Right OK I thought I would do a review of a new film as I went to see X-Men days of future past last night and so here is what I think of it, but rather than cover the whole I WON'T do that this time as its a new film so I will only reveal a bit of the plot. So strap on the X-men leather suit, sharpen those metal claws and give this one a look....
Soooo the film starts in the future where the world has been ravaged by a war that sees robot sentinels hunt down and exterminate the remaining mutants and oppressing the humans that harbour the mutant genes. However a small band of mutants lead by Kitty Pryde (Ellen Page) manage to avoid the sentinels due to her ability to project a person's conciousness back in time to send out warnings. Kitty and her band soon rendevous with Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), Magneto (Ian McKellen), Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) and Storm (Halle Berry). They form a plan to send Wolverine's consciousness back in time to 1973 where the war originated as a result of the mutant Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) assassinating the designer of the sentinels, Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage) and Wolverine goes back to try and stop her. Wolverine wakes up in a younger body back in 1973 in New York where he travels to Xavier's mansion, where he meets with a younger Xavier (James McAvoy) and Hank McCoy (Nicholas Hoult). Xavier however is now a broken man as his school has closed down and most of the mutants were drafted into the Vietnam war, where most of them have been killed and he can now walk due to a serum that Hank has developed, but as a result it neutralises his mutant telepathic powers. Wolverine however manages to persuade the reluctant Xavier into helping them find Mystique to try and stop her from killing Trask and also finding the younger Magneto (Michael Fassbender) to help them as well. Magneto himself at this time is being held captive in a secure prison for his alleged assassination of president John F. Kennedy. To enable them to free Magneto they approach another mutant, Pietro Maximoff (Evan Peters) who has the power of superhuman speed to break into the prison and release Magneto. Once they have Magneto they start on their journey to try and put the future of the world to rights by finding Mystique and changing history.
X-Men days of the future past is undoubtedly one of the best films in the franchise and with Bryan Singer back at the direction helm it really sees the series get firmly back on track, although First Class was already a pretty good film, Days of Future past really builds on the foundations of that film. And with its full array of cast members from the new and older films, Singer really has brought a great balance to the series and the story of the flashback also adds a refreshing slate to the proceedings as well.
Performance wise the film is also very good starting with Hugh Jackman who effortlessly slots back into playing his career defining role as Wolverine and provides his usual mix of seriousness and sarcastic one-liners. Although it really has to be said that Hugh Jackman's muscly physique really is starting to get a bit out of hand as he is starting to appear abnormally musculuar and its almost like looking at Arnold Schwarzenegger! Regardless of that Jackman has some good moments in the film and good lines such as the scene where he meets up with Magneto again and as they fly away on Xavier's plane, he says to him "So, you were always an asshole". Jackman's moments with McAvoy are also good where Wolverine tries to persuade Xavier to help them and as Xavier has lost confidence in himself, Wolverine helps try and realise the man he once was. Jackman has a good scene where Wolverine temporarily loses his concentration during the consciousness as he spots a younger William Stryker (Josh Helman) and has painful flashbacks of his adamantium operation. Jackman also has a funny moment when back in 1973, Wolverine has his bone structured claws, prior to his adamantium operation, and he walks through a metal detector and it doesn't go off, and he smiles.
James McAvoy is also very good in his role as the younger Charles Xavier, now a wounded man who no longer wants his telepathic powers and uses a serum to help him walk again, which neutralises his telepathic abilities as a result, but he soon comes around to helping Wolverine with their mission. McAvoy has his good moments in the film as well, such as in his opening scene where he refers to his last (and first) meeting with Xavier who told him to "go fuck himself" in a bar, and he says "I say to you now, what you said to me back then.... fuck off!". He has some other good moments such as where he keeps trying to reach to Mystique while using his telepathic powers. And McAvoy even has some funny moments such as where prior to meeting Magneto again he says to Wolverine "I'm just not a big fan of violence" and he sees Magneto and out of rage punches him in the face!
Jennifer Lawrence also provides another fine performance as the saucy Raven/Mystique, the blue skinned mutant who can transform appearance into anything. Lawrence thankfully is given more to do in this film as after seeing her character as the passive Raven in First Class, here we see Mystique kick some ass, and Jen's figure definitely lends very well to the character! Lawrence also provide some fine moments such as the one where she disguises herself as a sexy blonde (herself really!) who takes one of the Vietnamese delegates back to a hotel room to seduce him and she then transforms into her blue self and says "What's the matter, baby? Don't you think I look prettier like this?". Jennifer also does a good job at showing Raven's conflicting emotions about the consequences of killing Trask and whether its the right thing to do as Xavier keeps trying to reach out to her to prevent her.
Michael Fassbender also does a fine job in reprising his role as the somewhat morally ambiguous and cold hearted Magneto, yet Magneto agrees to help them put a stop to the assassination in order to save the Mutant race. Fassbender also allows his character to a few brief moments of levity as well in the film rather than just have Magneto as a very serious character. This is displayed in his scene where he meets up with Xavier again, who punches him and he says "Nice to see you too!". Of course as the film progresses Magneto has other ideas of his own in preventing the future war although they might bring their own drastic repercussions.
As for the other supporting cast members, Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellan also reprise their roles well as the older Xavier and Magneto in the future, although their roles are pretty minimal next to the younger actors playing the parts. Ellen page is also pretty good again in her role as Kitty Pride, who users her powers of projection to send Wolverine's consciousness back in time, which proves vital to the possible success of the mission. Peter Dinklage, a dwarf actor, also provides a good performance as the arrogant Trask, founder of Trask industries, who would have alot to answer for in the future and blindly thinks he is doing what is necessary for the future. Nicholas Hoult also does not too bad in his role as Hank McCoy, the mutant also known as Beast, who turns blue when he's angry and jumps around like a crazed monkey. And lastly Evan Peter is does OK in his role as Pietro Maximoff, the super speedy mutant, although his performance is somewhat grating at times, but he does allow for one or two funny moments, especially when he breaks out Magneto.
Moving onto Bryan Singer, its great to see him return to the franchise and he is well at home directing the X-Men films and here is no exception as he provides a great mix of drama, action and humour. Singer also makes good use of the new and older cast and he manages to elicit fine performances all round and handles the action sequences with ease, which are also very entertaining and fast paced (although I have to say I'm still not that enamoured by the name of Singer's production company, Bad Hat Harry, which is a naff reference to a line from Jaws). John Ottman also returns to the series, who is Singer's regular music composer and he incorporates his familiar X-Men theme again into the film and overall provides a pretty decent score for the film.
So flaws???? X-Men Days of Future Past, does it have any worth moaning about??? Well not too many although I think what I would say is the film is a bit busy in terms of its characters, as there are so many that there is precious little screen time for them, such as Storm (played again by Halle Berry) and also the future Xavier and Magneto are also largely sidelined. I also thought that there was a lapse in contunity between X-Men Last Stand and this film, as you might remember that Xavier's body was obliterated by Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) yet somehow Xavier appears here in the film as Patrick Stewart! Perhaps again though that is due to an alternate future, yet during a scene where Wolverine let's the younger Xavier read his mind, we see the scene where he is forced to kill Jean, which suggests he comes from that same timeline. So on that basis I'm not sure how they can still account for the fact Xavier can still be in the same form as before. Hmmmm. But apart from that I don't really see to much worth complaining about as the film get's most things right.
And that's it for my look at X-Men days of future past, which is an excellent addition to the series and I heartedly recommend going to see while its still in the pics, as it has great action, a fine cast and frankly one of the best X-Men films yet.
So with that I shall leave yee there.
Monday 26 May 2014
Saturday 24 May 2014
The Last Boy Scout "Shit! We're being beat up by the inventor of Scrabble!"
Right OK its been a bit of while since my last review on here so I thought I would do another movie and this is a rather bizarre choice as the film its not a masterpiece but it is good fun all the same. So this review will be on The Last Boy Scout starring Bruce Willis and Damon Wayans, an action comedy from the early 1990's. So let's give it a look....
The film begins with an American football player named Billy Cole (Billy Blanks) who receives a phone call from a mysterious caller, who tells Billy that he must start scoring touchdowns or he will be "history". Cole, who is under the influence of drugs, then goes out onto the pitch and during play he produces a gun and shoots a few of the opposing team's players before taking his helmet off and declaring "ain't life a bitch?!" and shoots himself in the head. In the meantime private investigator Joe Hallenback (Bruce Willis) a former secret service agent, discovers that his wife Sarah (Chelsea Field) is having an affair with a friend of his, Mike Matthews (Bruce McGill). Mike however is killed in a car bomb just outside Joe's house, but before he died he gives Joe the assignment of protecting a stripper named Cory (Halle Berry). At a bar where Cory works, Joe ends up meeting her boyfriend, Jimmy Dix (Damon Wayans) a former LA Stallions quarterback, who was banned from the sport for gambling and drug abuse. After Joe argues with Jimmy, Jimmy angrily takes Cory away while she is performing her striptease. Joe afterwards is attacked by henchmen outside and taken away into an alley, but he manages to escape. Meanwhile Jimmy and Cory leave in separate cars, another car hits the back of Cory's car who get's out to confront the driver, but she is then shot dead by hitmen in the car. Jimmy is then under attack from the hitmen but Joe manages to turn up just in time to rescue him and kill the hitmen.
After they are taken to the local police station and Joe meets with police Captain Benjamin Bessalo (Joe Santos) who despise Joe and warns him to watch his step. Bessalo also tells one of his officers McCoskey (Clarence Felder) however that Joe one time saved the president's life when he was a secret service agent. Jimmy after they leave the station persuades Joe to help him track down who was behind Cory's murder. The next day Joe and Jimmy go to Cory's apartment where they find a tape, which is of a phone conversation between Senator Calvin Baynard (Chelcie Ross) and the owner of the LA Stallions football team, Sheldon Marcone (Noble Willingham). While listening to the tape, Jimmy accidentally ruins the tape by pressing fast forward on Joe's faulty car tape player. Jimmy then realises that Cory was actually going to use the tape as leverage to force Marcone to give Jimmy's job back. Jimmy decides to leave in his own car, but Joe then stops him as he realises that Marcone would have rigged Jimmy's car as well and they find plastic explosives planted in the car. At this point two hitmen turn up and beat them up and force them to hand over the tape, but Joe tricks them having planted the explosives under the boot of the car, which one of the hitmen tries to open by shooting it, but the hitmen are then killed in the blast.
Later at the police station again, Bessalo berates Joe for his actions and gives him a final warning not to see him again. Joe also reveals to Jimmy the reason he kicked out of the secret service was because he stopped Baynard from beating up a woman in a hotel, by knocking out four of his teeth, as a result Joe was fired from the secret service as he refused to cover up the incident. Joe then goes back home with Jimmy, where they meet Joe's feisty daughter, Darian (Danielle Harris) who argues with her dad, as she is angry because he won't let her go to a party. Joe later catches Jimmy in the bathroom using drugs and furiously punches him and tells him to get out. As Jimmy leaves Darian asks for his autograph and reveals that Joe used to be a fan of Jimmy's before he got busted. The next morning however Bessalo learns of Mike's affair with Sarah and concludes that Joe killed Mike himself and sends McCoskey to arrest him. However the hitmen lead by Milo (Taylor Negron) capture Joe and Milo shoots McCoskey as he arrives, using Joe's prints to make it look he shot McCoskey. Joe is then taken to Marcone who reveals he intends to use Joe to frame him for murdering Baynard, as a result of Baynard's refusal to take Macrone's bribes to cease his investigations on him into illegal sports gambling.
Joe is then taken out into the woods where he is photographed handing over a briefcase to Baynard's bodyguards, which contains explosives. Joe however manages to escape from Milo and the hitmen with help of Jimmy and Darian, who comes along with him. Joe manages to run Milo off the road however during the ensuing car chase, but Milo survives and kidnaps Darian. And afer this Joe decides the only thing they can do is take down Marcone in order to save his daughter and save Baynard.
There is no doubt that The Last Boy Scout is a ridiculous movie and it is so over the top that it makes other action films look credible in comparison. But its because it dares to be so silly and over the top that it manages to succeed in being a very entertaining film to watch. The film's screenplay was also written by Shane Black (who wrote the Lethal Weapon screenplay and later directed and worte Kiss Kiss Bang Bang) which he got a whopping $1.75 million dollars for. Whether or not Black's script warranted such a high fee is highly debatable but he does allow for plenty of amusing dialogue and witty one liners of which I will cover more on in a bit.
Which neatly brings me onto the performance section of the review and the performances are pretty good here. Starting with Bruce Willis who is actually very good in his role as Joe Hallenbeck, the cynical, unshaven, private detective, who is essentially a good guy and has a fine line is dry witty one liners. Willis has some good moments in the film and one of my favourite scenes is where he captured by Milo and taken to Marcone's place and he beaten by one of Milo's thugs, and when Joe asks for a light he says to the thug "I'm gonna need a light, and if you touch me again I'll kill you" but the thug punches Joe again, who get's up and delivers a sucker punch to the man's face, which puts his nose into his brain, killing him instantly, Joe then stands and spits on him saying "Told you!". Another funny moment is in his first scene where Joe is fast asleep in his car, with the window wound down, a few kids decide to play a prank on him and throw a dead squirrel in his car, but he wakes up abruptly when they try and take his wallet, and he throws the squirrel away. And later in his office when Mike calls him he asks how he is and Joe says "I think I fucked a squirrel to death and I don't even remember it!". Also there is the scene where he finds out that Mike has been cheating on him with Sarah and Mike says it just happened. And Joe says "Oh sure! It just happened. You walked in, tripped on the floor and accidentally stuck your dick in my wife!". Another good moment is where Joe is being framed for Baynard's murder and they photograph him handing over the briefcase to Baynard's bodyguards and he tells Milo to go "fuck himself" and as Milo says "Just once I would like to hear you scream in pain" Joe says "play some rap music". There is also the scene where Joe first meets Jimmy at the strip bar and the two them argue and Joe tells him he is a private detective, Jimmy calls him a lowlife and Joe retorts "At least I didn't shit my talent away on coke!". Also there is the moment where Joe is about to killed in an alley by a hitman and he teases the hitman by saying how fat his wife is and he says "I'm not saying she's fat, but her high school picture was an aerial photograph!". And later on when Joe and Jimmy escape from Milo and during the car chase Joe says to Jimmy "I swear to Christ, Junior, if I ever survive this fucking case I'm gonna dance a jig!" and later on he does just that!
Damon Wayans is also very good in his role as Jimmy Dix, the former American football player who was disgraced due to gambling and drug abuse charges, and teams up with Joe to help take down Marcone who was behind the hit on his girlfriend Cory. Wayans also get's his fair share of snappy one liners and he also has some good moments in the film (even the odd dramatic one). One of Wayans best moments actually comes in a more serious scene where Joe catches him sniffing drugs in his bathroom and Joe decks him and tells him to get out his house. And Jimmy tells Joe about how easy it is to get fixed on painkillers in the sport "This shit starts real easy man. First you take dimmerol because your fuckin knees are shot and before you know it you are chewin codine with your pancakes!". And then he angrily says to Joe "Why is there a personal injury report in pro football? Its because so the gamblers can have an accurate fucking spread! Its all business now, they push you till you blow your brains out! Can't you see those fuckin hypocrites took away my fuckin life??!". Wayans has some funny moments of course in the film such as the scene where Milo's thugs bounce him off a car and before they do he says to them "Look I can't figure which one of you looks more like my dick!" and after they throw him off the bridge onto a car below he groggily get's up and says "Don't try this at home folks. I'm a trained professional. There's me and there's Super Dave!" and he passes out! And later as Jimmy and Joe race off to try and stop Baynard from being assassinated by Milo, Jimmy says to Joe "I figure you gotta be the dumbest guy in the world, Joe. You're trying to save the life of the guy who ruined your career, and the avenge the death of the guy who fucked your wife!". Another funny moment Wayans has is when Jimmy and Joe are being beaten up by Milo's henchmen and one of them likes using fancy words and Jimmy gasps saying "Shit! We're being beaten up by the inventor of Scrabble!". And lastly there is the scene where Jimmy and Joe go to Corry's apartment after Jimmy tells Joe that Corry had a high tech security system installed and only he could deactivate or "circumvent" it. So they go to Corry's apartment and Jimmy proceeds to kick the door in and Joe looks at him saying "Security system??" and Jimmy says "Yeah, I circumvented it!".
