Right onto the second part of my look at the Star Wars trilogy and of course this will cover The Empire Strikes Back, which saw a change of director, after the exertions of the making the first film, George Lucas handed over the directorial duties to Irvin Kershner in this sequel which many consider to be the best out of three (or indeed six films). So let's wrap up, get on the tauntauns and have a look at the 2nd chapter.... (or 5th!).
So the film begins with the sprawling titles telling us that it is now three years later after the events of Episode 4 and the rebel alliance have now relocated their man base on the ice planet within the Hoth system. During a routine scout of the freezing barren environment of the planet, Luke (Hamill) spots what appears to be a meteorite land in the snow, which turns out to be a probe, which was sent by Darth Vader (David Prowse and James Earl Jones yet again). However before Luke can investigate he is attacked by a yeti like monster, which leaves him unconscious and it drags him off. Han (Ford) who has also been doing a recce goes back to the rebel base and grows concerned when doesn't come back and decides to go out again. Luke awakens, hanging upside down in a cave, clearly awaiting to be the monster's lunch, he manages to use the force to grabs his light sabre, which is embedded nearby in the snow and he releases himself and cuts off the monster's arm and he escapes out into a severe blizzard. Luke soon collapses from exhaustion in the blizzard, but before he passes out he sees a vision of Ben Kenobi (Alec Guinness) tell him that he must go to the planet Degobah where he will be trained by a jedi master named Yoda. Han soon arrives and rescues Luke and uses his light sabre to cut open his tauntaun after it dies from the cold, and he stuff Luke inside it to keep him warm and soon they are rescued.
When Han and Luke arrive back at the base, Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) rejoins with them as she leads the alliance. Meanwhile Darth Vader has managed to locate the rebel base on the planet and sets up an attack. The rebels intercept a transmission telling them that the Empire are set to attack them and they prepare for battle. When the imperial troops arrive in their giant robotic walkers called AT-ATs, the rebels mount a strong defence but the base is soon captured. And Han, Leia, Chewie and the two droids, R2-D2 and C-3PO (Baker and Daniels) soon escape in the Millenium Falcon just as Vader arrives. Luke meanwhile travels along with R2 in his X-wing fighter to the Degobah system, where his ship crash lands in the muddy swamps on the surface and looks around and soon sets up camp and finds an old small creature with big ears, who soon turns out to be Yoda (voiced by Frank Oz) who tests Luke patience by pretending to be just a small inhabitant, but after consulting the spirit of Obi-wan, he accepts Luke as his pupil.
Han, Leia and the others in the meantime try to evade the attacks fom imperial TIE fighters and Han hides the Falcon inside a cave. During their time there, Han and Leia put aside their bickering and start to become attracted to one another and they kiss, however they are interrupted by Threepio, and soon they also are aware of strange tremors outside in the cave. When they go out to investigate Han fires his blaster, which sets off more severe tremors and they decide to take off as it dawns on Han they aren't in a cave, and we soon see it is a giant space worm, which they narrowly escape from. Luke meanwhile starts his training with Yoda and makes good progress although along the way he faces his own dark fears as he enters a cave and fights with himself as he sees an image of Darth Vader and they duel during which he decapitates Vader and the mask explodes open to reveal Luke's face. Luke later on during his training sees a vision of Han and Leia in pain, being punished at the hands of the Empire, Yoda however pleads with Luke to complete his training before he leaves, and Obi-Wan also insists that he do as well, as this is dangerous time for him, but Luke refuses to listen and departs to help them.
Han meanwhile having evaded the Imperial fighters decides to take the Falcon to the planet Bespin, where this is a floating gas colony owned by Lando Calrissian (Billy Dee-Williams) an old friend of Han's. When they arrive they are greeted warmly by Lando, however we soon discover that it is a trap as Vader and his troops are already there and they are captured, as Vader had sent the bounty hunter, Bob Fett (Jeremy Bulloch) to track them. Han is tortured by Vader's troopers but he tells them nothing and Lando insists that he had no choice and that the whole thing was arranged to lure Luke to Vader. Vader decides to use the facility's radiocarbon dating machinery to freeze Luke, but they decide to test it on Han first, who has a price on his head at the hands of Jabba the Hutt and Boba Fett intends to collect it. Just before Han is frozen, Leia professes her love for him, and Han survives the process and is taken by Boba Fett. Luke then arrives at the colony and he sees Leia briefly who warns him its a trap, and he soon faces Vader and they engage in a fierce light sabre duel, during which he learns a horrible truth about Vader......
The Empire Strikes Back has to be said it is arguably the best film in the series as it dramatic terms it is the richest and darkest film out of them all. The characters are also expanded on very well as see Luke start to mature and become a more patient and focused young man as he learns the ways of the force. And Han and Leia begin to develop their love story and their early bickering also provides some amusement. And Vader continues to ooze pure evil as he is ruthless in his quest to try and find Luke for his own ends. George Lucas's decision to step back from the directorial duties was in its own way a wise one as it let him concentrate on other aspects of the production such as financing and the special effects, which were advanced and impressive in Empire than in the first film. Lucas also hired Lawrence Kasdan to help write the screenplay after Leigh Brackett who wrote the first draft, died of cancer in 1978, although she still received a writing credit in the film. Lucas also managed to make himself independent of 20th Century Fox as he had set up Lucasfilm and financed the film with his own money and insisted that Fox had no interference during the film's production. Effects wise the film is also quite spectacular as the Industrial light and magic increased the amount of visual effects shots in the film, which are very impressive that include the dogfights on the Hoth system and also the Falcon evading the ensuing TIE fighters.
Performance wise things in Empire are about as good as the Star Wars trilogy got as everyone involved gave their best here. Mark Hamill builds on his performance in the original as he shows Luke to be now more serious and focused than before, even though early on he shows signs of impatience, as he learns about the force he matures, but he ultimately falls into Vader's trap. Hamill has quite a few highlights in the film such as his scenes with Yoda and the sequence where he fights with himself in the cave while on the Degobah system. His lightsabre duel with Vader is also a terrific sequence as Luke does his best to battle against Vader, who proves to be too experienced and powerul for him in the end. And this provides Hamill with his best lines, as he is defiant of Vader's pleas to join him, "I'll never join you!" and as Vader reveals that "I am your father!" Luke is horrified and says "No! No that's not true!! That's impossible!!!". And apparently this revelation in the plot was unknown to Hamill until just before the actual scene was filmed. Hamill has little in the way of humouress lines this time in Empire but he does have a good one when after he has just landed on the Degobah planet, R2 is pulled under by an unseen swamp creature and it spits him out and R2 crash lands upside down, and Luke helps pull him up and says "You're lucky you don't taste very good!".
Harrison Ford is also great again here as Han Solo and while Han is still insistent on getting back to Jabba the Hutt to pay off his debt, his unable to as the Rebels are stranded on Hoth due to the Imperial blockade and during the film Han's romance with Leia begins to blossom. Ford get's plenty of good lines in the film such as in the scene near the start where he is about to say goodbye to Leia and she doesn't look to bothered and he says "Well don't go all mushy on me, so long, princess!". Followed by their argument in the corridor where Han says "What come on, were you worried I was gonna leave without giving you a goodbye kiss??" and Leia says "I'd sooner kiss a Wookie!" and Han storms off saying "I could arrange that. You could use a good kiss!!". And after Luke recovers from nearly freezing to death on the surface of Hoth. And Han says to Leia "Well at least you managed to keep me around here a little longer" and Leia says that had nothing to do with and Han says "I just thought you just couldn't bear to let a gorgeous guy like me out of your sight!". And while Han and the others are in the Falcon which is parked inside a giant asteroid worm he has some good moments and he shares a good scene with Leia as he slowly starts to work his charms on her and he says as he leans to kiss her "You like me because I'm a scoundrel, and there aren't enough scoundrels in your life". And as their kiss interrupted by C-3PO who cheerily tells him he has isolated a circuit fault on the ship, as Leia slips away, Han sharply says to Threepio "Thank you. Thank you very much!". And later when Han realises they are not in a cave as they are being violently rocked by tremors inside what is giant spaceworm's mouth, when Leia says they might not make it out of the cave, Han says "This is NO cave!". And after Han is tortured he stumbles into his cell and is helped up by Chewie and he says wearily "I feel terrible!". And another favourite line of mine is when Han cuts open his dead Tauntaun and shoves Luke inside it to keep him and he says "And I thought they smelled bad on the outside!". And of course lastly when Han is about to be frozen Leia says "I love you" and Han replies "I know".
Carrie Fisher also resumes her role as the feisty Princess Leia really well and her chemistry with Harrison Ford works great in the film as Leia and Han are drawn together. Fisher later said however that she wasn't too keen on the characterisation of Leia in Empire though as she felt she came across as a mouthy bitch more than anything else, and I can see her point, which is why they softened her character in Return of the Jedi. Regardless Fisher get's plenty of good dialogue as well and good scenes, such as the scene where Han argues with her while they are on Hoth. And after Luke recovers from his ordeal on the surface of the plane, Han teases her about how she must really be happy to still have him around, and Leia says "Well maybe you do not everything about women yet!" and she gives Luke a big kiss on the lips, which unbeknownst to her is really an act of incest! Also in that scene Fisher also get's another great line when she loses it with Han and says "Why you stuck up, half-wttied, scruffy looking.... nerf herder!". And during the scene when they are in the asteroid worm and there is a tremor outside, Leia falls into Han's hands and she says "Would you please let go" and Han says "Don't get excited!" and she says "Captain, being held by you isn't quite enough for me to get excited!". Also during the sequence where they try to escape from the imperial troops on in the Falcon on the Hoth base, and Han is having trouble starting up with Falcon, Leia sarcastically says "Would it help if I got out and pushed?!" and Han replies "It might!".
David Prowse and James Earl Jones also once again do a grand job as Darth Vader in both physical and vocal form. Jones delivers Vader's intimidating and threatning dialogue in his fine booming tones and he also has some great lines. Starting with the scene where he uses the force to choke one of his incompetent officers to death and he says "You have failed me for the last time, Admiral!" and he says to another terrified officer next to the dying one "You are in command now, Admiral Piett!". Jones even shows that Vader has a rather twisted dark sense of humour (fitting!) as it comes across in two scenes, the first when one of his other officers fails to capture the Millenium Falcon who says he will apologise to Vader, again he uses his force powers to choke the officer to death, and he says "Apology accepted, Captain Needa!". And later when Lando complains about the conditions of their agreement, Vader says "Perhaps you feel you are being treated unfairly???" and Lando says reluctantly "No" and Vader says "Good! It would be unfortunate if I had to leave a garrison here!". And later he says to Lando as he intends to change their deal further by saying he wants Leia and Chewbecca taken to his ship "I'm altering the deal a little. Pray I don't alter it any further!".
Jones also delivers some immortal lines in the film such as the sequence where Vader and Luke duel and he says to Luke when he arrives "The force is with you, young Skywalker, but you are not a jedi yet!". And later on after Vader cuts off Luke's hand he says "Don't make me destroy you. Luke you do not yet realise your importance. You have only begun to discover your power. Join me and I will complete your training. With our combined strength we can end this destructive conflict and bring order to the galaxy!". And he follows it up with the dramatic revelation "Obi-wan never told you what happened to you father" and as Luke says "He told me you killed him!" Vader says "No. I am your father!". And lastly another great moment from Vader is when the Falcon makes it last get away and as Admiral Piett (played by Kenneth Colley) is to face the chop for his failure, he looks on terrified as Darth Vader just walks away past him.
As Kenny Baker and Anthony Daniels again they both do a fine job in their respective roles as R2-D2 and C-3PO. Baker does what he usually does by moving around in a tin can and R2 has one or two good moments where the droid get's spit out by an underwater swamp creature and it later spits some muddy water out of one of its flaps (probably R2's mouth equivalent). Daniels again get's some funny lines as Threepio, such as in the scene where he gravely delivers R2's assessment of Luke's survival chances outside in harsh weather on Hoth, "Artoo says that the chances of survival on the outside are 725 to 1. Actually Artoo has been known to make mistakes.... from time to time... dear oh dear!". And when Threepio tries to give Artoo some advice on how to get them to open a door on the cloud city, Artoo get's zapped by the terminal and Threepio says "Don't blame me. I'm an interpreter. I'm not supposed to know a power socket from a computer terminal!". And later on as Artoo drags a broken up Threepio behind him (as he was blasted apart by a stormtrooper on the cloud city) Threepio moans to Artoo "I thought that hairy beast would have been the end of me (i.e. Chewbacca who carried him). Of course I've looked better!". And my favourite is when the Falcon is parked inside the Asteroid worm's mouth, there is another tremor outside and Threepio says "Sir, its quite possible that this asteroid is not entirely stable!". And lastly there is the line where Han takes the Falcon into asteroid field to lose the ensuing TIE fighters and Threepio panics and says "Sir, the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid field are approximately 3720 to 1!!" and Han says "Never tell me the odds!".
And quickly Peter Mayhew reprises his role as Chewbecca and get's some good moments such as showing Chewie to be an affable furball who gives Luke a big bear hug before he flies to do battle on the surface of Hoth. And also the scene where he nearly chokes Lando to death on the cloud city after he releases him and when he makes a feeble attempt to repair Threepio and he has put the droid's head on backwards and switches him off after the droid moans about it!
And I will also quickly mention Alec Guinness as Obi-wan Kenobi, who was killed by Vader in Episode IV but makes a reappearance here as a spirit who guides Luke to Yoda. And when Yoda sighs at Luke's impatience he says "I cannot teach him. The boy has no patience." and Ben says "He will learn patience". And Yoda continues "Much anger in him, like his father" and Ben says "Was I any different when you taught me?". And just before Luke leaves Ben pleads with him not to go and says "Luke don't give into hate, that leads to the dark side!".
As for the new cast well Frank oz is great as he does the voice of Yoda (naturally Yoda is a puppet but you would have guessed that!) the near 900 year old Jedi master who trains Luke and has the tendancy to jumble up his sentences. Yoda at first is quite playful in the film as he tests Luke's patience and when they first meet Yoda has a funny moment where he mucks about Luke's camp and as he tries to take something R2 extends out a mechnical hand to stop him and Yoda hits R2 on the head with his cane and says "Mine! Mine! Mine! Or I will help you not!". Later on as Yoda becomes more serious and reveals himself to Luke as Yoda, he delivers one of the best lines in the film as Luke says "I won't fail you, I'm not afraid" Yoda looks warningly and says "You will be.... you will be!". And Yoda also in the scene Luke gives up trying to use his force power to retrieve his X-wing fighter from the swamp, Yoda then uses his own to completely lift the fight out of the swamp onto land. And as Luke looks around at the retrieved fighter in sheer astonishment he says "I don't believe it!" and Yoda says "That is why you fail". Later on Yoda also reveals an importance piece of information in his last scene when Luke leaves Degobah to help save Han and Leia, and Ben Kenobi says "That boy is our last hope" and Yoda reveals "No, there is another".
And lastly I will mention Billy Dee-Williams as Lando Calrissian, the smooth suave administrator of the cloud city on Bespin as well as former Captain of the Millenium Falcon. Billy's opening scene is a good one where he meets Han on the landing port of the cloud city and he says "Why you no good, double crossing swindler! You've got alot of guts coming here after what you pulled!" and he then gives him a hug. And as he tours Han, Leia and Chewie around he says "I've just made a deal that will keep the Empire out of here for ever" and he opens the doors to reveal Darth Vader and his imperial troops. And Lando carries on to say "I had no choice they arrived right before you did. I'm sorry". Williams has another good scene where having escaped on the Falcon as they try to activate the light speed drive it fails to work, and Lando shouts "I thought they fixed! I trusted them to fix it! Its not my fault!".
Direction wise Irvin Kershner does a fine job with Empire and the film benefits a great deal from a director who can, and no offense to Lucas, direct actors and as a result he get's some fine performances from the cast. Kershner also handles the action very well as the film has plenty of exciting battle scenes such as the Hoth battle, the Falcon evading the TIE fighters as well as Luke's duel with Vader. As for the film's score by John Williams, yet again its marvellous and it features the very memorable Imperial theme as well the lovey dovey romance theme for Han and Leia, which I admit I'm not too keen on, but that aside its another great score.
As for the flaws.... does Empire have any glaring ones??? Not really, the film has the odd niggle but again nothing serious as its close to being the best Star Wars film (although the first one would still be my favourite). But one thing that did bother me and wasn't highlighted until I had scene the funny Family Guy spoof of the film, Something something something dark side, was that when the rebels evacuate Hoth the rebels decide to fly out directly into the path of the imperial cruisers! Now that does not make alot of sense does it????!! Surely if you want to escape imperial cruisers and TIE fighters you would want to fly AWAY from them! Another point which I do agree with Carrie Fisher on is that yes Leia in Empire is indeed a bit too bitchy and in the end the character threatens to alientate herself from the audience although she seems to soften a little towards the end.
Any of the other issues I have with the film aren't to do with the original itself but are more to do with the remastered versions since that Lucas has done, as he couldn't resist tampering with his films. The special edition version released in 1997 which included some new effects and one or two scenes again seemed to detract from the film more than add to it. This includes a rather pointless scene where we see what is clearly a reshot version of Darth Vader making his way onto his shuttle to head back to the imperail star destroyer and James Earl Jones's voice has been redubbed by a different actor, which sounds really naff! And the worst inclusion of all was in the scene where Luke drops off the gantry he was clinging to after Vader tries to persuade him to join him, that we hear Luke's lame screaming as he falls through the air! Thankfully Lucas removed that for the DVD release although I'm not sure if its still in the Blu-ray, but let's hope not! One good inclusion in the special edition on DVD however was to have the actor Clive Revill, who played the emperor replaced with Ian McDiarmid in the scene where Vader speaks with the Emperor as it makes for better consistency and continuity in the series, although I'm not sure what Clive Revill thought about it!
Anywayyyyy that aside The Empire Strikes Back still remains one of the strongest entries in the Star Wars series, although for me it is a close second, it is in alot of peoples eyes the best and as such its worth repeated viewing.
So with that I shall leave it there and will be back with Episode VI soon.....
Monday 31 March 2014
Sunday 30 March 2014
Star Wars Part 1: A new hope "The force shall be with you, always"
Rrrrrright this is where its get a bit more ambitious and I've finally decided to tackle the holy trilogy, or as its better known, the Star Wars trilogy. And this means I will review all three "proper" Star Wars films, i.e. episodes 4, 5 and 6, but don't worry I shall still review the prequels aswell and why not?? Anyway but since this is the film that kicked it all off I will start with Episode IV: A New Hope....
