Killin' Nazis!

Right review time on this mother blogger, which is yet another movie, this time I've gone for another Quentin Tarantino flick, Inglorious Basterds, which I watched quite recently at the weekend.

So so so so, to start with the inevitable plot analysis, the film begins during the Second World War in 1941, in a German occupied France, where an SS officer, Colonel Hans Landa (Christophe Waltz) visits a local dairy farmer Perrier Lapidite (Denis Menochet) to enquire about a local jewish family who are missing in the area.  While Landa initially puts Lapitide at ease, he toys with him and gets him to admit that he is in fact hiding the Jewish family underneath his floorboards, after which Landa has his soldiers kill the family, but one of them escapes, a teenage girl Shosanna (Melanie Laurent), which Landa let's go.  Three years later, an American Lieutenant, Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) recruits 8 Jewish American soldiers to go on a mission into Germany to hunt down the Nazis.  Aldo being part Indian, has the nickname Aldo the Apache, and demands that each Nazi soldier his men kill, that they take their scalps for him, and the team become known as the Basterds.  As the Basterds become more notorious within Germany, Hitler (Martin Wuttke) interviews a German soldier, who was a sole survivor of one of the basterds attacks, and he reveals that he has had a swastika sign carved into his forehead, which Aldo did himself, to send a message to the Nazis.

Meanwhile Shosanna, in the summer of 1944, by now has re-established herself in Paris, where show now runs a Cinema left by her aunt and uncle.  Shosanna now goes under the psuedonum of Emanuelle Mimieux to conceal her real identity, and she is soon approached by a German soldier, Frederick Zoller (Daniel Bruhl) who tries to charm her with his exploits as a sniper, who successfully defended his position in a belltower over three days, and has become a national hero as a result.  Shosanna however is far from impressed with Zoller and leaves, but he soon persues her and sends a soldier escort to pick her up and take her to a meeting at a hotel with none other than Joseph Goebbels (Sylvester Groth) who has made a Nazi propaganda film, starring Zoller in his exploits at the belltower.  Zoller suggests to Goebbels that his film "Nations Pride", be permiered at Shosanna's cinema, Goebbels is however initially reluctant to accept, but agrees.  However at the meeting Shosanna meets Landa (who fully realises who she is), who is handling the security for the event, who proceeds to toy with her and interrogate her in a playful way before letting her go.  Shosanna soon plans to get revenge for her family, by using her stock of high flammable nitrate film prints to burn the cinema down at the night of the premiere.

While this is going on, another subplot sees a British soldier, Lieutenant Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender) who is recruited for a top secret mission named "Operation Kino", in which he is set to rendevous with two of the Basterds team, and the famous German film star Bridget Von Hammersmark at a tavern on the French border.  However the tavern has a group of drunken German soldiers there, as well as a Gestapo officer, Major Hellstrom (August Diehl) and suspicion is aroused when a drunken German soldier enquires why Bridget is there, and Hicox chastises the soldier for interrupting, and his indistinct German accent raises the suspicions of Hellstrom.  And soon enough Hicox gives himself away (by signalling the British for three with his hands, and not the German way) which leads to a gunfight, with everyone being killed except the drunk soldier, Wilhelm, who tries to negotiate with Aldo who is up top with the rest of his men, and Bridget who then kills the soldier, in order to keep her involvement a secret.  Bridget than reveals to Aldo that while the meeting was botched, that Hitler will attend the premiere.  Aldo then decides to attend the premiere as Bridget's escort, along with two of his team, Donny Donowitz (Eli Roth) and Omar (Omar Doom), posing as Italians.  However in the meantime, at the scene of the tavern, Landa finds a napkin autographed by Bridget and one of her shoes, which placed her there, and there at the prermiere he confronts her, and Aldo and his men, which soon leads to chaos.

Its hard to pick a favourite Quention Tarantino film for me, but I would have to say while Inglorious Basterds isn't it, its still a thoroughly entertaining flick, and it has a tremendous amount going for it.  I really also like Tarantino's decision to film the French and German actors, speaking their dialogue in their native languages, as it helps to lend a bit more authenticity to the proceedings.  And while the film is far from a history lesson, and is essentially just alot of farcical bumpkum, with Tarantino what you get will always be worth watching (well maybe with the exception of Death Proof).

The film also has some excellent performances in it, starting with Brad Pitt as the Aldo, he plays his part with an almost macho quality, and as a man who takes pride in his work, he also get's some of the best dialogue in the film.  As one example, my fav has to be "Nazis aint got any humanity, they are the foot soldiers of a jew-hating mass murdering maniac and they need to be destroyed!", and I also can't forget the hilarious moment where he attends the premiere of the film, posing as an Italian film maker and he says to Landa in his own unmistakable American accent "Arrvederci!".  Diane Kruger is also great as Bridget Von Hammersmark, the German film star and under cover agent for the British army.  Michael Fassbender is similarly great as Lt Hicox, the British soldier, who is also a film critic in his civiliian life, and he plays his part cool, with his unusual German accent, and his traditionally British one.  Melanie Laurent is also very good too as Shosanna, and she appears somewhat cool headed on the surface but deep down you know she is still distraught at the death of her family at the hands of the Landa's men, and she is hellbent on revenge.

However the best performance in the film belongs to Christoph Waltz as Hans Landa, the superficially charming SS officer, nicknamed the "Jew hunter" who plays Landa as a sadistic, cunning and manipulative bastard, who takes great pleasure in his work and toying with his victims.  Waltz has quite a few highlights in the film, but the one that stands out is of course the opening scene where he playfully interrogates the dairy milk farmer, before he gets the farmer to confess that he is concealing the Jewish family he is seeking out (I also enjoyed watching him smoke his ridiculously big pipe in that scene!).

