening to some podcasts. You don’t even have to go to the effort of reading these stories because they’re wonderfully narrated to you. If you’re a fan of Sci-fi, Fantasy or Horror stories (or even if you’re not) then check out Escape Pod, Pod Castle and Pseudopod for weekly short story podcasts. You will not regret it.

Ocean’s 11 retrospective

Ocean’s Eleven was originally made in 1960, but I’ve not seen that version and until a couple of days ago I’d not seen the remake from 2001. I’ve often heard good things about the film from people whose opinions I respect, but sadly I was disappointed. You might wonder why I’m reviewing a film of 9 years ago rather than one that came out recently – like say, Tron – but that would requite dragging myself to the cinema rather than watching from the comfort of my own bed.

So Ocean’s Eleven is about 11 people robbing three large Casinos in Las Vagas. The leader of this motley crew of miscreants and criminals is Danny Ocean, who was recently released on bail from jail – proof, I suppose, that the criminal justice system is worse than useless. Ocean has a personal vendetta against the owner of these casinos because, well I’m not actually sure why, the film never really made this terribly obvious. There was something about Ocean’s wife, but then if your husband was a convicted criminal you could be forgiven to jumping ship and screwing some rich guy instead.

Anyway the crew meticulously plan and execute the robbery perfectly, without any blemish or difficulty. Everyone gets on just fine (apart from one staged fight) and everything goes to plan. The bad guy gets his money stolen and the good guys drive off into the sunset, loot and woman in hand. Or do they?

The film only unconvincingly shows us that the casino owner is the ‘bad guy’ – apparently he’s pretty harsh on people he doesn’t like, which seems more like a tragic flaw than decent set up for an antagonist. Even more criminal however is the film’s failure to actually characterise the protagonists as ‘good guys’ at all. We are given no reason to like any of the eleven thieves; most of them are set up as hardened criminals, gamblers or petty thieves, none of which are likable character traits. These might be forgiven as something of a gritty dark side to their personalities if they weren’t the only things we are actually shown about the characters. Ocean does at least seem to rather like his ex-wife, but he mostly just comes across as clingy and unable to move on, especially given that the relationship is not really given any context.

This might seem to be taking the wrong approach to a film which is supposed to be admired for its fun action, stylish presentation and hunky actors, but I’m afraid all of that does not a good film make. I have nothing against well shot films and with good action sequences and attractive actors, but these should be extras that embellish the core of a film – the plot and the characters. If you remember my review of the Expendables I’m probably sounding like a stuck record at the moment, but bear with me.

Compelling characters are one thing, but I’ve spoken about why we need them before. The other thing Ocean’s Eleven lacked was conflict; the most important thing in any plot. At no point during the heist did it seem as though the team were going to fail. Ok there was one point, but by then they’d already mostly succeeded and it was pretty obvious that some ingenious solution had been devised and already enacted before the ‘SWAT Team’ arrived. The eleven members of the team never seemed to come into conflict major with one another; everything went smoothly, there was only one fight, but there didn’t seem to be much of a fall out from that.

The reason why a story needs conflict is that conflict creates tension. Once we have gained an emotional attachment to the character, causing us to want them to succeed, we then need to have those emotions tested. We need to feel the fear that the hero might die, we need to feel the excitement as we wonder how they’re going to get out of this mess. Ocean’s Eleven had no such fear or excitement because there was no reason to fear that they might not succeed. The difficulty of their task was made abundantly obvious early on, but that difficulty was never actually exploited once the heist actually began.

The other important part of conflict is conflict between characters. People fight, that’s a fact of life. When you assemble a team for a heist, especially a big team, egos are going to be at odds. You are going to have arguments and disagreements; some people are bound to dislike each other. I don’t want to keep referring back to Inception, but look at the disagreements there between the members of the team. The only time there was genuine and interesting conflict was when the sub plot between Ocean, the casino owner and Ocean’s ex-wife took centre stage. This made for some interesting conversations that actually made me want to keep watching, something that the rest of the film failed to do.