Sooo I will do a bit of a plot summary but we all know the story anyway but as a reminder the story is set during a civial war between the Galactic Empire and the Rebel Alliance. And the story starts with an attack on a ship belonging to the Rebell Alliance, which has Princess Lea (Carrie Fisher) on board, who happens to have stolen plans of a new technological weapon called the Death Star, built by the Galactic Empire. Imperial stromtroopers board and kills many of the rebel troops and the evil lord Darth Vader (Dave Prowse in physical form and James Earl Jones in voice) captures Princess Lea. However before Lea is captured she manages to conceal the stolen plans inside a droid named R2-D2 (Kenny Baker) along with a hologramatic recording of herself. R2 escapes the ship with fellow droid C-3PO (Anthony Daniels) and they land on the surface of the planet Tatooine.
On the surface of the planet the two droids argue and split up as a result R2 is captured as is Threepio by Jawa traders. The Jawas then sell the two droids to a family of moisture farmers, Owen and Beru Lars (Phil Brown and Shelagh Fraser respectively) who also have their nephew, Luke Sykwalker (Mark Hamill) stay with them. Luke however is bored of his normal chores and longs to join the rebels and fight for them against the Empire and while Luke tries to clean R2, he accidentally triggers part of Leia's mesasge which says "Help me Obi-wan Kenobi you're my only help". Luke says he doesn't know anyone named Obi-wan Kenobi, but he does know a Ben Kenobi, who is an old hermit that lives on the planet. The next morning, R2 goes missing as the droid is intent on finding Obi-Wan, and Luke and Threepio go out and find the R2, but Luke is attacked by sand people, native of Tatooine, but he is rescued by Ben Kenobi (Alec Guinness) who then reveals himself to indeed be Obi-wan Kenobi. Ben takes Luke back to his home and tells him about his father, who was murdered by a young Jedi who turned to the Dark side of the force, named Darth Vader. Then all of a sudden R2-D2 plays Leia's ful message for Ben, revealing that she wants Ben to help take the Death star plans to her father on the planet Alderaan. Ben asks Luke to come with him to Alderaan, but Luke declines at first, but soon after realises he must when he goes back to his home and finds it has been destroyed and his aunt and uncle both killed.
And from here Luke makes that crucial journey with Ben, R2 and Threepio to Mos Eisley spaceport where they meet a smuggler, Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and his first mate, Chewbacca, a wookie, and they agree to take them to Alderaan. However the imperial stormtroopers are on the lookout for the droids and they narrowly escape and flee in Han's ship, the Millenium Falcon. Meanwhile Leia is interrogated onboard the Death star by the callous Grand Moff Tarkin (Peter Cushing) to try and find the location of the rebel base, and Tarkin demonstrates the Death star's power on her home planet of Alderaan, which is totally destroyed as a result. As a result of this the Falcon, having made a jump into light speed, comes out of it to arrive at Alderaan's location, where there is nothing but debris from the destroyed planet and Han notices a imperial fighter ship pass them, and he decides to follow it only to eventually find the Death star. Han tries to turn the ship around but is unable to as it is drawn in by a tractor beam and they are forced to dock on the Death star. The crew then hide in Falcon's compartments, while the stormtroopers search for them and they manage to infiltrate the station by diguising themselves in stormtrooper outfits. Luke, Han, and Chewie soon manage to locate Leia and they rescue her only to fight off the imperial troops in the process. Meanwhile Ben splits up and goes to locate the tractor beam which he disables so the Falcon can escape and then has a showdown with Darth Vader, at the cost of his own life, it allows Luke and the others to escape the Death star, as Darth Vader cuts down Ben.
Onboard the Falcon they are followed by four imperial fighter ships, which Han and Luke manage to destroy and they make their way to the rebel base on the planet Yavin IV. However the Empire had placed a tracking device oboard the Falcon which let's them know where the base is. On the planet Yavin, Luke, Han, Chewie, Leia and the droids join up with the Alliance where they reveal their attack plans to destroy the Death star, once the plans have been analysed. And from here Luke plays his part in the rebels aerial attack on the Death star by flying in rebel fighter as part of a squadron who are set to try and destroy the Death star and strike a blow for victory....
There is no denying that Star Wars is an exceptional film and its influence has been so huge over the years that it also remains one of the most important films in cinematic history. It also saw a big step forward in the visual effects industry as prior to this film there weren't really any films up to this point like this, with the exception of 2001: A Space Odyssey, but here Star Wars took it to another level. George Lucas also was heavily influenced by Akira Kurosawa, the Japanese filmmaker, and especially the film, The Hidden Fortress and also Yojimbo, where it shows the basis for the hero, Luke, and the smuggler, Han Solo. And like all great films, Star Wars was made under incredible adversity from 20th Century Fox, who put Lucas under alot of pressure as he was forced to meet deadlines for the production and also the British crew were often scornful of the film itself and deemed it would be a failure. And even some of the cast themselves had doubts about how it would turn out, such as Kenny Baker and Harrison Ford was also outspoken about Lucas's writing, as he famously said "Well you can type this shit but you can't say it!" (well actually he did!). But despite all that once the film came together and was completed it was absolutely incredible how big a success Star Wars actually became. And it also rejuvanted an almost ailing industry at the time, where cinema had become about social commentary and grimy reality in the 1970s and Star Wars succeded brilliantly in bringing a fun experience back to the big screen.
Getting onto the performances well this is where Star Wars actually does very well, despite Lucas's corny dialogue, the cast do a wonderful job in their memorable roles. Starting with Mark Hamill, who does a fine job as Luke Skywalker, the plucky youngster, who is desparate to join the rebels and fight against the empire. Hamill has plenty of good moments in the film, such as his scenes with Ben Kenobi, and their first scene together at Ben's home where he tells Luke about his father and asks that he learn about the force and join the rebels. And Luke says "I can't get involved. I've got work to do! Its not that I like the empire, I hate it! But there's nothing I can about it right now. Its all a long way from here!". And also one of the film's more powerful moments is the scene Luke desparately goes back to his aunt and uncle's film only to find it burnt out and that they have both been killed, and we get a strong graphic image of their smouldering charred bodies, and Luke looks down sadly and then up again with anger. And he heads back to Ben and says that immortal line "There's nothing here for me now. I wanna learn the ways of the force and become a jedi like my father". Hamill also has some nice moments of course with Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher, as they all shared a natural chemistry with one another. Hamill also has some fun moments in the film, such as where he rescues Leia from her prison cell and she says to him "Are you a little short for a stormtrooper?" and he says "Oh the uniform! I'm Luke Skywalker, I'm here to rescue you!". And later when they are all trapped into the garbage compactor together, Luke is pulled down by some of sort of underwater beast, and he comes back up covered in tentacles and he yells at Han saying "Blast it will you? My gun's down!" and Han shouts "Where???" and Luke yells "Anywhere!!". Another good moment Hamill has is in the scene where he goes up to Han near the end of the film, when they are on Yavin and Han is taking his payment and getting ready to leave, as he doesn't want to get involved in the fight. So Luke says to Han "Alright, take care of yourself, Han. I guess that's what you're best at, isn't it?!". It also rather bizarre and interesting in a kind of peverse way that Luke is attracted to Leia as when he first sees her on the hologramatic image he says "Who is she? She's beautiful!" and he even later asks Han "What do you think of her" and he answers flatly "Tryin not to, kid" and Luke replies "Good!". And this is followed by Han saying "So what d'ya think? Do you think a princess and a guy like me..." and Luke quickly says "No" and Han smiles as he registers Luke's jealousy, although he obviously doesn't know at that point that he's related to her!
Harrison Ford is also great in his role as Han Solo, and it was an early role in his career and in many ways one of his very best. Ford since has played parts almost too close to his own real life persona, in a very dry way with little in the way of real zeal, passion or enthusiasm (not to say that is how Harry is in real life!). But here Ford has alot of fun with Han as he plays him with the perfect amount of charisma, bravado and humour. Ford pretty much get's all the film's best dialogue and there quite a few examples which I can mention. And the first is the scene where Luke practices his ligthsabre skils on the Falcon, and Han mocks Luke and says "Hokey religions and old weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid!" and when Luke asks Han if he doesn't believe in the force Han says "Kid, I've been all over the galaxy and I've seen alot of strange stuff, but I've never seen anything to make me believe there is one all powerful force controlling everything! There is no mystical force field controlling my destiny. Its all alot of simple tricks and nonsense!". And in one of Ford's funniest moments in the film, after a shootout on a Death star detention block, Han answers the com controls and explains "Everything is under control, the situation is normal. We had a slight weapons malfunction, but everything is fine now, how are you?!" and he later shoots the speaker when the trooper on the other end asks who he is and Han says "A boring conversation anyway!" all of which was ad-libbed by Ford himself. Ford also has a great scene in the proper and original version of the film with the alien smuggler, Greedo, where they share an exchange over a table in the saloon at Mos Eisley, where Greedo says "I've been looking forward to this for a long time" and Han says "Yes, I bet you have!" and he shoots Greedo in cold blood and as he leaves he throws some money to the bartender and says "Sorry about the mess!". Ford has some great chemistry with Fisher and they share some good moments, especially when they try and escape from the Death Star, and as Han and Luke try and fight off the stormtroopers on the detention block, Han yells "Wonderful girl! Either I'm gonna kill her or I'm beginning to like her!". And in his first scene where Han meets with Luke and Ben, he says to Ben "You mean you've never heard of the Millenium Falcon? Its the ship that made the Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs". And also in the scene where R2-D2 defeats Chewbecca a holographic game of chess with monsters, Han says "Let him have it. Its not wise to upset a wookie." and Threepio replies "But nobody worries about upsetting a droid" and Han says "That's because droids don't pull people arms out of their sockets when they lose. Wookies tend to do that!". And in the scene where Han and the others are trapped in the garbage compactor, he has another good line as it closes in around them Han looks worriedly up and says "Well one thing is for sure we're all gonna be alot thinner!". And lastly another favourite line of mine of Han's is during the dogfight onboard the Falcon when Han and Luke engage the TIE fighters and Luke celebrates when he destroys one and Han says "Great, kid. Don't get cocky!" which is again an ad-lib by Harrison.
Carrie Fisher is also great as Princess Leia as she appears in her career defining role as the small, feisty princess with two hairy buns attached to the side of her head, as a hairdo. Fisher also has some great scenes and dialogue, such as the scene where she is interrogated by Grand Moff Tarkin onboard the Death Star, and she says to him when they meet "Governor Tarkin! I should have expected to find you holding Vader's leash. I recognised your foul stench when I was brought onboard!". Carrie also has a great moment with Harrison when Han and Leia argue on the Falcon and she says the fight isn't over yet, but for Han it is and he says "I'm in this for money!" and she says sharply "You needn't worry about your reward. If money is all that you love, then that is what you will receive!" and as she goes out of the cockpit she says to Luke "Your friend is quite the mercenary. I wonder if he cares about anything, or anybody!". And as Leia she also shows her plucky resourcefulness when she grabs a blaster during their fight onboard the Death star and blasts a whole in the wall and says "Somebody has to save our skins" and to Han "Into the garbage shoot, fly boy!". And later after they escape the garbage compactor, Leia huffily walks past Chewbacca and says "Would someone get this big walking carpet out of my way?!" and followed by the line when she looks down below and sees the Falcon and says to Han "You came in that thing? You're braver than I thought!".
Next is up Alec Guinness who is excellent in his role as the aged Ben "Obi-wan" Kenobi who brings a sense of old fashioned heroism and moral deceny to the film and also portrays Ben as a wily old fella who can still outwit his enemies and is handy with a light sabre. Guiness's introduction in the film is great, as he wears the hood of his cloak over his head and he makes strange noises to scare away the sand people who attacked Luke, and he feels Luke's pulse and takes his hood off. And Luke tells him that R2 is looking someone named Obi-wan Kenobi, and Ben "Obi-wan.... now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time, a long time" and Luke asks if he knows him and Ben says "of course I know him! He's me! I haven't been known as Obi-wan since, oh before you were born". Guinness also get's some good lines such as in the scene where he gives Luke his father's light sabre and he says "It is the weapon of a jedi knight. Not as clumsy or random as a blaster. But a weapon of a more civilised age". Also the moment where they arrive at Mos Eisley spaceport and they look over it from a hilltop above and Ben says "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious!". And when they arrive they are stopped by imperial troops and Ben uses his jedi mind trick to hypnotise the trooper who questions them "You don't need to see our indentification. These are not the droids your looking for. He can about his business. Move along" and the stormtrooper repeats his every word and let's them go. And when the Millenium Falcon arrives at the destination of the destroyed planet of Alderaan and they follow the TIE fighter and see the Death star, Han thinks it is a small moon, and Ben says "That's no moon. That's a space station!". And of course perhaps Guinness's most famous line in the film when he fights with Vader "You can't win, Darth. If you strike me down I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!".
Peter Cushing is also excellent as the cold and villainous Governor Tarkin who operates onboard the Death Star. And his best scene is where he interrogates Princess Leia and when she arrives and says he "recognised his foul stench when I was brought onboard" he smiles faintly and says "Charming to the last!". And as he questions Leia he moves close to her and says "I grow tired of asking this, so it will be the last time, where is the rebel base??" and Leia unbeknownst to them lies and says it is on another planet, Dantooine, and Tarkin says "There we are, Lord Vader, she can be reasonable. You may fire when ready!" (on her home planet) "You are far too trusting! Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration, but don't worry, we shall deal with your rebel friends soon enough!". And later when its revealed that she had lied when the imperial troops did a sweep of Dantooine, Tarkin is outraged and says "She lied! She lied to us! Terminate her, immediately!".
David Prowse and James Earls Jones also collectively do a terrific job as perhaps the single most memorable villain in sci-fi fantasy cinema, Darth Vader. George Lucas apparently cast David Prowse in the role after seeing him playing the part of a bodyguard in A Clockwork Orange and his physical presence lends immeasurably towards making Vader such an intimidating figure. James Earl Jones also provides a wonderful voice for Vader, with his deep rich booming tones, he also delivers some great dialogue in the film. Such examples include, the first scene Vader appears, where he makes one of the great entrances in cinema, and he later grabs one of the rebels by the throat and lifts him off his feet and interrogates the rebel who struggles to speak and says "This is a diplomatic ship!" and Vader sharply says "If this is a dioplmatic ship then where is the consolate?!" and breaks the rebel's neck and throws him aside. And he angrily turns to his troops and says "Commander tear this ship apart until you've found those plans! And bring me the passengers, I want them alive!!". Another great scene with Vader is where Governor Tarkin convenes a meeting with some of his officers and Darth Vader says to one of the officers "Don't be so proud of this technological terror you have constructed. The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the force". And the officer then mocks Vader by saying "Don't try and frighten us with your sorcerer's ways, Lord Vader!" and Vader uses the forces to choke the man and he says "I find your lack of faith disturbing!". Also later, Vader his famous light sabre duel with Ben Kenobi and as they draw their blades, Vader says "I've been waiting for your, Obi-wan. At last the circle is complete. When I left you I was but the learner and now I am the master!". Also prior to this when the Death star has just pulled in the Falcon with the tractor beam, Vader senses that Ben might be onboard and he says "I sense something.... a presence I've not felt since..." and he walks off. And perhaps one of Vader's most memorables lines comes later on during the assault on the Death star by the rebels and he goes out in his own TIE fighter and takes down some of the rebel X-wing fighters, and as he tries to target Luke's fighter, he says "The force is strong with this one!" and as he finally get's a lock on him he says "I have you now!!".
As for the actors playing the most famous robotic duo in cinema, R2-D2 and C-3PO, Kenny Baker and Anthony Daniels both do a grand job in their own right. Baker himself was a stage comedian, and at a mere three foot five inches in height, he was handed the part of his career, even if we don't get to see him and he is placed in a motorised bin that makes bleeping noises! Anthony Daniels also does great as Threepio, the haughty and neurotic sounding droid, who is a protocol droid who can translate into several million different languages. Daniels has plenty of amusing dialogue in the film, such as in the scene where Luke accidentally triggers off part of Leia's message implanted into R2, and he removes a restraining bolt from R2 which turns the hologram image off, and Luke angrily tells R2 to replay the message, and R2 beeps, and Threepio bangs him on the head "What message??! The message you've just been playing! The one you have been carrying around inside your busty innards!". Also later on when R2 takes off, Threepio and Luke have a quick look outside and they can't find him and Luke says "You know that little droid is gonna cost me alot of trouble" and Threepio says "Oh he excels at that, sir!". And one of the film's funniest moments is where on the Death star, Threepio and R2 desparately try to act fast to try and shut down the garbage compactor that Han, Luke, Leia and Chewie are trapped in, and R2 finally succeeds. And Luke yells with joy as do the others, but Threepio thinks they are screaming in pain and says "Oh listen to them R2, they're dying! They're dying! Curse my metal body, I wasn't fast enough!". And when Chewie plays a game of hologramatic chess with R2, and Han tells him its wise to let the wookie have the game because they tend to pull people's arms out of their sockets when they lose, Threepio says to R2 "I suggest a new strategy, R2. Let the wookie win!".
And lastly I will mention a few other cast members starting Peter Mayhew as the large Wookie, Chewbacca, who at first is quite intimidating in his size and temper, but soon becomes an old softy for Luke and the others. Mayhew as Chewbacca has some funny moments, such as the scene where Chewie barks loudly at Luke when he tries to put some handcuffs on him when they are on the Death star. And later when they pretend to escort Chewie as a prisoner, a small robotic droid wheels its way around the corridors, beeing away it runs up to them and Chewie barks angrily at it and it scuttles away, and Chewie shrugs at Luke. And yet later Chewie turns out to be a big scardie cat when some creature from the garbage compactor screams out after they have escaped, and the wookie runs away as Han says "Come here ya big coward! Chewie come here!" and Chewie shakes his head cowering. Mayhew, who is 7ft 3 inches in size, apparently was the easiest member to cast as at the audition he merely stood up to greet George Lucas and Lucas instantly thought he was right for the part.
And finally I will quickly mention Phil Brown and Shelagh Fraser as Luke's Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru, as they only have a small screen time in the film. However they do have a good scene with Luke where Owen is reluctant to let Luke go to the academy to join the alliance and Owen insists that he stay with them for another year. And Beru says to Owen "Luke's not a farmer, Owen. He's got too much of his of father in him" and Owen says "That's what I'm afraid of!" (come to think of it that is a rather dodgy sounding line!). And finally last of all there is Denis Lawson who appears briefly in the film as Wedge Antilles, a rebel pilot, and he was the only actor to have appeared in all three films of the original trilogy aside the regular cast.
