deKay’s Blog

Jeff Goldblum only seems to fit a role if he’s playing a slightly strange scientist. In The Fly, he’s a physicist who develops a teleportation device. Having met a journalist who initially wants a story, but eventually falls in love with him, he manages to work out how to successfully transport living matter. Without turning it inside-out like the baboon it didn’t work on…

He later gets drunk having jumped to conclusions about his new girlfriend’s relationship with her boss, and decides to try his telepods on himself. Success! Only he accidently fuses his DNA with that of a fly also in the telepod.

Over the coming weeks he gradually becomes more and more fly-like, eventually being able to walk on walls and vomit acid with which to digest his food. He ends up a monster, with a terrible theory on how to resolve the problem.

So these days, some of the effects (particularly later in the film when he’s more fly and less man) are rubbish, but the film remains amazing. And, for once, it’s far better than the original film it is (pretty loosely, really) based on.

Verdict: 4/5

OMG! Matthew Broderick looks about 7 years old!

The plot: boy “accidently” kicks off World War 3 by hacking into a military defence computer, thinking it’s part of a video game company, and playing “Global Thermonuclear War”. He’s arrested, escapes, finds a guy who was legally dead (who wrote the “games” on the computer), and obviously, saves the day.

I don’t even know where to begin with regards to the nonsensical way computers are portrayed. But then, every film involving computers as a major plot point has the same problem. At least here the issues (mainly to do with the conversations with the computer - no, really) are relatively minor. It’s not like Minority Report or anything.

But it was pretty good all the same. Especially Malvin the geeky bloke, who didn’t remind me of The Gubbins at all. Oh no.

Verdict: 3/5

Visually, this has to be the cleverest, most well done art style I’ve seen in ages. Somehow, it welds live action with steampunk comic-book, adding some 1940s war film overtones, and film noir lighting. Pretty much the entire film was recorded on a blue-screen, yet everything seems real enough - albeit almost sepia-toned in places (and where appropriate).

The plot follows Joe (”Sky Captain” himself) and Polly, a reporter and love interest/rival for Joe, as they investigate the giant robots that have been attacking cities all over the world. The plot is OK, although it does wander from detective story to fighter plane action flick to Tomb Raider, getting slightly confused on the way.

One thing I didn’t understand, is how, at the start of the film, only Sky Captain himself (and not his entire fleet of aircraft) were sent out to take down an entire army of giant robots. And why didn’t Franky’s huge airbase get involved earlier? Anyway.

Well worth watching for the artyness of it. Perhaps missing something from the story, though.

Verdict: 3/5

Kurt Russell is an awkwardly almost-funny trucker who somehow ends up part of a fight against supernatural Chinese supermen and a very old, almost dead, guy who wants to regain his youth by marrying and then sacrificing a girl with green eyes.

The plot has huge holes. Some of it doesn’t even make sense. Lo Pan (the evil old bloke) reminds me of Davros. The acting is rubbish, several of the characters are completely superfluous, the Chinese girl (with green eyes) says about three words in total. Wang, one of the good guys, summons up amazing martial arts skills from out of nowhere. It’s nonsense. Complete nonsence.

But it’s also pretty ace. Despite having Kim Cattrall in it.

Verdict: 3/5

I have a few films to get through, so nothing in depth on these, sorry!

The Princess Bride is a film of the same genre, as well as style and era, as such things as Willow, The Neverending Story and Time Bandits. Basic plot: man and woman fall in love, man goes off to find his fortune, doesn’t return, girl is taken as bride for local prince, gang kidnaps girl, girl rescued by mysterious stranger, blah blah.

The plot doesn’t matter. Because the film is funny, brainless, and has Columbo, Fred Savage and Andre the Giant in it. What more do you need?

Verdict: 4/5

I’ve seen this before. A long, long time ago. But I was somewhat confused while watching it again.

First of all, large amounts of the film are pretty irrelevant to the story. There’s an awful lot of setting the scene, but the majority of the main action happens in the last 20 minutes. In fact, the first half of the film isn’t really even about Max himself anyway - it’s all about Goose, Max’s partner.

And there’s lots I don’t understand. Why are there so many broken old cars? Why is the police force now just a few guys in leather who take down people on the roads? What happened to all the people? Why, when they appear to have the whole of Australia to play in, do the police (or rather, “MFP”) keep bumping into the same biker gang? What exactly is wrong with Toecutter, which makes him and his gang decide to torture and kill random passersby for no reason?

So it didn’t make a lot of sense, had a stuttery story, and Mel Gibson only spoke around 20 words in the entire film (and most of them were in some soppy soliloquy which didn’t go anywhere). But I like “stories of a dystopian future”, so it scores a bit higher for that. And the scene where Johnny the Boy gets his come-uppance.

