Human Centipede 3 - What a grotesque delight...

I know I'm a sick man but this is a stunning return to form for Tom Six after the patently nasty Human Centipede 2. From start to finish this is overblown, hilarious, transgressive fun (The same sense of fun and ridiculousness that made the 1st Film such a treat) You know you're in for one hell of a ride when in the first five minutes Dieter Laser has already fingered and hurled abuse at poor Bree Olsen, who he blithely refers to as "Tits" or "Office Slut" alternatively.

This film is one long animal scream of racism, misogyny, testosterone, stereotypes, sadism and violence and I for one found it very cathartic and refreshing (In the same way I found the "Jackass" films refreshing; these films come along to clear the nastiness and repressed anger from your pipes) With Laser's UTTERLY over the top performance and Lawrence R Harvey's natural British accent occasionally coming through - and that fact that ANYONE would let a lunatic like Bill Boss get away with what he does - makes the ability to take this film seriously a challenge. Having been liberated from taking the film seriously, we are free to enjoy every hysterical transgression on display, from the "hot water boarding" to the castration scene (To Laser eating said testicles later) to the dream (?) sequence of Laser being raped in a puncture wound on his kidneys. It's repugnant joy from start to finish.

Some of the dialogue is just distastefully beautiful: "I need my ballsack drained before lunch!" Laser spits at Olsen, "Even the corpse of a spastic would turn you down!" he howls at Harvey before having sex with the brutalized, comatose body of Olsen in the Prison Hospital. My only complaint is Laser is so over the top that it's often hard to understand the dialogue through his ranting.

With the film's closing shot of a naked Laser literally screaming into a megaphone atop a Prison watch tower, while the American National Anthem plays over the soundtrack, the film ultimately won it's way into my heart.

The King of Pigs: 'cold bodies tumbling together'

Wow...for anyone who has ever been bullied in their life this is going to resonate with full force, like a savage beating itself. The first half will alternatively fill you with anger, outrage or sad recognition, and drag you reluctantly back to High School where all the old wounds you'd hoped had scabbed over will be torn open afresh. The old cliques, power struggles and ridiculous hierarchies of Secondary Education come into view, along with the victims and betrayals for self preservation. Ultimately everyone learns their place in the pecking order, and even those who fight back (like the new student Chan Young) soon learn submission in order to survive. All except (seemingly, in the beginning) the student Chul-Yi (The eponymous King of Pigs).

The opening scene of the film deals with the scars of victim hood and impotent rage. Kyung-Min has strangled his wife after the failure of his business venture. Just like during his teenage years, the 'cry baby' weeps uncontrollably in the shower - a man with the emotional maturity of a teenager; locked in this stage by his tormentors and his experiences. He sees the ghostly figure of Chul in the abandoned house where he, Chul and Jong-Suk used to meet as teens. Chul describes the distinction between Dogs and Pigs in this world; Dogs are the entitled, the wealthy who mange to "live a good life without doing much" and Pigs are the poor, the "losers" who Dogs feed off, whether this is their hard work or their suffering.

The first half of the film deals with the three leads (Chul, Kyung-Min and Jong-Suk) and asserts that the only way to win the respect of your tormentors is to become an even bigger monster than them. The futility of this assertion and the sad ends it leads to are punctuated at the film's end; everyone suffers, no body wins (at least no-one poor), nothing changes.

But the film's scope is much broader than the savage realities of high school, in the second half it surprisingly opens to attack the very nature of life itself - life for the dis-empowered, the disenfranchised and those on the lower rungs of the socioeconomic ladder. Jong-Suk catches his sister stealing a walkman; she wants to learn to use it so she can remain part of popular culture, the elite and not get left behind in her poor family's lifestyle. Though her needs are materialistic she acknowledges where her life is potentially headed and vows to avoid it at all costs. From this point on we are presented with multiple characters acknowledging their impoverished reality and how desperate/helpless they are to escape it. The Mother of Chul is a prostitute in a karaoke bar run by Kyung-Min's father. She squats outside on the phone to her sister, asking why her life is so terrible, desperate for the 'happy' life that will seemingly always be denied her.