Moving finally onto George Lucas well as a director he done a tremendous job with Star Wars, especially given the logistical nightmares of the production alone as well as the time he took to develop the story which had been in inception ever since the early 1970s just around the time he made THX1138. Lucas also directed the film with the perfect amount of thrills, fun, danger, drama and the pacing of the film is also perfect as it clocks in at two hours, there is not one moment where it drags and the action sequences are also spectacular as are the visual effects which as I previously mentioned were groudbreaking for their time. And then there is John Williams marvellous score, which has to go down as one of the greatest scores in the modern era of cinema, as the main theme remains as memorable as ever. The score also has plenty of other highlights and its worth even owning it to give it a listen and it thoroughly deserves the Academy Award it won back in 1978. And in addition to the wonderful orchestral passages it also features that funky wee track played by the Cantina band during the Mos Eisley sequence. Also special note also deserves to go out to the sound designer, Ben Burtt, who did a superb job with the sound effects of the film, and he created some truly unique sounds which suit the film perfectly. Such examples of the sounds Burtt utilised where the sounds of steel cable being struck under tension for the blasters, and a mixture of different animals for Chewbacca's growls, and he breathed through a scuba dive mask regulator with a microphone attached to get the sound of Darth Vader's deep breathing.
As for the film's flaws???? Well Star Wars is so good you can forgive them, but if you want to nitpick then yeah OK there are one or two. For starters one of the film's silliest plot points, which was actually highlighted in the Family Guy remake of Star Wars where the Death Star has one vulnerable exhaust port, which you think if that could lead to the entire destruction of the space station, why didn't they just close it up! Also why is there only one of them??? Given the massive size and scale of the Death Star it seems bizarre that it would have one on its own! Another troubling thing about the destruction of the Death Star is that it makes Luke a mass murderer and guilty of genocide, even if they are all bad, they might not have been, as there could have been some civilians onboard as it was a gigantic space station after all. This of course was hinted at in Kevin Smith's debut comedy, Clerks, about Return of the Jedi when any of the contractors working on the incomplete Death star were victims of the rebels when it was destroyed. But hey, it is a Hollywood film and genocide on any scale doesn't really matter, good or bad guys aside! The dialogue is also very corny in places which was something Lucas is guilty of in his films anyway, especially in the prequels. And one prime example is when Han is about to leave Yavin he says to Luke, "Hey Luke. May the force be with you". Also the lines where after Luke is attacked by the sand people he comes around and looks up at Ben and says "Ben?? Ben Kenobi?? Boy, am I glad to see you!" and of course when Luke finds Leia's prison cell on the Death star and enters he says "I'm Luke Skywalker and I'm here to rescue you!". Also Lucas is guilty of writing in some pretty daftly named characters in his time and the first one is here, Porkins (played by William Hootkins) who just so happens to be overweight! Not only that but he buys it in the first two minutes of the attack on the Death star! But given the standard of his ridiculously naff screenplays for the prequels its not anywhere near as bad in comparison. And yep then there is that incredibly cheesy happy ending where Luke and Han get their medals from Leia infornt of a large crow of the rebel alliance. Gawwwwddd!!
Another issue isn't so much with the film itself, or not the original anyway, but its with the unnecessary tampering that Lucas did with the film since then, as he has remastered it so many times and re-released it with new scenes and effects. The 1997 release wasn't too bad in itself but it was guilty of including that ridiculous scene where Greedo shoots first to make Han appear not so cold blooded! And there was naturally a big revolt over the idea from the fans at the time, rightly so, and for the DVD release, Lucas re-did again except THIS time he had Han and Greedo shoot at each other at the same time, which hardly makes it any better! This version also had a couple of naff scenes in it such as the scene where Han meets with Jabba the Hut, who in the original was played by an actor, and also the scene where Luke is rejoined with his buddies on Yavin, where one of the superior officers looks accusingly at him, but then Luke's friend tells him who he is, and the officer changes his tune and says lamely "You'll do alright!". And with all this tampering it hardly helped make Star Wars a better film as it was clearly already a close to perfect one without it!
Anyway all that aside Star Wars remains one of the most entertaining and historically influential and importants films in modern cinema, and one of those films which you could watch again and again and it would still never lose its appeal.
So with that I shall leave it there and I will be back sometime soon with Epsiode 5 but will be busy for a few days ahead for me so I will see how it goes.
Bye for now!
Sooo I will do a bit of a plot summary but we all know the story anyway but as a reminder the story is set during a civial war between the Galactic Empire and the Rebel Alliance. And the story starts with an attack on a ship belonging to the Rebell Alliance, which has Princess Lea (Carrie Fisher) on board, who happens to have stolen plans of a new technological weapon called the Death Star, built by the Galactic Empire. Imperial stromtroopers board and kills many of the rebel troops and the evil lord Darth Vader (Dave Prowse in physical form and James Earl Jones in voice) captures Princess Lea. However before Lea is captured she manages to conceal the stolen plans inside a droid named R2-D2 (Kenny Baker) along with a hologramatic recording of herself. R2 escapes the ship with fellow droid C-3PO (Anthony Daniels) and they land on the surface of the planet Tatooine.
On the surface of the planet the two droids argue and split up as a result R2 is captured as is Threepio by Jawa traders. The Jawas then sell the two droids to a family of moisture farmers, Owen and Beru Lars (Phil Brown and Shelagh Fraser respectively) who also have their nephew, Luke Sykwalker (Mark Hamill) stay with them. Luke however is bored of his normal chores and longs to join the rebels and fight for them against the Empire and while Luke tries to clean R2, he accidentally triggers part of Leia's mesasge which says "Help me Obi-wan Kenobi you're my only help". Luke says he doesn't know anyone named Obi-wan Kenobi, but he does know a Ben Kenobi, who is an old hermit that lives on the planet. The next morning, R2 goes missing as the droid is intent on finding Obi-Wan, and Luke and Threepio go out and find the R2, but Luke is attacked by sand people, native of Tatooine, but he is rescued by Ben Kenobi (Alec Guinness) who then reveals himself to indeed be Obi-wan Kenobi. Ben takes Luke back to his home and tells him about his father, who was murdered by a young Jedi who turned to the Dark side of the force, named Darth Vader. Then all of a sudden R2-D2 plays Leia's ful message for Ben, revealing that she wants Ben to help take the Death star plans to her father on the planet Alderaan. Ben asks Luke to come with him to Alderaan, but Luke declines at first, but soon after realises he must when he goes back to his home and finds it has been destroyed and his aunt and uncle both killed.
And from here Luke makes that crucial journey with Ben, R2 and Threepio to Mos Eisley spaceport where they meet a smuggler, Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and his first mate, Chewbacca, a wookie, and they agree to take them to Alderaan. However the imperial stormtroopers are on the lookout for the droids and they narrowly escape and flee in Han's ship, the Millenium Falcon. Meanwhile Leia is interrogated onboard the Death star by the callous Grand Moff Tarkin (Peter Cushing) to try and find the location of the rebel base, and Tarkin demonstrates the Death star's power on her home planet of Alderaan, which is totally destroyed as a result. As a result of this the Falcon, having made a jump into light speed, comes out of it to arrive at Alderaan's location, where there is nothing but debris from the destroyed planet and Han notices a imperial fighter ship pass them, and he decides to follow it only to eventually find the Death star. Han tries to turn the ship around but is unable to as it is drawn in by a tractor beam and they are forced to dock on the Death star. The crew then hide in Falcon's compartments, while the stormtroopers search for them and they manage to infiltrate the station by diguising themselves in stormtrooper outfits. Luke, Han, and Chewie soon manage to locate Leia and they rescue her only to fight off the imperial troops in the process. Meanwhile Ben splits up and goes to locate the tractor beam which he disables so the Falcon can escape and then has a showdown with Darth Vader, at the cost of his own life, it allows Luke and the others to escape the Death star, as Darth Vader cuts down Ben.
Onboard the Falcon they are followed by four imperial fighter ships, which Han and Luke manage to destroy and they make their way to the rebel base on the planet Yavin IV. However the Empire had placed a tracking device oboard the Falcon which let's them know where the base is. On the planet Yavin, Luke, Han, Chewie, Leia and the droids join up with the Alliance where they reveal their attack plans to destroy the Death star, once the plans have been analysed. And from here Luke plays his part in the rebels aerial attack on the Death star by flying in rebel fighter as part of a squadron who are set to try and destroy the Death star and strike a blow for victory....
There is no denying that Star Wars is an exceptional film and its influence has been so huge over the years that it also remains one of the most important films in cinematic history. It also saw a big step forward in the visual effects industry as prior to this film there weren't really any films up to this point like this, with the exception of 2001: A Space Odyssey, but here Star Wars took it to another level. George Lucas also was heavily influenced by Akira Kurosawa, the Japanese filmmaker, and especially the film, The Hidden Fortress and also Yojimbo, where it shows the basis for the hero, Luke, and the smuggler, Han Solo. And like all great films, Star Wars was made under incredible adversity from 20th Century Fox, who put Lucas under alot of pressure as he was forced to meet deadlines for the production and also the British crew were often scornful of the film itself and deemed it would be a failure. And even some of the cast themselves had doubts about how it would turn out, such as Kenny Baker and Harrison Ford was also outspoken about Lucas's writing, as he famously said "Well you can type this shit but you can't say it!" (well actually he did!). But despite all that once the film came together and was completed it was absolutely incredible how big a success Star Wars actually became. And it also rejuvanted an almost ailing industry at the time, where cinema had become about social commentary and grimy reality in the 1970s and Star Wars succeded brilliantly in bringing a fun experience back to the big screen.
Getting onto the performances well this is where Star Wars actually does very well, despite Lucas's corny dialogue, the cast do a wonderful job in their memorable roles. Starting with Mark Hamill, who does a fine job as Luke Skywalker, the plucky youngster, who is desparate to join the rebels and fight against the empire. Hamill has plenty of good moments in the film, such as his scenes with Ben Kenobi, and their first scene together at Ben's home where he tells Luke about his father and asks that he learn about the force and join the rebels. And Luke says "I can't get involved. I've got work to do! Its not that I like the empire, I hate it! But there's nothing I can about it right now. Its all a long way from here!". And also one of the film's more powerful moments is the scene Luke desparately goes back to his aunt and uncle's film only to find it burnt out and that they have both been killed, and we get a strong graphic image of their smouldering charred bodies, and Luke looks down sadly and then up again with anger. And he heads back to Ben and says that immortal line "There's nothing here for me now. I wanna learn the ways of the force and become a jedi like my father". Hamill also has some nice moments of course with Harrison Ford and Carrie Fisher, as they all shared a natural chemistry with one another. Hamill also has some fun moments in the film, such as where he rescues Leia from her prison cell and she says to him "Are you a little short for a stormtrooper?" and he says "Oh the uniform! I'm Luke Skywalker, I'm here to rescue you!". And later when they are all trapped into the garbage compactor together, Luke is pulled down by some of sort of underwater beast, and he comes back up covered in tentacles and he yells at Han saying "Blast it will you? My gun's down!" and Han shouts "Where???" and Luke yells "Anywhere!!". Another good moment Hamill has is in the scene where he goes up to Han near the end of the film, when they are on Yavin and Han is taking his payment and getting ready to leave, as he doesn't want to get involved in the fight. So Luke says to Han "Alright, take care of yourself, Han. I guess that's what you're best at, isn't it?!". It also rather bizarre and interesting in a kind of peverse way that Luke is attracted to Leia as when he first sees her on the hologramatic image he says "Who is she? She's beautiful!" and he even later asks Han "What do you think of her" and he answers flatly "Tryin not to, kid" and Luke replies "Good!". And this is followed by Han saying "So what d'ya think? Do you think a princess and a guy like me..." and Luke quickly says "No" and Han smiles as he registers Luke's jealousy, although he obviously doesn't know at that point that he's related to her!
Harrison Ford is also great in his role as Han Solo, and it was an early role in his career and in many ways one of his very best. Ford since has played parts almost too close to his own real life persona, in a very dry way with little in the way of real zeal, passion or enthusiasm (not to say that is how Harry is in real life!). But here Ford has alot of fun with Han as he plays him with the perfect amount of charisma, bravado and humour. Ford pretty much get's all the film's best dialogue and there quite a few examples which I can mention. And the first is the scene where Luke practices his ligthsabre skils on the Falcon, and Han mocks Luke and says "Hokey religions and old weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid!" and when Luke asks Han if he doesn't believe in the force Han says "Kid, I've been all over the galaxy and I've seen alot of strange stuff, but I've never seen anything to make me believe there is one all powerful force controlling everything! There is no mystical force field controlling my destiny. Its all alot of simple tricks and nonsense!". And in one of Ford's funniest moments in the film, after a shootout on a Death star detention block, Han answers the com controls and explains "Everything is under control, the situation is normal. We had a slight weapons malfunction, but everything is fine now, how are you?!" and he later shoots the speaker when the trooper on the other end asks who he is and Han says "A boring conversation anyway!" all of which was ad-libbed by Ford himself. Ford also has a great scene in the proper and original version of the film with the alien smuggler, Greedo, where they share an exchange over a table in the saloon at Mos Eisley, where Greedo says "I've been looking forward to this for a long time" and Han says "Yes, I bet you have!" and he shoots Greedo in cold blood and as he leaves he throws some money to the bartender and says "Sorry about the mess!". Ford has some great chemistry with Fisher and they share some good moments, especially when they try and escape from the Death Star, and as Han and Luke try and fight off the stormtroopers on the detention block, Han yells "Wonderful girl! Either I'm gonna kill her or I'm beginning to like her!". And in his first scene where Han meets with Luke and Ben, he says to Ben "You mean you've never heard of the Millenium Falcon? Its the ship that made the Kessel run in less than twelve parsecs". And also in the scene where R2-D2 defeats Chewbecca a holographic game of chess with monsters, Han says "Let him have it. Its not wise to upset a wookie." and Threepio replies "But nobody worries about upsetting a droid" and Han says "That's because droids don't pull people arms out of their sockets when they lose. Wookies tend to do that!". And in the scene where Han and the others are trapped in the garbage compactor, he has another good line as it closes in around them Han looks worriedly up and says "Well one thing is for sure we're all gonna be alot thinner!". And lastly another favourite line of mine of Han's is during the dogfight onboard the Falcon when Han and Luke engage the TIE fighters and Luke celebrates when he destroys one and Han says "Great, kid. Don't get cocky!" which is again an ad-lib by Harrison.
Carrie Fisher is also great as Princess Leia as she appears in her career defining role as the small, feisty princess with two hairy buns attached to the side of her head, as a hairdo. Fisher also has some great scenes and dialogue, such as the scene where she is interrogated by Grand Moff Tarkin onboard the Death Star, and she says to him when they meet "Governor Tarkin! I should have expected to find you holding Vader's leash. I recognised your foul stench when I was brought onboard!". Carrie also has a great moment with Harrison when Han and Leia argue on the Falcon and she says the fight isn't over yet, but for Han it is and he says "I'm in this for money!" and she says sharply "You needn't worry about your reward. If money is all that you love, then that is what you will receive!" and as she goes out of the cockpit she says to Luke "Your friend is quite the mercenary. I wonder if he cares about anything, or anybody!". And as Leia she also shows her plucky resourcefulness when she grabs a blaster during their fight onboard the Death star and blasts a whole in the wall and says "Somebody has to save our skins" and to Han "Into the garbage shoot, fly boy!". And later after they escape the garbage compactor, Leia huffily walks past Chewbacca and says "Would someone get this big walking carpet out of my way?!" and followed by the line when she looks down below and sees the Falcon and says to Han "You came in that thing? You're braver than I thought!".
Next is up Alec Guinness who is excellent in his role as the aged Ben "Obi-wan" Kenobi who brings a sense of old fashioned heroism and moral deceny to the film and also portrays Ben as a wily old fella who can still outwit his enemies and is handy with a light sabre. Guiness's introduction in the film is great, as he wears the hood of his cloak over his head and he makes strange noises to scare away the sand people who attacked Luke, and he feels Luke's pulse and takes his hood off. And Luke tells him that R2 is looking someone named Obi-wan Kenobi, and Ben "Obi-wan.... now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time, a long time" and Luke asks if he knows him and Ben says "of course I know him! He's me! I haven't been known as Obi-wan since, oh before you were born". Guinness also get's some good lines such as in the scene where he gives Luke his father's light sabre and he says "It is the weapon of a jedi knight. Not as clumsy or random as a blaster. But a weapon of a more civilised age". Also the moment where they arrive at Mos Eisley spaceport and they look over it from a hilltop above and Ben says "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious!". And when they arrive they are stopped by imperial troops and Ben uses his jedi mind trick to hypnotise the trooper who questions them "You don't need to see our indentification. These are not the droids your looking for. He can about his business. Move along" and the stormtrooper repeats his every word and let's them go. And when the Millenium Falcon arrives at the destination of the destroyed planet of Alderaan and they follow the TIE fighter and see the Death star, Han thinks it is a small moon, and Ben says "That's no moon. That's a space station!". And of course perhaps Guinness's most famous line in the film when he fights with Vader "You can't win, Darth. If you strike me down I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!".
Peter Cushing is also excellent as the cold and villainous Governor Tarkin who operates onboard the Death Star. And his best scene is where he interrogates Princess Leia and when she arrives and says he "recognised his foul stench when I was brought onboard" he smiles faintly and says "Charming to the last!". And as he questions Leia he moves close to her and says "I grow tired of asking this, so it will be the last time, where is the rebel base??" and Leia unbeknownst to them lies and says it is on another planet, Dantooine, and Tarkin says "There we are, Lord Vader, she can be reasonable. You may fire when ready!" (on her home planet) "You are far too trusting! Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration, but don't worry, we shall deal with your rebel friends soon enough!". And later when its revealed that she had lied when the imperial troops did a sweep of Dantooine, Tarkin is outraged and says "She lied! She lied to us! Terminate her, immediately!".
