White House Down (2013) 71/100

Posted on September 17, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 71/100 131 Min

Hitting cinemas not long after ‘Olympus Has Fallen’ this is essentially exactly the same story, as terrorists invade the White House and only Channing Tatum can stop them. Perhaps suffering slightly from being released second, it still manages to be quite fun, in fact various elements work slightly better – the child in peril scenario and some of the fight sequences for example. Similarly, it’s DNA closely mirrors that of Die Hard (88), in fact the character played here by Jason Clarke is very much a simulacrum of Karl in Die Hard, just as here the computer hacker Tyler (Jimmi Simpson) is essentially Theo, replete with one of his scenes being accompanied with classical music. There are also elevator scenes with the heroes listening to the terrorists below them, ‘rescue’ by helicopter plays a big role, and I think one of the lines used over the radio may almost be word for word the same as one issued forth by Bruce Willis all those years ago. But… who cares? Just as if you like one AC/DC song, you will probably like the majority of the rest (they stuck to a winning formula) if you enjoy Die Hard esque stories then they don’t ever really get old, so long as they’re done well. Roland Emmerich directs (‘Independence Day’ 96, ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ 04, ‘Anonymous’ 11) but manages to limit at least some of the cheese factor (you can still expect a decent amount though) and Tatum along with Jamie Foxx as the president do a reasonable job overall. Don’t have high expectations, but it should still satisfy any sudden cravings for an action blockbuster.

We’re the Millers (2013) 73/100

Posted on August 31, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 73/100 110 Min

Surprising enjoyable. As this is a light hearted comedy film we know exactly where it’s heading – its success is that we are quite happy for it to do so. Jason Sudeikis is a small time drug dealer who falls into debt with a bigger fish in his regional pond. To make amends he agrees to drive down to Mexico and collect a new shipment of Marijuana, and to facilitate the operation he decides to bring along a collection of people to pose as his family ‘The Millers’, people who are, for a variety of reasons, all at loose ends. The fake family are rounded out by Jennifer Aniston as the mom, and Emma Roberts and Will Poulter as the two kids.

Drawing quite a bit of attention from the trailers, something which they cunningly focused on, is Aniston’s character’s occupation, that of a nightclub stripper, suggesting her acting career may be continuing along the path begun with her more sexualised role in ‘Horrible Boses’ (11), and here the film lives up to expectations, with a lithe and salacious Aniston brazenly giving a show in itself more erotic than the whole of ‘Showgirls’ (95) taken together, and yet it never feels overtly gratuitous, in a sort of Megan Fox ‘Transformers : Revenge of the Fallen’ (09) kind of way, and she simultaneously maintains the spirit of most of her romcom characters as well.

The film provides a few genuine laughs, but scores highest with it’s enjoyable character dynamic, with some obvious improv and in the case of Will Poulter it features a rare cinematic moment when you are not only happy for the character, but also very much for the actor playing them too (you’ll see what I mean).

What Maisie Knew (2012) 73/100

Posted on August 31, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 73/100 99 Min

Emotional tearjerker based on the Henry James novel of the same name, focusing on the breakdown of a marriage and the effects for the young innocent girl, Maisie, caught in the middle of it. Julianne Moore and Steve Coogan play the self absorbed parents who’s priorities primarily lie with their careers, that of an ageing rock star for Moore, and a travelling arts dealer for Coogan, and although initially the mother comes off as by far the worse of the two, by the end of the film you will pretty much hate the pair of them.

Enter two young adults in the life of the child, one her regular and somewhat traditional ‘hot babysitter’ played by Scottish newcomer Joanna Vanderham, and the other a handsome male boy toy for the mother in the shape of Alexander Skarsgård, both of whom fall in love with Maisie but are also caught in the venomous crossfire of the separation. The film is well shot and well acted throughout, including by young Onata Aprile who plays Miasie, a performance accentuated by the single tear that she sheds after effectively being abandoned by everyone she loves. A great film, and one which thankfully has the kindness and affection of non family members to balance out the lack of care from those who should know better, suggesting that blood isn’t necessarily always thicker than water.