Even Chul, who devises a plan to get back at their tormentors by committing suicide at the school, making it impossible for the 'dogs' to ever remember School as a 'happy' memory, ultimately caves in, asking Kyung-Min to alert the teachers when he stands on top of the ledge. Chul wants to change his ways, not fight back at his oppressors, ignore them and live a 'happy life'. Chul is ultimately betrayed by Jong-Suk who pushes him off the ledge, unable to accept the King of Pigs abdicating the throne to sabotage their great revenge on the 'Dogs'

It's possible the film didn't need to explore the wider society surrounding the leads; it arguably would have been a much tighter and more impactful experience just focusing on the three boys and the revenge-suicide and betrayal. I for one found that in the second half my reasoning kicked in and started arguing "Yes, but this is relentlessly bleak and life ISN'T like that; happiness, however fleeting, can be found in messages and conversations from friends and loved ones, small successes, personal achievements" Now granted, I come from a reasonably comfortable, middle-class existence so I don't know what the experience of life is like for people from a lower socioeconomic background, but the relentless bleakness and suffering presented in the second half strains credulity; even poor kids can simply have fun in each others company, even amongst the darker moments there is light.

I would argue this is the weakness of the film, it's blanket bleakness; it's strength lies paradoxically in how relentlessly it pursues it's societal targets; it grips the inequalities of existence by the throat and refuses to let go until the bitter end.

There are two really poignant moments at the film's conclusion, one before and then after Kyung-Min's suicide from the same school building Chul fell from. When Kyung-Min confronts Jong-Suk with the knowledge he saw Jong-Suk push Chul, Jong-Suk strangles him and accuses him of trying to betray their great revenge. Kyung-Min simply smiles and says "Jerk. So what became different?" Immediately Jong-Suk releases him; Chul's death ultimately changed nothing, the 'Dogs' are still on top and life continues, nothing changes (This is one of the major themes of the film, 'helplessness'). The second moment involves Jong-Suk crying over the phone to the wife he earlier abused for unfounded suspicions of infidelity; she asks him "Where are you?" and he lifts his face in horror, the camera pulls back to an aerial shot: he is in 'that place called the world', the scariest place of all, where the cold 'bodies tumble together'.

Ultimately the film left me feeling shattered and truly terrified. My blood was pumping madly through the first half and then my body was clenched through the second half. Painful, sobering, somehow rewarding viewing - if only for being a film that doesn't make you feel like an idiot for those times inside your head which aren't hallmark moments; where you question existence and the necessity to carry on.

The only thing I strongly objected to was the talking ghost cat. No thanks, devil cat took me out of the film:p

The Raid 2: Gruesomely Satisfying

Believe the hype. This is pretty amazing action wise.

My passion for action films remains in my teenage years when I tried to expose myself to as many Jackie Chan, Tsui Hark, Jet Li and John Woo films as possible. I have fond memories of Armour of God 2, The Once Upon a Time in China series, The Killer and Hard Boiled. All were excellent but, by and large, I've moved on from martial arts films. I just don't feel the need to seek them out anymore.

Having said that, every now and then I'll grab an action film to satiate my blood lust and watch the kinetic ballet on display. The Raid 2 does not disappoint.

If I had one complaint it's that the story and concept of this film isn't as original as the first: a police raid on a block of units run by criminals was fresh and inventive for the action genre (Or at least I can't think of too many) Berandal follows the more conventional Japanese Yakuza film, with gang rivalries and machinations for power over territories, with the returning lead Rama thrown into the mix as an undercover cop trying to ensnare them all.

The actors, it has to be said, are universally solid. I sometimes felt that perhaps they had been studying the performances of Yakuza films a little too much, but there is no showy or over the top acting present.

The sheer brutality and bloodletting on display here is quite impressive. Shoulders are blown apart by pump action shotguns, faces caved in by baseball bats, claw hammers wrenched from people's necks. When the action sequences are on, it's a free for all, but with the same grit and realism of the first film.

We love this shit, people. Human beings crave violence and gore. It's the same impulse which drives the love of sports, the same impulse that drew us to the Colosseum. The sooner we admit to that the easier it may be one day to accept our sexual impulses and not treat sexuality with the level of ridiculous shame and awkwardness that is prevalent today. The fact that violence in the human psyche IS more easily embraced than sexuality is a prime reason for our lack of advancement as a species.

In nearly every way this film steps up the action from the first film; in terms of framing the action and in execution there is much more ambition here. The build up to another signature close quarters fight scene in a prison toilet is fantastic, with a slow push in on the door as a barrage of inmates outside swarm against it, trying to reach the waiting Rama within. There is clearly a section where digital morphing has been used to link shots that start outside a car, move through it and then back onto the road again (ala "Irreversible"). And yes, Hammer Girl (Julie Estelle) is a great new addition, her sequence in a train carriage with double handed hammer play being gruesomely awesome.