David Prowse and James Earls Jones also collectively do a terrific job as perhaps the single most memorable villain in sci-fi fantasy cinema, Darth Vader. George Lucas apparently cast David Prowse in the role after seeing him playing the part of a bodyguard in A Clockwork Orange and his physical presence lends immeasurably towards making Vader such an intimidating figure. James Earl Jones also provides a wonderful voice for Vader, with his deep rich booming tones, he also delivers some great dialogue in the film. Such examples include, the first scene Vader appears, where he makes one of the great entrances in cinema, and he later grabs one of the rebels by the throat and lifts him off his feet and interrogates the rebel who struggles to speak and says "This is a diplomatic ship!" and Vader sharply says "If this is a dioplmatic ship then where is the consolate?!" and breaks the rebel's neck and throws him aside. And he angrily turns to his troops and says "Commander tear this ship apart until you've found those plans! And bring me the passengers, I want them alive!!". Another great scene with Vader is where Governor Tarkin convenes a meeting with some of his officers and Darth Vader says to one of the officers "Don't be so proud of this technological terror you have constructed. The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the force". And the officer then mocks Vader by saying "Don't try and frighten us with your sorcerer's ways, Lord Vader!" and Vader uses the forces to choke the man and he says "I find your lack of faith disturbing!". Also later, Vader his famous light sabre duel with Ben Kenobi and as they draw their blades, Vader says "I've been waiting for your, Obi-wan. At last the circle is complete. When I left you I was but the learner and now I am the master!". Also prior to this when the Death star has just pulled in the Falcon with the tractor beam, Vader senses that Ben might be onboard and he says "I sense something.... a presence I've not felt since..." and he walks off. And perhaps one of Vader's most memorables lines comes later on during the assault on the Death star by the rebels and he goes out in his own TIE fighter and takes down some of the rebel X-wing fighters, and as he tries to target Luke's fighter, he says "The force is strong with this one!" and as he finally get's a lock on him he says "I have you now!!".
As for the actors playing the most famous robotic duo in cinema, R2-D2 and C-3PO, Kenny Baker and Anthony Daniels both do a grand job in their own right. Baker himself was a stage comedian, and at a mere three foot five inches in height, he was handed the part of his career, even if we don't get to see him and he is placed in a motorised bin that makes bleeping noises! Anthony Daniels also does great as Threepio, the haughty and neurotic sounding droid, who is a protocol droid who can translate into several million different languages. Daniels has plenty of amusing dialogue in the film, such as in the scene where Luke accidentally triggers off part of Leia's message implanted into R2, and he removes a restraining bolt from R2 which turns the hologram image off, and Luke angrily tells R2 to replay the message, and R2 beeps, and Threepio bangs him on the head "What message??! The message you've just been playing! The one you have been carrying around inside your busty innards!". Also later on when R2 takes off, Threepio and Luke have a quick look outside and they can't find him and Luke says "You know that little droid is gonna cost me alot of trouble" and Threepio says "Oh he excels at that, sir!". And one of the film's funniest moments is where on the Death star, Threepio and R2 desparately try to act fast to try and shut down the garbage compactor that Han, Luke, Leia and Chewie are trapped in, and R2 finally succeeds. And Luke yells with joy as do the others, but Threepio thinks they are screaming in pain and says "Oh listen to them R2, they're dying! They're dying! Curse my metal body, I wasn't fast enough!". And when Chewie plays a game of hologramatic chess with R2, and Han tells him its wise to let the wookie have the game because they tend to pull people's arms out of their sockets when they lose, Threepio says to R2 "I suggest a new strategy, R2. Let the wookie win!".
And lastly I will mention a few other cast members starting Peter Mayhew as the large Wookie, Chewbacca, who at first is quite intimidating in his size and temper, but soon becomes an old softy for Luke and the others. Mayhew as Chewbacca has some funny moments, such as the scene where Chewie barks loudly at Luke when he tries to put some handcuffs on him when they are on the Death star. And later when they pretend to escort Chewie as a prisoner, a small robotic droid wheels its way around the corridors, beeing away it runs up to them and Chewie barks angrily at it and it scuttles away, and Chewie shrugs at Luke. And yet later Chewie turns out to be a big scardie cat when some creature from the garbage compactor screams out after they have escaped, and the wookie runs away as Han says "Come here ya big coward! Chewie come here!" and Chewie shakes his head cowering. Mayhew, who is 7ft 3 inches in size, apparently was the easiest member to cast as at the audition he merely stood up to greet George Lucas and Lucas instantly thought he was right for the part.
And finally I will quickly mention Phil Brown and Shelagh Fraser as Luke's Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru, as they only have a small screen time in the film. However they do have a good scene with Luke where Owen is reluctant to let Luke go to the academy to join the alliance and Owen insists that he stay with them for another year. And Beru says to Owen "Luke's not a farmer, Owen. He's got too much of his of father in him" and Owen says "That's what I'm afraid of!" (come to think of it that is a rather dodgy sounding line!). And finally last of all there is Denis Lawson who appears briefly in the film as Wedge Antilles, a rebel pilot, and he was the only actor to have appeared in all three films of the original trilogy aside the regular cast.
Moving finally onto George Lucas well as a director he done a tremendous job with Star Wars, especially given the logistical nightmares of the production alone as well as the time he took to develop the story which had been in inception ever since the early 1970s just around the time he made THX1138. Lucas also directed the film with the perfect amount of thrills, fun, danger, drama and the pacing of the film is also perfect as it clocks in at two hours, there is not one moment where it drags and the action sequences are also spectacular as are the visual effects which as I previously mentioned were groudbreaking for their time. And then there is John Williams marvellous score, which has to go down as one of the greatest scores in the modern era of cinema, as the main theme remains as memorable as ever. The score also has plenty of other highlights and its worth even owning it to give it a listen and it thoroughly deserves the Academy Award it won back in 1978. And in addition to the wonderful orchestral passages it also features that funky wee track played by the Cantina band during the Mos Eisley sequence. Also special note also deserves to go out to the sound designer, Ben Burtt, who did a superb job with the sound effects of the film, and he created some truly unique sounds which suit the film perfectly. Such examples of the sounds Burtt utilised where the sounds of steel cable being struck under tension for the blasters, and a mixture of different animals for Chewbacca's growls, and he breathed through a scuba dive mask regulator with a microphone attached to get the sound of Darth Vader's deep breathing.
As for the film's flaws???? Well Star Wars is so good you can forgive them, but if you want to nitpick then yeah OK there are one or two. For starters one of the film's silliest plot points, which was actually highlighted in the Family Guy remake of Star Wars where the Death Star has one vulnerable exhaust port, which you think if that could lead to the entire destruction of the space station, why didn't they just close it up! Also why is there only one of them??? Given the massive size and scale of the Death Star it seems bizarre that it would have one on its own! Another troubling thing about the destruction of the Death Star is that it makes Luke a mass murderer and guilty of genocide, even if they are all bad, they might not have been, as there could have been some civilians onboard as it was a gigantic space station after all. This of course was hinted at in Kevin Smith's debut comedy, Clerks, about Return of the Jedi when any of the contractors working on the incomplete Death star were victims of the rebels when it was destroyed. But hey, it is a Hollywood film and genocide on any scale doesn't really matter, good or bad guys aside! The dialogue is also very corny in places which was something Lucas is guilty of in his films anyway, especially in the prequels. And one prime example is when Han is about to leave Yavin he says to Luke, "Hey Luke. May the force be with you". Also the lines where after Luke is attacked by the sand people he comes around and looks up at Ben and says "Ben?? Ben Kenobi?? Boy, am I glad to see you!" and of course when Luke finds Leia's prison cell on the Death star and enters he says "I'm Luke Skywalker and I'm here to rescue you!". Also Lucas is guilty of writing in some pretty daftly named characters in his time and the first one is here, Porkins (played by William Hootkins) who just so happens to be overweight! Not only that but he buys it in the first two minutes of the attack on the Death star! But given the standard of his ridiculously naff screenplays for the prequels its not anywhere near as bad in comparison. And yep then there is that incredibly cheesy happy ending where Luke and Han get their medals from Leia infornt of a large crow of the rebel alliance. Gawwwwddd!!
Another issue isn't so much with the film itself, or not the original anyway, but its with the unnecessary tampering that Lucas did with the film since then, as he has remastered it so many times and re-released it with new scenes and effects. The 1997 release wasn't too bad in itself but it was guilty of including that ridiculous scene where Greedo shoots first to make Han appear not so cold blooded! And there was naturally a big revolt over the idea from the fans at the time, rightly so, and for the DVD release, Lucas re-did again except THIS time he had Han and Greedo shoot at each other at the same time, which hardly makes it any better! This version also had a couple of naff scenes in it such as the scene where Han meets with Jabba the Hut, who in the original was played by an actor, and also the scene where Luke is rejoined with his buddies on Yavin, where one of the superior officers looks accusingly at him, but then Luke's friend tells him who he is, and the officer changes his tune and says lamely "You'll do alright!". And with all this tampering it hardly helped make Star Wars a better film as it was clearly already a close to perfect one without it!
Anyway all that aside Star Wars remains one of the most entertaining and historically influential and importants films in modern cinema, and one of those films which you could watch again and again and it would still never lose its appeal.
So with that I shall leave it there and I will be back sometime soon with Epsiode 5 but will be busy for a few days ahead for me so I will see how it goes.
Bye for now!
Monday 24 March 2014
Glengarry Glen Ross: "Always be closing!!"
Right OK so its been a week since my last review as its been a rather busy time doing other stuff as I have at last been involved in the old acting game again myself as I have a small(ish) part in a play just now, which I won't go into just yet, but perhaps later once its done and dusted. So I thought I would opt for another modern classic of the day and this one is Glengarry Glen Ross, which is based on the acclaimed play written by David Mamet, who also wrote the screenplay. So let's pick up the phone, starting closing and give this one a look......
So the story follows the lives of four real estate salesmen, who work for a firm named Mitch and Murray. One night the salesman are approached by Blake (Alec Badlwin) who gives them a rather brutal pep talk and tells them that only two of the sellers in the team with the most sales will remain with firm and the other two will be fired. Blake then gives them the promise of handing them the new and promising Glengarry leads to the top sellers. The salesmen include Shelley "the machine" Levine (Jack Lemmon) who was once a promising salesman, but has now endured a bad run of luck, who has a sick daughter. Shelley then tries to convince the office manager, John Williamson (Kevin Spacey) into giving some of the new leads, but is unsuccessful as he doesn't have the money to give to him to secure the leads. Two of the other salesman are Dave Moss (Ed Harris) and George Aaronow (Alan Arkin) who complain about the corrupt and underhanded tactics they are using against them and Moss insists that someone should strike back and steal the Glengarry leads and sell them on to another competitor and he tries to coerce George into taking to the task of doing the robbery, but he refuses. And the last salesman is Ricky Roma (Al Pacino) who is the top seller in the team who sits in a bar trying to his use salesmenship to try and persuade a meek middle aged man, James Lingk (Jonathan Pryce) into buying some land, which he eventually does.
The next morning however, the office has been broken into and the leads stolen as the police arrive they question the salesmen one by one. Roma arrives (with George already in the office) and complains to Williamson, demanding that he is owes the first prize for the top sales figures, which is a Cadillac, but he is fobbed by Williamson who deals with the police. Shelley also soon arrives having made a big sale to a couple named Bruce and Harriet Nyborg, however Williamson claims that the cheque they gave Shelley is probably worthless, which leaves Shelley angered and rants at him (much to the delight of Roma). Moss also turns up and after he is questioned by the police, launches a tirade at Roma, expressing his bitterness at Roma's recent success, Roma just throws it right back, and Moss storms out the office in a huff. To complicate matters further, Lingk shows up at the office as his wife has insisted that he cancel the deal with Roma, who tries to persuade him otherwise, but his attempts are thwarted by Williamson, who bluffs the situation without knowing the full facts, and tells Lingk has cheque had been cashed. Lingk is shocked and leaves in a panic, to which Roma then goes on to berate Williamson. Shelley then begins to mock Williamson but let's slip something that will get him into big trouble as the film nears its low key but effective climax....
Based on the acclaimed Pulitzer prize winning play by David Mamet, Glengarry Glen Ross is a compelling and entertaining drama, which keeps you watching thanks to its first rate cast and its superb script, which was adapted by Mamet himself for the film. The dialogue in typical Mamet fashion is pretty uncompromising and harsh and it reflects that hard hearted characters that are in the film, especially Blake, the foul mouthed enforcer who comes to the office to deal the bad news to the salesmen. And in Glengarry Glen Ross there are two types of characters, victims and bullies, with Roma being an aggressive and manipulative salesman, who uses his charm and wit to get what he wants, and Moss who forces the meek George Aaranow into being an accessory before the fact of a planned robbery. And then there is George, the weak willed salesman who struggles to make sales, because of his lack of confidence and Shelley who was once a top salesmen, but now is on a losing streak and faces being canned, as he struggles to support his sick daughter.
Which brings me onto the performances which are superb, starting with Al Pacino who is terrific in his role as the cocky salesman, Ricky Roma, who starts off self assured but as the film carries he begins to slowly shrink before our eyes. Pacino get's his lion share of great dialogue and he has several standout moments such as the one where he berates Williamson for blowing his sale with Lingk and he turns to him and says "You stupid fuckin cunt! Where did you learn you're trade???! What you are here for is to help us... not to FUCK US UP!! You fairy... you company man!" and later on in the same scene he says to him "Do you know the first rule if you ever spent a day in your life?? You NEVER open your mount until you know what the shot is! You fuckin child!". Another is when Williamson hands him some poor leads to work, which Roma throws one back at him, as he yells "Patel???! Ravidam Patel??!! How am I supposed to make a living with these deadbeats!" and followed by "Patel?? Fuck you! Shiva handed this guy a million dollars, and said "sign the deal" and he didn't sign. And the God Vishnu too! I'm gonna found out who's cousin you are, John, and figure out a way to have your ass!". And lastly another favourite line of Pacino's in the film comes when he arrives at the office and sees the break-in and the police standing around who ask him his name and he says "Yes I confess. I did it!".
Ed Harris is also excellent in his role as the hot tempered Dave Moss, a salesman who has had a bad run of luck aswell and is intent on stealing the Glengarry leads to get back at Mitch and Murray. Harris's best moments come in his scenes where he drives and later sits with George in a cafe as they speak about the idea of comitting a robbery in the office. And as they carry on Dave makes George an accessory before the fact "You take the consequences, because you listened". Also in the scene where he berates Roma for his cocky attitude and he shouts at him "What the fuck are you? Mr Slick?? What the fuck are you "Friend to the working man?". Big deal! FUCK YOU!!! You got the memory of a fuckin fly and I never liked you anyway!". And as he leaves the office and Roma teases him by saying "have a good trip" Moss delivers his last line which leaves a strong impression "FUCK YOU!! FUCK THE LOT OF YOU!! FUCK YOU ALL!!". Lovely.
Alan Arkin is also really good in his role as the meek salesman, George Aarnow who struggles with his confidence and ability to make a sale. And throughout the film he is a victim as he feels rightfully trodden on and he often dispairs by saying "I don't know what's the matter with me. I can't close em!". And his best moment later on comes when he is affronted after the police have interrogated him and he keeps yelling "I meet Gestapo tactics! I meet, meet Gestapo tactics! He says "cooperate or we'll take you downtown" as long as lived I have never....!" and then Williamson bursts out of his office and tells him to go to lunch. And later in the last scene he delivers a line I'm sure we can all identify with as he sits down and let's a big sigh and says "Oh God! I hate this job!". And briefly Jonathan Price is also good in his role as the victim of Roma's salesmanship and he later on comes to the office to try and stop the sale from going through only to be fed a lie from Williamson. And Price as Lingk says "Please don't follow me! I let you down! Forgive me." and leaves.
Kevin Spacey in an early film career performance also puts in an excellent performance as the cool headed and somewhat smarmy office manager, John Williamson. Spacey has a few highlights in the film and the one that springs to mind right away is George's outburst to the police after his interrogation, Williamson bursts out the office and says "Will you get out of here??! I am trying to run an office! Now will you go to lunch?! Go to lunch!! Will you go to lunch???!". And in his second to last scene where he speaks with Shelley, who let's slip that he knew the customer, Lingk's cheque was still on the desk (which was a lie), is his best, where he figures out that Shelley was (SPOILER!!!) behind the robbery. And Williamson says "You said you don't make something up unless its sure to help. So how do you know I made it up?" and ask Shelley asks him what he is on about, Williamson tells him he left the cheque on his desk and he didn't take it to the bank. "I told the customer I had taken the contract to the bank, but I didn't. Last night I stayed at home with my kids. One night out of a year I did that, now how did you know that?! Are you going talk to me, or you going to talk to them (the police)? As this is my job on the line here! And you are going to talk to me!". And he eventually get's Levine to admit he broke into the office and sold the leads, to which Williamson then decides to dob him in to the police and Levine asks why and Williamson coldly says "Because I don't like you!".
Which brings us onto Alec Baldwin who provides the film with probably its most memorable performance as the aggressive sales enforcer, Blake, who is "on a mission of mercy!" as he delivers the company's ultimatum to the salesmen to either get the sales in or be fired. Blake only has one scene buts its a long one as he delivers his volatile pep talk to the salesmen and he starts by saying to Shelley who goes to pour himself a cup of coffee: "Put that coffee down! You're name's Levine. You call yourself a salesman, you son of a bitch?! Coffee's for closers only!". Followed by some more gems such as "If you can't close shit, YOU are shit! Hit the bricks, pal, and beat it, because you are going OUT!!". And he walks up to George who almost cowers from him and says "You think this is abuse?? You think this is abuse, you cocksucker?! If you can't take this, how can you take the abuse you get on a sit! If you don't like it leave!". And later he shows the men the blackboard as with the letter "A I D A" "A-I-D-A. Attention, interest, decision, action. Attention, do I have your attention? Interest - are you interested? I know you are because its fuck or walk. Decision - have made your decision for Christ?! And action". And of course the clasic "A-B-C, always be closing. ALWAYS BE CLOSING!". And at the end of the scene he says to Moss "And to answer your question, pal, the reason I came down is because Mitch and Murray asked me to for a favour. And the real reason is, follow my advice and fire your fuckin ass because a loser is a loser!".
And last but far from least is Jack Lemmon is simpy outstanding in his role as the downtrodden and once great salesman, Shelley "The Machine" Levine and this performance really is one of the highlights of his career. Lemmon plays the put upon man better than any actor could possibly ever manage and he also succeeds in making Shelley the only really sympathetic character in the film. Lemmon has many highlights in the film such as the scene where he tries to barter with Williamson to buy some of the Glengarry leads and as Williamson keeps refusing his offers he says "That's defeatist, fuck it! Do you want to do something, you heard the man! Attack!". And later on in his rant against Williamson in the office, he says to him "You do not know your job! A man IS his job, and you are fucked at yours! What are you? You're a fuckin secretary! Fuck you! Yes that's right fuck you and kiss my ass! Now I want my name on that board, and I want three promising leads and I am going to close them all. And that's all I have to say to you today!" and he gives Williamson the finger. And later as he mocks Williamson for blowing Roma's deal, he says "You just fucked a good man out of six thousands dollars and his goddamn bonus because you didn't know the shot! If you can't something from that, you're scum, you're fuckin whitebread" and then he let's slip he knew about Williamson's lie "If you're gonna make something up, John, before sure it helps! Or keep your mouth shut".