Scene wise there are plenty of highlights in the film as well, such as the aforementioned opening scene, and the tensely staged scene with the Basterds, Hicox and Von Hammersmark meeting in the tavern, where things quickly go badly wrong.  The introduction of the Basterds with Aldo addressing them is also an amusing scene where he tells them "Each one of you will give me 100 nazi scalps! And I want my scalps!  Taken from the heads of 100 dead Nazis! Or you will die tryin!".  And finally the scene at the end at the Goebbels premiere of Nations Pride, his Nazi propoganda film, where the Basterds plan to take out Hitler, while Shosanna also sets the wheels in motion to burn her cinema down with Hitler and his top men in it.

However on a slightly critical note, there are one or two moments in the film that probably leave a slightly bad taste in your mouth, which can sometimes be the case in Tarantino's films, and such an example is when Hammersmark kills the young German soldier, Wilhelm in the tarven, who had become a new father.  Hammersmark pleads with Wilhelm to put the gun down and think of his son, only to then gun him down afterwards.  You can see why she did it, as she wanted her identity as a spy to be kept secret, so the best way was to kill him, but the scene does leave a nasty after impression.  You could also argue at times that Tarantino makes one or two hasty decisions in presenting how the Nazis are portrayed, especially in the lack of security on the foyer of Shosanna's cinema, as there appears a lack of security when surely security would be the most important things in this case.  And wouldn't they think to check every inch of the cinema, so that they know it is safe for the Fuhrer to attend, yet they let its owner leave a big pile of flammable film prints behind the screen.  They are not exactly being thorough are they???

Regardless of that though, Inglorious Basterds is highly enjoyable, and it also features a fine soundtrack, where again Tarantino expertly chooses some great music, one of which that stands out really well is his choice of the David Bowie song "Putting out fires with gasoline" when Shosanna prepares herself for the premiere.  Tarantino chooses some old classic pieces of music composed by Ennio Morricone, which also fit in really well with the tone of the film, and Tarantino intially wanted to Morricone to score the film, who was unavailable at the time.

So that's it for my Inglorious Basterds analysis, its a really enjoyable film, and while it might not be Tarantino's best, it still stands up well next to his other movies, and is well worth watching.

So on that note, arrivederci!

Olympics pympics

Well this post (don't worry!) doesn't have any tennis content (well one or two references but that's it) but it more about some of my thoughts about the Olympics, which are well under way now, as the opening ceremony was on Friday night last week.  And after a few hitches the main one being the controversy over the poor organisation of the security for the Olympic games, with 4GS making a muck of it, by insufficiently training enough staff, and playing the wrong national anthem for a Korean football team, and the organisers inability to spell weightlifitng properly, its all finally come together. 

And in regards to the opening ceremony for me it was definitely something of mixed bag, on one hand it was a very impressive visual spectacle, with the fireworks of the Olympic signs for example and the new stadium is quite stunning, but on the other hand we were subjected to the some cringeworthy dancers, doing their routines, like it was something out of musical.  Not to take away from their talents in any way but I'm just not a fan of razzamataz in general, it was almost like being forced to watch the Oscars ceremony as well! (which for the Oscars I could use the technical term for razzamataz, which is bullshit!).

There was also the film directed by Danny Boyle, which I caught brief glimpses of, but again my attention dithered from it.  So suffice to say that I didn't watch a great deal of it, and spent most of my time channel hopping between Coming to America on Film4 and DVDs of Peep Show (as I've been on a bit of an obssessive Peep Show kick lately!).  Danny Boyle also used the electronic music group Underworld as the musical directors, who had composed some original pieces of music for the ceremony (they most notably did the song "Born Slippy"for Danny Boyle's Trainspotting).      

However one thing I was fairly impressed with was the nations flagbearer part of the ceremony, as it was interesting to see the different nations walk onto the Olympic stadium, holding their nations flags, and yep I will briefly mention a few tennis players such as Novak Djokovic (of Serbia), Agnieszka Radwanska (of Poland), and Maria Sharapova (of America.... sorry Russia!) who were proudly carrying their nations flags.  Djokovic particularly looked proud to hold his nations flag, and I found his expression quite amusing as he seemed to be rejoicing to the heavens, but it was great to see the Serb being as patriotic as he was, as he is rather proud.  And although I didn't see it, Chris Hoy, the Olympic gold medal cyclist, was the flag bearer for Great Britain (who came on last) who apparently was very emotional, which you can understand.  Although some of the choices of songs for the nations parade were better than others, with the Pet Shop Boys "West end girls", David Bowie's "Heroes", the Bee Gees "Staying alive", and U2's "Beautiful Day", some of which were pretty suitable, but others were puzzling. 

As for the games so far well, I haven't been watching too much (apart from the tennis of course!), but its a shame so far that Great Britain have hardly won any medals, as so far there has only been two, with Lizzie Armistead winning the silver medal in cycling, and Rebecca Adlington who won the bronze medal in the 400m freestyle swimming (who previously won the Olympic gold in Beijing).  But it is still early days and there are plenty of sports on the go, with China who are in the lead at the mo with 12 olympic medals so far, 6 gold, 4 silver, and 2 bronze, with the USA in 2nd place with 11 medals. 

In fact as an update tonight Great Britain won another medal, this time it was in gymnastics, as the GB team won the bronze medal, although there was a bit of controversy over the decisions, as Japan, who were initially ranked in 4th place, allowed GB to have the silver medal.  But the Japanese team appealed the decision to the officials, as they felt they were marked harshly for their result, mainly due to one of their team's performance on the pommel horse (who had a dodgy dismount!), and they ended up securing the silver medal, which relegated Great Britain to 3rd place, and the Bronze medal.  Regardless of the decision, it was a terrific effort from the British team, who for the first time in 90 years managed to win a medal for Great Britain in the Olympics for gymnastics. 

And I probably should make a bit of an effort in watching some of the other sports as the table tennis can be really good to watch, especially the players reactions are so lightning quick, although I can't get over just how small the tables look on TV!  The judo as well looks quite good, the swimming, the heptahalon, which is a fav to watch as it incorporates different trials such as the long jump, the shot put, and the 100 metre hurdles, to name a few.  And of course there is also the volleyball, which if you are guy, isn't too bad to watch, especially as you see some nice looking girls in skimpy outfits hitting a volley ball over the high net (again perv!).

