Thirteen Days - stars Kevin Costner, Bruce Greenwood

After seeing JFK recently I found myself intrigued with the whole era - yet again.  There were many references made to the Cuban Missile Crisis, and all of it leading to JFK's assassination, so this I had to see.  What was it about the CMC that made the heads of state (my own personal speculation it should be noted) take out the great man?  Was he so great?  Don't you love movies that actually teach you shit?  I do, they're tops.

Thirteen Days focuses on Kenny O'Donnell, special assistant to the president and follows his role during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 under the Kennedy administration.  Before I go on, let it be said that Costner's rediculous attempt at a Louisiana accent in JFK is oscar material compared to whatever he's trying to pull off here.  We're of course talking a Massachusetts accent, but oh my.  Semantics.  So Russia's moved missiles into Cuba and are feverishly making them operational, the US has spotted them and needs to do something about the emanate nuclear threat, needless to say time is of the essence here.

As I said before I'd watched JFK not long before this, and I've gotta say that while the scenario playing out in front of me was edge of the seat stuff, I had a big eye on the moves being made around JFK specifically.  Stace and I looked at eachother afterwards and said "we've watched these two back to front haven't we".  In fact we'll watch Ruby - when I can find the bloody thing! - and that'll be out of order as well now lol.  So for me there were two scenarios playing out and that made it all the more worth while for me.

As a movie this thing is great.  Very well casted, very well acted, and you can't get a better script than real life can you.  Uncanny though was Steven Culp's performance as Robert Kennedy, who incidentally was the Attourney General during the JFK administration.  So who the hell is Steven Culp, anyone?  Yeah me neither, a quick browse of his filmography however reveals he's done mostly TV work up until this and since.  Interestingly, he has played Robert Kennedy before in a TV movie "Norma Jean & Marilyn", so I guess it wasn't just me after all, I mean its a top likeness.

I have one concern, nay, annoyance, with the film.  Every now and again, it switches to black and white.  Now I understand how these things work, the director wants to make a scene more poignant, I get that.  But here its just completely random, there's literally no point to it.  Stace noticed it as well, we were like "what the...?".  I mean if you're watching a flick and the picture is suddenly black and white, you automatically think ah, this must be an important flash back or something so you pay attention.  Here, the scenes in question are no more important, and in fact mostly less important than others.  And sometimes the scene itself only starts in black and white, other times the black and white comes in half way through a scene.  Its rediculous, and you'd expect more from someone with a resume consisting of Dante's Peak, Species, The Getaway, Cocktail and No Way Out (probably Costner's best by the way) - Roger Donaldson, you are the weakest link.

At the end of the day and with that previous paragraph put aside, this film has set out to tell a story, a true story based on facts and probably a little embelishment for the sake of entertainment here and there, and it delivers.  At no point is a stone unturned and for me at least, you get to see wheels in motion that only hindsight can forsee.  Ironic huh ;-)  Oh and one tip, if you know nothing about The Bay Of Pigs, definately chuck in Disc 2 (from the DVD set) and find out what it was all about before you watch the feature, it gets mentioned heaps and if you're not in the loop like we weren't you may struggle with the fact its assumed information.  The special features disc is very impressive by the way, loads of material (though not enough for mine) on our heroes and villains and the era in general.  Tops.  4 stars.

Dark City - stars Rufus Sewell, Kiefer Sutherland, William Hurt, Jennifer Connolly

If you enjoy movies like the Matrix, you'll enjoy this.  Whoever wrote this grabbed a big slab of Matrixisms and incorporated them, along with a dash of the Thirteenth Floor.  Forget the CGI though, there's not much of that going on here.

In a city full of foreign presence, that being alien, our hero awakes in a bath in a hotel room unsure how he got there.  In fact unsure of anything, not even his name.  The woman lying dead on the floor, however, even he knows not to hang around.  Good old fight or flight.  During his escape he encounters resistance from a group of strange men and he manages to defend himself thanks to his powers.  Powers he didn't know he had.  Turns out the others knew of his powers and are hunting him for them.  He finds an unlikely ally in his shrink, but his motivations are far from altruistic, or so it would seem.  In fact nothing is as it seems, literally.

The plot is thick as a bit of 4'b'2 so brace yourself for some hard work early; after that its pretty smooth sailing so stay with it.  Also, where something like the Matrix has a touch of reality, far fetched as it may be, this one's complete fantasy from start to finish.  So pull on your Star Wars cap, or whatever.

Personally, I think its a great concept with a great cast and some great performances.  Great!  No seriously, this one really sucked me in the first time I saw it.  I went from the Matrix, to this, and then had to see everything of their ilk afterward (Thirteenth Floor and Existenze being two of the better).  So yeah, you get the idea of what its about, its more Matrix than anything else.  Also, they introduce the alien element straight away, I mean if they didn't then the audience would be sitting there going "abuh" and never get an idea of what its about.