Finally getting onto the direction, James Foley does a fine job with the film and its material and he keeps the pace flowing nicely and keeps the drama of the piece quite taut. It also helps that Glengarry Glen Ross isn't that long a film so it rarely if ever drags. The film's score by James Newton Howard is not too bad, although it has to be said it remains one of my least favourite aspects of the film, but it does have one or two nice moody atmospheric tracks that suit the film's grimy tone well.
So as for flaws, how about Glengarry, how does it fair??? Well there's too much to complain about as ticks alot boxes as film. However perhaps the only thing about the film is perhaps some of the scenes do feel a little drawn out, as well written as they are. And the scene for me that is drawn out the most is Roma's relaxed sales pitch to Lingk in the bar, which seems to go on forever and in a way you feel it almost threatens to grind the film to a halt. The film's ending is also pretty low key even though it has a terrific scene between Shelley and Williamson which precdes it, but it does end on a rather flat note in itself, as despite the drama its just another day in the office ahead.
Anyway despite those niggles, Glengarry Glen Ross is still an excellent film and features a superb cast at its very best and if you fancy giving it a go, you won't be disappointed.
And with that I shall bid yee farewell!
So the story follows the lives of four real estate salesmen, who work for a firm named Mitch and Murray. One night the salesman are approached by Blake (Alec Badlwin) who gives them a rather brutal pep talk and tells them that only two of the sellers in the team with the most sales will remain with firm and the other two will be fired. Blake then gives them the promise of handing them the new and promising Glengarry leads to the top sellers. The salesmen include Shelley "the machine" Levine (Jack Lemmon) who was once a promising salesman, but has now endured a bad run of luck, who has a sick daughter. Shelley then tries to convince the office manager, John Williamson (Kevin Spacey) into giving some of the new leads, but is unsuccessful as he doesn't have the money to give to him to secure the leads. Two of the other salesman are Dave Moss (Ed Harris) and George Aaronow (Alan Arkin) who complain about the corrupt and underhanded tactics they are using against them and Moss insists that someone should strike back and steal the Glengarry leads and sell them on to another competitor and he tries to coerce George into taking to the task of doing the robbery, but he refuses. And the last salesman is Ricky Roma (Al Pacino) who is the top seller in the team who sits in a bar trying to his use salesmenship to try and persuade a meek middle aged man, James Lingk (Jonathan Pryce) into buying some land, which he eventually does.
The next morning however, the office has been broken into and the leads stolen as the police arrive they question the salesmen one by one. Roma arrives (with George already in the office) and complains to Williamson, demanding that he is owes the first prize for the top sales figures, which is a Cadillac, but he is fobbed by Williamson who deals with the police. Shelley also soon arrives having made a big sale to a couple named Bruce and Harriet Nyborg, however Williamson claims that the cheque they gave Shelley is probably worthless, which leaves Shelley angered and rants at him (much to the delight of Roma). Moss also turns up and after he is questioned by the police, launches a tirade at Roma, expressing his bitterness at Roma's recent success, Roma just throws it right back, and Moss storms out the office in a huff. To complicate matters further, Lingk shows up at the office as his wife has insisted that he cancel the deal with Roma, who tries to persuade him otherwise, but his attempts are thwarted by Williamson, who bluffs the situation without knowing the full facts, and tells Lingk has cheque had been cashed. Lingk is shocked and leaves in a panic, to which Roma then goes on to berate Williamson. Shelley then begins to mock Williamson but let's slip something that will get him into big trouble as the film nears its low key but effective climax....
Based on the acclaimed Pulitzer prize winning play by David Mamet, Glengarry Glen Ross is a compelling and entertaining drama, which keeps you watching thanks to its first rate cast and its superb script, which was adapted by Mamet himself for the film. The dialogue in typical Mamet fashion is pretty uncompromising and harsh and it reflects that hard hearted characters that are in the film, especially Blake, the foul mouthed enforcer who comes to the office to deal the bad news to the salesmen. And in Glengarry Glen Ross there are two types of characters, victims and bullies, with Roma being an aggressive and manipulative salesman, who uses his charm and wit to get what he wants, and Moss who forces the meek George Aaranow into being an accessory before the fact of a planned robbery. And then there is George, the weak willed salesman who struggles to make sales, because of his lack of confidence and Shelley who was once a top salesmen, but now is on a losing streak and faces being canned, as he struggles to support his sick daughter.
Which brings me onto the performances which are superb, starting with Al Pacino who is terrific in his role as the cocky salesman, Ricky Roma, who starts off self assured but as the film carries he begins to slowly shrink before our eyes. Pacino get's his lion share of great dialogue and he has several standout moments such as the one where he berates Williamson for blowing his sale with Lingk and he turns to him and says "You stupid fuckin cunt! Where did you learn you're trade???! What you are here for is to help us... not to FUCK US UP!! You fairy... you company man!" and later on in the same scene he says to him "Do you know the first rule if you ever spent a day in your life?? You NEVER open your mount until you know what the shot is! You fuckin child!". Another is when Williamson hands him some poor leads to work, which Roma throws one back at him, as he yells "Patel???! Ravidam Patel??!! How am I supposed to make a living with these deadbeats!" and followed by "Patel?? Fuck you! Shiva handed this guy a million dollars, and said "sign the deal" and he didn't sign. And the God Vishnu too! I'm gonna found out who's cousin you are, John, and figure out a way to have your ass!". And lastly another favourite line of Pacino's in the film comes when he arrives at the office and sees the break-in and the police standing around who ask him his name and he says "Yes I confess. I did it!".
Ed Harris is also excellent in his role as the hot tempered Dave Moss, a salesman who has had a bad run of luck aswell and is intent on stealing the Glengarry leads to get back at Mitch and Murray. Harris's best moments come in his scenes where he drives and later sits with George in a cafe as they speak about the idea of comitting a robbery in the office. And as they carry on Dave makes George an accessory before the fact "You take the consequences, because you listened". Also in the scene where he berates Roma for his cocky attitude and he shouts at him "What the fuck are you? Mr Slick?? What the fuck are you "Friend to the working man?". Big deal! FUCK YOU!!! You got the memory of a fuckin fly and I never liked you anyway!". And as he leaves the office and Roma teases him by saying "have a good trip" Moss delivers his last line which leaves a strong impression "FUCK YOU!! FUCK THE LOT OF YOU!! FUCK YOU ALL!!". Lovely.
Alan Arkin is also really good in his role as the meek salesman, George Aarnow who struggles with his confidence and ability to make a sale. And throughout the film he is a victim as he feels rightfully trodden on and he often dispairs by saying "I don't know what's the matter with me. I can't close em!". And his best moment later on comes when he is affronted after the police have interrogated him and he keeps yelling "I meet Gestapo tactics! I meet, meet Gestapo tactics! He says "cooperate or we'll take you downtown" as long as lived I have never....!" and then Williamson bursts out of his office and tells him to go to lunch. And later in the last scene he delivers a line I'm sure we can all identify with as he sits down and let's a big sigh and says "Oh God! I hate this job!". And briefly Jonathan Price is also good in his role as the victim of Roma's salesmanship and he later on comes to the office to try and stop the sale from going through only to be fed a lie from Williamson. And Price as Lingk says "Please don't follow me! I let you down! Forgive me." and leaves.
Kevin Spacey in an early film career performance also puts in an excellent performance as the cool headed and somewhat smarmy office manager, John Williamson. Spacey has a few highlights in the film and the one that springs to mind right away is George's outburst to the police after his interrogation, Williamson bursts out the office and says "Will you get out of here??! I am trying to run an office! Now will you go to lunch?! Go to lunch!! Will you go to lunch???!". And in his second to last scene where he speaks with Shelley, who let's slip that he knew the customer, Lingk's cheque was still on the desk (which was a lie), is his best, where he figures out that Shelley was (SPOILER!!!) behind the robbery. And Williamson says "You said you don't make something up unless its sure to help. So how do you know I made it up?" and ask Shelley asks him what he is on about, Williamson tells him he left the cheque on his desk and he didn't take it to the bank. "I told the customer I had taken the contract to the bank, but I didn't. Last night I stayed at home with my kids. One night out of a year I did that, now how did you know that?! Are you going talk to me, or you going to talk to them (the police)? As this is my job on the line here! And you are going to talk to me!". And he eventually get's Levine to admit he broke into the office and sold the leads, to which Williamson then decides to dob him in to the police and Levine asks why and Williamson coldly says "Because I don't like you!".
Which brings us onto Alec Baldwin who provides the film with probably its most memorable performance as the aggressive sales enforcer, Blake, who is "on a mission of mercy!" as he delivers the company's ultimatum to the salesmen to either get the sales in or be fired. Blake only has one scene buts its a long one as he delivers his volatile pep talk to the salesmen and he starts by saying to Shelley who goes to pour himself a cup of coffee: "Put that coffee down! You're name's Levine. You call yourself a salesman, you son of a bitch?! Coffee's for closers only!". Followed by some more gems such as "If you can't close shit, YOU are shit! Hit the bricks, pal, and beat it, because you are going OUT!!". And he walks up to George who almost cowers from him and says "You think this is abuse?? You think this is abuse, you cocksucker?! If you can't take this, how can you take the abuse you get on a sit! If you don't like it leave!". And later he shows the men the blackboard as with the letter "A I D A" "A-I-D-A. Attention, interest, decision, action. Attention, do I have your attention? Interest - are you interested? I know you are because its fuck or walk. Decision - have made your decision for Christ?! And action". And of course the clasic "A-B-C, always be closing. ALWAYS BE CLOSING!". And at the end of the scene he says to Moss "And to answer your question, pal, the reason I came down is because Mitch and Murray asked me to for a favour. And the real reason is, follow my advice and fire your fuckin ass because a loser is a loser!".
And last but far from least is Jack Lemmon is simpy outstanding in his role as the downtrodden and once great salesman, Shelley "The Machine" Levine and this performance really is one of the highlights of his career. Lemmon plays the put upon man better than any actor could possibly ever manage and he also succeeds in making Shelley the only really sympathetic character in the film. Lemmon has many highlights in the film such as the scene where he tries to barter with Williamson to buy some of the Glengarry leads and as Williamson keeps refusing his offers he says "That's defeatist, fuck it! Do you want to do something, you heard the man! Attack!". And later on in his rant against Williamson in the office, he says to him "You do not know your job! A man IS his job, and you are fucked at yours! What are you? You're a fuckin secretary! Fuck you! Yes that's right fuck you and kiss my ass! Now I want my name on that board, and I want three promising leads and I am going to close them all. And that's all I have to say to you today!" and he gives Williamson the finger. And later as he mocks Williamson for blowing Roma's deal, he says "You just fucked a good man out of six thousands dollars and his goddamn bonus because you didn't know the shot! If you can't something from that, you're scum, you're fuckin whitebread" and then he let's slip he knew about Williamson's lie "If you're gonna make something up, John, before sure it helps! Or keep your mouth shut".
Finally getting onto the direction, James Foley does a fine job with the film and its material and he keeps the pace flowing nicely and keeps the drama of the piece quite taut. It also helps that Glengarry Glen Ross isn't that long a film so it rarely if ever drags. The film's score by James Newton Howard is not too bad, although it has to be said it remains one of my least favourite aspects of the film, but it does have one or two nice moody atmospheric tracks that suit the film's grimy tone well.
So as for flaws, how about Glengarry, how does it fair??? Well there's too much to complain about as ticks alot boxes as film. However perhaps the only thing about the film is perhaps some of the scenes do feel a little drawn out, as well written as they are. And the scene for me that is drawn out the most is Roma's relaxed sales pitch to Lingk in the bar, which seems to go on forever and in a way you feel it almost threatens to grind the film to a halt. The film's ending is also pretty low key even though it has a terrific scene between Shelley and Williamson which precdes it, but it does end on a rather flat note in itself, as despite the drama its just another day in the office ahead.
Anyway despite those niggles, Glengarry Glen Ross is still an excellent film and features a superb cast at its very best and if you fancy giving it a go, you won't be disappointed.
And with that I shall bid yee farewell!
Monday 17 March 2014
Wolfenstein "Blazkowitz!!!!"
Right time for a slight change as I will cover a video game this time for my revoow and this one could be deemed a rather unpopular choice or rather one that wasn't so commercially successful and that is Wolfenstein, which is a sequel to the acclaimed Return to Castle Wolfenstein, in which an American spy takes on the Nazi army. So let's stack up the weapons and ammo and give this one a look....
So a bit about the plot as the story is set during World war II in 1943 where special agent "BJ" Blazkowitz steals a medallion on a German battleship. When BJ is discovered he uses the medallion which its powers kills everyone and he escapes back to the OSA headquarters. During a meeting BJ learns that the medallion needs crystals called Nachstonne, which are mined in a small town named Isenstadt, to make full use of its power. BJ is then sent to Isenstadt where he meets with the Kriesau circle, a resistance group who are intent on saving their town from the Nazis. In the town BJ visits a black market where he can buy upgrades, weapons and ammo as well as powers for the medallion. BJ also meets the leader of the Kriesau circle, Caroline Becker, who is a former schoolteacher and she sends BJ on a mission to a secret dig site in order to steal another medallion. At the dig site he rescues a young Russian named Sergei Kolov and as BJ finds the medallion, Kolov instructs him on how to use it with a crystal he has. The crystal when used with the medallion allows BJ to enter the Veil, which is a barrier between the real world and a dimension called Black sun, and they both escape. Kolov then takes BJ back to a secret hideout owned by the Golden dawn, a group of scholars who specialise in the occult. After this BJ goes on more missions and he gains more powers for the medallion as well as new weapons and upgrades. And as the game moves on BJ must use his weapons and powers to try and take down the Nazis who are hellbent on using these powers for their own evil ends.
While it wasn't a commercial success and as result of poor sales, the game's company Activision were forced to pay off some of their employees, Wolfenstein still is a very enjoyable action game and its a good follow up to the Return to Castle Wolfenstein. And gameplay wise Wolfenstein is also very entertaining and it actually has alot of options and upgrades to it as well, which in a way makes it surprising that it wasn't more of a success than it was. And the single player is also quite lengthy and the missions themselves are also fairly varied and offer a decent challenge as well as the game bosses most of which are good fun to try and bump off and aren't too frustrating to dispatch.
Which brings me onto say a bit more about the gameplay itself which is the game's main strength as the control system is very easy to use and the combat system is also pretty simple. The game also has good customisation for upgrading your ammo, weapons and crystal powers and the weapons available are quite varied. And BJ pays for the weapons by picking up bars of gold which are scattered throughout the game. The crystal powers in the game are also part of what makes the game so fun as the crystals have different powers such as the ability to slow down time, while you can still move at a normal rate, you can also run faster, create a shield around yourself to deflect gunfire as well as protect yourself against elements such as fire or electricity and you can even see through walls. The weapons themselves are also pretty nifty as in addition to the standard weapons such as the MP40 and MP43 machine guns, you can also get a rifle, flamethrower, panzerschreck (rocket launcher). And you cna also get some cool Nazi experimentation weapons such as the particle canon, which can literally vapourise your enemies and the Tesla gun which you can zap them dead with bolts of electricity and lastly the Leichenfaust 44, which can be used to open steel doors as well as vapourise its enemies (they seem to like that!). BJ can also has a simple in game inventory system where he can look at his current objectives, weapons status and as the game progresses he can gain intel throughout on the Nazis which he picks up during misssions. BJ also has in-game compass which he can use to help him navigate areas which will lead him toward his objectives and he can also find pools of black sun energy which he steps into to re-charge his medallion's power. The enemies themselves in Wolfenstein are mostly straightforward to dispatch as you get hoards of Nazi soldiers fighting you, although later some of them use crystals to defend themselves and create shields against your gunfire. As for the game's supernatural Nazis they can be tricky to kill off in some instances (such as Veil assassins that can become invisible and slice at you with blades attached to their hands) but in others they aren't too bad to defeat.
Moving onto the game's graphics they are largely excellent as the environments are very impressive and varied as BJ will travel to different locations such as dig sites, farms, churches, taverns, onto Zeppelins, and of course through the streets of Isenstadt. The character models themselves aren't too bad although in comparison to what you can get now in games they do look a bit unsophisticated by contrast. The game also has some great visual effects such as the veil itself, when you turn it on your screen goes dark green and you then see some strange creatures float around your screen called Geist, which can blow up if you shoot at them, they can also take out nearby enemies with them. The game also has some rather graphic violence in which the Nazi's can have their limbs blown off or be burned to a cinder by the flamethrower, and you later can upgrade your sniper rifle and add a more powerful silenced nozzle which allows for the Nazis to be decapitated! It sounds a bit sick but the game's violence overall isn't too bad even though it is fairly strong (and the game did receive an 18 certificate on its release). The game's music score by Bill Brown is also quite good and features some good passages although it does sound a bit cheesey at times and it does undercut the game's effectiveness from time to time.
As for the game's flaws well its not quite perfect for sure and its main problem lies in the voice acting which is at times a bit comical sounding. And while the voice actors aren't awful they could have done a much better job than they were allowed to as the German accents just sound ridiculous and the game's cutscenes are also a bit tedious as a result of this. The game itself probably would even have a bit more credibility if they were to do it in German with subtitles, but I guess that would have just alienated it more form a mainstream audience. And while the gameplay itself is really good, one fault that does come to mind is that you do spend quite a bit of time meandering in between missions to try and get to your next objective as you wander the streets and try and avoid or engage in combat with the Nazis or other supernatural baddies. The game's single player campaign could also be accused of taking some time to get into as it does get off to a slow start but it does become more fun once it get's going. Another flaw boils down to the game's multiplayer which was to said to be riddled with bugs although a patch was released to resolve these issues, and part of the game's appeal presumably would have lied in its multiplayer being a success, especially after the great success of Return to Castle Wolfenstein. However for me its always been about the single player game experience and not multiplayer.
So that's it for my look at Wolfenstein, which remains an underrated and very entertaining first person shooter game, which despite its lack of commercial success is well worth giving a go as you might just enjoy it.
And on that note I shall say Auf Weidersehen!