I think Ocean’s Eleven was trying, on some level, to be noir. There was some attempt to throw in a big twist and deception, but it was all very half hearted. Good noir films, like Luck Number Slevin or Fight Club have the big twist built and foreshadowed from the very start, but it still seems to come out of nowhere and shock you. There was no real built up to the twist at the end of the film and it didn’t change the nature of the story enough to be effective.

Ocean’s Eleven is a bad film with priorities in all the wrong places. But I’m guessing. Given that it’s nine years old already, my opinion is unlikely to change yours. I suppose this might also be a good time to tell you that I don’t like Snatch by Guy Richie either. Sorry if I’ve ruined your Christmas by saying that. On that subject, next week’s blog will be either late or early because there’s no way I’m blogging on Christmas Day!

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows… Sort Of

I stopped really enjoying Harry Potter books and films a couple of years ago when I realised that it contained very little that was terribly original and the books were not actually that well written, so I was not expecting much from the latest HP film. I was not disappointed. Well I was disappointed, but not at all surprised.

I have many problems with the books and, by extension, the films. The principle of these is that it’s all too cliché. Rowling extracts, pretty much unaltered, almost everything that popular folk law has to offer and stuffs it clumsily into her world. Creatures from across the globe cram into the forest outside Hogwarts without any attention paid to the context and subtleties of the myths with which they’re associated. This leads to a paper thin and rather unsatisfactory world in which the story it set.

The magic in the story suffers from much the same problem. Rowling never really sets any rules, either implicitly or explicitly. There are vagaries about relative strength and many of the Witches and Wizards at Hogwarts struggle to get to grips with the stuff, but once they reach adulthood, it seems that they can do pretty much anything that needs doing without too much trouble – unless of course the plot demands that they have trouble with something for the sake of tension. As such Magic just becomes a convenient plot device to be wheeled out whenever something needs to happen, rather than an integral part of the conflict, contributing in some meaningful way to the characters or themes being explored.

Examples of this is seen repeatedly in The Deathly Hollows; right at the beginning, for example, when Hermione extracts herself from her parent’s life with magic – which is an incredibly complicated and difficult thing to do properly when you consider the profound influence even relatively minor people in our lives can have. Magic is used here to perform the act with relative simplicity, but healing flesh wounds seems to be beyond the talents of everyone. If wounds were healed with as much ease as memories were selectively wiped, the tension and difficulty created later on by physical injury would be shattered. Magic has limitations when it’s convenient, but now when it doesn’t need to, and it becomes somewhat jarring.

Rowling’s world, on the whole, is pretty paper thin. It compared very unfavourably to the incredibly vivid worlds created by other Fantasy writers such as Tolkien and, more recently, Robert Jordan (one of my personal favourites) among others. Of course world building is not the be-all-and-end-all of fantasy. As with any story the plot and characters are by far more important that the setting. Rowling’s focus most certainly lies with the former, so it’s prudent to examine those further; writers should, on the whole, be judged according to their own priorities.

Rowling performs somewhat better in terms of characters and plot than she does on setting, but it still lacks complexity. HP essentially boils down to a very simple and overused fantasy structure; a young hero ignorant of his past and of his true place in the world is thrown into the world beyond his limited childhood and faced with his shadowy past. He much strive with his friends (many of whom are in a similar position to him) to foil the undoubtedly evil antagonist, who is somehow linked to the hero’s own past, in his plot to rule the world. Now this in itself in not inherently bad – Jordan’s Wheel or Time series is based on exactly the same model – but is only effective if it is build upon by interesting and original layers of complexity, as well as well thought out characters.

While Rowling does succeed in making it slightly more complex than the above model, it’s still pretty shallow; Voldemort’s motivation beyond being an evil bastard is pretty weak and the setup of Harry’s character is very standard. The link between the two is relatively interesting and well played out, but the lack of ambiguity spoils it somewhat.