World War Z (2013) 67/100

Posted on June 22, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 67/100 116 Min

This is a reasonably good zombie film, but one massively hindered by a director who hasn’t learned from previous mistakes. The man in question, Marc Forster, was criticised on a grand scale for his ultra fast editing of the action sequences on the Bond film ‘Quantum of Solace’, and here the same problem all but ruins the opening section of the film, where we are granted our first visual treatment of the zombie hordes (they are effectively the same as the zombies infected with the rage virus in 2002’s ‘28 Days Later’) and everything is so completely frenetic we can’t make out what on Earth is going on. The idea was to put the audience in the situation as much as possible, but ironically it has the very opposite effect, deadening our perception of events, in much the same way as watching a tense scene in fast forward would do.

It’s based on the novel by Max Brooks (the son of Mel Brooks), and after the first half an hour or so things start to pick up, and the story gets going. Brad Pitt does a good job of playing the central character, Gerry Lane, employed to investigate the source of the outbreak due to his military connections with the U.N. At one point he awakens to find himself tied to a stretcher and facing none other than Malcolm Tucker (well, Peter Capaldi) from ‘The Thick of it’, which is potentially far scarier than any of the zombie attacks. Decent, but never as tense as it should be.

The film is already famous throughout Scotland for being partly filmed in Glasgow, doubling up as Philadelphia, most notably in the city centre for the aforementioned starting attack. It is great to see the city on the big screen, and it’s obvious not just because of its architecture, but also because it looks decidedly coooooold and dreich (for anyone not familiar with Scots, this word is almost always used in connection with the weather and means dreary and miserable, we use it a lot) and I wonder if local business won’t be able to milk that to some degree, a zombie cafe perhaps, or the occasional zombie flash dance on unsuspecting tourists would be interesting …

The film is planned as part one of a trilogy, so the studios may return to Scotland’s largest city in the future. On a similar vein, Neil Marshall’s ‘Doomsday’ (08) revolved around a deadly killer virus which, naturally, began with one person coughing on the streets of Glasgow city centre. England’s response to the outbreak is to build another wall to keep us out, much like the Romans did, and the rest of the world pretty much leaves Scotland to die. Being a hardy bunch we don’t, of course, but we do degenerate into cannibalism and tribal warfare. All, that is, except for Dundee, which essentially carries on as normal.

Welcome to the Punch (2013) 61/100

Posted on March 17, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 61/100 99 Min

The most obvious and memorable thing about this film, other than it’s rather ridiculous title, which at least forewarns you of the violence you can expect to see, is that the entire film has been desaturated and colourised various shades of blue, a post-production procedure that is used ever more frequently to make work seem more ‘urban’ or gritty, but not usually to quite the excess as can be seen here. It actually works reasonably well in this scenario, and does give a very distinctive feel to the movie, although it also kind of feels like the whole film was shot around a dimly lit swimming pool. It’s a crime thriller that sees determined cop James McAvoy pitted against successful professional criminal Mark Strong in and around London, with support from Andrea Riseborough, Peter Mullan, David Morrissey, and Daniel Mays. The acting and unique look of the film are good enough to make it all right, but there’s little of any real originality or substance here, and it’s not nearly as explosive as the title suggests it might be. If the ushers punched you in the face when you walked into the screening it might be more memorable, an introduction to 4D cinema perhaps…

We Are Northern Lights (2013) 83/100

Posted on March 13, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 83/100 98 Min

This film was commissioned on a fantastic premise: an open call was given to anyone with access to a camera across Scotland to record footage showcasing places that have meaning to them, people that have inspired them, or just generally anything about the nation that they felt might warrant inclusion in this compendium of short clips. The resulting finished product is a gallant mix of comedy, social and political commentary, and a sightseeing tour of some of Scotland’s natural and man-made beauty. Glasgow, Edinburgh and the Highlands feature most prominently, although many of the other cities get a look-in along the way, though I don’t remember seeing any beautiful landscape shots of the city of Dundee … Plenty to talk about and remember, and worth watching whether you yourself are Scottish, or are simply curious about our somewhat distinctive sense of self, and, most notably, our sense of humour.