So it is early days in the Olympics so far, and in my other blog I will keep my eyes peeled on the tennis, naturally more than any sport (wonder why?????).  And here's hoping that GB win a few more medals throughout the games, as well as hopefully a few golds before its all over with.  And no doubt the British media will be all over it when they do win a gold, its bound to happen, as its usually overkill, with a great achievement they advertise the fact to death.  Did you know we just won the Olympic gold in swimming and rowing??? We did!  We did! And in fact let's tell you again, just in case you missed the last 18 times we told you!

Anyway my cynicism aside, I will keep an eye on the games and see if there are any interesting developments, which I'm sure there will be. 

Sooooo on that note that's it!

What's the most you ever lost in a coin toss....

Right this blog appears to be definitely turning into something of a review blog, but at least the reviews have got a bit of variety, different films, bit of tv, bit of theatre maybe coming up at some point.  So here is another movie review post, and its another Cohen brothers film, and not only that, it could well possibly be my favourite Cohen brother's film, the highly acclaimed No country for old men, based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy, so let's have a look at her.  So just to warn you all, PLOT SPOILERS ABOUND!! 

Starting with my usual obligatory dissection of the plot, the film is set out in Odessa Texas back in the June of 1980, where a local hunts-man and former Nam veteran, Lewellyn Moss (Josh Brolin) hunting for deer out in the open country, stumbles across several dead men, who appeared to have been involved in a gunfight.  Moss while scouting the scene he finds an injured man in one of the trucks, who begs for water in a foreign tounge (turns out he's Mexican), but Moss says he has none and take the man's gun and ammo.  Looking in the back of the truck he sees there is a massive quantity of drugs, and Moss soon comes across another dead man, who lies next to a suitcase, which is filled with money.  Moss takes the case back to his trailer, where his wife Carla Jean (Kelly MacDonald) asks where he has been.  Later that night Moss, out of guilt, decides to go back to the scene with water for the injured man in the truck, but when he get's there the man is nowhere to be seen, and all of a sudden a truck drives up, full of a gang of Mexicans, who bear down on Moss, who flees.  Moss barely escapes the Mexicans, and makes it back to his trailer, where he warns Carla to pack her bags and to stay with her mother, and Moss leaves with the suitcase of money and heads to a motel in the next county.

In the meantime, a hitman, Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), escapes police custody, by killing a police officer, and he later kills a driver, with a captive bolt pistol (used for killing cattle).  Chigurh makes his way out to the crime scene in the open country where the drug deal was, with the help of two associates, he finds a receiver, which he uses to track the suticase, Chigurh then kills the two men, and drives off, having found the licence plate of Moss's abandoned truck, he tracks down the location of Moss's trailer.  Chigurh then uses the receiver to track the whereabouts of the case, while in the meantime, Moss staying a motel, hides the money in an air vent between two of the motel rooms.  Chigurh soon finds Moss's whereabouts with the receiver, and he ambushes the motel room, where he thinks Moss is staying, but finds three Mexicans instead, and he kills them all.  Moss having heard the commotion in the next room, escapes the scene with the money, and goes to another motel.  Chigurh soon follows Moss again and finally locates him at another motel, where it soon dawns on Moss that the case must have a way of being tracked, he looks inside and finds a transponder, but before he can leave, Chigurh shoots at him, with Moss once again barely fleeing with his life, he runs out onto the streets, and Moss succeds in shooting Chigurh in the leg with his shotgun, but Chigurh manages to escape before Moss finds him.  Moss having been shot in the side, barely makes it across into the Mexican border, before he does, he tosses the suitcase over a fence into a field. 

Soon after this, the man who hired Chigurh, an associate of a firm (played by Stephen Root), hires another hitman, Carson Wells (Woody Harrelson), in order to try and recover the money, after realising Chigurh is a loose canon.  Wells manages to find Moss, who by now has been treated at a local hospital across the border, where Wells offers Moss protection in return for the money.  Wells however is soon intercepted by Chigurh who kills him, at this point Moss calls Well's hotel room, but Chigurh answers and offers to make a deal, in return if he gives him the money, he will let his wife go, but he can't save himself, however Moss turns him down.  After this Moss's wife, Carla Jean, and her mother (Beth Grant), arrange to rendevous with Moss at a motel in El Paso, but Carla Jean's mother, unwittingly blabs to one of the Mexicans, who locates them, the whereabouts of Moss, and they soon ambush Moss, killing him.

The local sherrif, Ed Tom (Tommy Lee Jones) whom Carla Jean has confided in the whereabouts of her husband, finds Moss in the motel room and he informs Carla Jean, and he makes a somewhat futile attempt at the crime scene to find any clues to what happened (with Chigurh hiding behind the door of an adjacent room).  Soon after Ed Tom decides to retire from his position, feeling outmatched in his job, and powerless to make a difference.  Meanwhile Carla Jean's mother passes away from ill health, as she returns to her mother's home, she finds Chigurh waiting for her....

It would be an understatement to say that No country for old men is a good film, and if anything it transcends pretty much anything the Cohen brothers have done before.  The film itself has a different feel to any of their previous movies, and it feels like it is the perfect almalgamation of their talents, in both writing and direction.  The film has a tremendous sense of dread and foreboding about it, and in this world there are no happy endings, and it shows the west to be a cruel and unrelenting place.  Yet there is still the trademark humour the underlies most of the Cohen brothers films, with locals providing plenty of moments of amusement.  One such scene is where Moss walks into a surplus store, where he bought guns and ammo from previously, except this time he is wearing a smock from hospital (and his cowboy boots), and he asks the store owner do you often see people come in here without any clothes, to which the owner replies "no, sir, its unusual!". 