Indeed the lack of ambiguity is one of the most glaring flaws in the series, along with most fantasy of similar ilk. There is no question of whether Voldemort or any of his cronies are evil; indeed the evil is, at times, cartoonish. The antagonists of Harry’s childhood; the Dursleys, are a perfect example of the unrealistically dislikeable characters. They are straw people designed to ally the reader’s sympathies with Harry straight off. The opportunity was to pose interesting questions on the tragedy of an unwanted child for whom the parent’s can’t care for, but it was ignored in favour of a childishly simplistic foil to the protagonist.

This is a theme through the books. Think of all the ‘bad guy’ in the series and try to think of one with whom you can actually sympathise. As far as I can remember, they’re all comically hate-worthy, with hardly a single saving grace amongst them. In the film for example, it is reinforced early on that Voldemort’s secret council is full of evil people (as if that wasn’t obvious by the fact that they all look shady and murderous), by having them feed some random Witch to a snake, just in case we didn’t realise that they were the bad guys. Similarly the Ministry of Magic is turned into some modern reimagining of Nazi Germany, just to make sure we were aware that they were the bad guys too.

This kind of paper-thin, black-and-white, good-vs-evil setup is so simplistic and juvenile as to be insulting, even keeping in mind that the books and films are aimed at a young audience. Young people can still understand and grapple with ambiguity. The books and films would be far richer if they encouraged the audience to consider the arguments of both sides and displayed an appreciation for the moral greyness of reality, rather than propagating a rather simplistic idea that there are good guys and bad guys and no-one in between.

In fairness this is more a criticism of fantasy as a genre than HP specifically, because the latter is very much a product of the former. Even Tolkien is not above unambiguous and poorly characterised straw-man villains. Nevertheless, in HP it is even more cartoonish and over the top than usual. Again the story here is of missed opportunities. Clearly Rowling is going for a Nazi parallel with the obsession with blood and the understandable superiority complex of some of those with magic over those without, and at first this is rather well done, but it becomes somewhat overplayed in the final book and all subtlety is lost. The most jarring thing is that most wizards seem to just go along with it, when there seems no reason to do so. It’s clear that Harry Potter isn’t the villain here because Voldemort so obviously is, so why don’t ordinary people smell a rat? It’s not like the situation in Germany when in the 1930s is anything like the situation in the wizard world; at least if it is Rowling fails to show it sufficiently for the parallel to be anything more than vulgar.

All of the above is forgivable. While there are many major flaws, these could be carried along by sufficiently strong characters. Unfortunately the characters are very much the same as the rest. I’ve talked about the straw-man villains, so let’s talk protagonists. Admittedly Rowling is able to create some likable and well developed characters, but the most interesting tend only to be side characters. The principle protagonists, Harry, Ron and Hermione are, by far, the weakest. Ron is little more than a goofy sidekick who occasionally shows some inconsistent glimmerings of valour to save the day, but spends most of the time just being annoying. Harry meanwhile is brave and heroic to a fault. His boldfaced attempts to try to do everything by himself are noble, but gets extremely annoying after a while. His pathological failure to realise that what he’s dealing with is not just about him gets jarring when it happens in every book. His insistence that no-one risk their life for his sake in the most recent film is not noble; it’s just plain stupid. You’d hope by now that it he’s work out that it’s not all about him, but apparently such intelligence is beyond him. Meanwhile Hermione is the super-rational, emotionally dysfunctional prodigy who is very much like Dr Temperance Brennan in the American crime drama ‘Bones’. The difference is that ‘Bones’ is very tongue in cheek, whereas HP is far too straight faced to pull off such a character without it being unintentionally silly.

Well, what was supposed to be a review of the recent Harry Potter movie has turned into a rant about why I don’t like the franchise, with a smattering of references to the actual film, so I guess I’d better pull out the stops and talk about the film for a bit.