As for the other cast members, Taylor Negron makes a pretty effective villain as the creepy Milo, who is in Marcone's employee, and has a tendency to call everyone by their Sunday names, i.e. Joe is Joseph. Negron has some good moments in the film, such as the scene where he get's riled by Joe after he tells him to go fuck himself, he takes out his switchblade and holds it to Joe's face and says "What would you do if someone told you to go fuck yourself? Would you cut one of their eyes out?!" and he continues "Just once I would like to see you scream in pain!". Also there is the moment where Milo kills the police officer, McConey, who asks him if there is a problem as he approaches Milo's car and Milo says "Yes there is a problem, officer, apparently there are too many bullets in this gun!" and he shoots him dead. And as they take Joe's prints they dump the gun out the window and Milo says "you've been a naughty boy, Joseph. You've just shot a policeman!".
Noble Willingham is also good as the film's main villain, Sheldon "Shelly" Marcone who owns the LA Stallions and employs Milo as his main henchman, who he uses to take care of business. Willingham also has some good scenes such as the scene where he takes a swim at his mansion and Joe is held captive and is somewhat insolent toward him, and Marcone says "Well I'll give you this, you sure are feisty for a man in your position. Milo teach him some manners, will you?". And later as he captures Joe and Jimmy he says to Jimmy "You got hooked on demerol, because you couldn't take the pain, you hated the pain! Life is pain, Jim!" and he grabs and shoots Jimmy in the hand. Danielle Harris also makes a good impression in her part as Joe's feisty daughter teenage daughter, Darian. Harris also get's some good lines of profane dialogue in the film such as her first scene where she has an argument with Joe, while watching TV (and its Lethal Weapon playing in the background!) and she angrily turns the volume up saying "God! Your such a fuck up!". And Joe angrily tells her "You are my daughter and you are in my house. You don't ever call me a fuck up!" and Darian says "Why not? Mom calls you it all the time!". And even when she is held captive by Marcone she still remains defiant as he she tells "Eat shit you fucking redneck!". And lastly Chelsea Field and Bruce McGill also do well with their smaller roles as Sarah, Joe's wife and Mike, Joe's best friend respectively.
Getting onto the director, the late Tony Scott, Scott does a fine job here as he is no stranger to action films he keeps the film's pace tight and the action scenes are pretty OTT by they are well staged and the action is entertaining all the same. Michael Kamen also provides a fairly good film score which is akin to his other scores of that period, but it fits the film pretty well overall.
Moving onto the flaws section of the Last Boy Scout does it have any???? Well yeah, its not a perfect film by any means as the film's plot is very silly and overall it is a pretty cheesy movie. The film also has one of the most ridiculous over the top action climaxes of any film where Joe fights the psychotic Milo who tries to take out Senator Baynard, who (PLOT SPOILER) ends up getting punched off the roof by Joe and is thereby splatted by the propellers of a police helicopter! The other thing that is so ridiculous about the film is how Joe get's away with all the murders he commits, by killing all the hitmen in the film, and he even assaults Baynard again at the end of the film, where Joe asks Baynard "head or gut?" meaning where yo do you want to get punched??? And he does all this yet there are no repercussions for him whatsoever as I'd imagine Baynard didn't press charges, or perhaps Joe revealed in the end he was acting in Baynard best interests to save his life. Or maybe not. Again logic in action films is never a strong point, least of all in Hollywood films! The film is also guilty of having the single WORST title sequence ever, with a God awful truly cringeworthy song called "Friday night's a great time for football" sung by Billy Medley, which deserves its place in the musical dustbin.
So that's it for my look at The Last Boy Scout which after 23 years is still an entertaining, albeit very silly action film with some nifty one liners and good cast giving decent accounts of themselves.
And with that I shall leave it right there.
The film begins with an American football player named Billy Cole (Billy Blanks) who receives a phone call from a mysterious caller, who tells Billy that he must start scoring touchdowns or he will be "history". Cole, who is under the influence of drugs, then goes out onto the pitch and during play he produces a gun and shoots a few of the opposing team's players before taking his helmet off and declaring "ain't life a bitch?!" and shoots himself in the head. In the meantime private investigator Joe Hallenback (Bruce Willis) a former secret service agent, discovers that his wife Sarah (Chelsea Field) is having an affair with a friend of his, Mike Matthews (Bruce McGill). Mike however is killed in a car bomb just outside Joe's house, but before he died he gives Joe the assignment of protecting a stripper named Cory (Halle Berry). At a bar where Cory works, Joe ends up meeting her boyfriend, Jimmy Dix (Damon Wayans) a former LA Stallions quarterback, who was banned from the sport for gambling and drug abuse. After Joe argues with Jimmy, Jimmy angrily takes Cory away while she is performing her striptease. Joe afterwards is attacked by henchmen outside and taken away into an alley, but he manages to escape. Meanwhile Jimmy and Cory leave in separate cars, another car hits the back of Cory's car who get's out to confront the driver, but she is then shot dead by hitmen in the car. Jimmy is then under attack from the hitmen but Joe manages to turn up just in time to rescue him and kill the hitmen.
After they are taken to the local police station and Joe meets with police Captain Benjamin Bessalo (Joe Santos) who despise Joe and warns him to watch his step. Bessalo also tells one of his officers McCoskey (Clarence Felder) however that Joe one time saved the president's life when he was a secret service agent. Jimmy after they leave the station persuades Joe to help him track down who was behind Cory's murder. The next day Joe and Jimmy go to Cory's apartment where they find a tape, which is of a phone conversation between Senator Calvin Baynard (Chelcie Ross) and the owner of the LA Stallions football team, Sheldon Marcone (Noble Willingham). While listening to the tape, Jimmy accidentally ruins the tape by pressing fast forward on Joe's faulty car tape player. Jimmy then realises that Cory was actually going to use the tape as leverage to force Marcone to give Jimmy's job back. Jimmy decides to leave in his own car, but Joe then stops him as he realises that Marcone would have rigged Jimmy's car as well and they find plastic explosives planted in the car. At this point two hitmen turn up and beat them up and force them to hand over the tape, but Joe tricks them having planted the explosives under the boot of the car, which one of the hitmen tries to open by shooting it, but the hitmen are then killed in the blast.
Later at the police station again, Bessalo berates Joe for his actions and gives him a final warning not to see him again. Joe also reveals to Jimmy the reason he kicked out of the secret service was because he stopped Baynard from beating up a woman in a hotel, by knocking out four of his teeth, as a result Joe was fired from the secret service as he refused to cover up the incident. Joe then goes back home with Jimmy, where they meet Joe's feisty daughter, Darian (Danielle Harris) who argues with her dad, as she is angry because he won't let her go to a party. Joe later catches Jimmy in the bathroom using drugs and furiously punches him and tells him to get out. As Jimmy leaves Darian asks for his autograph and reveals that Joe used to be a fan of Jimmy's before he got busted. The next morning however Bessalo learns of Mike's affair with Sarah and concludes that Joe killed Mike himself and sends McCoskey to arrest him. However the hitmen lead by Milo (Taylor Negron) capture Joe and Milo shoots McCoskey as he arrives, using Joe's prints to make it look he shot McCoskey. Joe is then taken to Marcone who reveals he intends to use Joe to frame him for murdering Baynard, as a result of Baynard's refusal to take Macrone's bribes to cease his investigations on him into illegal sports gambling.
Joe is then taken out into the woods where he is photographed handing over a briefcase to Baynard's bodyguards, which contains explosives. Joe however manages to escape from Milo and the hitmen with help of Jimmy and Darian, who comes along with him. Joe manages to run Milo off the road however during the ensuing car chase, but Milo survives and kidnaps Darian. And afer this Joe decides the only thing they can do is take down Marcone in order to save his daughter and save Baynard.
There is no doubt that The Last Boy Scout is a ridiculous movie and it is so over the top that it makes other action films look credible in comparison. But its because it dares to be so silly and over the top that it manages to succeed in being a very entertaining film to watch. The film's screenplay was also written by Shane Black (who wrote the Lethal Weapon screenplay and later directed and worte Kiss Kiss Bang Bang) which he got a whopping $1.75 million dollars for. Whether or not Black's script warranted such a high fee is highly debatable but he does allow for plenty of amusing dialogue and witty one liners of which I will cover more on in a bit.
Which neatly brings me onto the performance section of the review and the performances are pretty good here. Starting with Bruce Willis who is actually very good in his role as Joe Hallenbeck, the cynical, unshaven, private detective, who is essentially a good guy and has a fine line is dry witty one liners. Willis has some good moments in the film and one of my favourite scenes is where he captured by Milo and taken to Marcone's place and he beaten by one of Milo's thugs, and when Joe asks for a light he says to the thug "I'm gonna need a light, and if you touch me again I'll kill you" but the thug punches Joe again, who get's up and delivers a sucker punch to the man's face, which puts his nose into his brain, killing him instantly, Joe then stands and spits on him saying "Told you!". Another funny moment is in his first scene where Joe is fast asleep in his car, with the window wound down, a few kids decide to play a prank on him and throw a dead squirrel in his car, but he wakes up abruptly when they try and take his wallet, and he throws the squirrel away. And later in his office when Mike calls him he asks how he is and Joe says "I think I fucked a squirrel to death and I don't even remember it!". Also there is the scene where he finds out that Mike has been cheating on him with Sarah and Mike says it just happened. And Joe says "Oh sure! It just happened. You walked in, tripped on the floor and accidentally stuck your dick in my wife!". Another good moment is where Joe is being framed for Baynard's murder and they photograph him handing over the briefcase to Baynard's bodyguards and he tells Milo to go "fuck himself" and as Milo says "Just once I would like to hear you scream in pain" Joe says "play some rap music". There is also the scene where Joe first meets Jimmy at the strip bar and the two them argue and Joe tells him he is a private detective, Jimmy calls him a lowlife and Joe retorts "At least I didn't shit my talent away on coke!". Also there is the moment where Joe is about to killed in an alley by a hitman and he teases the hitman by saying how fat his wife is and he says "I'm not saying she's fat, but her high school picture was an aerial photograph!". And later on when Joe and Jimmy escape from Milo and during the car chase Joe says to Jimmy "I swear to Christ, Junior, if I ever survive this fucking case I'm gonna dance a jig!" and later on he does just that!
Damon Wayans is also very good in his role as Jimmy Dix, the former American football player who was disgraced due to gambling and drug abuse charges, and teams up with Joe to help take down Marcone who was behind the hit on his girlfriend Cory. Wayans also get's his fair share of snappy one liners and he also has some good moments in the film (even the odd dramatic one). One of Wayans best moments actually comes in a more serious scene where Joe catches him sniffing drugs in his bathroom and Joe decks him and tells him to get out his house. And Jimmy tells Joe about how easy it is to get fixed on painkillers in the sport "This shit starts real easy man. First you take dimmerol because your fuckin knees are shot and before you know it you are chewin codine with your pancakes!". And then he angrily says to Joe "Why is there a personal injury report in pro football? Its because so the gamblers can have an accurate fucking spread! Its all business now, they push you till you blow your brains out! Can't you see those fuckin hypocrites took away my fuckin life??!". Wayans has some funny moments of course in the film such as the scene where Milo's thugs bounce him off a car and before they do he says to them "Look I can't figure which one of you looks more like my dick!" and after they throw him off the bridge onto a car below he groggily get's up and says "Don't try this at home folks. I'm a trained professional. There's me and there's Super Dave!" and he passes out! And later as Jimmy and Joe race off to try and stop Baynard from being assassinated by Milo, Jimmy says to Joe "I figure you gotta be the dumbest guy in the world, Joe. You're trying to save the life of the guy who ruined your career, and the avenge the death of the guy who fucked your wife!". Another funny moment Wayans has is when Jimmy and Joe are being beaten up by Milo's henchmen and one of them likes using fancy words and Jimmy gasps saying "Shit! We're being beaten up by the inventor of Scrabble!". And lastly there is the scene where Jimmy and Joe go to Corry's apartment after Jimmy tells Joe that Corry had a high tech security system installed and only he could deactivate or "circumvent" it. So they go to Corry's apartment and Jimmy proceeds to kick the door in and Joe looks at him saying "Security system??" and Jimmy says "Yeah, I circumvented it!".
As for the other cast members, Taylor Negron makes a pretty effective villain as the creepy Milo, who is in Marcone's employee, and has a tendency to call everyone by their Sunday names, i.e. Joe is Joseph. Negron has some good moments in the film, such as the scene where he get's riled by Joe after he tells him to go fuck himself, he takes out his switchblade and holds it to Joe's face and says "What would you do if someone told you to go fuck yourself? Would you cut one of their eyes out?!" and he continues "Just once I would like to see you scream in pain!". Also there is the moment where Milo kills the police officer, McConey, who asks him if there is a problem as he approaches Milo's car and Milo says "Yes there is a problem, officer, apparently there are too many bullets in this gun!" and he shoots him dead. And as they take Joe's prints they dump the gun out the window and Milo says "you've been a naughty boy, Joseph. You've just shot a policeman!".
Noble Willingham is also good as the film's main villain, Sheldon "Shelly" Marcone who owns the LA Stallions and employs Milo as his main henchman, who he uses to take care of business. Willingham also has some good scenes such as the scene where he takes a swim at his mansion and Joe is held captive and is somewhat insolent toward him, and Marcone says "Well I'll give you this, you sure are feisty for a man in your position. Milo teach him some manners, will you?". And later as he captures Joe and Jimmy he says to Jimmy "You got hooked on demerol, because you couldn't take the pain, you hated the pain! Life is pain, Jim!" and he grabs and shoots Jimmy in the hand. Danielle Harris also makes a good impression in her part as Joe's feisty daughter teenage daughter, Darian. Harris also get's some good lines of profane dialogue in the film such as her first scene where she has an argument with Joe, while watching TV (and its Lethal Weapon playing in the background!) and she angrily turns the volume up saying "God! Your such a fuck up!". And Joe angrily tells her "You are my daughter and you are in my house. You don't ever call me a fuck up!" and Darian says "Why not? Mom calls you it all the time!". And even when she is held captive by Marcone she still remains defiant as he she tells "Eat shit you fucking redneck!". And lastly Chelsea Field and Bruce McGill also do well with their smaller roles as Sarah, Joe's wife and Mike, Joe's best friend respectively.
Getting onto the director, the late Tony Scott, Scott does a fine job here as he is no stranger to action films he keeps the film's pace tight and the action scenes are pretty OTT by they are well staged and the action is entertaining all the same. Michael Kamen also provides a fairly good film score which is akin to his other scores of that period, but it fits the film pretty well overall.
Moving onto the flaws section of the Last Boy Scout does it have any???? Well yeah, its not a perfect film by any means as the film's plot is very silly and overall it is a pretty cheesy movie. The film also has one of the most ridiculous over the top action climaxes of any film where Joe fights the psychotic Milo who tries to take out Senator Baynard, who (PLOT SPOILER) ends up getting punched off the roof by Joe and is thereby splatted by the propellers of a police helicopter! The other thing that is so ridiculous about the film is how Joe get's away with all the murders he commits, by killing all the hitmen in the film, and he even assaults Baynard again at the end of the film, where Joe asks Baynard "head or gut?" meaning where yo do you want to get punched??? And he does all this yet there are no repercussions for him whatsoever as I'd imagine Baynard didn't press charges, or perhaps Joe revealed in the end he was acting in Baynard best interests to save his life. Or maybe not. Again logic in action films is never a strong point, least of all in Hollywood films! The film is also guilty of having the single WORST title sequence ever, with a God awful truly cringeworthy song called "Friday night's a great time for football" sung by Billy Medley, which deserves its place in the musical dustbin.
So that's it for my look at The Last Boy Scout which after 23 years is still an entertaining, albeit very silly action film with some nifty one liners and good cast giving decent accounts of themselves.
And with that I shall leave it right there.
Monday 12 May 2014
Lethal Weapon Part 3: "Roger grab the cat!" and "Its fried rice you plick!"
Right now we get onto the third and final part of my look at the Lethal Weapon films, which will cover Lethal Weapon 3 and 4 as I can't really be bothered doing a whole post on 4 as its easily the weakest entry in the series. But we'll get to that later, let's start with 3 first....
So the film begins with Riggs and Murtaugh (Gibson and Glover again) making the very unwise decision to try and defuse a bomb, which has been placed in a building, which has been evacuated and it end in disaster as Riggs triggers the bomb and escapes with Murtaugh just in time as blows up. As a result both men are demoted to carrying out uniform patrolman duties, which annoys Murtaugh who has only seven days left before he is due to retire. During their first day on the beat they thwart a robbery involving an armoured car, but they only catch one of the suspects as the other escapes. As a result of their effort to stop the robbery, their superior officer Captain Murphy (Steve Kahan) reinstates Riggs and Murtaugh. Riggs and Murtaugh are then introduced to an Internal affairs officer, Sergant Lorna Cole (Rene Russo) who tells them the suspect they have captured is in fact an associate of former LAPD Lieutenant Jack Travis (Stuart Wilson) who is now an arms dealer.