In terms of the performances, there is very little at fault here, as everyone is at the top of their game here.  Josh Brolin for starters is excellent as Moss, who is basically just a normal guy, who is way out of his depth in the situation, but his former Vietnam veteran experience, just about keeps him alive long enough, before he meets his demise.  Tommy Lee Jones, is also great as ever, as the police sherrif, Ed Tom, whom he plays with a dry wit, and a morose sense of acceptance about the violence that plagues the region, and he get's some of the film's best dialogue, which my favourite line is where his deputy says to him, when the investigate the scene of the drug deal gone wrong "Its a mess ain't it, sherrif?" and Ed Tom replies "well if it ain't, it'll do until the mess get's here".  Woody Harrelson, although he has a shorter screen time than the others in the cast, is very good as Wells, and he too get's some fine dialogue, one of his lines I like is when Moss asks how he would describe Chigurh, and Wells replies "I would say he hasn't a sense humour".  And in the unlikely casting of Kelly MacDonald, she also proves to be really good in her role as Carla Jean, Moss's worried wife, and you quickly forget that she is Scottish, when you hear her more than adequate Texan accent, and her scene with Chigurh at the end is a highlight.

But the film's best performance is without doubt from Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh (who won the Oscar for best supporting actor), who you could almost say is like a human version of the Terminator, as he kills any one who stands in his way without any sense of remorse or conscience.  Bardem's potrayal of the sociopathic hitman is exceptional, and he must rank as one of the most chilling antagonists in any film, with his cold blooded, and at times almost robotic responses.  Chigurh clearly operates on a different plane from anyone else, and there are several scenes in the film that are highlights, particularly in the silent moments where he tracks down Moss, and has his gunfight with him on the streets, as well the scene where he blows up a car to create a diversion outside a local chemist, so he can steal some drugs to treat his wounds.  And I can't forget to mention the absolutely chilling and suspensful scene where Chigurh has a conversation with a convenience store owner,  who unwittingly has a very close call, when Chigurh asks him to make a call on a coin toss, that would determine his fate. 

Direction wise, the Cohen brothers never put a foot wrong here, and they create a quiet but utterly intense atmosphere throughout the film, yet they still allow for a few moments of levity.  And many of the films highlights come from the quiet scenes, with sparse dialogue, which makes them more suspenseful.  Visually the film also looks stunning, with their regular cinema photographer, Roger Deakins, providing some spectacular scenes, particularly in the opening sequences out in the wide open region of Texas.  And Carter Burwell also deserves mention, again the Cohen brother's regular composer, as he provides a very minimal score, with some intense passages, that add to the atmosphere of the film throughout.

On a slightly critical note, there has been some crticism from some viewers who thought that the film's ending left things unfinished, but if you look at the film again, it does pretty much tie up all the loose ends.  The only one left at the end you could probably say is what happens to Chigurh is somewhat less clear, but I guess the Cohen brother's wanted to leave his fate ambiguous.  You could also probably argue that Moss could have covered his tracks better than he did, by burning down his trailer for starters, so that way no one would ever have tracked him down, and that would have made things that bit more difficult for Chigurh to locate him.  But with the unstoppable force that Chigurh is, you would have to wager he would have found a way.  

So that's it for my review of No country for old men, which saw the Cohen brothers at the peak of their creative talent, and not only that they were also finally awarded with Academy awards for best picture, best direction and best adapted screenplay, which were totally merited (unlike some films that have won oscars I could mention!).  

And well that is that. 

Devil never cry

Ok doke, so for another wee change, here is a look at video game for a change, this time I've chosen to look at Devil May Cry, which was originally a PS2 game, which was released back in 2001.  Recently though it was re-released for the Xbox 360 as part of a remastered HD collection, along with DMC 2 and 3.  But for this post I will mainly focus on the original, so here we go into geek mode.

The game begins with demon hunter, Dante, who is receives a visit from a strange lady called Trish, who attacks him with a sword, but he impressively fights her off, and he tells her that he hunts demons, who were responsible for the deaths of his mother and his brother.  Trish tells Dante that the demon emperor Mundus, is planning to make a return, who was responsible for the deaths of Dante's family.  Dante then makes a trip to a castle with Trish, who vanishes over the castle walls, leaving Dante to explore the castle, and inside he faces a variety of demons, including marionettes, a big hybrid spider/scorpion, a bizarre shape shifting cat, called shadow.  Later Dante is attacked by a demon Nelo Angelo, who later on turns out to be his identical twin, and long lost brother, and after Vergil eventually dies, Dante takes Nelo's half amulet, which turns out to be identical to the one Dante has.  On forming the two halves of the amulet, which transforms Dante's sword into the legendary Sparda sword, that once belonged to his father (also called Sparda funnily enough).  Sparda was once a legendary demon fighter, but after time he settled down with a wife and two children, one being Dante and the other Vergil.  As the story progresses it is revealed that Trish also works for Mundus and betrays Dante to him, however Dante chooses to save Trish when her life is in danger, and soon after, Dante does battle with Mundus to determine his fate and the fate of the world.

Devil may cry was for its time was quite ground breaking with its innovations in its control system, action scenes and gothic visuals.  The gameplay itself is really good, and it is quite easy to control Dante, and the combat system itself is quite simple.  However the camera angles do somewhat restrict the movement a little, as Dante can only turn in certain ways that the camera angles allow.  Also the visuals, while they look stunning for their time, and still do, they are almost more like a 2D backdrop, and they lack the three dimensional feel, that some later action games would employ.  Dante also moves a bit of a plodding pace when he has not engaged his special powers, but when he does use them, particularly the demon triggers, he can move like lightning.

And the gameplay mechanics of Devil may cry are definitely one of the games most impressive elements, as well as how Dante's powers can be upgraded, such as his speed, movement, and his ability to perform different attacks, such as aerial lightning attacks and my personal fav being the stinger attacks, where Dante drives his sword lunging forward into a stabbing attack to knock down his enemies.  The weapons are also quite cool, with Dante's main guns, which he nicknames as Ebony and Ivory are standard, but they are good in a quick fight against some of the fast moving baddies, and there are is a shotgun, which can be used effectively at close range, mainly against the spooky ghosts that attack you with giant scisscors!  Later on Dante also receives a pretty cool grenade launcher, although if memory serves it is a little bit slow with its rate of fire (I might be wrong there!).