The director was always in for a challenge with converting this book into a film because it’s just so damn big! It’s not just the size, but also the fact that so much happens. In fact one of the problems with the books was that they lacked pacing. Everything happens quickly. Sure it keeps you interested, but Rowling never stop to really describe anything in vivid detail or build suspense. To quote Alan Bennett, ‘it’s just one fucking thing after another’. This means that there’s a lot to cram into a reasonable time space. They’ve already split the thing in two, but still if felt rushed.

There was very little suspense created because there was just so much to get through. Events happened to quickly that no-one, not even the characters, really had time to stop and take stock of what just happened. There wasn’t enough time for the characters to react to events because the next event happened straight away. As such there was very little opportunity to really form the emotional connection with the characters needed for the audience to actually give a damn what happened. Of course it didn’t help that they all acted to jarringly unrealistically and unsympathetically throughout.

There were some positives however; the story of the creation of the Deathly Hallows was really well done, and as ever the magical duels looked fantastic. Editorially it was very well put together and, as you might imagine, no expense was spared in making it look very pretty, however this is all style. Style is great, but it’s nothing without substance.

The film suffers from being part 1 of 2, because the ending is really weak and I left the cinema with a very unsatisfactory feeling. That being said I wasn’t exactly given a great deal of reason to look forward to the next one; I can’t say the characters really interested me enough to want to see any more of them. The books always managed to keep me interested and engaged, even if they were rather unsatisfactory, the films have all pretty much failed to do the same. It’s not just because I know what’s going to happen either; I’ve read the earlier book multiple times and they still engaged me.

In short, save your money, (re)read the book because it’s far more entertaining, or go pick up a much better fantasy series and get into the instead.

The Expendables

Public opinion on films could roughly be divided into two groups. One which thinks a film written and directed by Sylvester Stallone, featuring the latter, Jet Lee, Jason Statham, Mickey Rourke and Stone Cold Steve Austin, with cameos from Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger would genuinely be the best film ever made in the history of cinema, and one which would only go to see The Expendables in order to laugh at how completely absurd and ridiculous it is, and then maybe write a self-important, pretentious review, with an element of self-reference, explaining what was so rubbish about it.

The Expendables is about a group of mercenaries (called the Expendables) who are sent into a small central-American island to assassinate its dictator and the renegade CIA for whom the former is really just a puppet, and everyone else on the island for good measure. There’s also a love-interest sub-plot which is essentially the same as every film of this type – guy (Stallone in this case) meets girl as part of operation, falls in love with her, she doesn’t love him back, but after heroic exploits to save her she eventually realises her love for him as well. Statham also has some kind of love story, but that mostly involves beating the hell out of more people, so it’s not worth talking about.

So as a story, The Expendables is pretty weak, but let’s face it, the film was not created to have a gripping story with compelling characters, it was created because things getting blown up sells to the brainless meatbags who fall into the first category mentioned at the start of this review. As an unsophisticated action movie created for the lowest common denominator, The Expendables is pretty much as good as it gets; a stellar cast of high profile hard men, something thinly resembling a plot, which is easy to understand doesn’t take long to establish, easily identifiable villains with obvious and uncomplicated motives and plenty of big explosions. If you’re the kind of person who doesn’t really care about a film being well written, or well acted, or well filmed, if you couldn’t care less about plots and characters, then you are this film’s target audience. Well done for bringing the collective intelligence of the human race down by about 20 IQ points, you moron. Thank you for creating an audience for this kind of drivel. And congratulations for wasting everyone’s oxygen.

I think I need to make one thing clear before we go on. I don’t have a problem with films containing lots of high octane fight scenes, explosions, and ridiculous stunts. They certainly have their place and can make for genuinely exciting and enjoyable cinema. But they should not be the Film’s main selling point. They are decoration, icing and embellishment; they are not the whole cake. A film should be sold on a strong story with interesting characters. Explosions are an enticing and exciting extra, but they are not the core of what really makes a film. A good example of this is Inception. There are chase scenes, gun fights, hand to hand fights around rooms in which the gravity is constantly shifting and a fair few explosions. These things are all really we executed, they are not what makes the film so good – the plot and the characters in that plot are what makes Inception a great movie.