Meanwhile Travis deals with the other man who escaped the armoured car crime scene by having his men throw him into cement and uses it to show to a mobster Tyrone (Gregory Millar) that he isn't to be messed with. Travis then manages to access the police lock-up and kills the other associate who the police have captured. However Travis was caught on camera carrying out the execution and as Leo Getz (Joe Pesci) arrives at the station, paying visit to his two police buddies and he recognises Travis and he tells him where they can find him. This leads Riggs, Murtaugh and Leo to an ice rink where a ice hockey match is in progress and right enough Travis is there in the crowd, however he manages to escape before they can get to him. Later on Riggs and Murtaugh make a stop off at a burger van, run by an old friend of Murtaugh's, however nearby Riggs eyes a drug deal in process, which he breaks up, but he is attacked by one of the suspects, and Murtaugh chases after him and kills one of them, which turns out to be a young boy named Darryl, who was a friend of his son, Nick (Damon Hines). Roger is wracked with guilt as a result and becomes withdrawn and hides out on his boat.
In the meantime Riggs teams up with Cole and they head to Travis's warehouse where they are caught by Travis's henchmen but they manage to fight them off and escape with most of the guns shipment. Riggs heads back to Cole's apartment where they begin to flirt with one another, showing off their wounds from being in the line of duty to one another, they begin to fall for one another and sleep together. Riggs later learns that Roger has not returned home and he goes to confront Roger on his boat, who is drunk, but Riggs helps him face his guilty and get over it. The next day Riggs and Roger attend Darryl's funeral who's parents insist that Roger find the man who put the gun in their son's hand. Riggs and Roger than start trying to track down who was responsible and they trace it to Travis. Travis meanwhile kidnaps Murphy and uses him to access the police's arms dumps concealed in the lower basements of the police department. Cole during her investigations realises this is what Travis is up to and they track Travis and soon give chase and rescue Murphy, however Travis once again escapes. However Leo soon turns up on the scene and as he has been helping them try and track down info on Travis, he tells them where Travis's construction site is and Riggs and Murtaugh head off to put a stop to Travis's plans once and for all.....
Lethal Weapon 3 for me is probably the second best entry in the series as it has good mix of humour, action and a bit of drama as well thrown in. The tone of the film is however is actually more overtly comedic than the first two films and this time we practically have Riggs living in Roger's house (at the start of the film he even brings his laundry over!). It also sees the situations get even more proposeterous with Riggs at the start of the film convincing Roger to go into an evacuated building to try and defuse a bomb which goes badly wrong as the building is razed to the ground (but they manage to save a cat at least!). The dynamic between Riggs and Murtaugh is still strong as ever and the chemistry between Gibson and Glover works as well as it ever has.
Performance wise things are again pretty good here, beginning with Gibson is in fine form again as Riggs and this time he comes across like he is some sort of amateur comedian, cracking gags and being a bit of a practical joker with Murtaugh. This is demonstrated in the scene where Riggs displays a roundhouse kick to Murtaugh at the station and he deliberately has Murtaugh back up near a plastic water holder, which Murtaugh ends kicking over! Gibson also get's some funny lines such as in the scene where he stops a pedestrian for jaywalking and loses his temper with him and says to Rog "Get out of the way, Rog! I wanna drill him! We can make it look like suicide!". Also there is the ridiculous scene where Gibson and Russo flirt with one another and show off their wounds as a bit of foreplay before they get down to making out with one another and throughout the film, Gibson and Russo share a good onscreen chemistry with one another. Gibson also shares a good semi dramatic scene with Glover where Riggs goes to confront Roger on his boat and he tells him "When you are retire, you're not just retiring yourself, you're retiring us! I have three beautiful kids and a wife, and they are yours! I live in your icebox, I live in your life! After all the shit we;'ve been through! Don't you get it?!". Gibson also has the odd ridiculous moment such as where he makes friends with a vicious guard dog as he pretends to be a dog, as Cole watches on in disbelief and says "Riggs......you're crazy!". And near of the film he has a funny moment where he comforts Cole, who has been shot by Travis in the final fight scene, and they sit nearby a burning part of the construction part and Riggs says "Come on, honey, its just a nice night by the fireplace" and later he says "Hey, you're supposed to grow old with someone not because of them!". And Gibson and Russo's onscreen chemistry allows for them to tease each other earlier on in the film, which is seen in the scene where Cole says to Riggs "Are you trying to bate me?" and Riggs says "I'm a master at that!". Also in the scene where Riggs fails to defuse the bomb and instead it triggers, he says to Roger "Roger... grab the cat!!" and they run out the buiding just before it blows!
Danny Glover is also great again as Murtaugh and he often becomes a foil for Riggs's practical jokes in the film. Also their first scene in the film is quite funny where they go into an evacuated building and Roger finds a cat and he says "Only me, you and this cat are stupid enough to be here!" and Riggs quips "Nearly a cat-tastrophe, huh??". Also the scene where they are demoted to walking as patrolmen on the beat is funny where Roger says to Riggs "Six days to my retire and I'm busted down to patrolman!" and as they argue Riggs grabs Roger and feels his chest and says "What have you got under there?" and Roger awkwardly says "Its a girdle!" and Riggs asks "Do they do girdles for men??" and Roger says "Of course they do, the cleaner's must have shrunk it!!". Glover also has a good dramatic scene in the film, where he unwittingly kills Darryl, his son's friend, who was fired on him and when he realises who the kid is, he desparately tries to revive him to no avail. And sadly afterwards says "I know that kid. I know that kid! He was Nick's friend". And later onboard Roger's boat, Riggs confronts Roger who's is drunk and wracked with guilt he says to Riggs "It didn't happen to you, Riggs, it happened to me! I killed that kid. I killed that boy! Oh you killed a lot of people. You killed a lot of fuckin people!" but Riggs some helps Roger come to terms with his guilt. And afterwards Roger has funny moment where he drunkenly says "you know I love you, Riggs. And you're problems are my problems" and he get's Riggs to confide in him as Riggs says "Well I think I slept with someone and I shouldn't have" and Roger get's it into his head that it was his daughter, Rianne, and he yells "You son of a bitch!!!" and punches him off the boat into the water.
Getting onto Rene Russo who is really good in her role as Lorna Cole, an intelligent and tough headed Internal affairs cop, who helps Riggs and Murtaugh track down Travis. Russo early on shows that she gels well with the regular cast even in her first scene where she get's in the elevator with Riggs and Roger and Riggs winds up Roger about "those miserable drug dealers getting it" i.e. his so called stash of money and he nudges against her as she is about to leave the lift. And Roger asks who she is and she says "Fly me I'm your friendly Porteugese airline!". And in the scene where they argue with Cole, Riggs says "What are we required reading or something?" and Cole says "As a matter of fact you are. Its a cross between Police Gazette and Mad magazine!". And Russo's scene with Gibson where they show off their gun and knife wounds from the line of duty is also one of the film's most amusing moments.
As for the other cast members Joe Pesci makes an amusing return as the annoying Leo Getz and this time he has become a real estate agent, and he even tries to sell off Roger's house for him as he plans to retire and move out. However Leo is forced to "disclose" all true facts of the damage of the house to a couple viewing it and they ask what happened to the living room and he says "Oh a drug dealer one time crashed through here and shot up the place" and later the worried couple ask if there is anything else, and he says "OK the toilet has also been redone due to unexpected bomb damage!". And later as the try and capture Travis at the ice rink, Leo jumps on Travis who shoots Leo in the hand, and Leo overreacts thinking he is dying and he says to Rog "I'm dying, Rog! I'm dying! I'm cold, that's what happens when you die!" and Roger reassures him "Leo, you're lying on the ice!". And later after Leo has been kept in hospital, deliberately as a result of Riggs doctoring Leo's prognosis sheet in the hospital, Leo later returns to the police station. And he angrily says to Riggs and Roger "They fuck in you in the hospital! First they drug you, then they fuck you! And then the insurance company along and fuck you some more! 10 dollars for a fuckin aspirin!".
And lastly I will mention Stuart Wilson who is actually fairly effective in his role as the main villain, Jack Travis, an ex-cop turned arms dealer. Wilson has some good scenes in the film such as his first one where Travis deals with his associate who bungled the armoured car robbery by having thrown into cement and he says to him "Now we have a relationship we can build on!". Also later as he is on the phone to fellow mobster, Tyrone, who is having second thoughts of working together, Travis says "Tyrone, you back out now and I'll make sure only your dentist can identify the body, is that good enough?". And the scene where he kidnaps the police captain Murphy, he says to him about the police arms dump "Its one a stop shop and if you guts nobody can do a fuckin thing about it!" and as Murphy says he's history, Travis says "Sorry, Jack, I'm just gettin started!". And last of all Steve Kahan does well with his role as Captain Murphy, Riggs and Murtaugh's superior officer, who is given more to do this time round than before.
Getting onto Richard Donner who does another fine job here with the action and the cast as the film's stunts get more and more daring and this time they go even as far as blowing up a whole building! The building in question was in fact formerly the city hall building of Orlando, Florida, and Warner brothers (the film distributer company for the Lethal Weapon films) was paid a sum for the demolition of it. Music wise Michael Kamen provides another good score for the film, which is pretty similar to what we've heard before but it fits the bill alongside Eric Clapton and David Sanbourne who also provide their guitar and sax.
As for flaws well Lethal Weapon 3 certainly certainly is no masterpiece and it has to be said by the third film the characters are starting to become a parody of themselves with Riggs and Murtaugh becoming more like Laurel and Hardy than anything else. And the film's emphasis on comedy may keep the tone light but it also to an extent hampers it as well and there really is something daft about Riggs being so involved in Murtaugh's life that even get's Roger's wife to do his laundry! Also Riggs and Murtaugh once again get off lightly with disregarding orders, which we see at the start of the film where they are responsible for demolishing an entire building and a punishment all they get is demoted to being patrolmen, which seems to be no more than a slap on the wrist, despite the damages they must owe to the city! But again it is an action film and credibility will always take a massive dive where its involved. The plot again is also pretty thin (Rog's nickname funnily enough!) as are all the Lethal Weapon plots, the first one we had drugs, the second money, and this its guns! The film also does a bit of political mirroring of the times and reflects the LA riot troubles and the gangbang scene in LA, which is highlighted in the film where Roger shoots the young boy, Darryl, who get's caught up in the gang scene, having dropped out of high school. But this all again feels a bit superflous next to the rest of the film and Roger's guilt over Darryl's death is dealt with pretty quickly and low and behold we find out the gun came from Travis so it all connects up nicely! Whatever.
That aside Lethal Weapon 3 is still one of the most enjoyable entries in the series and the cast all work well and the introduction of Rene Russo also benefits the series as well given her onscreen chemistry with Gibson.
(SO THAT'S LETHAL WEAPON 3 DONE!)
Now for Lethal Weapon 4, OK I will keep this brief but as its not that great a film and the story is pretty daft and it involves Chinese immigrant smuggling. And Riggs and Murtaugh are up against a high ranked Triad negotiator, Wah Sing Ku (Jet Li) who alongside his boss, Benny Chang (Kim Chan). And in among all that Roger takes it upon himself to "save" a family of Chinese slave immigrants as he shelters them in his house. And on top of that Lorna Cole (Rene Russo) who is now in a relationship with Riggs, is pregnant with his baby, and is on maternity leave in the film. And then there is the small matter of Rog's eldest daughter, Rianne (Traci Wolfe) who is set to get married to a young detective with the LAPD, Butters (Chris Rock) which is kept secret from Roger, who actually thinks Butters might be gay! So that's a rough summary of what's involved on the different plot points, but that's as far as I'll go with that.
But it has to be said that Lethal Weapon 4 is easily the weakest in the series and the story is not interesting as there are too many subplots, and none of them are that appealing. The film also has its share of stupid scenes such as the intro where Riggs and Murtaugh try and take down a man in an armoured suit, armed with a flamethrower on the streets, and Riggs get's Rog to distract him, by stripping to his undies and flapping his arms like a chicken! Then there is the equally daft scene on Roger's boat, where Riggs, Rog and Leo are together and Roger has a mini shark flapping about on it!! Although this scene does include a funny moment where Leo tries to find his bags on Roger's boat and he tells Leo they are in the aft, which means nothing to Leo who says "AFT? And that is a fucking word?!". Then there are some more ridiculous moments where they pay Uncle Benny a visit and give him laughing gas and Benny corrects Riggs when he says "flied lice" and he says to him "Its fried rice, you plick!" which is probably the only real memorable thing about the film.
However one of the things the film has going for it is Jet Li, who provides some incredible fight sequences and at one point he even grabs Riggs's gun and dismantles piece by piece with lightning speed! But the film's ending is really protracted, after the two cops having dealt with Jet Li, Riggs goes off to support Lorna as she goes into labour and it ends on a very very cheesy family photo being taken with the new born babies.
Overall though Lethal Weapon 4 is a disappointing end to the series with its uninteresting and bloated story and many silly moments and with the characters now just a parody of their former selves it lacks the gritty qualities that were found in the original and to a lesser extent in the second and third films as well.
So I shall leave you there and that's it for my look at the Lethal Weapon series, so better get to bed as I'm getting too old for shit!
Bye for now.
So the film begins with Riggs and Murtaugh (Gibson and Glover again) making the very unwise decision to try and defuse a bomb, which has been placed in a building, which has been evacuated and it end in disaster as Riggs triggers the bomb and escapes with Murtaugh just in time as blows up. As a result both men are demoted to carrying out uniform patrolman duties, which annoys Murtaugh who has only seven days left before he is due to retire. During their first day on the beat they thwart a robbery involving an armoured car, but they only catch one of the suspects as the other escapes. As a result of their effort to stop the robbery, their superior officer Captain Murphy (Steve Kahan) reinstates Riggs and Murtaugh. Riggs and Murtaugh are then introduced to an Internal affairs officer, Sergant Lorna Cole (Rene Russo) who tells them the suspect they have captured is in fact an associate of former LAPD Lieutenant Jack Travis (Stuart Wilson) who is now an arms dealer.
Meanwhile Travis deals with the other man who escaped the armoured car crime scene by having his men throw him into cement and uses it to show to a mobster Tyrone (Gregory Millar) that he isn't to be messed with. Travis then manages to access the police lock-up and kills the other associate who the police have captured. However Travis was caught on camera carrying out the execution and as Leo Getz (Joe Pesci) arrives at the station, paying visit to his two police buddies and he recognises Travis and he tells him where they can find him. This leads Riggs, Murtaugh and Leo to an ice rink where a ice hockey match is in progress and right enough Travis is there in the crowd, however he manages to escape before they can get to him. Later on Riggs and Murtaugh make a stop off at a burger van, run by an old friend of Murtaugh's, however nearby Riggs eyes a drug deal in process, which he breaks up, but he is attacked by one of the suspects, and Murtaugh chases after him and kills one of them, which turns out to be a young boy named Darryl, who was a friend of his son, Nick (Damon Hines). Roger is wracked with guilt as a result and becomes withdrawn and hides out on his boat.
In the meantime Riggs teams up with Cole and they head to Travis's warehouse where they are caught by Travis's henchmen but they manage to fight them off and escape with most of the guns shipment. Riggs heads back to Cole's apartment where they begin to flirt with one another, showing off their wounds from being in the line of duty to one another, they begin to fall for one another and sleep together. Riggs later learns that Roger has not returned home and he goes to confront Roger on his boat, who is drunk, but Riggs helps him face his guilty and get over it. The next day Riggs and Roger attend Darryl's funeral who's parents insist that Roger find the man who put the gun in their son's hand. Riggs and Roger than start trying to track down who was responsible and they trace it to Travis. Travis meanwhile kidnaps Murphy and uses him to access the police's arms dumps concealed in the lower basements of the police department. Cole during her investigations realises this is what Travis is up to and they track Travis and soon give chase and rescue Murphy, however Travis once again escapes. However Leo soon turns up on the scene and as he has been helping them try and track down info on Travis, he tells them where Travis's construction site is and Riggs and Murtaugh head off to put a stop to Travis's plans once and for all.....