The game however isn't without some flaws, and there are one or two that are quite frustrating, one of them being that you can't save your progress during a level, you have to wait until you have finished the level before you can save again.  This is especially frustrating when you are facing a tough battle against one of the many bosses in the game, of which there are many!  The game also has some limiting options, particularly when Dante is killed and you have to use special yellow orbs in order to bring him back to life, and you can only have so many, and it starts with three, and if you use them all up, you have to reload your saved game, and start all over again!  Its almost like the game designers deliberately don't want to make things easy for you, although if you do lose in a boss fight, if you do get brought back to life, you do at least start back at the checkpoint just before the battle.  The camera movement is also a bit annoying at times, as it feels pretty static as I already said, and it still has the feel of the early Resident Evil games, with the pre-rendered visuals, and it wasn't until Resident Evil 4, where they impressively brough the whole 3D interactive experince to life.

And one of the main criticisms that can be levelled at DMC has to be its difficulty level, the game is far from easy, and it will challenge you.  You will also face some of the bosses more than once, as they reappear, particularly ones such as the hyrbid spider/scorpion creature, the shape shifting cat like creature.  However out of all the bosses the toughest one by far has to be Nightmare, which is basically a giant amorphous blob, which produces a number of bizarre attacks, and if it get's the chance it can consume Dante into its underbelly where you have to fight baddies that it has digested, which you have to fight in order to get out!  And yes you have to face Nightmare more than once as well, but for me once was quite enough, and it left me tearing my hair out trying to defeat it. 

However... in retrospect, having played the game again, I actually didn't find Nightmare to be that bad this time round, maybe because I had stocked up well in extras, and if you use the air hike (let's Dante do a double jump in the air) it let's you evade his attacks alot easier, so a bit ironic that one, after all this time that it turns out it wasn't that bad.  However one of the tougher bosses I found was the Griffin, a giant bird (funnily enough!) which has a variety of electrical attacks, that it can throw at you in different sizes and shapes.  But... it has to be said (update) now that I've finished the game, that the toughest boss in it is by far the head honcho of the badasses, Mundus.  Mundus takes two forms (well actually three) throughout the battle and both those parts are pretty tough, particularly the first one, where you have to defeat Mundus in the skies, as he takes on a God like form, who hurls lightning bolts and fireballs at you from all directions, as well as powerful rays, and in the second you fight him on the ground, where he summons firey dragons out of volcanic lava.  And it has to be said I struggled with this big guy as I was shot down more than once by him, but eventually I managed to get past him, but it was pretty frustrating!  

And I think the key to getting past these bosses is to stock up on orbs, and buy yourself some extra capabilities, such as the vital star to revitalise your health, devil trigger guages to increase the amount of time you spent in demon mode (which makes you faster or stronger).  And another vital extra you can purchase to help rid yourself of the bosses is holy water, which can be used to drastically reduce the baddies health bar.    

Regardless of its flaws though, Devil May Cry is a very impressive game, and the creators deserve nothing but credit for the game's stunning visual presentation, gameplay, story, voice acting, and its impressive ambient score, which as alot of today's games have the almost obligatory heavy metal guitar underlying it!  The variety of baddies is also impressive and you will not be disappointed in the choice of bad-asses that you will get.  And its no surprise that sequels followed, although Devil May Cry 2, which I haven't played, was considered a letdown, but Devil May Cry 3 was in itself an excellent sequel, and in Devil May Cry 4 we were treated to more of the same.

So that's it for my anaylsis of DMC, its a top game, although its not without its flaws, and it will leave you frustrated at times, but its all worth it.

So that's your lot!

The dude.

Right well here is another post, this time its another flick, and I've chosen another comedy, The Big Lebowski, which must rank as one of my favourite films, and one of my favourite Cohen brother films.

So to start with as usual, here is a but about the plot, which begins with the main character, Jeffrey Lebowski (Jeff Bridges), who is better known as "The Dude", being assaulted by two thugs who are looking for some money.  However the thugs have got the wrong man, as it soon turns out that they were looking for another Lebowski, who is a millionaire, who's wife Bunny owes money to a man called Jackie Treehorn (Ben Gazzara).  On realising their mistake, they leave, but not before one of them takes a pee on the Dude's rug.  After this the dude decides to go and approach Lebowski (David Huddleston), the millionaire who is wheelchair bound, to get some compensation for his rug, but Lebowski turns him down, however on his way out, the dude tells Lebowski's associate, Brandt (Philip Seymour Hoffman) that he was to take any rug he wanted.  Soon after however, the dude is visited by some people, one of who knocks him out, and after he comes round, he sees that his rug has been taken.  Further complications arise when Lebowski contacts the Dude, who tells him that his young trophy wife, Bunny (Tara Reid), has been kidnapped, and he wants the Dude to help get her back, as the kidnappers have sent a letter demanding money.

So the Dude along with his bowling buddie, Walter Sobchak (John Goodman) a hot headed Vietnam veteran,  go along to make a pay off, with a case full of money to the kidnappers, however Walter decides to get involved and changes the case of money with a "ringer", which is filled with his old undies!  After this, the kidnappers, who are three German nihilists (lead by Peter Stormare) get angry and pay the Dude a visit, while he is at home in his bath, they let a marmot off the leish and throw him into his bath, and they demand their money or they will "cut off his johnson!".  Meanwhile the Dude also gets a call from a woman, Maude (Julianne Moore) who turns out to be the daughter of Lebowski, and that she was the one who took the Dude's rug, which which actually belonged to her and was of sentimental value, and asks that the Dude recover the ransom.  Maude also reveals that Bunny was in actual fact a porn film star and plays a low rent porn film for him showing this, and that the three nihilists were her friends, the leader being Tortsen Voges (Stormare), who also appeared in the film.  The Dude is soon taken to meet Jackie Treehorn, a pornographer and loan shark, who wants to know where Bunny is and his money.  The Dude then tells Jackie that the kid, Larry Sellers, who allegedly stole the Dude's car, has his money, but Jackie doesn't believe him and drugs the Dude's drink, who soon passes out, and comes to in a police car, where he is taken to the police chief of Malibu, who warns him to not come back.  After the Dude get's back home, he finds his home ransacked, and Maude stands over him, naked, and after a bit of coital action, the Dude soon works out what has been going with Bunny as he suspects that Bunny actually faked her kidnapping and basically she was looking to extort money from her husband, the Big Lebowski, by using nihilist friends.  After that the Dude decides to go with Walter to pay the Big Lebowski a visit and confront him about the whole darn thing.     