The thing is that the Expendables could have been a much better film that it actually was. The main problem was that Stallone is a terrible writer, director and actor. The script was pretty damn awful, with no suspense, using every cliché and trope available to the genre and so covered in cheese that it would be lethal to a lactose intolerant viewer. Every single close-up was so tight to the actor’s face that you barely even saw the lips moving half of the time; this left almost no room for actual acting and meant that most of the emotion that was desperately trying to fight its way through the tangled and poorly written script failed to make it through to the screen. The basic story is not necessarily a recipe for a terrible, shallow film – it had an element of complexity with the multiplicity of villains with conflicting interests, which was essentially written out of the film early on. It contained a mysterious group of mercenaries who were clearly all battle hardened veterans, whose characters were not explored at all. I want to know how The Expendables started, who they all are and why they’re doing what they’re doing. There’s opportunity for real depth an interest that was squandered in favour of simplicity because the plot and the characters were not as important as blowing stuff up to the mastermind behind the film.

You might be wondering exactly why plot and character are so important to a film and why a film can’t be held up solely on the basis of action sequences. The reason is simple and it’s the same reason why, throughout the climax of The Expendables I couldn’t help feeling that I really did not care what happened to the protagonists. If the entire lot had died painful at the hands of Central American soldiers and Stone Cold Steve Austin, I don’t think I would have cared. I had absolutely no emotional attachment to the characters and, as such, no reason to want them to succeed. Contrast my apathy with the collective groan of anguish that emanated around the cinema at the end of Inception. In the latter everyone wanted Cobb to be able to life happily ever after, in the former I don’t think anyone cared. The reason for this contrast is that the audience was able to form an emotional connection with Cobb and the rest of the characters. We understood why they felt and acted as they did and we felt sympathy for them. We saw the virtue in their characters, despite their flaws and so the plot moved us to care about what happened to them. In The Expendables, no emotional connection with the characters was established because we were never told anything about them. At no point did we know who they were or why they were doing what they were doing. We didn’t sympathise with them because we had nothing with which to sympathise. The film contained no emotion and so there was no emotional connection. At no point did we develop an interest in the plot and so it failed completely to move us. For the audience there was nothing resting on the outcome of the climax, and so there was no tension. The explosions and gunfire were rendered hollow because there was no reason for caring where the bullets went or who got blown up.

The Expendables is a bad film. There is no doubt about that. However it is one of those bad films that you still enjoy watching because it’s just so absurd. If you feel like a few hours of meaningless entertainment then it’s better than most action films, but it will hardly grip you and drag you through an exciting and emotionally exhausting ordeal like a genuinely good film would. If you have plenty of time and money, then go and see it, if not then I suggest you prioritise seeing Scott Pilgrim (which might just be the next review) or Inception again because it actually gets better second time round, whereas I imagine The Expendables would get much worse.

Inception (spoilers immanent)

Do you remember that sometime last year I said I’d being doing more movie reviews in the next year? Hasn’t really happened has it? Well now it just might. I certainly have a plan to see The Expendables when it comes out and reviewing it – probably in order to rip it to pieces, because it looks pretty damn awful. Anyway this week is a far better film (even though I haven’t even seen The Expendables yet I can say this for sure). Christopher Nolan has a habit of making truly brilliant films – The Prestige, Memento (apparently; I’ve not seen it), Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, so I was looking forward to seeing Inception. I was not disappointed at all. Because the film only came out last week I will keep spoilers out of the first half of this review, then put a nice big spoiler tag when the spoilers arrive so that the slow ones can go off and see the film without knowing what’s going to happen.