One thing though, why is director Gareth Evans so obsessed with killing off his most iconic characters? Hammer Girl and Baseball Bat Man both get finished off, and he brings back MadDog (Yayan Ruhian, admittedly in a different role - but that wasn't obvious to me; it was still MadDog but with unruly bum hair as far as I was could tell) only to kill him off as well. I didn't think MadDog had been conclusively finished off in the first film, and if you are going to bring him back, wouldn't it have been more interesting to have him fight for Uco's Father (Following Uco's efforts to kill him in a night club) and then later confront Rama again? Anyway, as it is MadDog is brought back, made to look sympathetic in a scene with his estranged wife and then killed off a few minutes later, with little or no impact on the story. It's pretty obvious Evans just wanted to bring the actor back to play.

Another thing Evans seems set on doing is making the characters more human and sympathetic, we have the MadDog/Wife scene and a lengthier scene (compared to the first film) of Rama saying goodbye to his wife before going undercover. Not to mention Uco's torment after he murders his Father and the undercover cop gone rouge who saves Rama's life. Is this a reaction to comments about the first film's brutality and thin characterizations? An attempt to beef up the characters with conflict and torn allegiances? Or maybe to leaven, justify or contrast the brutal violence? In any case Evans seems at pains to give the story more substance this time around.

It's an interesting touch, but in the end, do we really care? I think most fans of the series just want to see the carnage and amazing martial arts, and there's no taking the edge off hammer time, no matter how you might try to soften the blows.

I for one enjoyed The Raid 2, possibly even more than the original. It is what it is; brutality and excess, brilliant choreography and some great stylistic touches from Evans. It is certainly better than most action fare out there and infinitely better than anything the laboring Fast and Furious franchise can cough up.

Fifty Shades of Extreme Disappointment

Let's give some quick context to this: a) I watched a Chinese online version, so the sex scenes were heavily edited and chopped up which may have affected my enjoyment b) I actually enjoyed the book (despite some of the mawkish dialogue e.g. "laters, baby", shudder) and really found the character of Grey compelling c) I found Ana to be a rather capricious and uninteresting mainstream figure d) I would have killed to play Christian Grey myself.

Now, why doesn't this film work?

Let's start with the source material; my theory on why the film has been roundly critically panned (and more importantly by women, it's hitherto chief audience) is that what was safe to enjoy as a fantasy and purely in the headspace of millions of housewives has now been made flesh, made real, and the reality is Grey, in person, is kind of scary and distasteful.

Does any woman truly want to give over all her personal power to a rich, stiff arsehole? In the book and film even Ana didn't.

Also, BDSM has always been a marginalized, fringe culture, a proclivity best enjoyed in private, so when you're trying to marry that with a Twilight-esque romance craving audience, it will always jar. You're trying to marry sexual violence with mainstream viewing; on page, as fantasy, maybe acceptable, realized on film, awkward and unsettling.

The film has done well at the box office, but I imagine this has more to do with the existing fan base and people's anxiety and gravitational pull towards sex.

Now, the director: Sam Taylor Johnson, apparently one of the Young British Artists (Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst et al.), famous for a serious of photographs ("Crying Men") of high-profile actors in tears (Laurence Fishburne, Robin Williams, Benicio Del Toro etc). She also produced one of the most dry and uninspired sequences in "Destricted" (2006), Death Valley where a guy has a wank and cums in the middle of the desert.

Where is the sense of playfulness or experimentation here? Did author E.L. James's reputed heavy handedness in this film kill that as well? Johnson shoots this in the most rudimentary, kitchen-sink fashion imaginable. It reeks of Twilight blandness. Why did she not play with more extreme close-ups of the principal character's lips and eyes; the book relies on these details to create the heat between the characters; Grey's subtle smiles and blazing eyes observed by Ana - there was so much leeway here for Johnson to experiment with editing and amp up the tension between them.

As it is, there is very little sexual tension on display here, and, as observed by other reviewers, seemingly no chemistry between the stars.

Performance wise, Dakota Johnson makes for a remarkable Ana, like Elijah Wood before her with Frodo, she manages to realize the reader's (Or at least this readers) impressions of Ana, while still keeping her performance alive. The lip biting is never mannered or affected which it could have been. For me at least Ana had stepped off the page and I even liked and sympathized with her more than I did in the book.