The Big Lebowski is without a doubt one of my favourite comedies, and it remains the funniest of the Cohen brother's films.  The Cohen brothers, Joel and Ethan, have been no stranger to comedy, and very strange, quirky comedy at that, but with The Big Lebowski, it seems like they finally got the perfect combination of all those quirky traits together.  And the Cohen brothers are great at drawing out amusing characters and bringing them to life for an audience.

Performance wise the film is also great, with Jeff Bridges playing one of his best roles, as the Dude, who is basically just normal average guy, who is a lazy down and out, who hangs around and likes to smoke grass, drink White Russian cocktails and go bowling.  And Bridges plays him in quite a cool laidback way and succeeds in actually making him likeable, and while he is no hero, or that much of a detective, you get that he is bright enough to work things out as they go along.  Bridges also get's one of the film's best lines when he grabbed roughly by the big Lebowski's limo driver, while he still holds his drink in his hands "Careful, man, there's a beveridge here!".

John Goodman is also terrific as Walter, the half crazed, hot headed, Vietnam veteran, who is so confident in his opinions, but half the time he is wrong, especially when he thinks that the big Lebowski can actually walk at the end (which we soon find out he can't when Walter drops him out of his wheelchair!).  Goodman also get's pretty much the best lines of the film, and my favourite scene in the whole movie is where he interrogates a kid, Larry Sellers, who they think stole the money and the Dude's car, and he says to him "Have you ever heard of Vietnam, Larry??? You're enterting a world of pain, son!  You're killing your father, Larry!".  After this he proceeds to go out and smash up a fancy sports car, which he assumes belongs to Larry, which actually belongs to a next door neighbour, ranting at Larry "this is what happens when you fuck a stranger in the ass!!".

The other cast members are also really good, particularly Julianne Moore as Maude, the cool tempered feminist, who asks the Dude to help get the ransom money back, and later on has sex with him, in order to help her conceive a baby (purely for her own reasons, but not to ask the Dude to be a father to the baby).  Steve Buscemi is also priceless, as the Dude and Walter's less than bright bowling buddie, Donny, who keeps wandering in on the middle of the Dude's conversations, and is often the butt of Walter's cruel put downs, and the often used line "shut the fuck up, Donny!".  I also loved the scene with Donny when he hears Walter and The Dude mention something that the Russian revolutionary Lenin once said, but Donny mistakes it to be John Lennon and he says "I am the Walrus?".

David Huddleston is very good as the title character, the Big Lebowski, the tetchy millionaire, who is wheelbound and insists that the Dude go and get his wife back, although as the film progresses it appears that he doesn't really want his wife back, and he just used the Dude in his own ploy.  And Peter Stormare is funny as the nihilist, Voges, who threatens to cut off the Dude's johnson (or chonson as the script says!), and its a far cry from his chilling portrayal of Grimsrud from Fargo, and in the end Voges is actually just a coward, which Walter later proves by kicking his ass.  John Turturro, occassional regular in Cohen brother films, is also really good as Jesus, the egomaniac bowler, and paedophile, who delivers one of the best lines which he says to Walter about pulling his gun at the bowling alley "If you do that to me, I will take that gun from you and shove it up your ass and pull the trigger to it goes click!".  And finally Sam Elliott as the film's narrator does a fine job, with his deep Southern voice, providing the perfect voice over for the movie, and appears briefly in the middle and at the end of the film.

The film also has a good soundtrack, and while I'm not a fan of Bob Dylan, they use his song "The Man in Me" very well (even though I'm not a fan of the song either!) over the title sequence.  And other songs are well used, particularly Creedence's "Looking out my back door" and "Running through the Jungle".  And one of my favourite tracks used in the film is Kenny Rogers "Just dropped in", which is again well used in the Dude's dream sequence, as he plays the lead part in a film "Gutterballs!".  Great name.  Although if the film does have any flaws then it is in the dream sequences, which are pretty daft, with the Dude dreaming of being a star in the film Gutterballs, and also flying on his magic rug through the skies at night, but these are minor niggles.  

So overall for me the Big Lebowski is a great laugh, it might not be for everyone and it was a commercial failure when first released, and for me it took a second viewing for it to grow on me, but when it did, its remained one of my favourite comedies and films from the 1990s.  The performances are all great, as they usually are in any Cohen brothers film, and if you haven't seen it yet, then the BL is one to watch.

And that is that!  Till next time, take her easy, dude.

I'm not even supposed to be here today!

OK this blog needs posts, so here is another one, it may turn into something of film, TV, theatre review fest, but yes there will other types of posts interspersed here and there.  Sooooo here is another on one of my favourite comedies from the 1990s, Clerks, Kevin Smith's debut movie about two slackers who work in a local convenience store.