Lethal Weapon 3 for me is probably the second best entry in the series as it has good mix of humour, action and a bit of drama as well thrown in. The tone of the film is however is actually more overtly comedic than the first two films and this time we practically have Riggs living in Roger's house (at the start of the film he even brings his laundry over!). It also sees the situations get even more proposeterous with Riggs at the start of the film convincing Roger to go into an evacuated building to try and defuse a bomb which goes badly wrong as the building is razed to the ground (but they manage to save a cat at least!). The dynamic between Riggs and Murtaugh is still strong as ever and the chemistry between Gibson and Glover works as well as it ever has.
Performance wise things are again pretty good here, beginning with Gibson is in fine form again as Riggs and this time he comes across like he is some sort of amateur comedian, cracking gags and being a bit of a practical joker with Murtaugh. This is demonstrated in the scene where Riggs displays a roundhouse kick to Murtaugh at the station and he deliberately has Murtaugh back up near a plastic water holder, which Murtaugh ends kicking over! Gibson also get's some funny lines such as in the scene where he stops a pedestrian for jaywalking and loses his temper with him and says to Rog "Get out of the way, Rog! I wanna drill him! We can make it look like suicide!". Also there is the ridiculous scene where Gibson and Russo flirt with one another and show off their wounds as a bit of foreplay before they get down to making out with one another and throughout the film, Gibson and Russo share a good onscreen chemistry with one another. Gibson also shares a good semi dramatic scene with Glover where Riggs goes to confront Roger on his boat and he tells him "When you are retire, you're not just retiring yourself, you're retiring us! I have three beautiful kids and a wife, and they are yours! I live in your icebox, I live in your life! After all the shit we;'ve been through! Don't you get it?!". Gibson also has the odd ridiculous moment such as where he makes friends with a vicious guard dog as he pretends to be a dog, as Cole watches on in disbelief and says "Riggs......you're crazy!". And near of the film he has a funny moment where he comforts Cole, who has been shot by Travis in the final fight scene, and they sit nearby a burning part of the construction part and Riggs says "Come on, honey, its just a nice night by the fireplace" and later he says "Hey, you're supposed to grow old with someone not because of them!". And Gibson and Russo's onscreen chemistry allows for them to tease each other earlier on in the film, which is seen in the scene where Cole says to Riggs "Are you trying to bate me?" and Riggs says "I'm a master at that!". Also in the scene where Riggs fails to defuse the bomb and instead it triggers, he says to Roger "Roger... grab the cat!!" and they run out the buiding just before it blows!
Danny Glover is also great again as Murtaugh and he often becomes a foil for Riggs's practical jokes in the film. Also their first scene in the film is quite funny where they go into an evacuated building and Roger finds a cat and he says "Only me, you and this cat are stupid enough to be here!" and Riggs quips "Nearly a cat-tastrophe, huh??". Also the scene where they are demoted to walking as patrolmen on the beat is funny where Roger says to Riggs "Six days to my retire and I'm busted down to patrolman!" and as they argue Riggs grabs Roger and feels his chest and says "What have you got under there?" and Roger awkwardly says "Its a girdle!" and Riggs asks "Do they do girdles for men??" and Roger says "Of course they do, the cleaner's must have shrunk it!!". Glover also has a good dramatic scene in the film, where he unwittingly kills Darryl, his son's friend, who was fired on him and when he realises who the kid is, he desparately tries to revive him to no avail. And sadly afterwards says "I know that kid. I know that kid! He was Nick's friend". And later onboard Roger's boat, Riggs confronts Roger who's is drunk and wracked with guilt he says to Riggs "It didn't happen to you, Riggs, it happened to me! I killed that kid. I killed that boy! Oh you killed a lot of people. You killed a lot of fuckin people!" but Riggs some helps Roger come to terms with his guilt. And afterwards Roger has funny moment where he drunkenly says "you know I love you, Riggs. And you're problems are my problems" and he get's Riggs to confide in him as Riggs says "Well I think I slept with someone and I shouldn't have" and Roger get's it into his head that it was his daughter, Rianne, and he yells "You son of a bitch!!!" and punches him off the boat into the water.
Getting onto Rene Russo who is really good in her role as Lorna Cole, an intelligent and tough headed Internal affairs cop, who helps Riggs and Murtaugh track down Travis. Russo early on shows that she gels well with the regular cast even in her first scene where she get's in the elevator with Riggs and Roger and Riggs winds up Roger about "those miserable drug dealers getting it" i.e. his so called stash of money and he nudges against her as she is about to leave the lift. And Roger asks who she is and she says "Fly me I'm your friendly Porteugese airline!". And in the scene where they argue with Cole, Riggs says "What are we required reading or something?" and Cole says "As a matter of fact you are. Its a cross between Police Gazette and Mad magazine!". And Russo's scene with Gibson where they show off their gun and knife wounds from the line of duty is also one of the film's most amusing moments.
As for the other cast members Joe Pesci makes an amusing return as the annoying Leo Getz and this time he has become a real estate agent, and he even tries to sell off Roger's house for him as he plans to retire and move out. However Leo is forced to "disclose" all true facts of the damage of the house to a couple viewing it and they ask what happened to the living room and he says "Oh a drug dealer one time crashed through here and shot up the place" and later the worried couple ask if there is anything else, and he says "OK the toilet has also been redone due to unexpected bomb damage!". And later as the try and capture Travis at the ice rink, Leo jumps on Travis who shoots Leo in the hand, and Leo overreacts thinking he is dying and he says to Rog "I'm dying, Rog! I'm dying! I'm cold, that's what happens when you die!" and Roger reassures him "Leo, you're lying on the ice!". And later after Leo has been kept in hospital, deliberately as a result of Riggs doctoring Leo's prognosis sheet in the hospital, Leo later returns to the police station. And he angrily says to Riggs and Roger "They fuck in you in the hospital! First they drug you, then they fuck you! And then the insurance company along and fuck you some more! 10 dollars for a fuckin aspirin!".
And lastly I will mention Stuart Wilson who is actually fairly effective in his role as the main villain, Jack Travis, an ex-cop turned arms dealer. Wilson has some good scenes in the film such as his first one where Travis deals with his associate who bungled the armoured car robbery by having thrown into cement and he says to him "Now we have a relationship we can build on!". Also later as he is on the phone to fellow mobster, Tyrone, who is having second thoughts of working together, Travis says "Tyrone, you back out now and I'll make sure only your dentist can identify the body, is that good enough?". And the scene where he kidnaps the police captain Murphy, he says to him about the police arms dump "Its one a stop shop and if you guts nobody can do a fuckin thing about it!" and as Murphy says he's history, Travis says "Sorry, Jack, I'm just gettin started!". And last of all Steve Kahan does well with his role as Captain Murphy, Riggs and Murtaugh's superior officer, who is given more to do this time round than before.
Getting onto Richard Donner who does another fine job here with the action and the cast as the film's stunts get more and more daring and this time they go even as far as blowing up a whole building! The building in question was in fact formerly the city hall building of Orlando, Florida, and Warner brothers (the film distributer company for the Lethal Weapon films) was paid a sum for the demolition of it. Music wise Michael Kamen provides another good score for the film, which is pretty similar to what we've heard before but it fits the bill alongside Eric Clapton and David Sanbourne who also provide their guitar and sax.
As for flaws well Lethal Weapon 3 certainly certainly is no masterpiece and it has to be said by the third film the characters are starting to become a parody of themselves with Riggs and Murtaugh becoming more like Laurel and Hardy than anything else. And the film's emphasis on comedy may keep the tone light but it also to an extent hampers it as well and there really is something daft about Riggs being so involved in Murtaugh's life that even get's Roger's wife to do his laundry! Also Riggs and Murtaugh once again get off lightly with disregarding orders, which we see at the start of the film where they are responsible for demolishing an entire building and a punishment all they get is demoted to being patrolmen, which seems to be no more than a slap on the wrist, despite the damages they must owe to the city! But again it is an action film and credibility will always take a massive dive where its involved. The plot again is also pretty thin (Rog's nickname funnily enough!) as are all the Lethal Weapon plots, the first one we had drugs, the second money, and this its guns! The film also does a bit of political mirroring of the times and reflects the LA riot troubles and the gangbang scene in LA, which is highlighted in the film where Roger shoots the young boy, Darryl, who get's caught up in the gang scene, having dropped out of high school. But this all again feels a bit superflous next to the rest of the film and Roger's guilt over Darryl's death is dealt with pretty quickly and low and behold we find out the gun came from Travis so it all connects up nicely! Whatever.
That aside Lethal Weapon 3 is still one of the most enjoyable entries in the series and the cast all work well and the introduction of Rene Russo also benefits the series as well given her onscreen chemistry with Gibson.
(SO THAT'S LETHAL WEAPON 3 DONE!)
Now for Lethal Weapon 4, OK I will keep this brief but as its not that great a film and the story is pretty daft and it involves Chinese immigrant smuggling. And Riggs and Murtaugh are up against a high ranked Triad negotiator, Wah Sing Ku (Jet Li) who alongside his boss, Benny Chang (Kim Chan). And in among all that Roger takes it upon himself to "save" a family of Chinese slave immigrants as he shelters them in his house. And on top of that Lorna Cole (Rene Russo) who is now in a relationship with Riggs, is pregnant with his baby, and is on maternity leave in the film. And then there is the small matter of Rog's eldest daughter, Rianne (Traci Wolfe) who is set to get married to a young detective with the LAPD, Butters (Chris Rock) which is kept secret from Roger, who actually thinks Butters might be gay! So that's a rough summary of what's involved on the different plot points, but that's as far as I'll go with that.
But it has to be said that Lethal Weapon 4 is easily the weakest in the series and the story is not interesting as there are too many subplots, and none of them are that appealing. The film also has its share of stupid scenes such as the intro where Riggs and Murtaugh try and take down a man in an armoured suit, armed with a flamethrower on the streets, and Riggs get's Rog to distract him, by stripping to his undies and flapping his arms like a chicken! Then there is the equally daft scene on Roger's boat, where Riggs, Rog and Leo are together and Roger has a mini shark flapping about on it!! Although this scene does include a funny moment where Leo tries to find his bags on Roger's boat and he tells Leo they are in the aft, which means nothing to Leo who says "AFT? And that is a fucking word?!". Then there are some more ridiculous moments where they pay Uncle Benny a visit and give him laughing gas and Benny corrects Riggs when he says "flied lice" and he says to him "Its fried rice, you plick!" which is probably the only real memorable thing about the film.
However one of the things the film has going for it is Jet Li, who provides some incredible fight sequences and at one point he even grabs Riggs's gun and dismantles piece by piece with lightning speed! But the film's ending is really protracted, after the two cops having dealt with Jet Li, Riggs goes off to support Lorna as she goes into labour and it ends on a very very cheesy family photo being taken with the new born babies.
Overall though Lethal Weapon 4 is a disappointing end to the series with its uninteresting and bloated story and many silly moments and with the characters now just a parody of their former selves it lacks the gritty qualities that were found in the original and to a lesser extent in the second and third films as well.
So I shall leave you there and that's it for my look at the Lethal Weapon series, so better get to bed as I'm getting too old for shit!
Bye for now.
Friday 9 May 2014
Lethal Weapon Part 2: "Free South Africa you dumb son of a bitch!!"
Right OK so now onto part 2 of my posts on the Lethal Weapon films and this one will of course cover the sequel to the original, which for some reason was called Lethal Weapon 2 (can't imagine why!). But anyway enough silly sarcasm its time to give this sequel a look.....
So the story is set a year after the events of the first film and starts with Murtaugh (Glover) and Riggs (Gibson) chasing unidentified suspects who are transporting illegal shipments of gold krugerrands. The South African government then has its local counsul-general Arjen Rudd (Joss Ackland) and his security agent, Pieter Vorstedt (Derek O'Connor) warn Riggs and Murtaugh off the case, which they do by invading Mutaugh's house and typing up him and his wife. The next day Murtaugh and Riggs are reassigned by their superior officer, Captain McCluskey (Steven Kahan) to look after a federal state witness, Leo Getz (Joe Pesci). On arriving at Leo's hotel room, one of Rudd's associates is sent to kill Leo, who is saved by Riggs as they dive out the window together into a swimming pool below, but the associate flees and Leo reveals that he formerly was a money launderer for smugglers. Together with Leo's help, Riggs and Murtaugh track the South Africans to a large stilt house, where Riggs gives chase to the associate who made an attempt on Leo's life and the associate is killed during the pursuit. After this Riggs and Murtaugh turn up at the South African consulate with backup, however Rudd confronts them and tells them that he has diplomatic immunity and therefore can't be prosecuted, so Riggs and Murtaugh and the others leave, not before Riggs bumps into Rudd's attractive secretary, Rika van den Haas (Patsy Kensit) who is a libreral Afrikkan who disapproves of her boss.
Back at the police department, McCluskey tells Riggs and Murtaugh to back off on Rudd, given his diplomatic immunity. However this only inspires Riggs to harrass Rudd even more publicly as he follows him around and even confronts him back at the consulate headquarters. At this time the South Africans start to put more heat on the cops as they rig Murtaugh's toilet seat with explosives, which leaves him on the can all night and in the end Riggs saves Murtaugh's life by calling in the bomb squad and helping him off the seat into a bomb resistant bath tub. Riggs later meets up with Rika again and the two of them go back to Riggs's place and get more acquainted and end up having sex. Roger meanwhile is stuck with looking after Leo and follows up on lead from which Riggs found a piece of paper in Rudd's office, which says "Alba Varden, Thursday". Roger returns to his home (from which he has evacuated his family due to the South African threats) and searches through his video collection to find that the Alba Varden (which he seems to remember seeing somewhere) is in fact the name of a freighter. At this point one of the Rudd's men makes an attempt on Roger's life, however Roger manages to kill the man and escape only to find the South Africans have taken Leo.
In the meantime Rudd has declared war on the police and has his men kill some of Riggs and Murtaugh's fellow police officers. Rudd also has his men ambush Riggs's trailer, however Riggs manages to kill them and escapes with Rika, as he drops her off at her place, he is knocked out by Pieter. Pieter later tells Riggs, who he has chained up in a straight jacket, that he was the one that was responsible for his wife's death, as there was a contract put out on Riggs's life, as they sabotaged his car but instead his wife was driving that night instead. Pieter then has his men throws Riggs into the water, however Riggs manages to escape, given his talent to dislocate his shoulder whenever he needs, but he soon finds Rika drowned underwater. Riggs in a rage kills Pieter's men and heads after Pieter, calling Roger he tells him he's going to go after Rudd and Murtaugh soon joins him. Riggs and Murtaugh then rescue Leo from Rudd's men, who have him held at the stilt house and Riggs destroys the stilt house, using his truck and cables which he attaches to one of the stilts however Pieter escapes. And from here Riggs and Murtaugh head off to find Rudd and Pieter and put an end to their schemes once and for all.....
As a sequel, Lethal Weapon 2 is a very enjoyable and credible sequel, which does see a more comedic tone present itself than what we had before in the original. Shane Black himself had made the script more harsh and violent in tone as it originally was supposed to end with Riggs being brutally tortured and killed, however after his draft was re-written he chose to leave the series and the screenwriting duties were taken over by Jeffrey Boam (who wrote the screenplay for Indian Jones the last crusade). However film still manages to largely keep its feet on the ground and we also get a bit of back story over the events of how Riggs's wife died and we later on find out that it was Pieter that was behind it. The film also dealt with the timely issues of Apartheid government in South Africa, as at that time of course the country was in great political turmoil and that is mirrrored here in the film as Rudd and his men are harrassed by the police and the public given they are against the South African government's politics and racial segregation.
Getting to the performances they are all pretty good, starting with Mel Gibson who reprises his role of Riggs with aplomb and he adds a lighter dimension to his character than before as Riggs is now on a more even keel as he has a solid friendship with Murtaugh and his character has become more a joker although we still get shades of Riggs's sadness over his wife's death as he reveals the circumstances of her death early on in the film. Gibson has a fair few highlights in the film such as the scene where he turns up at Rudd's office and he pulls his gun on him and his men and says "I'll make a deal with your, Arjen, or whatever the fuck your name is. You fold up your tents and get the fuck out of my country, and I won't do anything to you, I'll leave you alone. Because if you stick around here I'm gonna fuck your ass! I'm gonna send you home with your balls in a sling, you got that?!". Another good scene is where Riggs meets Rika at the grocery store and he flirts with her and tells "hey come back to my place, I'll cook you dinner, I've got a new view of the beach. I'm a gourmet cook, come on!" and as Rika says no, he continues to charm her and says "Come on, be original! Say yes, everyone else says no!" and he empties the contents of her shopping cart all over the floor and he says "Lady let go off my bag, somebody call a cop!" before they leave together.
