Month: January 2026

Battle on!

On By ghostof82In 4K UHD, Movies2 Comments

ImageOne Battle After Another (2025), Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson, 161 mins, 4K UHD

Bob Ferguson was once Pat Calhoun, part of a far-left  American insurgent group, the French 75, with his lover Perfidia Beverly Hills, rescuing detained migrants and threatening revolution. Pat and Perfida had a child  but things fell apart. Perfida was captured and turned informer, selling-out the French 75- the rightwing establishment hunting them down and executing those they caught. Those members that escaped, like Pat and his infant daughter, went off-grid with assumed identities. Now, sixteen years later the hardcore immigration officer Col.Lockjaw, who captured Perfida has a personal stake in hunting down Bob and daughter Willa and what remains of the French 75.

The word ‘masterpiece’ gets used too often these days regards films and TV shows, so much so it possibly doesn’t mean anything, certainly if its immediately after watching a film for the first time. But its a word being thrown at this particular film by many. Maybe one should reserve such adjectives until a film is, say, ten years old and watched a few times. A film can be ‘very good’ or even ‘excellent’ but, you know, lets give it time to breathe, find its cinematic place in the world. Time judges the great ones.

To be clear- I really, really, enjoyed this latest film from Paul Thomas Anderson, the guy behind Boogie Nights, Magnolia and There Will be Blood. What might have been a bruising running time really rushed by faster than one might expect and the performances of its cast were as impressive as once could hope; its cinematography is some of the best I’ve seen in years, and its script at times exhilarating, confounding and ridiculous- its a hell of a movie. Its got more balls than most $130 million films these days; its quite a film.

But ‘masterpiece’? Well, maybe we’ll give some pause on that. For one thing, it was such a captivating first-watch going in blind that I want to rewatch it just to settle a few things in my head; there’s plenty about it that I loved but plenty that really grated. It felt like too much of a film to really take in with one sitting.  Maybe that’s true of the best movies.

The clearest problem I had with the film, that may settle down second time around, was regards some of the very surreal characters- this is a film of deliberate extremes likely designed to antagonise and some of the characters really frustrated. The far-right ‘bad guys’, Sean Penn’s monstrous Steven J. Lockjaw and the secret white supremacist cult the Christmas Adventurers Club, never feel real. If they did feel real, they would be utterly terrifying, but Anderson seems more comfortable setting them up for mockery. And yet, at the same time, I suppose the same could be true of the French 75; who are decidedly far-left (in this film, there’s a vacuum where the usual centre-ground would be). Nominally the self-appointed ‘freedom fighters’ that are the French 75 are who we and Anderson are rooting for, but Bob (Leonardo DiCaprio), who throughout looks like a stoned-out Arthur Dent from Douglas Adams’ Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, is always something of a useless jerk buffeted around by everything and never really exercising any agency; I may be wrong, but I’m not convinced that he ever really believed in the violent revolution he was caught up in, he’s just captured in Perfida’s gravity-well, her beauty and personality dragging him in. In many ways, this is as refreshing and realistic a hero as we’re likely to ever see in a film like this, and feels very… well, very Boogie Nights/Magnolia. Its The Big Lebowski by way of Les Misérables. But with guns. Lots of guns.

I found Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor) contemptible from the start; an angry Amazonian revolutionary so full of hate… who ironically, considering how strong a character she is, betrays everything she was fighting for. She disappears from the proceedings once the film jumps forward sixteen years but her shadow hangs over everything that follows. I was a little puzzled she doesn’t return, and doubted the authenticity of the letter that Willa (Chase Infiniti, who pretty much steals the film) reads at the end- indeed narratively it felt rather a cop-out and I could have done without it. But was I missing the point?

I did get the impression that the film feels incredibly timely considering what we see on the nightly news these days, with left and right both in America and Europe horribly divided; whether this matches the extremes portrayed in Anderson’s film is debatable. The film’s violent chaos and political extremism is stark to the point of satire, and maybe that’s what Anderson is aiming for- annoying both sides if only to start a conversation and debate. Or maybe its just a polarizing movie.

The Legacy that might have been…

On By ghostof82In 4K UHD, Movies3 Comments

ImageTron: Legacy (2010), Dir. Joseph Kosinski, 125 mins, 4K UHD

If there’s one good thing about Tron: Ares existing (I haven’t seen that one yet) it was Tron being released on 4K disc last October and the film finally being done justice on physical media (the HDR being a big bonus and a few effects glitches being fixed). Of course with Tron being released on 4K, so was its belated sequel, Tron: Legacy.