Sci-fi at its trippy best, 3 and a half stars.

Crackerjack - stars Mick Molloy, Bill Hunter, Samuel Johnson

Yet another "yet another" in a long line of Aussie flicks that embellishes the Australian way of life.  The Nugget, The Castle, Crackers, The Sum Of Us, I've mentioned it all before, that Australian "throw another prawn on the barby" stereotype that I'm quite sure only us Aussies see the humour in, and perpetuates stereotypes to the rest of the world that we're all breaking our necks to play down.  Ie, its a great flick but I dare say only we'll get the undertones.

Jack holds membership at an inner city bowling club in Melbourne, and for no other reason than the carpark.  Actually he has three memberships and "leases" his parking permits to colleagues to make a bit of cash on the side.  One of the funniest conversations goes something like:

Jack: "I went to uni across the road for 18 months doing horticulture"
Person 1: "So you got the membership for the carpark while you were at uni?"
Jack: "Yup"
Person 2: "I thought you got the membership for the carpark for your job?"
Jack: "No, I got the job because it was across the road from the carpark"

Something.  Anyway yeah, so Jack goes through life looking to make it as easy a ride as possible, doing the bare minimum.  He works in IT sitting on a phone all day, he parks for free, things are going along quite swimmingly for him in the easy stakes.  The Bowling club, an aging institution in the area, is having trouble paying its bills and needs to raise money before the money hungry Bernie Fowler takes over and puts in pokies.  Perish the thought!  Jack's name comes up as the club looks for new players and much to his chagrin and annoyance, he is forced to participate in the club's activities.  Turns out he can actually bowl, hilarity ensues.

As I said, another from the cream of the crop in Australian movies - its classic Aussie drama-humour - but this has a couple of nice twists which puts it out on its own.  First off, we're in the big city and not in the country.  Second, Jack's in IT, I was sniggering at how poignant (my new favourite word, lol) these particular scenes were.  Anyone whose done time on a Helpdesk will feel the same way.  And third, where other movies see the elderly characters taking on their new found idiosyncrasies of our younger heros, here they don't.  I found it refreshing.

Molloy's probably the only actor who isn't quite up to the job.  Obviously his plan was to just be himself in that modern day ocka (how the hell do you spell that anyway/???) intelligent slob guise, but where he does that really well, there's no bipolarity (is that even a word?  Is now, lol) for his other emotions.  A couple of times he has to look down in the dumps and bummed out and even upset, but yeah, he's terrible at it.  Looked very forced and a bit too "can we get to the next scene please, this is the best I can do" for me.  Other than that, no qualms at all.  On the rest of the cast its important to note is Judith Lucy's role, she's always tops.  And Samuel "Evan" Johnson certainly didn't look out of place as a drinking, drug smoking flat mate.  Oh, and keep an eye out for Tony Martin, for those of you who aren't sure who I'm talking about, I'll just say Mick hasn't forgotten his roots.

As I said, nice to see the real IT being exposed for what it is, and nice to see lawn bowls get brought to the fore.  I've played before, yes, in fact I represented my high school in lawn bowls.  Got to the semis of the ACT schools championship in fact, beaten out in extra ends by some haughty taughty private school team with an actual lawn bowls outfit.  Ah good on 'em.  Anyway so yeah, I definately appreciated the bowls scenes and found myself reliving some of it.

The DVD extras are excellent, I wasn't sure what they could've done for it, but how excited was I to find out in the behind-the-scenes segment that the final bowling match was filmed in Corowa.  We love Corowa!  Didn't recognise the bowling club but next time we're there I'll definately make the trip.  The swear jar is a nice touch too.  All round good package, 3 and a half stars.

They - stars noone of note, you will recognise a Buffy character there somewhere

They haunted you when you were children, they wouldn't leave you alone, and when they found the right opportunity and the lights went out, they took you away and marked you.  For what, we don't know, but they did it for some reason.  Now, you're all grown up, and they think you're ripe, they've come back for you.  Don't sleep, don't dream, and whatever you do, stay in the light.

Wes Craven, you owner of an out there imagination you, good job.  Movies like this usually annoy me, I mean there's no purpose to them.  But here its all put aside and quite easily.  Is it scary?  I think so, but we've had this discussion.  Sick of all you brave, unflappable souls!  Ah, more fun for me ;-)  Wes' new creation is more about what is implied as opposed to what is seen, because you don't get a good look at our villains, whatever they may be.

The reason films like this work, in my humble opinion, is when you put a bunch of no-name thespians into a script from anther planet, there is literally no expectation.  I also managed to avoid any publicity at all for it, not even reading the blurb on the cover when it got brought home, so I'm happy to say I may have watched this under minimal affectations.  Bravo.  So my first bit of advice would be, if you're into scary flicks but can't take a movie home without reading about it, this is the one to practice on.