Gibson also get's some glib one liners as well from Boam's script such as when Riggs and Murtaugh first turn up to babysit Leo at his hotel room, and they knock the door and Riggs says "Police open up!" and Leo asks how does he know its the police and Riggs replies "When I shoot you through the door you can examine the bullet. Open up!". Also he has another where McCluskey (who keeps saying "I don't give a fuck!" all the time) throws a "No smoking" sign at him as he has a lit cigarette in his mouth and McCluskey asks "You know what that says?" and Riggs says "Yeah same thing as that, but I don't give a fuck!". Another good scene Gibson has is with Glover where Riggs stays behind to help Murtaugh off his toilet, which is rigged with an explosive and the two of them joke about why didn't they put the bomb in Roger's wife's stove and Riggs says "Yeah think of all the needless suffering that could have ended right then and there!" (as Rog's wife is a terrible cook!). Gibson however also some good dramatic moments as well such as the scene where he finds Rika has been drowned underwater and he takes her body up to the surface and after he kills Pieter's men, he sorrowfully carries her in his arms, as he walks in circles. Which is then followed by his phone call to Roger where he expresses his desire for revenge and says "I'm not a cop tonight, Rog, this is personal! I'm gonna get those bastards, Rog, I'm gonna get em and fuck em! You don't undertstand, Rog, they killed them both, Rika and Vicki!". But of course the film ends on a lighter note where after all the fighting is done, and Riggs lies on the floor with a few bullet wounds, he says to Rog "I want you to reach into my pocket" and Rog takes out his cigarettes and Riggs says "I want you to throw away those things, they'll kill you, really!".
Danny Glover is also great again as Murtaugh, Riggs's long suffering partner who at the start of the film has bought his wife a brand new station wagon, but it then takes a serious beating during their car chase and as the film goes it becomes more and more damaged! Glover also has his share of good moments in the film, such as the scene where Riggs and Murtaugh turn up at the stilt house and try to arrest Rudd's men. Rudd turns up and announces who he is and that he is a South African diplomat and Riggs says to Rog "South Africa, Rog. The home of the Krugerrand" and Rog says "Yeah among other things!". Another funny moment is when Roger puts on the TV at night for the premiere of his eldest daughter, Rianne's debut TV advert, which turns out to be an add for condoms (which Rog was naturally unaware of!). And after Roger sees the advert he shuts off the TV in shock and quietly says to his wife "Trish, take the kids upstairs!" and his youngest daughter says "But daddy we learn about this everyday in human development!" and Roger is outraged and says "Human development???? Human what????!!". And afterward he moans to Riggs about how he told his fellow police officers about the commercial and no doubt they would be watchin and Roger says "Cops never let up you see! Now I'll have rubbers on my desk, rubbers in the coffee, rubbers rubbers rubbers! If only you kept your mouth shut!" which Riggs follows up by saying "But you know what the boys are like, in one ear and out the rubber!". Which brings onto another funny scene where Roger and Leo are in hotel room where Leo looks at Roger's taxes and all of a sudden, Rianne's commercial comes on again and Leo says "Look the body on this girl! She is so hot!" and Roger turns off the TV and grabs his hand and says "I'm gonna make believe I didn't hear you say that!". Also there is of course the scene where he is sitting on the toilet and as Riggs looks under the toilet seat he sees the explosives attached to it Roger says "Tell me I'm not fucked!" and Riggs says quietly "He's fucked!" which leads Rog to say "I'm gonna die on the toilet aren't I?". But my favourite scene of Glover's in the whole film comes when Roger turns up at the South african consulate headquarters pretending to be someone who wants to emigrate to South Africa. And the South African employee at the consulate looks surprised and says "I don't think you want to emigrate to South Africa" and Rog asks why not and the man says "Well... because your black!". And Rog says "Of course I'm black. That's why I want to go to South Africa, to help my oppressed brothers take up the tyranny against the fascist white minority regime! One man, one vote! Free South Africa, you dumb son of a bitch!!" after which he is kicked out by security and rouses the support of the protesters outside!
Joe Pesci is also pretty good and funny in his role as the irritating federal witness, accountant and former money launderer, Leo Getz, who's catchphrase is "Whatever you want, Leo Getz!". Pesci also has some good moments in the film such as the scene where he is incensed at being stiffed at a drive thru where he was given the wrong sandwich. And he says to Riggs and Roger "Can I give you guys a friendly piece of advice? Don't ever go to the window, always go up to the counter! You know why? I'll tell you. The FUCK you at the drive-thru OK? They fuck you at the drive-thru! They know you're gonna be miles away before you find out you got fucked! They know you're not gonna turn around and go back, they don't care. So who get's fucked?! Ol' Leo Getz! I don't give a fuck, and I'm not eatin this tuna, ok???!!!". Then there is the scene where Leo first meets Riggs and Murtaugh and they are both abrupt and rude to him and Riggs tells him to shut up "I get it, bad cop, good cop!" and Rog then tells him to shut up and Leo says "Oh I get it! Bad cop, bad cop! I know all the routines". And after the South Africans make an attempt on Leo's life, and they land in a swimming pool below, Riggs unwittingly punches Leo in the face, thinking it to be the would be assassin. And Riggs asks what Leo did and he says "Nothing, nothing honest! OK I laundered half a billion dollars in drug money, OK?! Give or take a few, there was so much money! Can I please have some cotton balls for my nose?!" and Riggs says "Can you please shut the fuck up!". Also there is the scene where Leo clocks the TV advert Rianne, Rog's daughter is in, and Leo says "Look at the body on this girl, she is so hot!" and as Roger sharply turns off the TV set, Leo protests and says "What are you doin??? What are you doin???! She's got a great body! She wants to make me buy rubbers!".
As for the supporting cast and the villains, Joss Ackland is excellent in his role as the rather creepy and cool headed main villain, Arjen Rudd, who eventually declares open war on the police after so much harrassment. Ackland has some good moments in the film as well, such as the scene where he drops off Rika at her apartment and he explains to her "You see my dear, the politics of our government are not very popular in this country. And the police force in this city is overrun with blacks. They have badges and guns and they hate us. Our consulate staff, particularly myself, will always be victims of their harrassment". Ackland also get's one of the film's best line as well in the scene where Rog and Riggs turn up at the stilt house and try to arrest Rudd and his men, but he reveals his diplomatic credentials to them. And as Riggs swears to bring Rudd down, Rudd cooly says "My dear officer, you couldn't even give me a parking ticket! Who is the dickhead now, eh?!". And later when Riggs invades Rudd's office and warns him to leave the country, Rudd says "Just get out of here. Kaffir lover!".
Patsy Kensit who is arguably the weak link in the cast, also does well enough with her role, but she is largely underused in the film and obviously just serves as nothing more than the romantic interest for Riggs, which we plainly see in Kensit and Gibson's sex scene. Kensit admitted though that she felt uncomfortable filming the sex scene with Gibson (as did he) given that they were both in marriages and Kensit at that time was married to Simple Minds lead singer, Jim Kerr (and later she went out with that twat Liam Gallagher, and she must have been taking some serious mind altering substances back then!).
And lastly Derrick O'Connor is excellent in his role as Pieter Vorstedt, Rudd's security enforcer, who later rages war with the police and tells Riggs of his involvement in his wife's death. O'Connor has some good scenes in the film, such as his first scene where he shoots one of Rudd's men in head (actually played by Mark Rolston from Aliens), as a result of his failure and Pieter says "You give a whole new meaning to the word dropcloth, Mr Rudd!" and he proceeds to wrap the man's body in plastic covers. And later as Rudd berates Pieter in his office for letting Leo escape, Pieter looks around the floor and Rudd asks what he is doing and Pieter says "Oh I was just making sure to see I wasn't standing on plastic!". And lastly O'Connor shares a good scene with Gibson where he has captured him and tied him in a straight jacket and tells him "I'm the guy who changed the course of your life, man! You were working as a narc and you were getting too close to us, so you had a contract put out on you. I handled it myself. Drove your car right off the fucking road, remember? Oh of course you weren't driving. I pushed back this mop of blood soaked hair and I saw a face... your wife right? She didn't die straight away. It took a bit a of time" and as he is about to leave he says "You don't have much luck with woman do you, Riggs!".
Moving finally onto Richard Donner, who once again does a fine job with the film and he stages the action scenes really well and ups the tempo and the pace from the original and despite the shift to a more comedic tone he also still manages to retain a fair balance of drama as well in the sequel. Music wise, Michael Kamen once again provides a fine score for the film and is backed up very well once more by Eric Clapton on guitar and David Sanbourne on the sax. The film also makes good use of George Harrison's song "Cheer down" which was in fact recorded for the film to promote it, which he recorded along with the American rock artist, Tom Petty.
So as for flaws.... how does Lethal Weapon 2 favour??? OK well its not quite perfect of course and perhaps part of the problem lies partly with the film's more comedic tone, which serves to undercut the effectiveness of the characters a bit more than in the original film. It still does have some good dramatic moments and its good that Weapon 2 has its funny moments but on the other hand it started to show signs of the main characters one day would become a parody of themselves, which by Lethal Weapon 4 they certainly did! Perhaps also you could argue that while the film certainly aimed to cover relevant issues of the time with the Apartheid in South Africa, it feels somewhat superficial next to all the action and despite Ackland and O'Connor's excellent performances, the other cast members performing as South africans sound a bit feeble and almost like they have a slapped on accent (although perhaps some of them are South African!). Another thing is the film has a pretty silly over the top ending where (OK PLOT SPOILER!!!!!) Riggs and Murtaugh disregard all police procedure, despite being under strict orders not to interfere, they both go and create havoc, kill all Rudd's men, with Riggs flattening (literally!) Pieter and Rog "revoking" Rudd's diplomatic immunity! Yet at the end of course I'm sure given Hollywood's so-called (or rather non-existant as I made this bit up!) policing policies that the LAPD will be willing to sweep this whole mess under the carpet with no repurcussions whatsoever for Riggs or Murtaugh for a blatant disregard to following direct orders! And that is something that Riggs continually does particularly with Rudd where he is ordered to back off him, yet he far from subtly pesters him in public and even goes to his office, assaults Rudd's men and shoots his fish tank! And nothing will be done, cos its Riggs and he can do what he wants! Again its Hollywood.
But apart from all that Lethal Weapon 2 is a very entertaining sequel to the original and its still worth a watch now and then. So that's it for 2, next up Lethal Weapon 3.....
Bye for now!
So the story is set a year after the events of the first film and starts with Murtaugh (Glover) and Riggs (Gibson) chasing unidentified suspects who are transporting illegal shipments of gold krugerrands. The South African government then has its local counsul-general Arjen Rudd (Joss Ackland) and his security agent, Pieter Vorstedt (Derek O'Connor) warn Riggs and Murtaugh off the case, which they do by invading Mutaugh's house and typing up him and his wife. The next day Murtaugh and Riggs are reassigned by their superior officer, Captain McCluskey (Steven Kahan) to look after a federal state witness, Leo Getz (Joe Pesci). On arriving at Leo's hotel room, one of Rudd's associates is sent to kill Leo, who is saved by Riggs as they dive out the window together into a swimming pool below, but the associate flees and Leo reveals that he formerly was a money launderer for smugglers. Together with Leo's help, Riggs and Murtaugh track the South Africans to a large stilt house, where Riggs gives chase to the associate who made an attempt on Leo's life and the associate is killed during the pursuit. After this Riggs and Murtaugh turn up at the South African consulate with backup, however Rudd confronts them and tells them that he has diplomatic immunity and therefore can't be prosecuted, so Riggs and Murtaugh and the others leave, not before Riggs bumps into Rudd's attractive secretary, Rika van den Haas (Patsy Kensit) who is a libreral Afrikkan who disapproves of her boss.
Back at the police department, McCluskey tells Riggs and Murtaugh to back off on Rudd, given his diplomatic immunity. However this only inspires Riggs to harrass Rudd even more publicly as he follows him around and even confronts him back at the consulate headquarters. At this time the South Africans start to put more heat on the cops as they rig Murtaugh's toilet seat with explosives, which leaves him on the can all night and in the end Riggs saves Murtaugh's life by calling in the bomb squad and helping him off the seat into a bomb resistant bath tub. Riggs later meets up with Rika again and the two of them go back to Riggs's place and get more acquainted and end up having sex. Roger meanwhile is stuck with looking after Leo and follows up on lead from which Riggs found a piece of paper in Rudd's office, which says "Alba Varden, Thursday". Roger returns to his home (from which he has evacuated his family due to the South African threats) and searches through his video collection to find that the Alba Varden (which he seems to remember seeing somewhere) is in fact the name of a freighter. At this point one of the Rudd's men makes an attempt on Roger's life, however Roger manages to kill the man and escape only to find the South Africans have taken Leo.
In the meantime Rudd has declared war on the police and has his men kill some of Riggs and Murtaugh's fellow police officers. Rudd also has his men ambush Riggs's trailer, however Riggs manages to kill them and escapes with Rika, as he drops her off at her place, he is knocked out by Pieter. Pieter later tells Riggs, who he has chained up in a straight jacket, that he was the one that was responsible for his wife's death, as there was a contract put out on Riggs's life, as they sabotaged his car but instead his wife was driving that night instead. Pieter then has his men throws Riggs into the water, however Riggs manages to escape, given his talent to dislocate his shoulder whenever he needs, but he soon finds Rika drowned underwater. Riggs in a rage kills Pieter's men and heads after Pieter, calling Roger he tells him he's going to go after Rudd and Murtaugh soon joins him. Riggs and Murtaugh then rescue Leo from Rudd's men, who have him held at the stilt house and Riggs destroys the stilt house, using his truck and cables which he attaches to one of the stilts however Pieter escapes. And from here Riggs and Murtaugh head off to find Rudd and Pieter and put an end to their schemes once and for all.....
As a sequel, Lethal Weapon 2 is a very enjoyable and credible sequel, which does see a more comedic tone present itself than what we had before in the original. Shane Black himself had made the script more harsh and violent in tone as it originally was supposed to end with Riggs being brutally tortured and killed, however after his draft was re-written he chose to leave the series and the screenwriting duties were taken over by Jeffrey Boam (who wrote the screenplay for Indian Jones the last crusade). However film still manages to largely keep its feet on the ground and we also get a bit of back story over the events of how Riggs's wife died and we later on find out that it was Pieter that was behind it. The film also dealt with the timely issues of Apartheid government in South Africa, as at that time of course the country was in great political turmoil and that is mirrrored here in the film as Rudd and his men are harrassed by the police and the public given they are against the South African government's politics and racial segregation.
Getting to the performances they are all pretty good, starting with Mel Gibson who reprises his role of Riggs with aplomb and he adds a lighter dimension to his character than before as Riggs is now on a more even keel as he has a solid friendship with Murtaugh and his character has become more a joker although we still get shades of Riggs's sadness over his wife's death as he reveals the circumstances of her death early on in the film. Gibson has a fair few highlights in the film such as the scene where he turns up at Rudd's office and he pulls his gun on him and his men and says "I'll make a deal with your, Arjen, or whatever the fuck your name is. You fold up your tents and get the fuck out of my country, and I won't do anything to you, I'll leave you alone. Because if you stick around here I'm gonna fuck your ass! I'm gonna send you home with your balls in a sling, you got that?!". Another good scene is where Riggs meets Rika at the grocery store and he flirts with her and tells "hey come back to my place, I'll cook you dinner, I've got a new view of the beach. I'm a gourmet cook, come on!" and as Rika says no, he continues to charm her and says "Come on, be original! Say yes, everyone else says no!" and he empties the contents of her shopping cart all over the floor and he says "Lady let go off my bag, somebody call a cop!" before they leave together.