But Grey. Alas, Jamie Dornan just didn't pull off the Grey I imagined. As I prefaced, I'm jealous of the cat, but I also don't envy his position: this is not an easy assignment. Not only does he have to pull off reader's expectations of the character, he has to be impossibly handsome (Dornan is hot, but he doesn't 'embody' sexiness), cold, icy, mercurial, tortured, smooth and debonair, but above all Grey must have a kind of calculating, animal intensity that leaves you breathless. Dornan just never has that animal force you'd expect of this character, not even burning or bristling underneath the surface. He also isn't scary, just kind of doe-eyed and stiff. Dornan also seems uncomfortable with the trappings of power and control (Granted Grey is meant to be struggling with this as he falls in love with Ana, but Dornan portrays this struggle flatly), he just doesn't seemed to come from this entitled, efficient world.

This part would have been perfect for actors like Sean Penn, Ed Harris or Ralph Fiennes (And yes I realize they're all way too old:p), intense actors who have that innate 'animalistic' sense to them, who can portray characters with complex interiors and are comfortable with power, enjoying power and displaying power on screen. Dornan isn't powerful, he doesn't make you WANT to give over power to him.

However, as I continued watching, what I noticed he is very good at is humanising and attempting to make likable this potentially shady and repulsive character. Dornan grounds and attempts to make a charming romantic lead out of twisted, child-abused CEO who enjoys torturing women. As I said before, no easy assignment for an actor.

Despite the eroticism and Twilight-esque romantic leanings of the book, I always felt that Fifty Shades was primarily a character study of Grey and Ana's compatible and conflicting traits. This is what I was hoping to see on a screen, a scorching whirlwind of passion, love and conflict between two characters. This is a largely dull and tepid affair. The leads don't ignite and the entire film just falls short of any expectations.

Ultimately Gilbert Gottfried's reading of the book remains infinitely sexier;)

Jupiter Ascending? Stop Wachowskis, I want to get off...

A beautiful failure? I felt that way about Cloud Atlas but not this:p

(I will preface this by saying I had a really shitty experience at the cinema before going in to watch this and I'm certain that colored my viewing)

To be honest, and I realize this is total conjecture, but I just don't think the Wachowski's hearts were in this. They may even be still hurting from the failure of Cloud Atlas.

The production design and look of this film is fantastic, but Andy and Lana have always had a gift for making beautiful images on screen, even as far back as "Bound". The problem here is it's just a convoluted, often confusing muddle - both in terms of story and tone. It took me a while just to work out who were all the different parties involved, who they were working for and what they were after. I understand that this is a stab at a potential franchise, which goes some way to explaining why characters like Doona Bae's are introduced and then promptly ditched, and the inexplicable and jarring scenes of the "Brazil"-inspired bureaucratic nightmare - we are being introduced to worlds we will no doubt be revisiting in the sequels. To me however that's bad storytelling - only introduce what's important for THIS film, not the films that may follow.

On the note of the red tape scenes, I did get a thrill out of seeing director Terry Gilliam play a small and vivid part (and the "Brazil" reference to "27B-6":D). He protests to not being an actor but he's always an interesting and manic energy on screen.

The action scenes are uninspired and tedious. The seven minute chase sequence from 'Grey' aliens just stops the film from moving forward and quite frankly bored me. And I'm sorry but jet-powered shoes are dumb, just dumb. (I liked them in "Guardians of the Galaxy", which suited the irreverent, Buck Rogers tone of that film but here they are clumsy)

Eddie Redmayne is genuinely creepy and unsettling in his role, although the ashen voice is occasionally annoying and the Wachowski's should have pulled him up on his explosive shouting choice (Nearly everyone in the cinema groaned) Seriously though, what the fuck does everyone see in Channing Tatum? Even the bloody Coen Brothers are using this git in their next film! Am I the only one that sees the wooden, emotionless void that is this jumped-up himbo? He was 'there' in "21 Jump Street" and Danny McBride's sex toy in "This is The End" - why does anyone care? (I haven't seen the Jump Street sequel or Foxcatcher) He's a jock who got lucky; it wouldn't surprise me if Hollywood grew him from a skin scraping of Chris Klein.