This is to my knowledge the first documentary of its kind, so it is fitting that it should take place in Scotland where documentary filmmaking has such strong roots (according to legend, the term was itself coined by Scots filmmaker and critic John Grierson). In fact, although this film premiered at a sold out screening in the Glasgow film festival, the Edinburgh film festival was begun in 1947 as a showcase for documentary film, and currently holds the title of the longest continually running film festival in the world (both Cannes and Venice are slightly older, 1946 and 1932 respectively, but have both had breaks over the years).

The project is such a good idea, and has been so well received that it would be fantastic to see it spread to other countries, and indeed for it to become an annual event in Scotland, producing a databank of digital footage that the public could have free access to for research, or entertainment, in years to come. With the widespread ownership of digital cameras and smartphones, such an archive could only grow in popularity and cultural value. Another documentary released at the same time as this, ‘Side by Side’, hits on the same enterprising possibilities now available to anyone who wants to become involved with filmmaking. The official website for this project, complete with access to all the submitted material and a list of all the screenings around the nation, can be found here.

Warm Bodies (2013) 33/100

Posted on February 9, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 33/100 98 Min

A classic tale of undead zombie falls in love with young pretty lass, but still has to win over her father (John Malkovich) before they’ll have peace. The problem is, it’s very much a one trick pony, and once the slight amusement of the premise has passed there is nothing particularly funny or interesting left in the rest of the film. It’s mainly the fault of the director and screenwriter (the same person in this case – Jonathan Levine) and less so of the actors who do OK with what they have. The would-be Romeo and Juliet (who can’t resist aping the star-crossed lovers’ balcony scene) are played by zombie Nicholas Hoult (‘A Single Man’ 09) and not-zombie Teresa Palmer (‘I am number four’ 11), who almost looks and sounds like someone has mashed together bits of Amanda Seyfried and Kristen Stewart, an interesting combination …

The film also has an inherent problem in that the leading male character can’t speak properly. It does, though, at least have a pretty good soundtrack, but it even repeatedly succeeds in garbling that, cutting off songs like ‘Rock You Like a Hurricane’ by Scorpions before they’ve even started – if you’re going to sacrifice a decent story and script for good music AT LEAST PLAY THE SONG! If you really want to see a zombie romcom then forget this and watch ‘Shaun of the Dead’ (04) instead. SPOILER ALERT (though I’m sure you will see it coming a mile off anyway) to make matters worse, their cross-species love saves all of zombiekind who start to become more human again. Bleurggghhh.

Wreck-It Ralph (2012) 70/100

Posted on February 9, 2013 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 70/100 108 Min

Disney’s latest attempts to do for video games what Pixar did for discarded childhood playthings, à la ‘Toy Story’, their debut film, back in 95. The story follows the adventures of the titular Wreck-it Ralph (John C. Reilly) as he determines to prove himself worthier than the bad guy role he’s been programmed to play out every day in an old, classic arcade game, which has managed to survive the test of time as others around it have perished and been replaced by more modern rivals, including a ‘Gears of War’/’Halo’ esque first person shooter. It’s aimed more at kids than adults of course, who ironically won’t get a lot of the in-jokes and references, though most of the action takes place inside the fictional game of ‘Sugar Rush’, which operates much like a candy fuelled version of ‘Mario Cart’.

Though it has succeeded in making The Red Dragon think about dusting down some old games, from around one third of the way into the film it starts to feel a little sluggish and in many ways as clumsy and obvious as its main character; with the wealth of parody material at its disposal it doesn’t quite seem as involving or humorous as it ought to. Ultimately, the film is still pretty good, though this is perhaps more thanks to traditional Disney gushiness rather than fond thumb battering nostalgia, and there is enough here to merit a sequel that will hopefully have a bit more in it for adult audiences, and more in the way of familiar faces from the world of arcade games.

Perfect for families (unless you’re dead against your kids playing video games) and full of nice little touches, from poor path detection and a beholder holding multiple cups of juice at the ‘bad guys support group’, to the thanks given to the caffeinator at the end of the credits, and a little ‘Star Wars’ nod now that Disney have acquired the rights to the franchise from George Lucas (though, interestingly, parts of ‘Sugar Rush’ do look strikingly similar to a certain other eagerly awaited J.J.Abrams project … ).

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