Gibson also get's some glib one liners as well from Boam's script such as when Riggs and Murtaugh first turn up to babysit Leo at his hotel room, and they knock the door and Riggs says "Police open up!" and Leo asks how does he know its the police and Riggs replies "When I shoot you through the door you can examine the bullet. Open up!". Also he has another where McCluskey (who keeps saying "I don't give a fuck!" all the time) throws a "No smoking" sign at him as he has a lit cigarette in his mouth and McCluskey asks "You know what that says?" and Riggs says "Yeah same thing as that, but I don't give a fuck!". Another good scene Gibson has is with Glover where Riggs stays behind to help Murtaugh off his toilet, which is rigged with an explosive and the two of them joke about why didn't they put the bomb in Roger's wife's stove and Riggs says "Yeah think of all the needless suffering that could have ended right then and there!" (as Rog's wife is a terrible cook!). Gibson however also some good dramatic moments as well such as the scene where he finds Rika has been drowned underwater and he takes her body up to the surface and after he kills Pieter's men, he sorrowfully carries her in his arms, as he walks in circles. Which is then followed by his phone call to Roger where he expresses his desire for revenge and says "I'm not a cop tonight, Rog, this is personal! I'm gonna get those bastards, Rog, I'm gonna get em and fuck em! You don't undertstand, Rog, they killed them both, Rika and Vicki!". But of course the film ends on a lighter note where after all the fighting is done, and Riggs lies on the floor with a few bullet wounds, he says to Rog "I want you to reach into my pocket" and Rog takes out his cigarettes and Riggs says "I want you to throw away those things, they'll kill you, really!".
Danny Glover is also great again as Murtaugh, Riggs's long suffering partner who at the start of the film has bought his wife a brand new station wagon, but it then takes a serious beating during their car chase and as the film goes it becomes more and more damaged! Glover also has his share of good moments in the film, such as the scene where Riggs and Murtaugh turn up at the stilt house and try to arrest Rudd's men. Rudd turns up and announces who he is and that he is a South African diplomat and Riggs says to Rog "South Africa, Rog. The home of the Krugerrand" and Rog says "Yeah among other things!". Another funny moment is when Roger puts on the TV at night for the premiere of his eldest daughter, Rianne's debut TV advert, which turns out to be an add for condoms (which Rog was naturally unaware of!). And after Roger sees the advert he shuts off the TV in shock and quietly says to his wife "Trish, take the kids upstairs!" and his youngest daughter says "But daddy we learn about this everyday in human development!" and Roger is outraged and says "Human development???? Human what????!!". And afterward he moans to Riggs about how he told his fellow police officers about the commercial and no doubt they would be watchin and Roger says "Cops never let up you see! Now I'll have rubbers on my desk, rubbers in the coffee, rubbers rubbers rubbers! If only you kept your mouth shut!" which Riggs follows up by saying "But you know what the boys are like, in one ear and out the rubber!". Which brings onto another funny scene where Roger and Leo are in hotel room where Leo looks at Roger's taxes and all of a sudden, Rianne's commercial comes on again and Leo says "Look the body on this girl! She is so hot!" and Roger turns off the TV and grabs his hand and says "I'm gonna make believe I didn't hear you say that!". Also there is of course the scene where he is sitting on the toilet and as Riggs looks under the toilet seat he sees the explosives attached to it Roger says "Tell me I'm not fucked!" and Riggs says quietly "He's fucked!" which leads Rog to say "I'm gonna die on the toilet aren't I?". But my favourite scene of Glover's in the whole film comes when Roger turns up at the South african consulate headquarters pretending to be someone who wants to emigrate to South Africa. And the South African employee at the consulate looks surprised and says "I don't think you want to emigrate to South Africa" and Rog asks why not and the man says "Well... because your black!". And Rog says "Of course I'm black. That's why I want to go to South Africa, to help my oppressed brothers take up the tyranny against the fascist white minority regime! One man, one vote! Free South Africa, you dumb son of a bitch!!" after which he is kicked out by security and rouses the support of the protesters outside!
Joe Pesci is also pretty good and funny in his role as the irritating federal witness, accountant and former money launderer, Leo Getz, who's catchphrase is "Whatever you want, Leo Getz!". Pesci also has some good moments in the film such as the scene where he is incensed at being stiffed at a drive thru where he was given the wrong sandwich. And he says to Riggs and Roger "Can I give you guys a friendly piece of advice? Don't ever go to the window, always go up to the counter! You know why? I'll tell you. The FUCK you at the drive-thru OK? They fuck you at the drive-thru! They know you're gonna be miles away before you find out you got fucked! They know you're not gonna turn around and go back, they don't care. So who get's fucked?! Ol' Leo Getz! I don't give a fuck, and I'm not eatin this tuna, ok???!!!". Then there is the scene where Leo first meets Riggs and Murtaugh and they are both abrupt and rude to him and Riggs tells him to shut up "I get it, bad cop, good cop!" and Rog then tells him to shut up and Leo says "Oh I get it! Bad cop, bad cop! I know all the routines". And after the South Africans make an attempt on Leo's life, and they land in a swimming pool below, Riggs unwittingly punches Leo in the face, thinking it to be the would be assassin. And Riggs asks what Leo did and he says "Nothing, nothing honest! OK I laundered half a billion dollars in drug money, OK?! Give or take a few, there was so much money! Can I please have some cotton balls for my nose?!" and Riggs says "Can you please shut the fuck up!". Also there is the scene where Leo clocks the TV advert Rianne, Rog's daughter is in, and Leo says "Look at the body on this girl, she is so hot!" and as Roger sharply turns off the TV set, Leo protests and says "What are you doin??? What are you doin???! She's got a great body! She wants to make me buy rubbers!".
As for the supporting cast and the villains, Joss Ackland is excellent in his role as the rather creepy and cool headed main villain, Arjen Rudd, who eventually declares open war on the police after so much harrassment. Ackland has some good moments in the film as well, such as the scene where he drops off Rika at her apartment and he explains to her "You see my dear, the politics of our government are not very popular in this country. And the police force in this city is overrun with blacks. They have badges and guns and they hate us. Our consulate staff, particularly myself, will always be victims of their harrassment". Ackland also get's one of the film's best line as well in the scene where Rog and Riggs turn up at the stilt house and try to arrest Rudd and his men, but he reveals his diplomatic credentials to them. And as Riggs swears to bring Rudd down, Rudd cooly says "My dear officer, you couldn't even give me a parking ticket! Who is the dickhead now, eh?!". And later when Riggs invades Rudd's office and warns him to leave the country, Rudd says "Just get out of here. Kaffir lover!".
Patsy Kensit who is arguably the weak link in the cast, also does well enough with her role, but she is largely underused in the film and obviously just serves as nothing more than the romantic interest for Riggs, which we plainly see in Kensit and Gibson's sex scene. Kensit admitted though that she felt uncomfortable filming the sex scene with Gibson (as did he) given that they were both in marriages and Kensit at that time was married to Simple Minds lead singer, Jim Kerr (and later she went out with that twat Liam Gallagher, and she must have been taking some serious mind altering substances back then!).
And lastly Derrick O'Connor is excellent in his role as Pieter Vorstedt, Rudd's security enforcer, who later rages war with the police and tells Riggs of his involvement in his wife's death. O'Connor has some good scenes in the film, such as his first scene where he shoots one of Rudd's men in head (actually played by Mark Rolston from Aliens), as a result of his failure and Pieter says "You give a whole new meaning to the word dropcloth, Mr Rudd!" and he proceeds to wrap the man's body in plastic covers. And later as Rudd berates Pieter in his office for letting Leo escape, Pieter looks around the floor and Rudd asks what he is doing and Pieter says "Oh I was just making sure to see I wasn't standing on plastic!". And lastly O'Connor shares a good scene with Gibson where he has captured him and tied him in a straight jacket and tells him "I'm the guy who changed the course of your life, man! You were working as a narc and you were getting too close to us, so you had a contract put out on you. I handled it myself. Drove your car right off the fucking road, remember? Oh of course you weren't driving. I pushed back this mop of blood soaked hair and I saw a face... your wife right? She didn't die straight away. It took a bit a of time" and as he is about to leave he says "You don't have much luck with woman do you, Riggs!".
Moving finally onto Richard Donner, who once again does a fine job with the film and he stages the action scenes really well and ups the tempo and the pace from the original and despite the shift to a more comedic tone he also still manages to retain a fair balance of drama as well in the sequel. Music wise, Michael Kamen once again provides a fine score for the film and is backed up very well once more by Eric Clapton on guitar and David Sanbourne on the sax. The film also makes good use of George Harrison's song "Cheer down" which was in fact recorded for the film to promote it, which he recorded along with the American rock artist, Tom Petty.
So as for flaws.... how does Lethal Weapon 2 favour??? OK well its not quite perfect of course and perhaps part of the problem lies partly with the film's more comedic tone, which serves to undercut the effectiveness of the characters a bit more than in the original film. It still does have some good dramatic moments and its good that Weapon 2 has its funny moments but on the other hand it started to show signs of the main characters one day would become a parody of themselves, which by Lethal Weapon 4 they certainly did! Perhaps also you could argue that while the film certainly aimed to cover relevant issues of the time with the Apartheid in South Africa, it feels somewhat superficial next to all the action and despite Ackland and O'Connor's excellent performances, the other cast members performing as South africans sound a bit feeble and almost like they have a slapped on accent (although perhaps some of them are South African!). Another thing is the film has a pretty silly over the top ending where (OK PLOT SPOILER!!!!!) Riggs and Murtaugh disregard all police procedure, despite being under strict orders not to interfere, they both go and create havoc, kill all Rudd's men, with Riggs flattening (literally!) Pieter and Rog "revoking" Rudd's diplomatic immunity! Yet at the end of course I'm sure given Hollywood's so-called (or rather non-existant as I made this bit up!) policing policies that the LAPD will be willing to sweep this whole mess under the carpet with no repurcussions whatsoever for Riggs or Murtaugh for a blatant disregard to following direct orders! And that is something that Riggs continually does particularly with Rudd where he is ordered to back off him, yet he far from subtly pesters him in public and even goes to his office, assaults Rudd's men and shoots his fish tank! And nothing will be done, cos its Riggs and he can do what he wants! Again its Hollywood.
But apart from all that Lethal Weapon 2 is a very entertaining sequel to the original and its still worth a watch now and then. So that's it for 2, next up Lethal Weapon 3.....
Bye for now!
Tuesday 6 May 2014
Lethal Weapon Part 1: "I'm too old for this shit!!"
Ok time to cover another Hollywood action film franchise and my next few posts will cover the Lethal Weapon films, which follows two unlikely cops who become buddies and this post will naturally cover the first film in the series. So let's give the first film a look....
So the story is set in 1987 in Los Angeles at around Christmas time and it starts with Sergeant Roger Murtaugh (Danny Glover) who is just reached his 50th birthday and is wary of his age and the prospect of getting older. Roger is called in to investigate the suicide of a prostitute, who turns out to be the daughter of an old friend of his, Michael Hunsaker (Tom Atkins) who he fought alongside in the Vietnam war. Meanwhile another LAPD police officer, Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson) is in the middle of a drugs bust, however he nearly kills one of the disarmed suspects as he goes into a blind rage. Riggs as it turns out is suffering from depression as the result of his wife's death, which has left him suicidal. The next day Riggs is reassigned to homicide and partnered up with Murtaugh, who is very reluctant to take on Riggs. The two of them go to see Michael Hunsaker, and Roger reveals to Hunsaker that his daughter, Amanda, was in fact murdered as the pills she had taken were doctored and laced with window cleaner, so she would have died within minutes had she not jumped. Hunsaker tells Roger that she was also involved in making pornographic video tapes and drugs and he wants Roger to find out who was behind it and kill them.
Murtaugh however finds out first hand what a loose canon Riggs is when he goes up to try and talk down a man who is threatening to jump off a building, and instead handcuffs him and they jump off together onto a large inflatable catch. Murtaugh is furious with Riggs and taunts him to shoot himself with his gun, but stops short when he realises Riggs might actually do it. Afterwards they then go to question a pimp in connection to Amanada at a mansion, which turns out to be a drug lab, however the pimp open fires on them and Riggs ends up having to kill the pimp in self defence and he saves Murtaugh in the process, which leads Murtaugh to slowly gain respect for his new partner. The two of them later go and have dinner at Murtaugh's house, where Riggs meets Rog's wife and family (and finds out Roger's eldest daughter has a crush on Riggs!) and they also speculate on what was behind the case.
The next day they go to question the hooker that Roger spoke to earlier, Dixie in connection with Amanda, however as Dixie's house is blown up as they arrive. Riggs finds a piece of a mercury switch, which woud only be used by professionals, and as they question a young boy who witnessed a man lurking about the house, he spotted that he had the same tattoo as Riggs, which is a US Army special forces tattoo, with whom Riggs served with during Vietnam. Muratugh and Riggs then go and question Hunsaker, who admits to being involved in a drug operation run by mercaneries, who were all involved in special ops and that he was trying to get out the operation and that his daughter's death was ordered by the head of the operation, General McAllister (Ryan Mitchell). However before Hunsaker can reveal anymore on the operation to Roger, McAllister's chief enforcer, Mr Joshua (Gary Busey) shows up in a helicopter and shoots Hunsaker dead, and McAllister decides to turn up the heat on the two cops and kidnaps Roger's daughter, Rianne (Traci Wolfe).
Riggs and Murtaugh are given a meeting place with McAllister, Joshua and their men, however they are ambushed by Riggs, who provides cover far away with a sniper rifle, but he is eventually captured as is Murtaugh and Rianne who attempts to escape by car. As a result Murtaugh and Riggs are both tortured in order for the mercs to find out what they know, with Joshua administering electric shock treatment to Riggs, and McAllister having Murtaugh beaten. Riggs however manages to escape and he enters and kills McAllisters men and releases Muratugh and Rianne and they flee out onto the streets, where Riggs gives chase to Joshua and Murtaugh exacts his revenge on McAllister by killing him, but Joshua get's away. And its far from over as Riggs and Murtaugh have to try and hunt down Joshua in order to keep Roger's family safe....
If I had to pick the best of the four Lethal weapon films I would say that the original, this one, Lethal Weapon is still the best. As the series went on their was a larger emphasis on the comedic tone, but here the film keeps a good balance of comedy and drama and the film has a pretty intense feel throughout. And both the lead characters have a fair bit of emotional weight over their heads, with Murtaugh feeling his age having turned 50, being a family man realising he has more to lose as he get's older, and Riggs, who's has been driven half crazy with rage and sorrow over the loss of his wife, leaving him a near suicidal emotional wreck. But where Lethal Weapon succeeds is that it takes the cop buddy buddy formula and puts two very unlikely cops together and they end up being dependent on one another, with Murtaugh becoming something of a saviour for Riggs who is so burnt out and close to the edge. That's not to say that Lethal Weapon isn't funny as it still has plenty of humourous moments and Shane Black's witty script provides some funny lines, which I will get to soon.
And that brings me onto the performances section of the review and they are excellent, particularly the two leading actors, Mel Gibson and Danny Glover, who have a natural onscreen chemistry with one another. Starting with Mel Gibson who is great as Riggs, the near pyschotic cop who is on the ragged edge who is thrown into a reluctant partnership with Murtaugh, but they soon end up becoming friends. Gibson has quite a few highlights in the film such as in his first scene where he is involved in an undercover drugs bust and he convinces the dealers that he is interested in buying the drugs and they ask for "a hundred" and he starts to count out 100 dollars. And one of the dealers angrily tries to stop him and Riggs says "Shut up, man. I'm losing count" and as the dealer tells him he wants a hundred thousand dollards, Riggs says "Tell you what, why don't I take the whole stash off your hands for free and you assholes can go to jail!". And as they cal him crazy, he pulls out his gun and says "Now that is a real badge, I'm a real cop and this is a real fucking gun!". Also there is the scene where Riggs tries to talk down the would-be jumper off the roof of a building and as he handcuffs the jumper, the jumper defiantly tells him he will jump and Riggs grabs him and says "Do you wanna jump?! Do you wanna??! Because that is just fine with me, asshole! Let's do it!" and they do just that! Gibson also has some chilling moments in the film such as where Murtaugh taunts Riggs to put his gun under his chin and pull the trigger and he nearly does it, but Murtaugh stops him at the last second, and he says "You really are crazy!" and Riggs glares at him and says "I'm hungry. I'm gonna go and get something to eat!". Also there is the scene where he calmly tells Roger when Rianne has been kidnapped "You realise they are going to kill her. And the only way to get her back is to take her from them. We're gonna get bloody on this one, Roger!". But of course Gibson has some funny moments as well such as the scene where Riggs and Murtaugh go to the firing range and Murtaugh shows off his skill as he fires a perfect shot at a paper target right in the centre. And Riggs says "Step aside old man!" and fires six shots at the target from a distance and brings it closer to see that the bullet holes he's made are a smiley face and Riggs says "Have a nice day!". There is also the moment where Riggs holds a cup of coffee under Murtaugh's nose, the next day after their first day together, as Murtaugh slowly get't out of his bed and he says to Riggs "Give me that coffee and get out of here!" and Riggs springs off the bed! Also there is the line where Riggs having rescued Murtaugh and Rianne says "Let's do what one shepherd said to the other shepherd. Let's get the flock out of here!!". Gibson also handles the action scenes in the film really well as he does plenty of running, shooting and fighting throughout.