So a bit about the plot as the story is set during World war II in 1943 where special agent "BJ" Blazkowitz steals a medallion on a German battleship. When BJ is discovered he uses the medallion which its powers kills everyone and he escapes back to the OSA headquarters. During a meeting BJ learns that the medallion needs crystals called Nachstonne, which are mined in a small town named Isenstadt, to make full use of its power. BJ is then sent to Isenstadt where he meets with the Kriesau circle, a resistance group who are intent on saving their town from the Nazis. In the town BJ visits a black market where he can buy upgrades, weapons and ammo as well as powers for the medallion. BJ also meets the leader of the Kriesau circle, Caroline Becker, who is a former schoolteacher and she sends BJ on a mission to a secret dig site in order to steal another medallion. At the dig site he rescues a young Russian named Sergei Kolov and as BJ finds the medallion, Kolov instructs him on how to use it with a crystal he has. The crystal when used with the medallion allows BJ to enter the Veil, which is a barrier between the real world and a dimension called Black sun, and they both escape. Kolov then takes BJ back to a secret hideout owned by the Golden dawn, a group of scholars who specialise in the occult. After this BJ goes on more missions and he gains more powers for the medallion as well as new weapons and upgrades. And as the game moves on BJ must use his weapons and powers to try and take down the Nazis who are hellbent on using these powers for their own evil ends.
While it wasn't a commercial success and as result of poor sales, the game's company Activision were forced to pay off some of their employees, Wolfenstein still is a very enjoyable action game and its a good follow up to the Return to Castle Wolfenstein. And gameplay wise Wolfenstein is also very entertaining and it actually has alot of options and upgrades to it as well, which in a way makes it surprising that it wasn't more of a success than it was. And the single player is also quite lengthy and the missions themselves are also fairly varied and offer a decent challenge as well as the game bosses most of which are good fun to try and bump off and aren't too frustrating to dispatch.
Which brings me onto say a bit more about the gameplay itself which is the game's main strength as the control system is very easy to use and the combat system is also pretty simple. The game also has good customisation for upgrading your ammo, weapons and crystal powers and the weapons available are quite varied. And BJ pays for the weapons by picking up bars of gold which are scattered throughout the game. The crystal powers in the game are also part of what makes the game so fun as the crystals have different powers such as the ability to slow down time, while you can still move at a normal rate, you can also run faster, create a shield around yourself to deflect gunfire as well as protect yourself against elements such as fire or electricity and you can even see through walls. The weapons themselves are also pretty nifty as in addition to the standard weapons such as the MP40 and MP43 machine guns, you can also get a rifle, flamethrower, panzerschreck (rocket launcher). And you cna also get some cool Nazi experimentation weapons such as the particle canon, which can literally vapourise your enemies and the Tesla gun which you can zap them dead with bolts of electricity and lastly the Leichenfaust 44, which can be used to open steel doors as well as vapourise its enemies (they seem to like that!). BJ can also has a simple in game inventory system where he can look at his current objectives, weapons status and as the game progresses he can gain intel throughout on the Nazis which he picks up during misssions. BJ also has in-game compass which he can use to help him navigate areas which will lead him toward his objectives and he can also find pools of black sun energy which he steps into to re-charge his medallion's power. The enemies themselves in Wolfenstein are mostly straightforward to dispatch as you get hoards of Nazi soldiers fighting you, although later some of them use crystals to defend themselves and create shields against your gunfire. As for the game's supernatural Nazis they can be tricky to kill off in some instances (such as Veil assassins that can become invisible and slice at you with blades attached to their hands) but in others they aren't too bad to defeat.
Moving onto the game's graphics they are largely excellent as the environments are very impressive and varied as BJ will travel to different locations such as dig sites, farms, churches, taverns, onto Zeppelins, and of course through the streets of Isenstadt. The character models themselves aren't too bad although in comparison to what you can get now in games they do look a bit unsophisticated by contrast. The game also has some great visual effects such as the veil itself, when you turn it on your screen goes dark green and you then see some strange creatures float around your screen called Geist, which can blow up if you shoot at them, they can also take out nearby enemies with them. The game also has some rather graphic violence in which the Nazi's can have their limbs blown off or be burned to a cinder by the flamethrower, and you later can upgrade your sniper rifle and add a more powerful silenced nozzle which allows for the Nazis to be decapitated! It sounds a bit sick but the game's violence overall isn't too bad even though it is fairly strong (and the game did receive an 18 certificate on its release). The game's music score by Bill Brown is also quite good and features some good passages although it does sound a bit cheesey at times and it does undercut the game's effectiveness from time to time.
As for the game's flaws well its not quite perfect for sure and its main problem lies in the voice acting which is at times a bit comical sounding. And while the voice actors aren't awful they could have done a much better job than they were allowed to as the German accents just sound ridiculous and the game's cutscenes are also a bit tedious as a result of this. The game itself probably would even have a bit more credibility if they were to do it in German with subtitles, but I guess that would have just alienated it more form a mainstream audience. And while the gameplay itself is really good, one fault that does come to mind is that you do spend quite a bit of time meandering in between missions to try and get to your next objective as you wander the streets and try and avoid or engage in combat with the Nazis or other supernatural baddies. The game's single player campaign could also be accused of taking some time to get into as it does get off to a slow start but it does become more fun once it get's going. Another flaw boils down to the game's multiplayer which was to said to be riddled with bugs although a patch was released to resolve these issues, and part of the game's appeal presumably would have lied in its multiplayer being a success, especially after the great success of Return to Castle Wolfenstein. However for me its always been about the single player game experience and not multiplayer.
So that's it for my look at Wolfenstein, which remains an underrated and very entertaining first person shooter game, which despite its lack of commercial success is well worth giving a go as you might just enjoy it.
And on that note I shall say Auf Weidersehen!
Saturday 15 March 2014
Spinal tap "These go up to 11!"
Well I've reviewed so many films already and after a while you come stuck for ideas for one, but I couldn't resist finally doing a review on this modern comedy classic, This is Spinal tap which did an immaculate job in taking the piss out of heavy metal bands in this wonderful psuedo rock documentary film. So let's get on the spandex, turn on the guitars, and turn this up to 11.....
So the film is told in a documentary style, or "rockumentary" as the film's director Marty Di Bergi (Rob Reiner) would say it, who follows the fictional British rock band, Spinal tap on their tour of America as they release their new album "Smell the glove". The film is interspersed with one on one interviews as well footage from their previous periods in their career. The band's two founding members, David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean) and Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest) started the band back in the 1960s. David and Nigel talk about how over the years how they changed their band's name and even styles of music but they soon ended as a heavy metal band. The other band members include Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer) keyboardist Viv Savage (David Kaff) and a series of drummers who have all died in mysterious circumstances. David and Nigel during the interviews prove to be good musicians and decent songwriters but they are also rather immature and not too bright.
As the film progresses the band go on tour but their shows are repeatedly cancelled due to poor ticket sales and there are further issues when the band's new album cover is deemed as being offensive and sexist. And to make matters more complicated, David's girlfriend, Jeanine (June Chadwick) turns up and she starts to try and exert her influence on the band by making suggestions about their stage presentations and costumes. There are also further disgruntlements in the group when their manager Ian Faith (Tony Hendra) reveals the new album cover to be completely black, without the band's consent. As a result of the poor ticket sales and empty shows, Nigel suggests that they do an epic stage production for one of their biggest songs "Stonehenge" for which Nigel draws a Stonehenge megalith on a napkin but he mislables the dimensions (as he labels it as 18 inches instead of feet!). As a result a small prop of the Stonehenge megalith is produced on stage and the band is made a laughing stock. After the performance the band row with Ian and Jeanine offers to co-manage the band with Ian to help out on the creative side, however Ian refuses and quits.
After this things go from bad to worse for the bad as without Ian to promote them, Jeanine is forced to find them smaller and smaller venues and they soon end up playing at an airforce base. During the gig there, Nigel, frustrated at his equipment malfunctioning, throws down his guitar and quits the band. As Nigel was the main songwriter of the band, this leaves them without much material to play, so they result to doing "Jazz Odyssey" their own free form version of Jazz, which isn't well received. On the last day of the tour, Nigel reappears and tells David that Ian has heard that one of their singles from the album, "Sex Farm" is a big hit over in Japan and would he be interested in doing a tour over there, at first David isn't so keen on the idea but he then invites Nigel back on stage during the last gig, caught up in the moment. As a result of this David decides to hire back Ian and they do a very successful sell out tour in Japan.
There have been many attempts at the rock documentary spoof since, but This is Spinal Tap is without a doubt the best one and it set the precedent which has remained unbeaten since. The film was actually only a moderate success on its initial release but over time it has gained a big cult following and has gained much critical acclaim. Spinal tap also perfectly succeeds in taking the piss out of not only big heavy metal bands of the time that took themselves way too seriously but also the nature of the rock documentaries as well. The film's main characters, David and Nigel are both egomaniacs and pretentious yet somehow likeable buffoons who are so wrapped up in their little fantasy world that they can't see past themselves. This is something which is well noted by their manager, Ian Faith, who at one point says to them "you seem to just live in this poncy little adolescent world you have built for yourselves!". The script itself has so many funny lines of which many were ad-libbed by its cast and there was also several hours of recorded film and there is also apparently a four and half hour long bootleg version of the film. And the DVD version also features a number of deleted scenes which add up to the length of the film itself!
Getting onto the performances the cast are all great and the play each part to perfection starting with Michael McKean as David St.Hubbins, the leader, singer and ryhtyhm guitarist of the group who is a bit of a pretentious airhead yet still fairly likeable. The film has it choice of dialogue and McKean certainly get's plenty of good lines in the film, such as the line after Nigel leaves the band, David is drugged up and during his interview with Marti he says "Well I'm sure I would be more upset if I wasn't under such heavy sedation!". And just after the intro scene where the band play their first song of the film David addresses the audience by saying "We are Spinal tap from the UK and you must be the USA!!!". And during their row with Ian after the Stonehenge debacle of their model monument being kicked around by stage dwarves, David berates Ian by saying "I do not think for one second that the problem was that the band was down. I think the problem may have been that there was a Stonehenge monument on stage that was in danger of being crushed by a dwarf! That tended to understate the hugeness of the object!". And later on at the end of the scene when Derek asks David if they will do Stonehenge tomorrow David shouts "No we're not gonna fucking do Stonehenge!!". And also in the scene where Ian reveals the all black cover album for Smell the Glove, David is disgusted and says "I mean this is depressing! This isn't something you put on your fucking turntable!". And of course one of my favourites is when Marti asks David about the origins on his surname, St.Hubbins and he says "He was the patron saint of quality footwear".
Which brings me onto Christopher Guest who is hilarious as Nigel Tufnel, David's dimwitted co-founder of the band, yet at the same time he is a pretty good musician. I think it safe to say that Guest get's all the best dialogue in the film and there so many examples and one of the most obvious ones is of course where he plays a poignant piece of music on the piano for Marti, who asks him what its called and Nigel says "Its called lick my love pump!" as well as it being "A sort of Mozart and Bach piece, or a Mach piece". Another hilarious moment that Guest has is when he is backstage and expresses his annoyance over how the bread he has to make sandwiches is too small. And then he goes to moan about the olives, as he says "Look who's in here?" to an empty olive and then he picks up one stuffed with pimento and he says "And in here there's a little guy, look! So its a complete catastrophe!" and Ian insists he shouldn't let it get to him and Nigel says "It won't affect my performance. It does disturb me, but I am a professional so I will rise above it!". And then there is the definitive scene where Nigel gives Marti a tour of his guitar collection and he shows him his customised Marshall amp which "goes up to 11". And when Marti asks Nigel "Well why don't you make 10 a little louder and make that the loudest??" and Nigel looks blankly for a second and then says "These go up to 11". And then there is the scene where they discuss how the band's various drummers have died over the years and how one of them apparently choked on vomit, although they couldn't determine who's vomit it was and Nigel says "You can't dust for vomit". And lastly I will mention what happens to be the film's final scene where Marti asks Nigel what would he do if he wasn't a rock star and Nigel says he could probably work in a shoe store. And Nigel pretends to be a shop worker and Marti asks "Do you think you'd be happy doing that?" and Nigel naively says "Well I don't know... what are the hours???". And I should also add that both McKean and Guest have excellent English accents that if you didn't know they were American you might not have twigged.
Harry Shearer is also great in his role as the band's bass player, Derek Smalls, who is the cool, calm and collected member of the group who attempts to diffuse the tensions between David and Nigel when things get heated. And Shearer has some funny moments of his own of course and in reference to his place in the group he says "They're like two types of distinct visionaires, like fire and ice. And I'm more like lukewarm water". And Shearer also has another funny moment where during one of their live stage performances, David and Nigel emerge from their stage set piece cocoons, but Dereks' doesn't open properly and he ends up have to play the song trapped inside, and he emerges just as the song finishes and David and Nigel re-enter their cocoons, and Derek get's his arm trapped in his cocoon as it closes again! And then there is of course the scene where Derek tries to walk through an airport metal detector machine, and he keeps having to take off metallic items, and the security woman eventually has to use a detector which goes off around his groin area, and Derek undoes his zip and pulls out a large cucumber and drops it on the counter!
Rob Reiner also deserves a mention as he is also great in his role as Marti Di Bergi, the film director (as well as director!) and his opening monologue to the screen sets the film's tone perfectly. And in his opening scene he says "In 1966, I went down to Greenwich village in New York city to a rock club called the Electric Banana. Don't look for it, it isn't there anymore. But that night I heard a band that redefined the word "rock and roll". I remember being knocked out by their exuberance, their raw power, and their punctuality!". Reiner also has another funny moment where he reads some unfavourable reviews of Spinal tap's previous albums over there years, one such review says "I wonder on which day God created Spinal tap and couldn't he have rested on that day too?" and also "Here is a review for your album, Shark sandwich, which is simply a two word review which says "Shit sandwich".
The film also features some fun supporting performances, which include Tony Hendra who is priceless in his role as the band's Australian manager, Ian Faith, who comes across as bit of a control freak who has a rather hot temper and is often scene toting his cricket bat (which he uses in one scene to smash up a table and place against someone's throat). Hendra has plenty of great moments in the film such as in the scene where he unveils the black cover album to the group and he says "I think this is it now! I think its time to kick arse!". And also earlier when Ian talks to the president of Polymer records (Tap's record promoter) who is against the album cover he exclaims quietly from the phone "Fuckin old poofta!" and later he speaks to Bobbi Flekman who tells how offensive the cover of the album is and Ian says "Well you should have seen the cover they wanted to do! It wasn't a glove, believe me!". Another hilarious moment is when Ian meets with the designer who creates the small Stonehenge monument, specified to 18 inches as drawn ineptly on Nigel's napkin, and Ian is outraged at how small it is and the designer says "But the napkin said 18 inches!" and Ian throws down and yells "Forget this! Fuck the napkin!". And later on during the scene where he rows with the band and balks at Jeanine's suggestion to co-manage the band with him and he says "I am not going to co-manage the band with anyone and certainly not with someone who dresses like an Australian's worst nightmare! So fuck you, and fuck all of you! I quit!".
And lastly I will mention Bruno Kirby and Billy Crystal who put in small cameo roles in the film, although the more prominent of the two is Bruno Kirby. And Kirby's scene is great as he plays a limo driver who drives the band while they are in New York and he notices one of the band's girlfriends is reading a Frank Sinatra biography, and they close the limo glass window while he talks to them reciting from the book. And the driver shakes his head and says "Fuckin limeys!" and Marti explains how the band are from a different world than Frank Sinatra and the driver "Yeah I know. But the thing is you don't know life unless you have loved and lived life like Frank has" and he goes on to say of the band "This is passing thing. Its a fad!".
As for the film's music the songs which were all written by the three lead actors in McKean, Guest and Shearer and they are priceless as well as perfect parodies of the kind of cheesy hard rock songs of the time. The songs themselves are pretty catchy and good in their own right, such as "Tonight I'm gonna rock you", "Hell Hole", "Sex Farm". But my favourite has to be "Big Bottom" as the lyrics are just hilarious as the chorus lines are so ridiculous "Big bottom, big bottom! Talk about bumcakes, my girl's got em! Big bottom leave me out of my mind. How can I leave this behind???". Also direction wise Rob Reiner also never puts a foot wrong here either as he perfectly sends up the material that he is supposed to and even he himself contributed to the songs in the film.
As for the film's flaws???? Spinal tap get's so much right that its hard to be picky about it, although perhaps in a way the only problem with Spinal tap is the legacy it left as so many imitators came along to do the rock spoof and they just never came close to this. And after a while I think the actors themselves were probably guilty of milking the parts publicly long after the film was released, even so much so they even appeared in the American heavy metal band, Metallica's black album tour documentary video, where Spinal Tap show up at an event and express their displeasure at Metallica for ripping off their album cover! But I guess that's just nitpicking really.
So that's it for my look at This is Spinal Tap, which after 30 years is still as funny as it was when it was first released and is still always worth a revisit once in a while.
And so I will leave ye there for now.
So the film is told in a documentary style, or "rockumentary" as the film's director Marty Di Bergi (Rob Reiner) would say it, who follows the fictional British rock band, Spinal tap on their tour of America as they release their new album "Smell the glove". The film is interspersed with one on one interviews as well footage from their previous periods in their career. The band's two founding members, David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean) and Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest) started the band back in the 1960s. David and Nigel talk about how over the years how they changed their band's name and even styles of music but they soon ended as a heavy metal band. The other band members include Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer) keyboardist Viv Savage (David Kaff) and a series of drummers who have all died in mysterious circumstances. David and Nigel during the interviews prove to be good musicians and decent songwriters but they are also rather immature and not too bright.
As the film progresses the band go on tour but their shows are repeatedly cancelled due to poor ticket sales and there are further issues when the band's new album cover is deemed as being offensive and sexist. And to make matters more complicated, David's girlfriend, Jeanine (June Chadwick) turns up and she starts to try and exert her influence on the band by making suggestions about their stage presentations and costumes. There are also further disgruntlements in the group when their manager Ian Faith (Tony Hendra) reveals the new album cover to be completely black, without the band's consent. As a result of the poor ticket sales and empty shows, Nigel suggests that they do an epic stage production for one of their biggest songs "Stonehenge" for which Nigel draws a Stonehenge megalith on a napkin but he mislables the dimensions (as he labels it as 18 inches instead of feet!). As a result a small prop of the Stonehenge megalith is produced on stage and the band is made a laughing stock. After the performance the band row with Ian and Jeanine offers to co-manage the band with Ian to help out on the creative side, however Ian refuses and quits.
