60 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/ Rants, raves and randomness from the Empire office 04/07/2009 07:22:40 james@empireonline.com (James Dyer) http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=574 Ladies and gentlemen, I have seen the future of fashion, and it looks like people tying halved satellite dishes to their feet, attaching wide, glittery, striped flares around the edges, and then donning half a florists by way of headgear. It's beautiful, it's daring, it's totally impractical and it's probably the real star of the Priscilla, Queen of the Desert musical - never mind Jason Donovan, Tony Sheldon and Oliver Thornton. It may seem a little odd to focus on the costumes - but that's what the characters do, and to an extent what the film did, so bear with me for a moment, because the costumes are just astonishing. Soaring headgear, showgirl feather headdresses that would put Kylie to shame, corsets with both frills and heart-shaped decoupage, baroque funeral duds that happen to be ass-less, animal costumes - this thing has it all. It makes last month's Sister Act look positively austere, and knocks La Cage Aux Fol... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=574 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=572 I was woken at 4am by pigeons cooing amorously on my windowsill, and then assaulted by waves of oven heat on the Tube this morning. The chocolate teacakes left thoughtlessly on the table in Cafe Empire on Friday have dissolved into small puddles of brown and white goo (cf. pigeons above) and there's a 90% chance I'll turn lobster pink if I so much as cross the road to buy lunch*. It can all mean only one thing: summer is here, and it's time to book in my outdoor film viewing for this year. I'm a bit devotee of outdoor screenings. The trick is to bring lots of blankets, rugs, possibly cushions, nibbles etc - and then throw some more blankets, rugs and cushions in the bag just when you think you've got enough. Basically, bring as many as you can carry. If you're sitting in Somerset House's stony courtyard, you're going to want as much padding between you and the ground as possible, particularly if you're watching a double-bill and the second film's starting around 11pm. You're also going to start to f... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=572 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=570 So the news today of Michael Jackson's passing has left me with rather mixed emotions. On the one hand, it's clear that the King of Pop was weird, to say the least, and damaged from a childhood spent under the full glare of the spotlight. On the other hand, it's undeniable that he was a huge musical talent, and I've been rather enjoying listening to his hits without a break all morning so far. But this is a film site, so let's assess his contribution to film history. First of all, there were his starring roles. I remember being very excited about going to see Moonwalker as a kid, what with the trailers showcasing all the swooshy effects and the music and the fact that Michael Jackson was making a film and there was a bit with a giant robot spaceship! One of my best friends was a massive fan, so I'd already been lectured thoroughly about MJ's career and had it explained that this would be the greatest film ever. I went to see it, if memory serves, with high hopes and quite... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=570 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=571 Scold me for my laziness if you will, but for my last day of EIFF-ing, I took some time away from the big screen to concentrate on some of its living, breathing attractions. I’m still kicking myself somewhat for missing the hastily-developing-“Sex Pistols Manchester 1976”-levels-of-festival-folklore Le Donk & Scorz-ayz-ee party (although I had the best possible reason for not making it), but I did manage to get to the Five Day Features Q&A the following afternoon. Shane Meadows and producer Mark Herbert were in conversation with festival director Hannah McGill for 90 minutes, recounting their experiences making Le Donk as an example to us all that their idea – to invigorate filmmakers new and old by shooting a feature film in five days - could work. Meadows in particular has an almost militantly can-do attitude (to the point where he refuses to acknowledge the opinion of anyone saying they can’t; and again by his own example, he’s right) a... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=571 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=569 So, as of next year, the Oscars’ Best Picture race will include ten nominees, rather than the traditional five, the biggest sea change for the ceremony since the minting of the Best Animated Feature Film category (ironically, a category that may be threatened by this new move; more on that later). It’s a decision that has split pundits down the middle. Everyone’s favourite grumpy old man, Jeff Wells over at Hollywood Elsewhere, has bah-humbugged the whole enterprise – “Why didn't the Academy decide to nominate 15 films for Best Picture?” he asks - while Steven Zeitchik at The Hollywood Reporter thinks it’s a potentially positive move, calling it a “shrewd marketing move” even if it’s also “a questionable policy change.” Meanwhile, in my initial spur-of-the-moment reaction in our news story, I pooh-poohed the idea, seeing it as a largely cynical move to acknowledge f... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=569 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=567 Only three nights in, and this year’s festival experience seems to me to have blurred into some self-induced, Apocalypse Now-style odyssey. Where did I start going wrong? The jet lag, the constant liver-bashing, the parties? Costcutter baked goods at 4am? All of the above, I guess. Still, the quality of the films are pulling me through. As promised, I was recently at the press screening for Le Donk & Scorz-Ayz-Ee. Given the pre-existing praise of Nev & Damo, I’ll not waffle on anymore here: suffice to say that I really dug it. A completely unexpected turn from all involved, it’s hilarious for nearly all of its 71 minutes, with Paddy Considine finally getting a chance to unleash his little known, yet mile-wide comedic streak. Le Donk – the long-gestating character, and background star of many a Shane Meadows short – is the actor’s Partridge or Brent. Meadows, meanwhile, gives the five days of improvisation a genuinely moving (yet not overdone) st... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=567 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=566 BEWARE: SPOILERS ABOUND. DO NOT READ THIS UNLESS YOU HAVE SEEN REVENGE OF THE FALLEN!  A few hours ago I became the last Empire-ite to slap my eyes upon Michael Bay’s mega-sequel, Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen. And, as my interest rapidly waned ‘neath the relentless barrage of robot punching, robot kicking, robot smashing, robot leg humping, robot farting, robot incomprehensible exposition and ROBOT LOUD NOISES, I noticed something that piqued my interest. In short, Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen may be the gayest mainstream movie since Top Gun, with its talk of wingmen and tails and whatnot. Not, as Seinfeld once said, that there’s anything wrong with that. In fact, it’s quite audacious and subversive. After all, Transformers is a giant, toy-shifting, popcorn-shovelling buster of blocks, a movie designed for parents to take their kids along to, safe in the knowledge that it won’t turn out to be a paean to the jo... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=566 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=559 Cinema is filled with lousy dads, real shitheels dedicated to being the biggest bastard they can be. But, on this most artificial of manufactured, card company-created days, I want to give something back to the dads. Dads often get the short end of the stick – it’s the mums we run to when we’re kids and we’ve hurt our hands, it’s the mums who feed us, who clothe us. But it’s the dads who we look up to. It’s the dads we want to play with, whether it’s a game of football or a fruitless session trying to teach them how to use a joypad. It’s the dads, frankly, and not astronauts or doctors or footballers that we want to be when we’re growing up. And so here, in no particular order, are some of cinema’s most inspirational, moving, and emotional dad moments… From the moment his child is born, a father’s life is about sacrifice – giving up the little things in life to make his offspring’s life easier ... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=559 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=565 One of the most anticipated films of this year’s festival is Le Donk & Scor-zay-zee, the third feature-length collaboration between Shane Meadows and Paddy Considine. It does not disappoint. Pre-screening hubbub focussed on the fact the improvised docu-style feature was shot in a mere five days… which left me worried, frankly – as if the low-budget, micro-schedule might be used to excuse a dip from the pair’s usual quality (Dead Man’s Shoes, A Room For Romeo Brass). The concerns were ill-founded; this is an actor and director at ease but not at rest: Le Donk is very funny and oddly touching and features a brilliant performance from Considine. He’s an actor perhaps best known for the sense of edge he can give characters – an unpredictable, feral presence – but Le Donk, a roadie and wannabe music manager, is a lighter creation, daft instead of dangerous and vulnerable beneath his bloke-ish bluster. He’s got ... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=565 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=564 Humpday is a film I had high hopes for, and, thankfully, they were met. It's the kind of comedy we can't seem to make in the UK, even though all it really boils down to is three actors and a camcorder. Made by Lynn Shelton, it's an exquisitely funny film about male intimacy and ego that skirts some very uncomfortable issues without ever losing the audience's sympathy or interest. Mark Duplass plays Ben, a Seattle guy who has settled down with his wife Anna (Alicia Delmore). Their marital harmony is suddenly and rudely interrupted by the arrival Ben's old friend Andrew (Blair Witch's Joshua Leonard), who turns up at 2am in a warm fuzzy haze of brotherly love. Andrew stays one night before moving on to a college dorm, where he has befriended a sexually adventurous college girl, Monica (Shelton), who lives in a state of semi-permanent orgy. Staying overnight, Monica and her friends/lovers tell the pair about a local amateur porn-movie festival called Humpfest. Stoned, dru... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=564 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=562 “I’m sorry I’m late, I got here as fast as I couId." I wouldn’t miss this for the world, but commitments to visiting the mighty, ace Pixar studios meant I had to start EIFF 2009 a few days off of the pace. I felt obliged to hit the ground running when I arrived on Saturday evening, and managed to score myself a last minute ticket to the late screening of Jamie Blanks’ remake of Australian horror/thriller Long Weekend (pictured). It’s an odd beast, and anyone who’s seen the original recently will probably walk away disappointed – but I don’t imagine there were many of those in the audience, nor will there be at large, so I can certainly see the merits in dusting off Everett De Roche’s story. 30 years after the original, Blanks’ re-shoot of a virtually unchanged screenplay substitutes arrogant Australian white man (a legendary Oz character actor, the late John Hargreaves, who is honoured with an on... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=562 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=561 Four films today, all of which, to varying degrees, dealt with escape. Writer/director Andrea Arnold – widely feted for Red Road – returns with Fish Tank and I’ll add my tuppence worth to Damon’s views. It’s an estate-set drama about troubled teen Mia (Katie Jarvis), who dreams of dancing her way beyond the high rises, cheap cider and familial conflict of her confined existence. Where Red Road was gripping but somewhat dour, Arnold finds humour in unlikely circumstances here (the potty-mouthed exchanges between Mia and her younger sister make the foul-but-funny banter of Superbad appear mild), while visually she finds unexpected beauty in parts of the kitchen-sink surroundings, without appearing studied, self-conscious or patronising. Jarvis is very good – giving a charisma and empathy to a character who could easily have appeared brattish – while Michael Fassbender underlines his extraordinary talent once again, walking a... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=561 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=560 I feel I've been a bit slack with my missives from the Edinburgh front line. I kind of enjoyed Sam Mendes' Away We Go, as you can see from my Times review here, but it fell away from me as it became progressively more serious and more American. I think the problem with it is that it perhaps requires you to have certain life experiences for it to really work. For example, it probably has a more profound impact on parents, or people trying to become parents, or people who have lost parents. Being a fairly stereotypical film journalist, however – I even have a beard – I do not tick any of those boxes yet. I also had an issue with the ending, which, of course, I will not endeavour to spoil for you here. Speaking of endings, I had issues also with the very well made and intentioned Crying With Laughter</... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=560 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=558 Pregnancy, lunar mining and an x-rated Apprentice… The 63rd Edinburgh International Film festival has opened with a good blend of films, including two unusually smart, intriguing British thrillers and the latest from Brit-abroad Oscar-winner Sam Mendes. Away We Go is the Reading-born director’s fifth feature and based on bar-chatter with fellow journalists*, it’s received a somewhat lukewarm reaction. Of course, this could in part be put down to the relentless cynicism the profession appears to inspire – for while the film has it’s faults, no doubt, it’s also very funny, somewhat charming and definitely, defiantly optimistic and warm-hearted. The story – a loose term here, it must be said – starts with the six-months pregnant Verona (Maya Rudolph) and boyfriend Burt (John Krasinski) discovering his parents are about to move abroad, leaving them to hold the impending baby… Unmoored, they decide to travel around North Ameri... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=558 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=557 Christopher Lee is a legend, an icon, a bona fide walking all-time movie great. And now, thanks to the Queen and her Birthday Honours List, he’s also set to become Sir Christopher Lee. And about bloody time, too – here are 50 reasons why his knighthood is long overdue… ... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=557 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=554 On a crazy whim that had nothing to do with seeing it bundled with the superb Clear And Present Danger in a leading US retail store, I picked up The Hunt For Red October, headed home and settled down for a mini-Jack Ryan marathon (no Patriot Games, but I didn’t mind that so much; and the absence of The Sum Of All Fears was not lamented). I started, as Quentin Tarantino is so loathe to do, at the beginning, with The Hunt For Red October, the one in which Alec Baldwin originated the role of CIA analyst Jack Ryan before, bafflingly, turning down the role for Patriot Games, allowing Harrison Ford to nip in and pocket a ready-made franchise. But that’s another story for another blog. This blog has another thing on its mind: namely, John McTiernan. Currently more famous for his entanglement in the Anthony Pellicano wiretapping scandal, for which he narrowly escaped a custodial sentence, McTiernan hasn’t made a film since 2003’s middling, ... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=554 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=553 Religious leaders could learn a lot from Sister Act: A Divine Musical Comedy at the London Palladium. The last act sees a chorus of nuns dressed in robes entirely covered in silver sequins dancing around the stage Saturday Night Fever-style, before forming a chorus line (!) for some high-kicks. Spotlights drench them, a giant silver plated statue of the Virgin Mary rotates behind them and disco lights flash through the stained glass windows that line the stage. The effect is literally dazzling - Empire's theatregoing companion had to avert her eyes - and demonstrates one thing conclusively: if religion were actually like this, no one would miss church on Sunday*. But how good, we hear you cry, was the musical itself? Was it as divine as advertised? Well, it's at least saintly. The show takes its inspiration from the 1992 Whoopi Goldberg film of the same name (Goldberg is a producer of the musical) and follows a nightclub chanteuse forced to hide out from her gangster boyf... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=553 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=551 Most mornings, the first thing I see when I open my eyes — other than tall stacks of unpaid utility bills — is the poster for Chinatown, hanging on the wall. Which got me contemplating the question: what is it about this vintage 70cm x 100cm print that makes it such a pleasure to gaze at? And why did I buy this and not – say – the poster for the just-as-awesome Terminator 2: Judgment Day? So I thought I’d do a quick run-down of the movie posters I own, then find out which ones you all cherish. After all, it’s about time to retire that Raiders one-sheet in the lounge… CHINATOWN Okay, so it’s one of my very favourite movies of all time, so chances are I would have bought the poster even if it just featured Jack Nicholson eating dim sum. But this particular design (by Jim Pearsall) really is, to quote Alan Partridge, “premier league”. I love the... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=551 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=546 So just last night I was watching a film that contained a whole heap of film cliches and screenwriting tropes, and I thought of an exercise to keep your brain ticking over after the Bank Holiday - because the UK economy can't afford you to remain in a hazily pleasant post-Monday-off state. I thought we could all get together and try to compile a complete list of movie cliches that we're sick to death of. Yes, all of them. Yes, from all the different genres. Then maybe someone in Hollywood will print the list out, put it on their wall and stop putting them in all their movies. Hey, it's worth a try. Here are a few suggestions of the most egregious examples to get you going. 1. No one ever locks their car. This is especially true in action movies but kinda tired all over. In the modern world, you leave your car and you lock it. It's not even something you think about. If you are currently actively engaged in chasing a suspect, I'll concede that you might sk... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=546 http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=533 It might have escaped your attention but Star Wars Episode I The Phantom Menace opened ten years ago to the day in the US (for some inexplicable reason Blighty didn’t get the film for another two months). It seems to me that What Went Wrong With Episode One arguments is an energy that binds a generation together. Put a group of twentysomething/thirtysomethings who have never met and you can bet your bottom dollar that they can find common ground about Darth Maul’s majesty/Jar Jar Binks’ crapness. Nothing stirs up debate like Episode I I’ll tell you where I am on the debate. I am a Prequel Apologist. I would even go as far as to say that I would rather watch Episode I than any LOTR film. Are the Lord Of The Rings films “better movies” than the prequels — of course they are. But I don’t love Tolkien’s universe half as much as I do Lucas’ lands, so I would much rather race through the Boonta Eve classic or watch Maul pace arou... http://www.empireonline.com/empireblog/post.asp?id=533