There isn't a great deal of plot in it other than it just follows the events of Dante (Brian O'Halloran) during his day job at the local Quickstop convenience store, based in New Jersey.  Dante is an OK guy, but he is rather cranky, whiny, and always feel hard done by, and on this morning he has to come into work to cover for his boss, who unbeknownst to Dante is away to Vermont.  Dante also has a co-worker friend Randall (Jeff Anderson), who is very much an anti-authority figure, who frankly doesn't care about his job, as he works in the video store just along from Quickstop, and he takes delight in dishing out abuse to his customers.  Dante meanwhile plans on getting back together with his ex-girlfriend Caitlin Bree (Lisa Spoonhauer), who is coming back into town, although he finds out through a local newspaper ad that is she getting married to an Asian design major.  Dante also rows with his current girlfriend Veronica (Marilyn Ghigliotti) who pops in and out of the store throughout the film.  The other characters in the film also include, what would become the centre of Kevin Smith's first five flicks, Jay and Silent Bob (played by Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith respectively), who are two drug dealers who hang around outside the Quickstop.  Jay often spouts obscenities to anyone who comes near him, meanwhile Silent Bob, as his name would suggest doesn't say much at all, except he might spout the odd little piece of advice (like he does to Dante later in the film).  As the day progresses things get more chaotic, as Dante decides to close the store to play hockey on the roof with his buddies, attend a funeral of an ex-girlfriend, gets a fine for selling cigarettes to a child (although it was Randall that actually did it).  And towards the end his ex, Caitlin, comes back to see him, as they prepare for a date, so she goes to the bathroom in the store, and unwittingly has sex with a dead man in the bathroom, mistaking it to be Dante!  And by the end Dante is ready to go spare as he keeps ranting about "he's not even supposed to be here today!" and he endures the fun of working at a 7/11.

Clerks really did herald the arrival of a great comic talent in Kevin Smith, who actually successfully blends crude humour with intellectualism in his debut film.  Dante and Randall, although they are both just lazy slackers, also come across as being likeable, although Randall is by far the more dispicable of the two of them.  In one scene, probably his most obnoxious, Randall spits water at a customer who can't stop blathering on about the stupid tabloid headlines from a newspaper.  Dante also flirts with danger as he pines after his ex-girlfriend Caitlin, who actually it is revealed wasn't really good for him, as she cheated on him constantly at high school, but it all ends badly of course.

Kevin Smith also provides plenty of crude jokes in the film, and one of the funniest being Dante's current girlfriend, Veronica, who reveals to Dante that prior to dating Dante, that sucked off 36 guys, and Dante asks her "does that include me?????", and Veronica bashfully admits including him "its 37", and he explodes "I'M 37?????????????!!!!!".  Randall also has quite a few funny moments, one of my favourites being when he is in the video store, he sits on the counter reading a newspaper, ignoring a customer who asks his advice on a film, and he says "I don't watch movies, I think its best to stay out of other people's affairs".  Smith also goes even further with some of his gross out dialogue, as an example he talks to Dante about nudie booths, in which guys stand in and watch girls perform a sex show, and guys whack off, while watching them, and how they employ a "jizz mopper" to clean the booth afterwards!

There is of course also Jay and Silent Bob, who both become really entertaining characters as the films progress, and Jay delivers one of my favourite lines in the film where he berates Dante as they are about to leave the store "Let's get the fuck out of this gyp joint, with this fuckin faggot, Dante! You cock smoker!".  Silent Bob, played by Kevin Smith, is also a source of much amusement as all he mostly does is stand around, trying to look cool and smoking cigarettes, and his best moment comes when he puts a stereo on near the end and starts dancing along with Jay!

Performance wise, Clerks is actually very good, and Brian O'Halloran is excellent as the cranky Dante, who tries his best to juggle his thankless hectic day job, as well as deal with Randall and try and go between he current and ex-girlfriends.  Jeff Anderson is also very good as Randall, and you almost admire how he comes across as an anti-establishment figure who keeps being rude to the customers, as he must voice alot of what store employees must think, and he also delivers one of the film's best speeches about how Dante should stop blaming everyone else except himself.  Marilyn Ghigliotti is also good as Dante's current girlfriend, as the two of them row constantly, as she wants to see him go back to school, rather than keep working at the convenience store.  And Lisa Spoonhauer is also good as Caitlin, Dante's ex, who comes back into his life, as they plan on going out on a date, but before they do, Caitlin has an encounter with a dead guy in the bathroom (she didn't see because the lights were off!).  And finally Jason Mewes as Jay is great, and allegedly Jay's character was basically an extension of Mewes's own personality, and Smith decided to cast him apparently after he saw Mewes one day go around and pretend to fellate everything in sight!

Direction wise Smith does a fine job, with what was a very small budget, as the film probably cost no more $30,000 to make, hence the use of the black and white video cameras.  Since then Clerks has been re-mastered on DVD and even on Blu-ray although its not exactly a film that lends toward needing more definition then it already doesn't have!  And the presentation is pretty basic, or as basic as you can get.  Smith also makes good use of the soundtrack with the catchy theme tune for film, performed by Love Among Freaks, and he also includes other classic tracks such as Alice in Chains's track "Got me wrong".  The film itself also apparently had an alternate ending where Dante is shot by a robber who comes into the store and steals money from the till, but it was decided to drop it, which was the right choice, as at the end of the film you just want to see Dante go home after such a chaotic day, rather than get killed at the end of it.  And in later years, Smith finally decided to make a sequel, Clerks II (good title) which saw all the characters reunite although that might be saved for another post.

So that's it for my Clerks analysis, its a very funny film, and it marked an impressive debut from Kevin Smith, and he really announced himself with this one, and he went on to make some more fine movies with dick and fart jokes in them. :-)

And so I will leave it there.  

Doctor Who: It could be rough!

OK so here's my maiden post about on this blog about something, and I've chosen to do it on the Doctor Who story, Earthshock, during the Peter Davison era, which was in a way kind of landmark story of its own at that time in the programme as it saw the return of the dreaded Cybermen to our screens.  So here is a lot more about that.