Danny Glover is also great in his role as Martaugh, the middle aged cop who is start to feel old and wary of being a cop and Glover provides a nice world weary cynicism yet deceny to Murtaugh's character. Glover also has his share of good scenes and some funny dialogue as well throughout, such an example is in a scene near the beginning where he speaks to the hooker, Dixie, and she says "I'm beat you know how it is" and Roger says "Yeah! All dressed up and no one to blow!". And of course Glover delivers the film's most famous well recognised line when Roger first clocks Riggs in the office take out a gun as Roger runs right at Riggs, who grabs him and throws him to the floor and puts his foot on his chest, and as Roger is introduced to Riggs as his new partner, Roger groans and says "Oh I'm too old for shit!". Glover also has some good dramatic moments as well especially his scene with the mercaneries in the desert where he meets with them to trade for his daughter and he takes out a grenade from his pocket and says "If she's gonna die, she's gonna die with me! My way! Not yours!". Later on when he get's beaten up by McAllister's men who pour rock salt onto his gunshot wound and he screams out "Go spit you son of a bitch! Fuck you!" and he also later as he chases McAllister on the streets of LA, he wearily says "General McAllister.... time for you to die!". Glover also naturally shares some good chemistry and moments with Gibson, such as the scene at the firing range where they fire their weapons and discuss the case. And in the scene as Roger says their theory for the case is "Pretty fuckin thin! Hell but thin's my middle name" Riggs replies "with your wife's cooking I'm not surprised!" and Roger replies "Remarks like that will not get you invited to Christmas dinner!". Also they have a great scene where Roger angrily confronts Riggs over his actions in jumping with the jumper off the building and he yells "OK! No bullshit, do you want to kill yourself??!! Shut up, yes or no, do you wanna die??!" and as he taunts Riggs to use his gun to shoot himself, Riggs puts his finger on the trigger but Roger stops him just at the last second and says "You ain't trying to draw no psycho pension. You really ARE crazy!". However later on after all they go through, they share a nice moment at the end where Riggs says "I let you in on a little secret. I'm not crazy" and Roger smiles and says "I know" and Riggs says "Oh good, lets eat!". And lastly I will mention Glover's scene where Roger makes a poor but funny attempt at rapping in front of his kids and he laughs to himself saying "I am awful!".
Gary Busey in his role as the main villain, Mr Joshua, is also excellent and he plays the creepy albino killer in quite an understated way (which is unusual for Busey!) and he makes for an effective villain. Busey has some good scenes such as his intro where Joshua displays his ability to deal with pain as McAllister uses a lighter to burn underneath Joshua's arm, which he takes with ease. And later on in the scene where he questions Riggs, prior to him being tortured by electric shock treatment and he refers to the Asian torturer, Endo (Al Leong) and says "You know Endo, has forgotten more about dispensing pain than you and I will ever know". And as he refuses to believe that Riggs knows nothing about McAllister's next heroin shipment he says "I wish I could believe you but unfortunately I don't! Now if you would kindly tell me everything you know then I promise I will kill you real quick!". And later when he turns up at Roger's house to kill his family he enters the house and shoots the TV and yells "Goddamn Christmas! I'll give you a home to come back to!" which leads into Joshua's final fight scene with Riggs.
Ryan Mitchell is also good in his role as General McAllister, the leader of the mercaneries who captures the cops and later is forced to flee from them. Mitchell has two main scenes, the first where he is introduced and he uses Mr Joshua to a prospective buyer and he threatens him by showing Joshua's ability to withstand pain and he says "No tricks, and if you try anything you will have to answer to Mr Joshua!". And later as he has Roger tortrured he walks over to Rianne, who is tied up and in her underwear and he says "That is one real good looking young woman you have there, Mr Murtaugh!" and as Roger warns him to leave her alone he says "Spare me, son. There are no more heroes left in the world!".
The rest of the supporting cast are also fine in their roles, such as Darlene Love as Trish, Roger's wife who is has a rather small role here but she sets up her character nicely for the future films. Steven Kahan is also pretty good as Captain Murphy, Rog and Riggs cynical superior officer and he shows little concern for Riggs's mental state and he says "Look! He just wants the cash. I've seen it a dozen times! And if he off's himself then we'll know I was wrong!" which he says to the police station's psychiatrist, Dr Stephanie Woods (Mary Ellen Trainor) who gives up and says "Asshole!" after he goes to the bathroom. And lastly Tom Atkins is also very good as Michael Hansaker, Roger's Vietnam buddy who turns to him for help as he tries to get out of the drug operation run by the mercs.
Finally getting onto the film's director, Richard Donner, who does a great job here and he carried on to direct the sequels and it would be hard to imagine another director carry the style, pace, action and humour that Donner brings to the series. The film is also notable for its stunts and action which are of course great and it also features a former stuntman, Dar Robinson, who died shortly after the film was completed, who pulled off one of the film's most difficult stunts as Riggs shoots a baddie who is up in a gantry and falls off and catches his leg in a chain, leaving the dead man dangling upside down. The film's music score is also excellent which was composed by Michael Kamen and it also features some good guitar work from Eric Clapton and also the distinctive saxophone from David Sanbourne, who plays part of Murtaugh's theme. Although it has to be said the film does feature a truly awful and cringeworthy theme song, by the Canadian rock band, Honeymoon Suite which is played over the end credits (who curiously went uncredited and I wonder why?!).
As for the flaws of the film???? Well Lethal Weapon isn't perfect but it hasn't got too many glaring problems, but perhaps the only problem is the story itself is pretty flimsy an unimaginitive with two cops who become buddies and fight against drug dealers, which is nothing new in itself. Also the baddies, despite the good performances from Busey and Mitchell, are a bit bland and one dimensional and while both actors play their parts with a decent amount of menace, their characters aren't that interesting, so when they cop it (no pun intended) who cares really. Some of the characters in the film are also a bit underused such as Captain Murphy, who would later be utilised better in the sequels, and Kahan himself is Donner's cousin, so perhaps he had a word with him about it! ;-) But I'm nitpicking so there isn't a great deal here to whinge about.
So that's it for my look at the first Lethal Weapon film which for me is still the best one and I will get back to y'all soon with Lethal Weapon 2.
Till the bye the now!
Saturday 3 May 2014
Gladiator "AM I NOT MERCIFUL??!!!"
Well its now May and I must admit I haven't probably posted up as many reviews as I have done last year as yet (well I think!) but here is another one and its another film and I've opted for Gladiator, Ridley Scott's acclaimed historical epic drama. So grab yourself a sword, helmet and shield and prepare to enter the colosseum....
So here's the story, which is set back in AD 180 and it begins with General Maximus Decimus Meridius (Russell Crowe) of the Roman army fight and win against the Germanic forces, which ends the war on the frontier. Maximus, who has already gained the respect of the Roman emperor, Marcus Aurelius (Richard Harris) who as a result of the victory wants him to be his succesor after he dies and end the political corruption in Rome, in spite of the fact that Marcus has a son, Commodus (Jaoquin Phoenix) whom Marcus does not approve of and is not a moral man. As Marcus meets with Commodus and tells him that he will not be his successor, Commodus is deeply wounded by the news and does not take it well and ends up smothering his father to death and he takes the throne. Commodus then asks Maximus for his loyalty, however Maximus turns him down and leaves, only to be arrested by one of his own men, Quintus (Tomas Arana) who has decided to be loyal to Commodus instead and tells Maximus that his wife and son will be executed. Maximus however manages to escape his execution sentence after killing the Praetorian guards that hold him captive and he flees on a horse to his home in Spain, where he desparately tries to save his wife and son, but he arrives too late to find them already dead. Maximus devastated, buries them and passes out and is soon found by a slave caravan, which takes him to Zuchabbar in the African province of the Roman empire and he is sold to a man named Proximo (Oliver Reed) and made to fight as a gladiator.
Maximus however as a gladiator proves to be a great success given his superior fighting skills he wins every match he faces and he begins to gain popularity in the province. Maximus also makes a friend with one of the other gladiators, an African former bounty hunter called Juba (Djimon Hounsou). As a result of Maximus's sucesses, Proximo reveals that they will be returning to Rome to the Roman Colosseum. The timing of this is a result of Commodus who has decided in his new reign as the emperor of Rome that he will bring the games back to the Colosseum. As Maximus and the other gladiators arrive at the Colosseum they are pitted against a group of warriors, who fight them using chariots, but Maximus again uses his military resources and leadership to upset the odds and secures a victory. Commodus is surprised by the result of the match and he goes to meet Maximus (who wears a metal helmet to conceal his face) but is angered when Maximus refuses to tell him his name and demands he take off his helmet, which Maximus does and tells him that he will have his vengeance for the murders of his wife and son and Marcus. Despite Commodus's wish to kill Maximus the crowd who are won over by the Spaniard, and chant for him to live, which Commodus reluctantly allows. And from here Maximus is thrown into a fight for his own survival against the crazed and corrupt Commodus and also find a way to try end his reign and the corruption in Rome.
There is not much doubt that Gladiator is a very entertaining historical drama and its popularity is fairly easy to comprehend as the film offers many sequences that are thrilling as the battle scenes are so well staged and gladiatorial fights are as compelling as they are bloody. The film's story is of course pretty much as old fashioned as it gets in its battle of good vs evil with Maximus, the moral and decent soldier in the field, who fights for the Roman empire, only to be ultimately betrayed by his own men and sentenced to death by the corrupt and amoral Commodus and he eventually manages to escape and fight his way back to Rome where he enters the Colosseum as a gladiator. The film however succeeds very well in showing the complexity of Commodus's character as well as while he is twisted and corrupt he is also quite pitiful as he was almost cruelly shunted aside by his father and denied the throne which was rightfully his. However Commodus is also depicted as having inappropriate and incestuous feelings for his sister, Lucilla (Connie Nielsen).
As for the performances well they are all largely excellent as the film features a fine cast. Starting with Russell Crowe well for me he is actually the weak link in the chain here as his performance as Maximus is actually not bad at all but its hardly great and it has to be said is much overrated and in my eyes didn't exactly merit the Academy Award he received for it (call me bias if you will!). And for me it remains one of Crowe's most bland performances and Maximus himself is largely a very one dimensional character, which in a way is a pity given that Crowe is an adept and very capable actor. Despite that however Crowe does do very well with the physical side of the film as he handles the fight scenes really well as he engages in some fierce hand to hand combat and he does lend a strong presence and authority to his character. Crowe also has some good moments in the film such as the scene where in the Colosseum he is forced to remove his helmet and reveal himself to Commodus and he says to the emperor "My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelias. Husband to a murdered wife, father to a murdered son. And I will have my vengeance in this life or the next!". Crowe also has the odd moment of levity in the film such as in the scene where, Lucilla's son, Lucius (played by Spencer Treat Clark) and Lucius visits Maximus who in the market and says to him "I hear you can crush a man's skull with your own hands" and Maximus says "Not a man's.... a boy's!". Another good moment is later on in the film when Maximus has been captured trying to stage a coup against Commodus. And as Maximus is chained up and confronted by Commodus he says "I knew a man who once said that death smiles at us all. All a man can do is small back." and as Commodus "I wonder did your friend smile at his own death?" and Maximus says "You must know, it was your father". Then there is Maximus's opening scene where he addresses his men as the Roman army takes on the forces in Germania. And he says to his troops "Three weeks from now, I will be harvesting my crops. Imagine where you will be, and it will be so. Hold the line! Stay with me! If you find yourself alone, riding in the green fields with the sun on your face, do not be troubled. For you are in Elysium (the afterlife) and you are already dead! Brothers, what we do in life... echoes in eternity!". And there is of course Crowe's most memorable line where he says to Quintus, his second in command "At my signal, unleash hell!".
Joaquin Phoenix by contrast actually gives the film's best peformance as the twisted and corrupt Commodus who is both loathsome and pitiful and Phoenix deserves much credit for his complex potrayal of the immoral emperor. Phoenix has quite a few highlights in the film, the first one that comes to mind is the scene where Commodus's father, Marcus, tells him he won't be emperor and Commodus tearfully asks why he hates him. And as Marcus pleads with Commodus to embrace him, Commodus does and starts to smother him to death and he says "I would butcher the whole world if only you would have loved me!". Another scene is where Commodus realises that Lucilla has betrayed his trust by plotting against him with Maximus and he disguises it by telling Lucius the story of "The emperor Claudius who betrayed by those closest to him by his own blood." And as Lucilla starts to silently cry as he tells the story to Lucius, Commodus continues "And the emperor was heartbroken. The little bee had wounded him more deeply than anyone else could ever have done. And do you know what happened then? The little bee told him everything!". Another fine scene is where Commodus taunts Maximus in Colosseum after Maximus defies him once again as he refuses to kill Rome's most prized gladiator. And in the scene Commodus says to Maximus "they told me your son cried like a little girl when they nailed him to the cross and your wife moaned like a whore when they ravaged her again, and again, and again!". And Phoenix's finest moment arrives in the scene where after Maximus has been captured, Commodus expresses his full intentions of his incestuous expectations for his sister to provide him with a son. And Commodus says "And as for you, you will love me as I have loved you. You will provide with an heir of true blood, so that Commodus and his progency will rule for a thousand years. Am I not merciful?" and as Lucilla turns her head away, he angrily grabs her face and yells "AM I NOT MERCIFUL???????!!!!".
Which brings me to Connie Nielsen is also excellent in her role as Lucilla, Commodus's sister and former lover of Maximus, who is forced to leave in fear of her brother and tries to resist his incestuous advances and then betrays his trust to conspire against him with Maximus. Nielsen also has some good moments in the film such as the scene where she meets with Maximus in a prison cell after he reveals himself to Commodus and she says to Maximus "Today I saw a slave become more powerful than the emperor of Rome!". Also her reactions in the scenes where Commodus learns of her betrayal and also when he tells her that she will give her a son so his reign can continue.
Richard Harris also provides a fine performance as Marcus Aurelius the ageing emperor who is dying and turns to Maximus to succeed him as emperor. Harris also has some good dialogue in the film such as in the scene where he tells Maximum that he wishes him to take over as the protector of Rome. And Marcus explains to Maximus his decision and says of Rome "You have never been there. You have not seen what it has become. I am daying, Maximus. When a man sees his end... he wants to know there was some purpose to his life. How will the world speak of my name in many years to come? Will I be known as the philosopher? The warrior? The tyrant? Or will I be the emperor who gave back Rome her true self?". And later in his last scene where he tells Commodus that he will not be the emperor and he pleads with his son, on his knees "Commodus, your faults as a son, are my failure as a father".
Oliver Reed is excellent in what turned out to be the final performance of his career as the grouchy Proximo, a former gladiator, who now trades in using slaves as gladiators. Reed has some fine moments in the film, and even his opening scene is funny where he get's angry with a sleazy trader (played by the comedian Omid Djail) "Those giraffes you sold me won't mate, they just stand around. You sold me queer giraffes!" followed later as he driven in a carriage toward his home through a busy market place he moans "How long does it take to get into my own house?!". Also in the scene where he addresses the slaves, with Maximus among them, and he says to them "I am Proximo! I shall be closer to your for the next few days, which will be the last of your lives, than that miserable bitch of a mother who first brought you screaming into this world! And just as your mother was there at your beginning... I will be there at your end. And when you die - and die you shall - your transition will be to the sound of.... (claps his hands) gladiators.... I salute you!". And later on in the scene where he talks to Maximus after his success in African province and he tells him of his memories of being a gladiator himself as he says "Oh you should see the Colosseum, Spaniard. I was the best not because I killed quickly, I was the best because the crowd loved me. And if you win the crowd, then you will win your freedom!".
As for the other supporting cast Djimon Hounsou is also good in his part as Juba, fellow gladiator and good friend to Maximus as they fight together in Africa and then later in Colosseum. Hounsou also get's the film's last words as he buries Maximus's two small figurines of his wife and son and he says "We will meet again, but not yet...not yet". And lastly Derek Jacobi also makes provides a fine turn as Senator Gracchus, a roman senator who opposes Commodus's rule and often makes sarcastic remarks to him. This is well noted in their first scene together where Commodus says "Rome is my children and I will embrace it like it were my own" and Gracchus says "Have you ever embraced anyone with plague, sire?!" to which Commodus turns him and says "No, but if you interrupt me again, I'm sure you will!".