Anyway Inception is, in short, about going into people’s dreams. Actually it’s about a guy trying to reconcile his guilt. Actually it’s about films and film making. Actually it’s about all three and some others. Whatever it’s about, the delivery is perfect; the setting is wonderfully thought out, yet it doesn’t dominate the film – it’s simply there, so the viewer finds out about it very organically. The plot is really exciting, very clever and wonderfully paced – largely due to the masterful writing. Again the plot doesn’t really dominate the film, it simply acts as it should; as a vehicle for the rest of the story. That is to say it acts as a vehicle though which the characters can develop, chiefly among them, the protagonist. Cobb (his name) is a truly wonderful character and the film takes a lot of time to characterise him appropriately. Indeed Cobb and his internal conflict is the main focus of the film. As all main characters should, Cobb develops throughout the film, demonstrably changing as a result of the events of the plot. The film is as much about him as it is about the story, which is exactly how it should be. The supporting characters perhaps suffer from not being characterised in anywhere near as much detail; nevertheless they’re very interesting characters who serve as an appropriate foil for Cobb, particularly the lead female – Ariadne, who is incredibly strong, but in a very subtle and intelligent way. On top of all these layers is a deep and subtly allegory for the very process of film making and how it is, in many ways, recreating a dream.

As you can probably tell, I really like this film, however it is not perfect. It may seem like I’m trying to have my cake and eat it (what with my obsession with characters as the epicentre of any good story), but I think in many ways Inception focuses too much on the characters at the expense of a really interesting angle which is barely explored – the moral questions over what Cobb and co are doing. Going into people’s dreams has obvious ethical ramifications (especially given what they do there), as do the reasons for them doing it. However these are all but ignored in Inception, which is a bit of a shame because it could have made an already superb film even better. Likewise the supporting characters are somewhat neglected in favour of Cobb. It would have been nice to understand their history and motivations, rather than having to assume that they have their reasons without knowing what they are.

Having though long and hard over this film, this is pretty much the only things I can think of which could have made it better. It’s fantastically acted, superbly written, beautifully filmed, amazingly clever, uniquely original and all round genius. It will blow your mind. The fact that there was a collective groan of anguish as the film finished (those who have seen it will know why) just shows that this film does it’s job perfectly; it draws the audience in and makes us desperately want to know what happens and want there to be a ‘happily ever after’ ending. If you’ve not already seen it go and do so, for the rest of this blog contains many spoilers as I delve a little deeper into the film.

SPOILER WARNING!!!!!! STAY OUT IF YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS!

Firstly the ethical issue which is underdeveloped during the film. Cobb and co are breaking into Fisher’s mind and inserting an idea deep into his subconscious. Not only are they planning on lying to him, but they are planning on lying to his subconscious, thus making it seem that the idea has come from himself. This is the most ultimate form of deception and is dishonest in the extreme. The ethical implications of forcible changing someone’s entire personality without them even being aware of it are huge, yet they remain largely elephant in the room for the duration. It is mentioned in the film that Inception is unethical, but this is never really explored. Cobb and the team never question whether or not what they’re doing is the right thing. Perhaps one of the weaknesses of Inception is that there is no real conflict within the team. Despite a number of edgy, interesting personalities with conflicting motives, there is very little animosity between them. Sure there was a mutual dislike between Arthur and Eames, but this only really involved a few clever jibes, and comic moments, rather than any real drama.

Indeed this ethical issue is compounded when you ask why they’re performing the Inception. At the start of the film it seems that Saito is hiring them to do his dirty work in bringing down Fisher’s faceless multinational company so that his faceless multinational company can to what faceless multinational companies do best in Hollywood – subjugate the masses. Clearly this is immoral; performing an immoral Inception on someone in the name strengthening one’s business and destroying someone else’s, probably destroying people’s livelihood in the process, is not an ethical reason to do something, even in the cut and thrust of the free market. Later on this concern was discounted by Saito says something about Fisher’s company being powerful enough to take over the energy industry completely, causing a world wide monopoly that must be stopped, but this was not really developed or mentioned ever again. I think that the film could again be improved by Cobb and co doubting whether their mission was really all that ethical.