The story begins with the Doctor (Peter Davison) and his companions, Tegan (Janet Fielding), Nyssa (Sarah Sutton), and Adric (Matthew Waterhouse) who land the TARDIS on Earth far into the future, inside some caves.  Meanwhile an expedition of military men, lead by Lieutenant Scott (James Warwick) explore the caves with Professor Kyle (Clare Clifford) an archeologist who's team went missing during a survey to find fossils.  However as the team search, they are killed off one by one, by some strange androids, who appear to be protecting something.  The Doctor is soon captured by Scott, but then they soon find the bodies of Kyle's team and a metal hatch in the wall, which Scott forces the Doctor to open.  However before the Doctor can do so, they are attacked by the androids who are clearly guarding the hatch for their masters, which we soon find out are the Cybermen!  The hatch in fact contains a bomb which the Cybermen activate a coundown to kill the others, but the Doctor with Adric's help successfully manages to deactivate the bomb.  The Doctor then is able to trace the signal of the bomb back to its origin which is a big space freighter.  The Doctor tells Scott and his crew to stay in the TARDIS while he investigates the freighter with Adric, but they are soon captured after the find two dead bodies onboard the ship.  The Doctor and Adric are then taken to Captain Briggs (Beryl Reid of all people!) who demands what they are doing there as the Doctor explains about the bomb.  However before they know it they find out the Cybermen are actually stowed away onboard the freighter, and they emerge from containers on the freighter to take control of the ship, lead by their Cyber leader (David Banks).  So the Doctor must try and find a way to defeat the Cybermen who intend to wipe out Earth while several dignitaries visit Earth to discuss forming a pact to destroy the Cybermen.

Eartshock was widely regarded as one of Peter Davison's best stories, and its hard to argue with that as the story has plenty going for it and it was refreshing to see the return of the cybermen after a seven year absence.  The cybermen themselves also had an impressive makeover from the rather flared looking outfits they had in Tom Baker's 1975 adventure, the Revenge of the Cybermen.  Although one criticism that has been levelled at this story was how the cybermen were no longer emotionless, as in this story they are clearly more emotional in their responses, especially as the cyberleader is forever saying "Excellent!".  David Banks, who does an "excellent" job as the cyber leader also fairly raised the point while the cybermen in the story weren't seen to be robotic or emotionless enough, it would undercut the drama of how they were presented if he did perform the dialogue in a very robotic monotone manner, which is fair enough as it would have been ridiculous!  Of course in the new series, the Cybermen voices were done by Nicholas Briggs who had his voice electronically altered, and it sounded far more robotic than before, but it worked well.

Performance wise the story however I have to say is a mixed bag, some of them are better than others, the worse culprit has to be Clare Clifford as Professor Kyle, as she get's some awful dialogue, especially the scene where she is in the TARDIS and shes the Cybermen on the screen and she says "They're huge!".  James Warwick also delivers his lines in a very cheesy macho manner, and the title of this post refers to one of his corniest deliveries when Tegan says she wants to go with him outside the TARDIS and he says "No, it could be rough!".  There is also the baffling decision made by the producer of the time, John Nathan Turner, to cast Beryl Reid as the freighter ship's captain, which is in itself bizarre, as Reid is hardly the stuff of captains is she???!  She also delivers her lines in a very half hearted manner, as she moans about how her crew don't do their job etc.  Although June Bland is definitely one of the stronger of the supporting cast as she plays Captain Brigg's second officer, Berger.  But it is David Banks who provides the best performance as the Cyber Leader, whom he plays with a sense of menace, perhaps a hint of too much emotion, but he is by far the best actor to have played the part of any cybermen.

However most of the regulars do a fine job here, with Peter Davison now well into his role as the Doctor, who continues to play the fifth doctor with a sense of authority and vulnerability, and his youthful exterior always betrays the doctor's real age.  Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton are also both fine as Tegan and Nyssa, with Fielding getting one of the stories best lines "Don't listen to me, I'm just a mouth on legs!".  However out of the regulars, Matthew Waterhouse as Adric was always the weak link in the chain, and it was apparently a decision made by the production staff to kill off his character, as we see in this story, which was the first death of a full time companion of the Doctor's.  The story of course ends with Adric choosing to stay on the freighter to crack the code to prevent the ship from crashing into Earth, but in the end he fails and the ships crashes into Earth with him still onboard.  And througout we see how awkward Matthew's performance is, as he clearly doesn't know what do with his hands, as he half puts his hands in his pockets, and there are fans who have derided him because of his performance, especially in the scene where he anxiously touches the keyboard on the freighter just before the cybermen looms through the door and shoots it.  However his last scene definitely has a sense of dignity to it, and it is in itself one of the most memorable scenes from that time of the show.  

Direction wise, Peter Grimwade does an excellent job here with the story and he expertly hides the cybermen from the viewers till the very end of the first episode, the use of dark and dank caves also works very well.  The scene with the Doctor, Tegan and Nyssa who stare on at the TARDIS screen in horror as the space freighter that Adric is on crashes into Earth, is really well done too and is actually quite a powerful moment as well in the story.  The decision to roll the credits silently at the end to commemorate Adric's death is without a doubt the right one, although perhaps the inclusion of his broken badge as a still shot maybe would have been better substituted with a black screen, but well that's what they chose to go with, and it works well enough. 

And another very noteworthy aspect of the story is the music score by Malcolm Clarke, which is excellent, as it is a very ambient mixture of suspense and doom.  The music used in the cave scenes is great, as is the theme where the Cybermen smash out of the ship containers to storm the freighter, and the passage of music at the end just as Adric meets his maker is really suspenseful, followed by a poignant lull. 

So so so, that's my critique on Earthshock, which was an excellent addition to the Peter Davison era of the show, and despite its flaws, it remains a strong story that is worth a watch.

So I will leave it there.

Welcome welcome

Hello there, well this is a new blog altogether from my previous one, and the main reason for this is that I felt I had simply posted too many entries about tennis, and that it was getting in the way of the posts that had nothing to do with tennis at all.  So this blog will be devoted to other stuff maybe personal, TV, films, music, theatre and so on, just as a switch, and it will hopefully make it easier to navigate around other stuff that wasn't just about a net, two players hitting a yellow ball back and forth.  And the blog has a new font, yay, new background, although I might change if it ends up giving me a headache, like all things change if you don't like them, well at least I change them anyway! 

So this is just a brief intro to what will coming ahead, so once I think of something else that has now to do with the "T" word, its going in here!  So there might not be that much! ;-) Kidding, well maybe.  And this must easily rank as the shortest post I have ever done!  Well there has to be a first time for everything.

And on that note I shall leave it there for now.