Verdict: 2/5

Some people say a lot of bad things about Quentin Tarantino. They say his films are overly violent. They say he borrows too many ideas from other films. But that doesn’t matter - he’s a clever writer and an outstanding cinematographer.

Like his previous films, Kill Bill is told in a disjointed, out of sequence manner. The story jumps backwards and forwards in time, but never in a way that confuses. It follows The Bride (Uma Thurman) as she bumps off the five assassins who attacked and killed both her and her wedding guests. Only, of course, she wasn’t dead.

Each sequence in the film is fantastically put together. Tarantino uses his skills to make the most of light, colour, shadow and sound. Each part of the film has it’s own feel - some parts are like a comic book. Another is straight out of Crouching Tiger. There’s even a whole section shown as Japanese anime.

Looking forward to Vol. 2 now!

Verdict: 5/5

I was expecting this to be very similar to 28 Days Later. I wasn’t far wrong. A seemingly empty city, actually filled with “infected” humans. The story differs, however - in 28 Days Later, a few survivors band together to escape to a safe haven. Here, one man and his dog remain in the city, trying to find a cure.

The shots of the overgrown city are very well done, but would have been more believeable if the streets were jammed with taxis and other traffic. After all, New York is shown, in a flashback, being evacuated in a hurry. Where did all the cars go? Yeah, there are a few filled roads, but some are surprisingly empty. Are we to expect that Neville (played by Will Smith) spent three years clearing the way?

But it isn’t a major thing. The story is (generally) stong and the set pieces impressive. As the film progresses, you can see that Neville is actually starting to lose the plot, although it’s a shame more isn’t made of it. The “god has a reason for everything” undertones should have been lost instead, as far as I’m concerned.

I won’t go into too much more of the story, as there are two (or three) unexpected happenings and I’d spoil it if you’ve not yet seen it, but the ending was unnecessarily twee and righteous. Neville does something near the end, for completely no reason. It didn’t make sense!

However, for all of its faults, I Am Legend was still very watchable and enjoyable. Just don’t try to analyse it too much.

Verdict: 4/5

I seem to recall that round the time of release, Bulletproof Monk got some good press and pretty decent reviews. So imagine my surprise when not only was the film not really what I was expecting in terms of content (I think I mixed it up with Equilibrium), but also it wasn’t as good as I thought it was supposed to be either.

I’ve never been a fan of “mis-matched partners” films. Here, Tibetan monk Chow-Yun Fat and New York street thief Seann William Scott team up to protect an ancient scroll. Lots of martial arts fighting (and, as Scott is in it, “funny lines”) ensue.

The problem is, it’s all either obvious, or badly done. The scene where Kar (Scott) squares up against “Mr Funktastic” (played by quite possibly the worst actor ever) and his goons just made me cringe it was so cheesy. In fact, it reminded me a lot of a scene in the absolutely dire - but funny for that reason - Exterminator 2. The addition of the daughter of a Russian mobster, the English Mr Funktastic, and a Japanese owner of a Chinese cinema, all just seemed to add unnecessary nationalities to the story for no apparent reason.

There was also a slight twist at the end that I didn’t see coming, although it made me feel sick in that way over-exposed mush often does.

Thankfully, the fighting was mainly well done. It didn’t quite fit, as it felt a bit like Crouching Tiger in New York, but I’ll allow it that. John Woo fans will be pleased to know there’s a John Woo Signature Gunfight half-way through the film too.

Overall, it was watchable (if not completely enjoyable), but felt very much like a kid’s martial arts film with added swearing and Nazis. Perhaps if it moved closer to one end of the spectrum rather than sitting awkwardly in the middle, it may have faired better.

Verdict: 2/5

They don’t make films like this any more. Well, not often. In the 80’s, they made loads of “zany madcap chase” films, but you just don’t see them these days.

Rat Race is silly. It’s over the top nonsense. Every situation is contrived, the few special effects are awful, and I have no idea why they cast Rowan Atkinson as an Italian. But… it was funny. Some bits were absolute genius too - the build up of Jon Lovitz’s character stealing Hitler’s car, then because of one thing after another, getting a Hitler moustashe, burning his tongue so he sounds German, and then landing the car on a stage in front of WWII war vets before trying to explain himself at a podium using mainly arm gestures. Amazing.

Completely ridiculous, it really shouldn’t work, but like “It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World” (Rat Race could almost be a remake of that, actually), it somehow does.

And it’s worth watching for John Cleese’s teeth alone.

Verdict: 4/5