As for Ridley Scott well he does a great job with Gladiator as the film is visually spectacular and he effortlessly handles the staging of the film's epic battle scenes, particularly at the start and also the fight scenes in the colosseum. Scott also makes good use of the film's locations as the opening sequence was actually filmed in the Bourne woods in Surrey, and the scenes of the desert travel and the African province were shot in Morroco, and lastly the Colosseum location was shot in Malta, where the production even built a smaller scale set of the Colosseum itself. The film at over two and hours long never drags and Scott paces the story very well throughout as well. And Ridley Scott was inspired to direct the film after he saw the painting titled Thumbs Down (or Pollice Verso in Italian) by the French paintor Jean-Leon Gerome, which was of a gladiator in the colosseum standing over two slain corpses. The thumbs up and down signalling is also demonstrated by Commodus in the film as thumbs up means live and thumps down of course means die.
Which brings me onto the film's score by Hans Zimmer, which is excellent and remains one of his most memorable and recognisible scores and was also co-written by Lisa Gerard who provides the disinctive singing in the film. The film score itself did not win an oscar although it was nominated but it did win the Golden Globe award for best original score.
Now we get onto the flaws, does Gladiator have any glaring ones???? Well not as such but there are of course the odd little one here or there. But these niggles are morely on the character front and the one thing that springs to mind that bugs me is Marcus Aurelius's character as he comes across as a rather arrogant, presumptuous wanker who rather cruelly inflicts the decision on his son to not let him become emperor. And while this is very understandable its the manner in which he shafts his son at the start and doesn't even bother to ride with him that shows his open contempt for him. Not only that there is the infuriating presumption that after all Maximus has done for him that he won't even let him go back to his wife and family and insists he end the corruption in Rome instead. I mean hasn't the guy done enough for you already????!!!! And its the arrogance of giving Maximus no choice when Maximus says "I need time to think" and Marcus says "Of course and by the morning I hope you will have agreed with my decision". Acchh bugger off ya old arrogant twat!
And I enjoy looking at cause and effect in movies and it has to be said, and this is by no means a flaw, but Maximus's capture and ultimate demise actually lies with Lucius as the youngster naively reveals to Commodus while they have a playful swordfight that he is "Maximus, the saviour of Rome!". And as Commodus looks surprised by this, he asks Lucius who told him that, and the boy whispers in his ear that it was Lucilla (presumably anyway) and Commodus later has his men ambush Maximus and capture him, where Commodus later stabs Maximus, to weaken him during their final duel in the colosseum. And that all boils down to Lucius's flippant remark, so if only he'd kept his mouth shut then that probably wouldn't have happened. Thanks Lucius!
I also thought it was rather peculiar how the character Quintus, who betrayed Maximus's loyalty for Commodus's, at the end of the film switches sides and rather than give Commodus his sword, as Commodus commands, Quintus refuses and says "shield your swords!". And this is the emperor he is disobeying!!! Now either there are strict rules in the gladiatorial combat that once an opponent has dropped their sword they can't pick it up again (which might be so) or Quintus has committed a blatant act of mutiny! In the end of course its the right decision and it sees Quintus acquit himself for his actions in ordering the execution of Maximus's family (which was at the hands of Commodus anyway, so he was just following orders).
But despite all that Gladiator is still a highly entertaining film and it still remains one of Ridley Scott's finer moments in his career and it also really announced Russell Crowe as a real superstar in Hollywood.
And with that I shall leave yeee there!
So here's the story, which is set back in AD 180 and it begins with General Maximus Decimus Meridius (Russell Crowe) of the Roman army fight and win against the Germanic forces, which ends the war on the frontier. Maximus, who has already gained the respect of the Roman emperor, Marcus Aurelius (Richard Harris) who as a result of the victory wants him to be his succesor after he dies and end the political corruption in Rome, in spite of the fact that Marcus has a son, Commodus (Jaoquin Phoenix) whom Marcus does not approve of and is not a moral man. As Marcus meets with Commodus and tells him that he will not be his successor, Commodus is deeply wounded by the news and does not take it well and ends up smothering his father to death and he takes the throne. Commodus then asks Maximus for his loyalty, however Maximus turns him down and leaves, only to be arrested by one of his own men, Quintus (Tomas Arana) who has decided to be loyal to Commodus instead and tells Maximus that his wife and son will be executed. Maximus however manages to escape his execution sentence after killing the Praetorian guards that hold him captive and he flees on a horse to his home in Spain, where he desparately tries to save his wife and son, but he arrives too late to find them already dead. Maximus devastated, buries them and passes out and is soon found by a slave caravan, which takes him to Zuchabbar in the African province of the Roman empire and he is sold to a man named Proximo (Oliver Reed) and made to fight as a gladiator.
Maximus however as a gladiator proves to be a great success given his superior fighting skills he wins every match he faces and he begins to gain popularity in the province. Maximus also makes a friend with one of the other gladiators, an African former bounty hunter called Juba (Djimon Hounsou). As a result of Maximus's sucesses, Proximo reveals that they will be returning to Rome to the Roman Colosseum. The timing of this is a result of Commodus who has decided in his new reign as the emperor of Rome that he will bring the games back to the Colosseum. As Maximus and the other gladiators arrive at the Colosseum they are pitted against a group of warriors, who fight them using chariots, but Maximus again uses his military resources and leadership to upset the odds and secures a victory. Commodus is surprised by the result of the match and he goes to meet Maximus (who wears a metal helmet to conceal his face) but is angered when Maximus refuses to tell him his name and demands he take off his helmet, which Maximus does and tells him that he will have his vengeance for the murders of his wife and son and Marcus. Despite Commodus's wish to kill Maximus the crowd who are won over by the Spaniard, and chant for him to live, which Commodus reluctantly allows. And from here Maximus is thrown into a fight for his own survival against the crazed and corrupt Commodus and also find a way to try end his reign and the corruption in Rome.
There is not much doubt that Gladiator is a very entertaining historical drama and its popularity is fairly easy to comprehend as the film offers many sequences that are thrilling as the battle scenes are so well staged and gladiatorial fights are as compelling as they are bloody. The film's story is of course pretty much as old fashioned as it gets in its battle of good vs evil with Maximus, the moral and decent soldier in the field, who fights for the Roman empire, only to be ultimately betrayed by his own men and sentenced to death by the corrupt and amoral Commodus and he eventually manages to escape and fight his way back to Rome where he enters the Colosseum as a gladiator. The film however succeeds very well in showing the complexity of Commodus's character as well as while he is twisted and corrupt he is also quite pitiful as he was almost cruelly shunted aside by his father and denied the throne which was rightfully his. However Commodus is also depicted as having inappropriate and incestuous feelings for his sister, Lucilla (Connie Nielsen).
As for the performances well they are all largely excellent as the film features a fine cast. Starting with Russell Crowe well for me he is actually the weak link in the chain here as his performance as Maximus is actually not bad at all but its hardly great and it has to be said is much overrated and in my eyes didn't exactly merit the Academy Award he received for it (call me bias if you will!). And for me it remains one of Crowe's most bland performances and Maximus himself is largely a very one dimensional character, which in a way is a pity given that Crowe is an adept and very capable actor. Despite that however Crowe does do very well with the physical side of the film as he handles the fight scenes really well as he engages in some fierce hand to hand combat and he does lend a strong presence and authority to his character. Crowe also has some good moments in the film such as the scene where in the Colosseum he is forced to remove his helmet and reveal himself to Commodus and he says to the emperor "My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelias. Husband to a murdered wife, father to a murdered son. And I will have my vengeance in this life or the next!". Crowe also has the odd moment of levity in the film such as in the scene where, Lucilla's son, Lucius (played by Spencer Treat Clark) and Lucius visits Maximus who in the market and says to him "I hear you can crush a man's skull with your own hands" and Maximus says "Not a man's.... a boy's!". Another good moment is later on in the film when Maximus has been captured trying to stage a coup against Commodus. And as Maximus is chained up and confronted by Commodus he says "I knew a man who once said that death smiles at us all. All a man can do is small back." and as Commodus "I wonder did your friend smile at his own death?" and Maximus says "You must know, it was your father". Then there is Maximus's opening scene where he addresses his men as the Roman army takes on the forces in Germania. And he says to his troops "Three weeks from now, I will be harvesting my crops. Imagine where you will be, and it will be so. Hold the line! Stay with me! If you find yourself alone, riding in the green fields with the sun on your face, do not be troubled. For you are in Elysium (the afterlife) and you are already dead! Brothers, what we do in life... echoes in eternity!". And there is of course Crowe's most memorable line where he says to Quintus, his second in command "At my signal, unleash hell!".
Joaquin Phoenix by contrast actually gives the film's best peformance as the twisted and corrupt Commodus who is both loathsome and pitiful and Phoenix deserves much credit for his complex potrayal of the immoral emperor. Phoenix has quite a few highlights in the film, the first one that comes to mind is the scene where Commodus's father, Marcus, tells him he won't be emperor and Commodus tearfully asks why he hates him. And as Marcus pleads with Commodus to embrace him, Commodus does and starts to smother him to death and he says "I would butcher the whole world if only you would have loved me!". Another scene is where Commodus realises that Lucilla has betrayed his trust by plotting against him with Maximus and he disguises it by telling Lucius the story of "The emperor Claudius who betrayed by those closest to him by his own blood." And as Lucilla starts to silently cry as he tells the story to Lucius, Commodus continues "And the emperor was heartbroken. The little bee had wounded him more deeply than anyone else could ever have done. And do you know what happened then? The little bee told him everything!". Another fine scene is where Commodus taunts Maximus in Colosseum after Maximus defies him once again as he refuses to kill Rome's most prized gladiator. And in the scene Commodus says to Maximus "they told me your son cried like a little girl when they nailed him to the cross and your wife moaned like a whore when they ravaged her again, and again, and again!". And Phoenix's finest moment arrives in the scene where after Maximus has been captured, Commodus expresses his full intentions of his incestuous expectations for his sister to provide him with a son. And Commodus says "And as for you, you will love me as I have loved you. You will provide with an heir of true blood, so that Commodus and his progency will rule for a thousand years. Am I not merciful?" and as Lucilla turns her head away, he angrily grabs her face and yells "AM I NOT MERCIFUL???????!!!!".
Which brings me to Connie Nielsen is also excellent in her role as Lucilla, Commodus's sister and former lover of Maximus, who is forced to leave in fear of her brother and tries to resist his incestuous advances and then betrays his trust to conspire against him with Maximus. Nielsen also has some good moments in the film such as the scene where she meets with Maximus in a prison cell after he reveals himself to Commodus and she says to Maximus "Today I saw a slave become more powerful than the emperor of Rome!". Also her reactions in the scenes where Commodus learns of her betrayal and also when he tells her that she will give her a son so his reign can continue.
Richard Harris also provides a fine performance as Marcus Aurelius the ageing emperor who is dying and turns to Maximus to succeed him as emperor. Harris also has some good dialogue in the film such as in the scene where he tells Maximum that he wishes him to take over as the protector of Rome. And Marcus explains to Maximus his decision and says of Rome "You have never been there. You have not seen what it has become. I am daying, Maximus. When a man sees his end... he wants to know there was some purpose to his life. How will the world speak of my name in many years to come? Will I be known as the philosopher? The warrior? The tyrant? Or will I be the emperor who gave back Rome her true self?". And later in his last scene where he tells Commodus that he will not be the emperor and he pleads with his son, on his knees "Commodus, your faults as a son, are my failure as a father".
Oliver Reed is excellent in what turned out to be the final performance of his career as the grouchy Proximo, a former gladiator, who now trades in using slaves as gladiators. Reed has some fine moments in the film, and even his opening scene is funny where he get's angry with a sleazy trader (played by the comedian Omid Djail) "Those giraffes you sold me won't mate, they just stand around. You sold me queer giraffes!" followed later as he driven in a carriage toward his home through a busy market place he moans "How long does it take to get into my own house?!". Also in the scene where he addresses the slaves, with Maximus among them, and he says to them "I am Proximo! I shall be closer to your for the next few days, which will be the last of your lives, than that miserable bitch of a mother who first brought you screaming into this world! And just as your mother was there at your beginning... I will be there at your end. And when you die - and die you shall - your transition will be to the sound of.... (claps his hands) gladiators.... I salute you!". And later on in the scene where he talks to Maximus after his success in African province and he tells him of his memories of being a gladiator himself as he says "Oh you should see the Colosseum, Spaniard. I was the best not because I killed quickly, I was the best because the crowd loved me. And if you win the crowd, then you will win your freedom!".
As for the other supporting cast Djimon Hounsou is also good in his part as Juba, fellow gladiator and good friend to Maximus as they fight together in Africa and then later in Colosseum. Hounsou also get's the film's last words as he buries Maximus's two small figurines of his wife and son and he says "We will meet again, but not yet...not yet". And lastly Derek Jacobi also makes provides a fine turn as Senator Gracchus, a roman senator who opposes Commodus's rule and often makes sarcastic remarks to him. This is well noted in their first scene together where Commodus says "Rome is my children and I will embrace it like it were my own" and Gracchus says "Have you ever embraced anyone with plague, sire?!" to which Commodus turns him and says "No, but if you interrupt me again, I'm sure you will!".
As for Ridley Scott well he does a great job with Gladiator as the film is visually spectacular and he effortlessly handles the staging of the film's epic battle scenes, particularly at the start and also the fight scenes in the colosseum. Scott also makes good use of the film's locations as the opening sequence was actually filmed in the Bourne woods in Surrey, and the scenes of the desert travel and the African province were shot in Morroco, and lastly the Colosseum location was shot in Malta, where the production even built a smaller scale set of the Colosseum itself. The film at over two and hours long never drags and Scott paces the story very well throughout as well. And Ridley Scott was inspired to direct the film after he saw the painting titled Thumbs Down (or Pollice Verso in Italian) by the French paintor Jean-Leon Gerome, which was of a gladiator in the colosseum standing over two slain corpses. The thumbs up and down signalling is also demonstrated by Commodus in the film as thumbs up means live and thumps down of course means die.
Which brings me onto the film's score by Hans Zimmer, which is excellent and remains one of his most memorable and recognisible scores and was also co-written by Lisa Gerard who provides the disinctive singing in the film. The film score itself did not win an oscar although it was nominated but it did win the Golden Globe award for best original score.
Now we get onto the flaws, does Gladiator have any glaring ones???? Well not as such but there are of course the odd little one here or there. But these niggles are morely on the character front and the one thing that springs to mind that bugs me is Marcus Aurelius's character as he comes across as a rather arrogant, presumptuous wanker who rather cruelly inflicts the decision on his son to not let him become emperor. And while this is very understandable its the manner in which he shafts his son at the start and doesn't even bother to ride with him that shows his open contempt for him. Not only that there is the infuriating presumption that after all Maximus has done for him that he won't even let him go back to his wife and family and insists he end the corruption in Rome instead. I mean hasn't the guy done enough for you already????!!!! And its the arrogance of giving Maximus no choice when Maximus says "I need time to think" and Marcus says "Of course and by the morning I hope you will have agreed with my decision". Acchh bugger off ya old arrogant twat!
And I enjoy looking at cause and effect in movies and it has to be said, and this is by no means a flaw, but Maximus's capture and ultimate demise actually lies with Lucius as the youngster naively reveals to Commodus while they have a playful swordfight that he is "Maximus, the saviour of Rome!". And as Commodus looks surprised by this, he asks Lucius who told him that, and the boy whispers in his ear that it was Lucilla (presumably anyway) and Commodus later has his men ambush Maximus and capture him, where Commodus later stabs Maximus, to weaken him during their final duel in the colosseum. And that all boils down to Lucius's flippant remark, so if only he'd kept his mouth shut then that probably wouldn't have happened. Thanks Lucius!
I also thought it was rather peculiar how the character Quintus, who betrayed Maximus's loyalty for Commodus's, at the end of the film switches sides and rather than give Commodus his sword, as Commodus commands, Quintus refuses and says "shield your swords!". And this is the emperor he is disobeying!!! Now either there are strict rules in the gladiatorial combat that once an opponent has dropped their sword they can't pick it up again (which might be so) or Quintus has committed a blatant act of mutiny! In the end of course its the right decision and it sees Quintus acquit himself for his actions in ordering the execution of Maximus's family (which was at the hands of Commodus anyway, so he was just following orders).
But despite all that Gladiator is still a highly entertaining film and it still remains one of Ridley Scott's finer moments in his career and it also really announced Russell Crowe as a real superstar in Hollywood.
And with that I shall leave yeee there!
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