After this things go from bad to worse for the bad as without Ian to promote them, Jeanine is forced to find them smaller and smaller venues and they soon end up playing at an airforce base. During the gig there, Nigel, frustrated at his equipment malfunctioning, throws down his guitar and quits the band. As Nigel was the main songwriter of the band, this leaves them without much material to play, so they result to doing "Jazz Odyssey" their own free form version of Jazz, which isn't well received. On the last day of the tour, Nigel reappears and tells David that Ian has heard that one of their singles from the album, "Sex Farm" is a big hit over in Japan and would he be interested in doing a tour over there, at first David isn't so keen on the idea but he then invites Nigel back on stage during the last gig, caught up in the moment. As a result of this David decides to hire back Ian and they do a very successful sell out tour in Japan.
There have been many attempts at the rock documentary spoof since, but This is Spinal Tap is without a doubt the best one and it set the precedent which has remained unbeaten since. The film was actually only a moderate success on its initial release but over time it has gained a big cult following and has gained much critical acclaim. Spinal tap also perfectly succeeds in taking the piss out of not only big heavy metal bands of the time that took themselves way too seriously but also the nature of the rock documentaries as well. The film's main characters, David and Nigel are both egomaniacs and pretentious yet somehow likeable buffoons who are so wrapped up in their little fantasy world that they can't see past themselves. This is something which is well noted by their manager, Ian Faith, who at one point says to them "you seem to just live in this poncy little adolescent world you have built for yourselves!". The script itself has so many funny lines of which many were ad-libbed by its cast and there was also several hours of recorded film and there is also apparently a four and half hour long bootleg version of the film. And the DVD version also features a number of deleted scenes which add up to the length of the film itself!
Getting onto the performances the cast are all great and the play each part to perfection starting with Michael McKean as David St.Hubbins, the leader, singer and ryhtyhm guitarist of the group who is a bit of a pretentious airhead yet still fairly likeable. The film has it choice of dialogue and McKean certainly get's plenty of good lines in the film, such as the line after Nigel leaves the band, David is drugged up and during his interview with Marti he says "Well I'm sure I would be more upset if I wasn't under such heavy sedation!". And just after the intro scene where the band play their first song of the film David addresses the audience by saying "We are Spinal tap from the UK and you must be the USA!!!". And during their row with Ian after the Stonehenge debacle of their model monument being kicked around by stage dwarves, David berates Ian by saying "I do not think for one second that the problem was that the band was down. I think the problem may have been that there was a Stonehenge monument on stage that was in danger of being crushed by a dwarf! That tended to understate the hugeness of the object!". And later on at the end of the scene when Derek asks David if they will do Stonehenge tomorrow David shouts "No we're not gonna fucking do Stonehenge!!". And also in the scene where Ian reveals the all black cover album for Smell the Glove, David is disgusted and says "I mean this is depressing! This isn't something you put on your fucking turntable!". And of course one of my favourites is when Marti asks David about the origins on his surname, St.Hubbins and he says "He was the patron saint of quality footwear".
Which brings me onto Christopher Guest who is hilarious as Nigel Tufnel, David's dimwitted co-founder of the band, yet at the same time he is a pretty good musician. I think it safe to say that Guest get's all the best dialogue in the film and there so many examples and one of the most obvious ones is of course where he plays a poignant piece of music on the piano for Marti, who asks him what its called and Nigel says "Its called lick my love pump!" as well as it being "A sort of Mozart and Bach piece, or a Mach piece". Another hilarious moment that Guest has is when he is backstage and expresses his annoyance over how the bread he has to make sandwiches is too small. And then he goes to moan about the olives, as he says "Look who's in here?" to an empty olive and then he picks up one stuffed with pimento and he says "And in here there's a little guy, look! So its a complete catastrophe!" and Ian insists he shouldn't let it get to him and Nigel says "It won't affect my performance. It does disturb me, but I am a professional so I will rise above it!". And then there is the definitive scene where Nigel gives Marti a tour of his guitar collection and he shows him his customised Marshall amp which "goes up to 11". And when Marti asks Nigel "Well why don't you make 10 a little louder and make that the loudest??" and Nigel looks blankly for a second and then says "These go up to 11". And then there is the scene where they discuss how the band's various drummers have died over the years and how one of them apparently choked on vomit, although they couldn't determine who's vomit it was and Nigel says "You can't dust for vomit". And lastly I will mention what happens to be the film's final scene where Marti asks Nigel what would he do if he wasn't a rock star and Nigel says he could probably work in a shoe store. And Nigel pretends to be a shop worker and Marti asks "Do you think you'd be happy doing that?" and Nigel naively says "Well I don't know... what are the hours???". And I should also add that both McKean and Guest have excellent English accents that if you didn't know they were American you might not have twigged.
Harry Shearer is also great in his role as the band's bass player, Derek Smalls, who is the cool, calm and collected member of the group who attempts to diffuse the tensions between David and Nigel when things get heated. And Shearer has some funny moments of his own of course and in reference to his place in the group he says "They're like two types of distinct visionaires, like fire and ice. And I'm more like lukewarm water". And Shearer also has another funny moment where during one of their live stage performances, David and Nigel emerge from their stage set piece cocoons, but Dereks' doesn't open properly and he ends up have to play the song trapped inside, and he emerges just as the song finishes and David and Nigel re-enter their cocoons, and Derek get's his arm trapped in his cocoon as it closes again! And then there is of course the scene where Derek tries to walk through an airport metal detector machine, and he keeps having to take off metallic items, and the security woman eventually has to use a detector which goes off around his groin area, and Derek undoes his zip and pulls out a large cucumber and drops it on the counter!
Rob Reiner also deserves a mention as he is also great in his role as Marti Di Bergi, the film director (as well as director!) and his opening monologue to the screen sets the film's tone perfectly. And in his opening scene he says "In 1966, I went down to Greenwich village in New York city to a rock club called the Electric Banana. Don't look for it, it isn't there anymore. But that night I heard a band that redefined the word "rock and roll". I remember being knocked out by their exuberance, their raw power, and their punctuality!". Reiner also has another funny moment where he reads some unfavourable reviews of Spinal tap's previous albums over there years, one such review says "I wonder on which day God created Spinal tap and couldn't he have rested on that day too?" and also "Here is a review for your album, Shark sandwich, which is simply a two word review which says "Shit sandwich".
The film also features some fun supporting performances, which include Tony Hendra who is priceless in his role as the band's Australian manager, Ian Faith, who comes across as bit of a control freak who has a rather hot temper and is often scene toting his cricket bat (which he uses in one scene to smash up a table and place against someone's throat). Hendra has plenty of great moments in the film such as in the scene where he unveils the black cover album to the group and he says "I think this is it now! I think its time to kick arse!". And also earlier when Ian talks to the president of Polymer records (Tap's record promoter) who is against the album cover he exclaims quietly from the phone "Fuckin old poofta!" and later he speaks to Bobbi Flekman who tells how offensive the cover of the album is and Ian says "Well you should have seen the cover they wanted to do! It wasn't a glove, believe me!". Another hilarious moment is when Ian meets with the designer who creates the small Stonehenge monument, specified to 18 inches as drawn ineptly on Nigel's napkin, and Ian is outraged at how small it is and the designer says "But the napkin said 18 inches!" and Ian throws down and yells "Forget this! Fuck the napkin!". And later on during the scene where he rows with the band and balks at Jeanine's suggestion to co-manage the band with him and he says "I am not going to co-manage the band with anyone and certainly not with someone who dresses like an Australian's worst nightmare! So fuck you, and fuck all of you! I quit!".
And lastly I will mention Bruno Kirby and Billy Crystal who put in small cameo roles in the film, although the more prominent of the two is Bruno Kirby. And Kirby's scene is great as he plays a limo driver who drives the band while they are in New York and he notices one of the band's girlfriends is reading a Frank Sinatra biography, and they close the limo glass window while he talks to them reciting from the book. And the driver shakes his head and says "Fuckin limeys!" and Marti explains how the band are from a different world than Frank Sinatra and the driver "Yeah I know. But the thing is you don't know life unless you have loved and lived life like Frank has" and he goes on to say of the band "This is passing thing. Its a fad!".
As for the film's music the songs which were all written by the three lead actors in McKean, Guest and Shearer and they are priceless as well as perfect parodies of the kind of cheesy hard rock songs of the time. The songs themselves are pretty catchy and good in their own right, such as "Tonight I'm gonna rock you", "Hell Hole", "Sex Farm". But my favourite has to be "Big Bottom" as the lyrics are just hilarious as the chorus lines are so ridiculous "Big bottom, big bottom! Talk about bumcakes, my girl's got em! Big bottom leave me out of my mind. How can I leave this behind???". Also direction wise Rob Reiner also never puts a foot wrong here either as he perfectly sends up the material that he is supposed to and even he himself contributed to the songs in the film.
As for the film's flaws???? Spinal tap get's so much right that its hard to be picky about it, although perhaps in a way the only problem with Spinal tap is the legacy it left as so many imitators came along to do the rock spoof and they just never came close to this. And after a while I think the actors themselves were probably guilty of milking the parts publicly long after the film was released, even so much so they even appeared in the American heavy metal band, Metallica's black album tour documentary video, where Spinal Tap show up at an event and express their displeasure at Metallica for ripping off their album cover! But I guess that's just nitpicking really.
So that's it for my look at This is Spinal Tap, which after 30 years is still as funny as it was when it was first released and is still always worth a revisit once in a while.
And so I will leave ye there for now.
Sunday 9 March 2014
Call of Duty "Banzaiiiiii!!!!"
OK another review coming your ways and this one is on a video game, Call of Duty World at War, which was the fifth in the COD series so let's load up the rifles, bayonets, flamethrowers and get ready to go to war....
So a quick bit about the story of the game as it starts during the second world war in August 1942 where a marine Private Miller is held captive by the Japanese on Makin island and Miller witnesses the torture and execution of one of his fellow soldiers. Just before Miller is set to suffer the same fate he is rescued by Corporal Roebuck (voiced by Kiefer Sutherland) and his men who launch an attack on the Japanese soldiers on the island. The story then moves two years ahead at the start of the battle of Peleliu with Miller and Roebuck arriving in ships onto the fortified shores, Miller then radios an air strike to destroy to Japanese tanks to allow the American tanks to move ahead. The battle continues and near the end Sergeant O'Sullivan is killed by a Japanese soldier with a katana, after which Roebuck takes over as Sergeant and leads the squad, and during the mission Miller obtains a flamethrower to burn out soldiers in the bunkers and a bazooka to destroy tanks.
After this story then shifts to Moscow in September 1942 during the Battle of Stalingrad, and the playable character is Private Dimitri Peterenko who lies in the aftermath of an assault on Russian soldiers, who lie dead everywhere. Dimitri soon comes along another solider, Sergeant Viktor Reznov, who tells him he is on a secret mission to kill a German general named Henreich Amsel who is behind the massacres. Together the two of them work together and regroup with Dimitri's squad and Dimitri succeeds in killing Amsel as he flees for his life and afterward Reznov and Dimitri escape together in a boat. The following mission for the Russians takes place in 1945 during the battle of the Seelow Heights where Reznov meets up with Dimitri and saves his life and they continue their fight against the Germans. And the story also continues to alternate between the Americans fighting the Japanese in Okinawa and the Russians fighting the Germans in Berlin.
Following the commercial and critical success of Call of Duty Modern Warfare the year previous in 2007, World at War does a fine job in following it up and it still remains one of my own favourite COD games. There was at the time criticism aimed the series for shfiting yet again back to the 2nd world war when they have already covered it extensively in the first three games and thereby adds precious little new to the series. And while you might say that is a fair argument what it did do is take what was so good about Modern Warfare and transfer it into the WWII setting, especially with the new heightened sense of drama and intensity as shown in MW the year before it is very much still there in World at War. The game also adds a slightly different take on the previous games by instead of it just solely focusing on the Germans as the primary antagonists, the Japanese are now also your enemies as well. And its always been the strength of the Call of Duty games that it tells the story of the war from different sides.
Which brings me onto the gameplay which is still as effective as before and the controls of the game and combat are pretty ease to pick up (unless you use the Nintendo Wii version then its a bloody nightmare as the Wii remote controls turning your movement, which is a real pain in the ass! (not to mention your arm!). The game also adds in a few new features such as the fixable bayonet to your rifle which can be used as a melee weapon and there is also the flamethrower, which you can use to burn your enemies to death with (bit nasty really but kinda fun as well) although this is only featured in the American campaign when you fight the Japanese. Another new feature in the game also is the ability to use rifle grenades, which come in handy during the American campaign, and these are attached to your rifle and can simply be launched to do some serious damage. The game also covers fighting in different environments, such as fighting in an airplane taking on the Japanese in an aerial assault during one mission, as well as battling past German tanks in another while playing the Russians. In addition to this game also utilises the previously used health metre system by the screen turning more red as you take more firepower, and you must duck out of sight to avoid taking heavy fire or you will run risk of being killed in battle. The game also features the usual multiplayer modes, a co-op mode and also a new inclusion is a new fun mini game called Nazi zombies, which is good fun and also a bit creepy as the zombies start to really come at you as the rounds progress and you only have so much ammo and weapons to defend yourself with against the baddies.
As for the graphics, the World at War looks great and the environments all look superb in HD graphics, regardless of which version you play with the Xbox 360, PS3 or the PC version, and even the Wii version looks quite good in comparison (although cos it isn't HD it takes a hit on the frame rates). The game's expansive environments all look mighty impressive and the different effects are also very impressive such as smoke, debris, rain, not to mention the fire from the flamethrowers. The character models are also pretty good too and are an improvement from the previous ones as the series had become more visually sophisticated. The game's music score is also pretty good as well as it was scored by Sean Murray and it has plenty of suspense and drama to it and it blends the Eastern and European themes together really well. And there is also the voice acting in the game which is excellent, and kudos deserve to go out to Kiefer Sutherland who voices Sgt Roebuck, who's fate you can decide later as a choice in your gameplay, and also Gary Oldman who does a great job as Viktor Reznov, the Russian soldier, who reprises his role in Call of Duty Black Ops. And the game's audio in general is great as well with the intense COD atmosphere perfectly captured again with the intense noise of gunfire, explosions, planes, tanks, not to mention to the new sound of crazed kamikaze Japanese soldiers screaming "Banzaiiiiiii!!!!" as they charge toward you!
Getting on the game's flaws.... well World at War doesn't have any real glaring flaws as such although it is fair to say that overall it doesn't really add a whole new amount of content to the series than what has already been before. And the WWII setting by this time has already been done to death, and with Modern Warfare (or COD4) it was a breath of fresh air for the series as it started to look a bit stagnant after the rather average Call of Duty 3. The game's single player campaign is also a bit on the short side and will probably last you about six or seven hours although given how the most recent single player campaigns have gotten even shorter (Black Ops II was said to be just four hours!) its not too bad in itself. The game also has some rather graphic violence in it as well but then again war is as they say is hell, and we have some rather unpleasant visages of Japanese soldiers being burned to death, and soldiers in general having their limbs blown off etc which certainly saw the series become more gritty and realistic in its content. And this is shown instantly at the start of the game where Miller is beaten and watches one of his team mates being brutally executed, but in the context of the games violent content since then, overall its not quite as bad. Another strange anomaly in the game is actually in Sean Murray's otherwise fine score where he decides to use some heavy metal guitars in some of the battle scenes, which just doesn't fit and feels like it should belong in something out of Guitar Hero and not Call of Duty!
Despite all that however Call of Duty World at War still remains one of my favourite entries in the series and its well worth checking out and giving it a go.
And I shall leave you there the now.
Auf Weidersehen!
So a quick bit about the story of the game as it starts during the second world war in August 1942 where a marine Private Miller is held captive by the Japanese on Makin island and Miller witnesses the torture and execution of one of his fellow soldiers. Just before Miller is set to suffer the same fate he is rescued by Corporal Roebuck (voiced by Kiefer Sutherland) and his men who launch an attack on the Japanese soldiers on the island. The story then moves two years ahead at the start of the battle of Peleliu with Miller and Roebuck arriving in ships onto the fortified shores, Miller then radios an air strike to destroy to Japanese tanks to allow the American tanks to move ahead. The battle continues and near the end Sergeant O'Sullivan is killed by a Japanese soldier with a katana, after which Roebuck takes over as Sergeant and leads the squad, and during the mission Miller obtains a flamethrower to burn out soldiers in the bunkers and a bazooka to destroy tanks.
After this story then shifts to Moscow in September 1942 during the Battle of Stalingrad, and the playable character is Private Dimitri Peterenko who lies in the aftermath of an assault on Russian soldiers, who lie dead everywhere. Dimitri soon comes along another solider, Sergeant Viktor Reznov, who tells him he is on a secret mission to kill a German general named Henreich Amsel who is behind the massacres. Together the two of them work together and regroup with Dimitri's squad and Dimitri succeeds in killing Amsel as he flees for his life and afterward Reznov and Dimitri escape together in a boat. The following mission for the Russians takes place in 1945 during the battle of the Seelow Heights where Reznov meets up with Dimitri and saves his life and they continue their fight against the Germans. And the story also continues to alternate between the Americans fighting the Japanese in Okinawa and the Russians fighting the Germans in Berlin.
Following the commercial and critical success of Call of Duty Modern Warfare the year previous in 2007, World at War does a fine job in following it up and it still remains one of my own favourite COD games. There was at the time criticism aimed the series for shfiting yet again back to the 2nd world war when they have already covered it extensively in the first three games and thereby adds precious little new to the series. And while you might say that is a fair argument what it did do is take what was so good about Modern Warfare and transfer it into the WWII setting, especially with the new heightened sense of drama and intensity as shown in MW the year before it is very much still there in World at War. The game also adds a slightly different take on the previous games by instead of it just solely focusing on the Germans as the primary antagonists, the Japanese are now also your enemies as well. And its always been the strength of the Call of Duty games that it tells the story of the war from different sides.