This would have raised another interesting issue from Cobb’s point of view. He is clearly only doing this because he wants to get back home to see his kids. Wouldn’t there be doubt over doing something so clearly immoral in order to fulfil his own personal desires? And would this not be a really interesting internal conflict for Cobb to deal with? Indeed much of the character work done on Cobb is completely disconnected with the plot and is to do with him resolving actions which occurred previous to the event of the film. There is nothing wrong with this, but it would have been nice to see the plot integrated into the characterisation a little more, making the plot seem more integral to the film, rather than simply a vehicle for character exploration. Furthermore this raises the issue of motivation for the rest of the team – something which is not really explored anyway. We can see that Ariadne is doing what she’s doing partly out of a slightly nerdy curiosity with Architecture within dreams and partly out of a very human concern for Cobb’s physiological wellbeing. However as someone who is so clearly intelligent and caring I would expect her to bring up the ethical issues, yet she seems to accept Cobb’s mission without question. Obviously Saito would have no qualms and Arthur has been working with Cobb for a while, so he’s probably dull to the ethical issues. As long time professionals working with entering people’s dreams, the rest of the team may have been immune to conscious too, but I’m not sure this is entirely watertight – Inception is something new to them all and the purpose of their mission is not exactly ethical either, so it seems logical that one of them would have mentioned it.

The ending of the film has raised many questions over whether the entire film was actually all a dream created to perform Inception upon Cobb in order to remove the guilt he feels over the death (or similar) or Mel (or something like that anyway). I disagree with these theories. I believe that the end of the film is intentionally ambiguous – the dreamy way in which it is filmed, the fact that the children are wearing the same clothes as other times in the film, the fact that the top doesn’t stop spinning – but there is no reason to extrapolate this to other parts of the film. One scene people point to is when Cobb is being chased through the streets of a city in some poor country somewhere (I forget where), squeezes through a gap in two building and is conveniently picked up by the Saido.. This appears to be rather dream-like; you know how convenient things happen in dreams? And squeezing between two walls as they get closer to one another is common of anxiety dreams. People have linked this in with the concept of the film being an allegory for the filmmaking process – the film is a dream in the same was as making a film is something of a process of the imagination.

I disagree with this theory – Cobb squeezing in between two building is simply adding drama and tension to the chase scene, the arrival of the Japanese guy is one of the few examples of poor writing in the film; it does however serve to characterise the Japanese guy quite well, and gives him a reason to actually be there and be part of the inception, so we’ll forgive the film this. Just because the film is a really clever allegory doesn’t mean it’s not ‘real’. The concepts can still be transmitted even though the events are within the film’s reality. This is the beauty of storytelling – you can create your own reality and make it say what you want it to say. You can create an allegory for whatever you will out of your own imagination and as far as the story is concerned, the message is real. The very purpose of fiction is to create a world in which whatever the writer wants to happen can happen. In many ways fiction is simply giving an expression to our dreams and our imagination. Inception is no more a dream than any other story.

I think the reason why many think Inception is actually a dream created to perform Inception on Cobb is that the film focuses so much on his character. In many ways the Inception of Fisher is simply a vehicle to explore Cobb psyche and to resolve the guilt he feels over Mel’s death. From a storytelling perspective this is the case; the character development of Cobb supersedes the plot, but this does not mean that the whole thing is an elaborate deception. Cobb’s development as a character is the focal point of the film because Nolan realises that Character is more important than Plot. The only Inception that is going on is on a completely Meta level – in many ways Cobb is being Incepted, but that is because the plot of the film is constructed so that his character can be explored and eventually the major conflict in his personality can be resolved – the Inception is not happening within the film, but without. It’s something that should happen in every story. It doesn’t, but then that’s what makes Inception such a good film.

Anyway, I think that’s a suitably bizarre and bewilderingly pretentious note to end on. I will probably see the film again some time, so some more things may occur to me, probably not enough to dedicate another entry to do, but I may post a comment below elucidating my further thoughts. I’d love to hear yours as well so feel free to comment (who am I kidding, no-one comments on my blog).