Mila Kunis is the sole grace of the leads, she is a genuinely warm, solid and engaging presence (Yes, this film made me hot for her, I'll admit it) as Jupiter and a good choice for the central character. Her acting can't hold a flame, however, to Sean Bean who manages to outact everyone else who features in this film in the few scenes he's in. Seriously, I'm worried when complex, real and interesting old guard actors like Bean, Oldman etc. eventually die, who the hell will we be left with? Tatum and Chris Hemsworth? Jezuz, paint the walls with my fucking brains now:p

Sorry, I'm getting off topic now. To sum up: Jupiter Ascending falls flat.

The Monuments Men. Meh.

There's no questioning the quality production of this film and the star pull. As usual Cate Blanchett is excellent and Clooney and Damon both solid. Murray does his Murray thing, but seeing as everyone seems to be crawling up Bill Murray's arse these days I will refrain from doing so. The problem with this film is one of tone; it has to be light and whimsical for the comedy to work (It's not terribly funny at that) but still give reverence for the realities of war. As such death and senseless loss are treated with sentiment rather than with impact or consequences that push the story forwards.

It never really strikes a tone that engages. It's not a gritty, ugly action fest like The Dirty Dozen, nor a drama like Guns of Navarone - there is no drama (Let's clarify: edge of your seat drama) You never really feel a sense of danger in this film and that's where it falls short, there's very little tension and it remains flat throughout; a crime especially for a film of this running length.

Red Hill - A sloppy cinematic outing (2011)

Dear, oh dear...

Where do I begin? This film, from the producers of Wolf Creek, with at least aspirations to mirror the arid, unsettling atmosphere of The Proposition (Itself a highly flawed picture), falls short of either engaging the viewer in it's revenge story or living up to the Western genre it aspires to be.

The concept is simple and promising; Constable Shane Cooper (True Blood's Ryan Kwanten) moves to the rural town of red Hill, hoping to provide a less stressful environment for his pregnant wife. When a convicted murderer, Jimmy Conway,(Tommy Lewis) escapes from prison, bent on killing every member of the local Police Force, Cooper becomes embroiled in the crossfire between Conway and Sargent Bill (Steve Bisley). Conway was convicted of murdering his wife, but as many cluey viewers will already have guessed by the time Conway emerges, he is an innocent man framed by Bisley's character.

This should have been enough for a compelling revenge movie, with the airless, tension-packed atmosphere of say, No Country for Old men, where we follow two men bent on each other's destruction. Writer-director Patrick Hughes delivers some nice moments, (Conway, like Wolf Creek's Mick Taylor, is an instantly iconic figure; an Aboriginal cowboy whose face is half obscured with deep burn scars. Hughes shoots this stony-faced avenger like a force of nature, with an almost supernatural ability to sense his opponents - witness the scene where he takes out a sniper on a roof, without even having acknowledged his presence with a turn of the head) but none of them are nearly as assured or as well shot as the afore mentioned Coen brother's set pieces.

There are some very clumsy elements in this film (In one scene a character is shot side on through the shoulders? Is Hughes trying show something different with the violence; frankly it's neither darkly amusing nor arresting); the incorporation of a rogue panther stalking Red Hill is laughable and does not serve the plot in any way. Yes, it probably does mirror Jimmy as the rogue element stalking the town but how does it move the story forward? There is a terrible scene where Conway stands coolly in front of an opponent who is apparently so anxious to see him dead that despite firing at him from point-blank range he misses Conway entirely. I did not believe this moment for a second; even an amateur shooter (As indeed the character was) could not have failed to have at least hit him once given the distance suggested by the camera placement. Also, why does Conway possess a psychic ability to sniff out his opponents and hit them with supernatural accuracy in some scenes, yet he can't hit Steve Bisley's character in plain sight in front of a car in another? For me such moments just take you out of the film and cause you to stop investing in the action.

The dialogue is sometimes so laughably B-grade that you pray there's a real moment coming along soon. Such prayers go unanswered as everybody pretty much says whats happening on the surface without ever trying to conceal their intentions and ramp up the tension. In fact the dialogue; which is reasonable at the beginning of the film - take Bisley's unfeeling interrogation of Kwanten's reason's for moving to Red Hill - is superseded by the clumsy action by the second half of the film.

Kwanten is passable, his plain features mirroring a equally plain and uninvolving character.

There was such a missed opportunity with this film. In the hands of a better director, who might have added complexity to the central characters and shaped the action with more style and assurance, this could have been really involving. Instead, it's popcorn fodder for undemanding audiences.