Which brings me onto the gameplay which is still as effective as before and the controls of the game and combat are pretty ease to pick up (unless you use the Nintendo Wii version then its a bloody nightmare as the Wii remote controls turning your movement, which is a real pain in the ass! (not to mention your arm!). The game also adds in a few new features such as the fixable bayonet to your rifle which can be used as a melee weapon and there is also the flamethrower, which you can use to burn your enemies to death with (bit nasty really but kinda fun as well) although this is only featured in the American campaign when you fight the Japanese. Another new feature in the game also is the ability to use rifle grenades, which come in handy during the American campaign, and these are attached to your rifle and can simply be launched to do some serious damage. The game also covers fighting in different environments, such as fighting in an airplane taking on the Japanese in an aerial assault during one mission, as well as battling past German tanks in another while playing the Russians. In addition to this game also utilises the previously used health metre system by the screen turning more red as you take more firepower, and you must duck out of sight to avoid taking heavy fire or you will run risk of being killed in battle. The game also features the usual multiplayer modes, a co-op mode and also a new inclusion is a new fun mini game called Nazi zombies, which is good fun and also a bit creepy as the zombies start to really come at you as the rounds progress and you only have so much ammo and weapons to defend yourself with against the baddies.
As for the graphics, the World at War looks great and the environments all look superb in HD graphics, regardless of which version you play with the Xbox 360, PS3 or the PC version, and even the Wii version looks quite good in comparison (although cos it isn't HD it takes a hit on the frame rates). The game's expansive environments all look mighty impressive and the different effects are also very impressive such as smoke, debris, rain, not to mention the fire from the flamethrowers. The character models are also pretty good too and are an improvement from the previous ones as the series had become more visually sophisticated. The game's music score is also pretty good as well as it was scored by Sean Murray and it has plenty of suspense and drama to it and it blends the Eastern and European themes together really well. And there is also the voice acting in the game which is excellent, and kudos deserve to go out to Kiefer Sutherland who voices Sgt Roebuck, who's fate you can decide later as a choice in your gameplay, and also Gary Oldman who does a great job as Viktor Reznov, the Russian soldier, who reprises his role in Call of Duty Black Ops. And the game's audio in general is great as well with the intense COD atmosphere perfectly captured again with the intense noise of gunfire, explosions, planes, tanks, not to mention to the new sound of crazed kamikaze Japanese soldiers screaming "Banzaiiiiiii!!!!" as they charge toward you!
Getting on the game's flaws.... well World at War doesn't have any real glaring flaws as such although it is fair to say that overall it doesn't really add a whole new amount of content to the series than what has already been before. And the WWII setting by this time has already been done to death, and with Modern Warfare (or COD4) it was a breath of fresh air for the series as it started to look a bit stagnant after the rather average Call of Duty 3. The game's single player campaign is also a bit on the short side and will probably last you about six or seven hours although given how the most recent single player campaigns have gotten even shorter (Black Ops II was said to be just four hours!) its not too bad in itself. The game also has some rather graphic violence in it as well but then again war is as they say is hell, and we have some rather unpleasant visages of Japanese soldiers being burned to death, and soldiers in general having their limbs blown off etc which certainly saw the series become more gritty and realistic in its content. And this is shown instantly at the start of the game where Miller is beaten and watches one of his team mates being brutally executed, but in the context of the games violent content since then, overall its not quite as bad. Another strange anomaly in the game is actually in Sean Murray's otherwise fine score where he decides to use some heavy metal guitars in some of the battle scenes, which just doesn't fit and feels like it should belong in something out of Guitar Hero and not Call of Duty!
Despite all that however Call of Duty World at War still remains one of my favourite entries in the series and its well worth checking out and giving it a go.
And I shall leave you there the now.
Auf Weidersehen!
Monday 3 March 2014
Lara Croft's anniversary
Right OK time for another post and this one is on a video game, which celebrates the begining of a very popular franchise, Tomb Raider, and this is Tomb Raider Anniversary. So let's gie this one a looksee...
Right so as this is a remake of the original game, the plot is pretty much identical so I will give it a quick going over although I will keep it to just one paragraph for the sake of not going overboard like I usually do. The story is set in 1996 and Lara Croft (voiced by Keely Hawes) is approached by Larsson Conway who puts her in touch with Jacqueline Natla who wants to her locate a piece of an artefact called the Scion, which is said to be located in the Peruvian mountains, and Laura agrees to go. In the Peruvian mountains, Lara finds a tomb belonging to the Atlean King named Qualopec, and she finds out that he was one of three kings who ruled Atlantis before it sank. Lara soon finds one part of the Scion and escapes the temple before it collapses, and shortly after Larsson tries to steal it from her but Lara knocks him out. After this Lara learns that Natla has sent another archeaologist named Pierre DuPont to find the next piece and she breaks into Natla's office and discovers clues that the next piece is located in St. Francis folly in Greece. Lara travels to Greece and arrives to confront Pierre and she soon locates the second piece deep in another tomb, which Pierre takes from her, but he is killed by the tomb Guardians, which Lara eventually defeats. After this Lara travels to Egypt where she successfully grabs the third and final piece of the Scion but she is captured by Natla who steals the Scion from her and leaves Lara at the hands of her henchman. Lara then escapes and follows Natla, sneaking onto her boat, she intends to try and stop using the Scion for her own ends as she intends to ressurect the Atlantis army and gain immortality for herself.
As a celebratory game for the 10th anniversary of the game series, Tomb Raider Anniversary more than delivers on its promise to celebrate the franchise as it is a very entertaining, varied and at times exciting game (although it was actually released 11 years later in 2007, so its not quite strictly a proper anniversary game!). The game mechanics primarily remain the same with Lara, the young intrepid (and busty) archaeologist running, jumping, shimmying and climbing her way around the expansive environments. Also given the original was made back in 1996 (nearly 20 years ago!) in the 10 years since then, Anniversary makes enormous steps forward in terms of fine tuning the gameplay and also the graphics, which naturally are vastly superior to the very dated looking pixellated and blocky graphics back in the 90s. And in updating itself it has to be said that the remake remains a stronger game than the original as well.
Which brings me on to say a bit about the actual gameplay, which is excellent, and Lara's control system is easy enough to use, and her moves remain much the same as she runs, jumps, shimmies, crouches, dives and swims around her surroundings. The game also adds in one or two of the previous enhancements which we have seen in the previous game, Tomb Raider Legend, such as auto aiming, slow-mo action to pull off better execution shots, as well as Lara can now climb ladders and shimmy round cliff edges at a faster rate. There is also the inclusion a rage meter, which is used when Lara shoots some of the larger enemies, such as the T-Rex near the start of the game, and when it reaches maximum the enemy will charge toward Lara and she must dive out the way and pull off an adrenaline charged head shot to kill or stun them. One thing that hasn't changed however is the weaponary, as Lara still has the same guns, her dual pistols, a shotgun, a pair of uzis and heavy calibre handguns and Lara can pick up ammo which is scattered throughout the game. The game also features some puzzles where Lara will need to either push pillars, blocks, bolders into certain positions to gain access to keys and other items to unlock other areas. The game also features some scripted moments in the cut scenes where you must press the right button at the right time for Laura to peform an evasive action when facing her enemies, which is mostly straight forward but can become a little annoying every now and then to get right.
The games enemies are also fairly varied in that in addition to humans, which there aren't many, Lara has to defend herself against aggressive animals such as gorrillas, panthers, wolves, as well as some mythological enemies such as minotaurs, sand monsters, and a big ugly blob near the end (which is a pain in the ass to kill off!). In fact in the original the big blob that Lara has to kill, if it kills her it made for a rather nasty and graphic death as it violently flings Lara to the ground, breaking her neck, and we get the rather nasty crunching noises of her neck snap (something which this game has probably rightfully not repeated!). Still Lara can die in a variety of ways and not slipping and falling from great heights, she can also drown, be killed by the baddies of course, be burned, spiked, crushed and of course there is the neat effect where in one level where Lara stands on the hand of Midas, which turns her to gold! And the difficulty level of the game is fairly manageable although towards the end in the last level it becomes very tough to finish off and the last game boss (i.e. Natla) is also very hard to beat and requires alot of fast and frantic button pushing. This isn't a bad thing as the game should present a fair challenge and its also a very lengthy single player campaign as it must clock in at about 15-20 hours of gameplay (or thereabouts).
Which brings me onto the graphics which light years ahead of the original of course, 11 years on, Anniversary looks terrific and the expansive environments are quite stunning. The character models are also fairly impressive for their time and Lara looks pretty good and her chest is just the right size! (I know perv!). Another nice graphical features in the game is when Lara dives into the water and swims, when she get's out the water she is all wet and her character has a glistening effect to show this, which is a nice touch and welcome progression from the previous games where Lara got out of the water and was bone dry! The game also has plenty of variation in its graphics as well as Lara has to navigate tombs, temples, mines and other terrains. However it has to be said that the different versions of the game on its release looked better than others, as the Xbox 360 console version was a disappointment graphically as the colours and detail are soft and washed out looking, but the PC version is by far the best looking and runs great. And for its time in 2007, it was and still is a mighty good looking game. Music wise, Anniversary is also excellent, and it features a really good score which was closely composed in the same vein as the original, and it was done by the Danish composer, Troels Brun Folmann, who went through many of his original compositions and reworked them in an orchestral fashion and there are plenty of fine tracks which invoke the atmosphere of the original game. And lastly I will mention the voice acting which is very good and it once again features Keely Hawes (who was prior to this known for her role in the TV show Spooks) in the role as Lara Croft and she does a great job here again. The game also allows for the odd bit of humour, such as in the scene where Lara has to find a way of getting rid of her doppledanger, which is identical to her (except her skin texture) and she eventually manages to outwit by opening a trap door, which sees her doppledanger fall into a lava pit, and Lara after says "Talk about being your own worst enemy!".
Getting onto the games flaws..... well Anniversary does have the odd one, such as the control system, while it is largely easy and straight forward, it also does have one or two frustrations to it. The main one being the Lara's use of her attachable rope swing, which she can use to wall run between different areas and jump to reach other walls or surfaces. It can be useful but on the other hand its easy to mistime using the rope swing and Lara can end up falling to her death, and this is quite evident in a later level where she tries to traverse her way up to the top of part of a temple and she has to wall swing, then climb up another level and do the same, but its too easy to get wrong. The adrenaline charge metre is also a bit of a pain as its easy again to mistime getting it right when Lara dives backward in slow motion she has a limited timeframe to pull off the kill shot to down her enemies. The game also becomes quite frustrating towards the end as the difficulty level takes a big leap in the final level and the toughest part of the game comes when Lara has time a series of jumps to reach an upper level, with slide out platforms, which only stay out for so long, and again if you miscalculate or take too long, Lara will fall to her death again! And it threatens to almost ruin the enjoyment of the game as up to that point it is a very entertaining adventure.
Another thing is that you have to remember the game's mechanics are built upon the original so it does feature some tedious moments such as the constant having to run back and forth between areas, to drag stone blocks out to access ammo, health packs or to get something else. And this brings me onto another thing which might go past some people, which is Lara's unnatural and freakish physical strength! This is shown in one scene where in one of the tombs, Lara has to physically push two GIANT stone pillars, which must weigh many tonnes, yet somehow this slim built athletic lass has the superstrength pull it around like a shopping trolley! But then again it is just a game after all.
Anyway all that aside Tomb Raider Anniversary remains an excellent remake of the original, which surpasses it in terms of gameplay and certainly graphics and if you haven't played it and like the series, its worth a shot.
So I will leave it there for now.
Later.
Right so as this is a remake of the original game, the plot is pretty much identical so I will give it a quick going over although I will keep it to just one paragraph for the sake of not going overboard like I usually do. The story is set in 1996 and Lara Croft (voiced by Keely Hawes) is approached by Larsson Conway who puts her in touch with Jacqueline Natla who wants to her locate a piece of an artefact called the Scion, which is said to be located in the Peruvian mountains, and Laura agrees to go. In the Peruvian mountains, Lara finds a tomb belonging to the Atlean King named Qualopec, and she finds out that he was one of three kings who ruled Atlantis before it sank. Lara soon finds one part of the Scion and escapes the temple before it collapses, and shortly after Larsson tries to steal it from her but Lara knocks him out. After this Lara learns that Natla has sent another archeaologist named Pierre DuPont to find the next piece and she breaks into Natla's office and discovers clues that the next piece is located in St. Francis folly in Greece. Lara travels to Greece and arrives to confront Pierre and she soon locates the second piece deep in another tomb, which Pierre takes from her, but he is killed by the tomb Guardians, which Lara eventually defeats. After this Lara travels to Egypt where she successfully grabs the third and final piece of the Scion but she is captured by Natla who steals the Scion from her and leaves Lara at the hands of her henchman. Lara then escapes and follows Natla, sneaking onto her boat, she intends to try and stop using the Scion for her own ends as she intends to ressurect the Atlantis army and gain immortality for herself.
As a celebratory game for the 10th anniversary of the game series, Tomb Raider Anniversary more than delivers on its promise to celebrate the franchise as it is a very entertaining, varied and at times exciting game (although it was actually released 11 years later in 2007, so its not quite strictly a proper anniversary game!). The game mechanics primarily remain the same with Lara, the young intrepid (and busty) archaeologist running, jumping, shimmying and climbing her way around the expansive environments. Also given the original was made back in 1996 (nearly 20 years ago!) in the 10 years since then, Anniversary makes enormous steps forward in terms of fine tuning the gameplay and also the graphics, which naturally are vastly superior to the very dated looking pixellated and blocky graphics back in the 90s. And in updating itself it has to be said that the remake remains a stronger game than the original as well.
Which brings me on to say a bit about the actual gameplay, which is excellent, and Lara's control system is easy enough to use, and her moves remain much the same as she runs, jumps, shimmies, crouches, dives and swims around her surroundings. The game also adds in one or two of the previous enhancements which we have seen in the previous game, Tomb Raider Legend, such as auto aiming, slow-mo action to pull off better execution shots, as well as Lara can now climb ladders and shimmy round cliff edges at a faster rate. There is also the inclusion a rage meter, which is used when Lara shoots some of the larger enemies, such as the T-Rex near the start of the game, and when it reaches maximum the enemy will charge toward Lara and she must dive out the way and pull off an adrenaline charged head shot to kill or stun them. One thing that hasn't changed however is the weaponary, as Lara still has the same guns, her dual pistols, a shotgun, a pair of uzis and heavy calibre handguns and Lara can pick up ammo which is scattered throughout the game. The game also features some puzzles where Lara will need to either push pillars, blocks, bolders into certain positions to gain access to keys and other items to unlock other areas. The game also features some scripted moments in the cut scenes where you must press the right button at the right time for Laura to peform an evasive action when facing her enemies, which is mostly straight forward but can become a little annoying every now and then to get right.
The games enemies are also fairly varied in that in addition to humans, which there aren't many, Lara has to defend herself against aggressive animals such as gorrillas, panthers, wolves, as well as some mythological enemies such as minotaurs, sand monsters, and a big ugly blob near the end (which is a pain in the ass to kill off!). In fact in the original the big blob that Lara has to kill, if it kills her it made for a rather nasty and graphic death as it violently flings Lara to the ground, breaking her neck, and we get the rather nasty crunching noises of her neck snap (something which this game has probably rightfully not repeated!). Still Lara can die in a variety of ways and not slipping and falling from great heights, she can also drown, be killed by the baddies of course, be burned, spiked, crushed and of course there is the neat effect where in one level where Lara stands on the hand of Midas, which turns her to gold! And the difficulty level of the game is fairly manageable although towards the end in the last level it becomes very tough to finish off and the last game boss (i.e. Natla) is also very hard to beat and requires alot of fast and frantic button pushing. This isn't a bad thing as the game should present a fair challenge and its also a very lengthy single player campaign as it must clock in at about 15-20 hours of gameplay (or thereabouts).
Which brings me onto the graphics which light years ahead of the original of course, 11 years on, Anniversary looks terrific and the expansive environments are quite stunning. The character models are also fairly impressive for their time and Lara looks pretty good and her chest is just the right size! (I know perv!). Another nice graphical features in the game is when Lara dives into the water and swims, when she get's out the water she is all wet and her character has a glistening effect to show this, which is a nice touch and welcome progression from the previous games where Lara got out of the water and was bone dry! The game also has plenty of variation in its graphics as well as Lara has to navigate tombs, temples, mines and other terrains. However it has to be said that the different versions of the game on its release looked better than others, as the Xbox 360 console version was a disappointment graphically as the colours and detail are soft and washed out looking, but the PC version is by far the best looking and runs great. And for its time in 2007, it was and still is a mighty good looking game. Music wise, Anniversary is also excellent, and it features a really good score which was closely composed in the same vein as the original, and it was done by the Danish composer, Troels Brun Folmann, who went through many of his original compositions and reworked them in an orchestral fashion and there are plenty of fine tracks which invoke the atmosphere of the original game. And lastly I will mention the voice acting which is very good and it once again features Keely Hawes (who was prior to this known for her role in the TV show Spooks) in the role as Lara Croft and she does a great job here again. The game also allows for the odd bit of humour, such as in the scene where Lara has to find a way of getting rid of her doppledanger, which is identical to her (except her skin texture) and she eventually manages to outwit by opening a trap door, which sees her doppledanger fall into a lava pit, and Lara after says "Talk about being your own worst enemy!".
Getting onto the games flaws..... well Anniversary does have the odd one, such as the control system, while it is largely easy and straight forward, it also does have one or two frustrations to it. The main one being the Lara's use of her attachable rope swing, which she can use to wall run between different areas and jump to reach other walls or surfaces. It can be useful but on the other hand its easy to mistime using the rope swing and Lara can end up falling to her death, and this is quite evident in a later level where she tries to traverse her way up to the top of part of a temple and she has to wall swing, then climb up another level and do the same, but its too easy to get wrong. The adrenaline charge metre is also a bit of a pain as its easy again to mistime getting it right when Lara dives backward in slow motion she has a limited timeframe to pull off the kill shot to down her enemies. The game also becomes quite frustrating towards the end as the difficulty level takes a big leap in the final level and the toughest part of the game comes when Lara has time a series of jumps to reach an upper level, with slide out platforms, which only stay out for so long, and again if you miscalculate or take too long, Lara will fall to her death again! And it threatens to almost ruin the enjoyment of the game as up to that point it is a very entertaining adventure.
Another thing is that you have to remember the game's mechanics are built upon the original so it does feature some tedious moments such as the constant having to run back and forth between areas, to drag stone blocks out to access ammo, health packs or to get something else. And this brings me onto another thing which might go past some people, which is Lara's unnatural and freakish physical strength! This is shown in one scene where in one of the tombs, Lara has to physically push two GIANT stone pillars, which must weigh many tonnes, yet somehow this slim built athletic lass has the superstrength pull it around like a shopping trolley! But then again it is just a game after all.
Anyway all that aside Tomb Raider Anniversary remains an excellent remake of the original, which surpasses it in terms of gameplay and certainly graphics and if you haven't played it and like the series, its worth a shot.
So I will leave it there for now.
Later.
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