The characters are very believable and the situations are really well done.  You find yourself hitting the old cliches like "ooooo, don't go in there, what are you doing woman?!?" but they're not worn out over time.  Wes has this way of doing things, lets face it, he revolutionised the teen-slasher with Scream - that opening scene still gets me going now.

This is good fun if you're into scary with a dash of supernatural, watch it with the lights off and the sound up, good fun.  3 and a half stars.

Wishmaster - stars noone of note

I say noone of note, but the lead chick is the splitting image of Linda Hamilton with buggy eyes...but I digress...

Wes, Wes, Wes, tops!  This was one of my favourite in the supernatural genre from some years back.  I recall my sister and I going on a video binge, as we did, bringing this and Warlock and several others home (wonder if she remembers the Arachnophobia incident).  I've only ever seen this that one time but recall it being really good, and knowing Stace would like it I recommended it.  She brought it home last night, tops!

Legend has it that the Djinn is an all powerful being that lives between the worlds, that of heaven and earth.  When a Djinn is stirred, the one who wakes it is granted three wishes.  Upon the third wish, the gate between the worlds is opened and the Djinn will usurp both worlds for their own bringing armageddon with them.  Cor, so don't go waking one of these suckers up will you.  But even with its all conquering power, the Djinn can only use it if something is asked of it - be careful what you wish for.

This looks like that classic 80's B-grade fare, plasticy characters and that slightly dulled sound and overly glossy sheen behind it, but don't be fooled.  Once you get past the tennis scene and the Djinn is introduced its all tops.  And of course, Wes, not wanting to see people get offed in the standard way (guns for show, knives for a pro, big fuck off shiny ones!) has these fantastically elaborate death scenes, some of the best in my memory at least.  Also intriguing were a couple of the casting choices, with Freddy and the Candyman making appearances.  Great stuff.

Its a classic tale of an ancient evil profiting in a modern world and how it would be handled.  The only disappointing thing for me is when the battle of wits is upon us, our heroine stumbles early leaving little jousting left.  Still, this passes with flying colours and Stace dug it too saying she'll be on the lookout for 2 and 3.  3 and a half stars.

Last Boy Scout - stars Bruce Willis, Damon Wyans

I'd put this in my top 10 action movies, and Stace digs this too.  After reliving Point Break and Speed and trying to work out if I still dig movies of yore as much as I did, this was also on the list.  Cliche me up!

Bruce plays our hero, as only he can, hungover and dishevelled and on a one way track to self distruction, yet the only man for the job.  Of course.  Joe Hallenbeck is a private detective, his history includes distinguished service in the secret service, but now its all about cigarettes, surveillance jobs and warm cups of piss.  But when his partner and client are offed in quick succession, and a chance to bring down his favourite senator rears its head, he goes full contact with the bad guys.  "Touch me again, I'll kill ya!"

Loads of cliches and sayings came out of this: "Water's wet, sky's blue, women have secrets, who gives a fuck".  Some top action as well, loads of guns and blowing shit up, we love it.  Its a script that begs the usual questions like how on earth is noone else hearing/reacting to all this gun fire, but why let a few facts spoil a good story.  Really bad bad guys and really unlikely good guys making the really bad bad guys get what's coming to them - totally satisfying in every cliche way possible.  Noticable this time around however is how much Bruce's character smokes, holy crap.  Any smokers out there see smoking in a movie or one TV and think hey, that'd be nice right now?  Don't watch this movie if that happens to you, he's rarely without one, its horrendous even for a hardcore like myself.

As much fun as I remember it being, 4 stars.

The Deep End - stars Tilda Swinton, Goran Visnjic

Lets say you're a mother, your eldest son is having an affair with an older man which results in a drunken car crash.  You don't agree with the relationship.  You get up one morning and find this older man dead near the boat house on your property, you suspect your son did the job, what do you do?  So lets say you stash the body away from the house and get rid of any evidence pointing to your son, then someone rolls up on your doorstep and blackmails you with evidence which if presented to police would implicate your son in the now-found dead man's murder.  Cor, twisted yeah?

I found myself following the woman's progress with some reticence, I mean sure she does a lot right, but man is she trying everything to undo it all at the same time.  Occassionally excruciatingly so.  Tilda makes does a great job stressing out, Goran on the other hand has to play the most reluctant extortionist I've ever seen put on screen, I mean its like he doesn't even want to be there from the outset.  A badly drawn up character, athough I could see and appreciate where they were taking it, they did it all wrong.

Could've been a lot better I think, but other than that, and unremarkably ok effort.  3 stars.

BH