Now, we didn’t know it back in 2010 when it came originally came out, but curiously, Tron: Legacy proved to be something of a precursor to another belated sequel, BR:2049, with both films inspired by films originally released in 1982. Both films were sincere attempts to continue the narratives of those 1982 films rather than being the cynical cash-ins/franchise hijacks they could have been. Both films were late to the party, so to speak; 28 years for Tron: Legacy, 35 years for BR2049, and yet at the same time both –Tron: Legacy more than BR2049– were constrained by technology, specifically the de-aging effects work that I dare say will become increasingly prevalent in the future.

Its the one thing that impacts horribly on Tron: Legacy; the de-ageing of Jeff Bridges for a scene featuring Kevin Flynn in 1989  and more damagingly the antagonist character Clu, a version of Flynn frozen in time, so to speak, who has far too much uncanny-valley screen time for comfort. The ambition regards what they were trying to do should probably be applauded, but it was a case of too much wishful thinking regards actual visual effects ability. At least in BR2049, it was kept to an absolute minimum with a representation of Rachel that, while more successful, was understandably limited regards screen time – a case of the film’s narrative working within limitations, whereas Tron: Legacy went for the Hail Mary pass bigtime and blew it.

Well, you know the old saying, better to have tried and failed than not try at all. But then again… maybe the film would have been better served limiting the narrative to what was possible.

There still could have been a great film with a storyline still close to what they went with. Imagine a film set entirely in 2010 (no flashbacks) with an early reference to Kevin Flynn having disappeared back in 1989 and his company Encom being subject to a hostile takeover afterwards. Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner) pays Kevin’s son Sam (Garrett Hedlund) a visit, saying that he’s received a message from his dad on an old pager. They investigate where it may have come from, and visit the disused videogame arcade that Kevin Flynn owned back in the 1982 film. Sam discovers a secret corridor leading to a hidden basement with an old workstation, and inadvertently triggers the laser that digitises him and sends him into the Grid. There the plot follows a similar line it does in the film, Sam meets Quorra (Olivia Wilde) who takes him to his dad, an obviously now-older Kevin who reveals he has been trapped in the Grid since the portal was shut down. The portal can only be opened in the Real World, and the pager message to Alan was clearly a tease to get him to open the portal. The antagonist in this film could have been Zuse (Michael Sheen) negating  any need for Clu and all that uncanny valley material. Zuse’s forces chase Kevin, Sam and Quorra, and the three flee to the real world. The happy ending is cut short when it becomes clear that the portal is still open and Zuse and his forces are invading the real world. Hey presto, sequel teased keeps the studio execs happy.

I mean, its practically the same movie, but one structured within effects limitations of 2010 (better still, cut out most of the real world/present day stuff at Encom and you could tell the story above in half the running time, and Zuse’s invasion could have been the grand finale of Tron: Legacy, negating any need for a further film at all).

Its fun sometimes, playing games like that, imagining other versions of films that ‘fix’ perceived problems.

A curious link between Tron Legacy and BR2049 lies in its digital, AI characters, which hadn’t really occurred to me before, but  rewatching the film this time around it was loud and clear. In BR2049 we have virtual companion Joi (Ana de Armas) and some of the most interesting sections of the film feature her hologram ‘experiencing’ the outside world, rain etc. and it seems clear that Tron: Legacy‘s Quorra, (Olivia Wilde) is very similar, asking Sam what the sun looks like, and feels like. There’s a whole other film there, Quorra experiencing the real world and questions regards how real she herself, what agency she has and how much is programming. I wonder if the way Joi was written, and her arc, was maybe inspired by Quorra’s character in Tron: Legacy and how that films finale suggested what might have followed in a further sequel that didn’t happen.

So anyway, I was watching Tron: Legacy again for the first time in several years and it really was clear how hamstrung the film was; its not as good as I’d remembered. Some things do work very well indeed and the Daft Punk music score is absolutely marvelous – its great to hear a film with the music so loud and front and center, so to speak- but its hard to refute the suggestion that its a broken film. Its curious how so many effects films championing the then-latest technology tend to age badly. The film did prove very popular of course, and likely merited a sequel to continue its storyline but Disney decided otherwise, unfortunately. I do think a sequel was merited and most of Tron: Legacy‘s problems are simply the fact that its central arc goes nowhere, its all teasing a story that never ends. Indeed this time around I had the feeling that the film ends just when things get really interesting. Frustrating, especially when the eventual follow-up, Tron: Ares apparently dumps everything and starts afresh.

Imagine a film with the now-older Kevin Flynn back in the real world having a mental health crisis, wondering if he’s really ‘real’ or just a copy. The laser, after all, scans and breaks down the ‘real’ character and creates a duplicate in the digital world, and then later this is reversed, but its still just the laser reconstituting that character in the real world like a copy. Its the interesting conundrum of Star Trek’s transporter which has always troubled me: Kirk, Spock and co. are dematerialised then beamed down and  ‘reconstituted’ at their destination, but is it really them or a copy? It feels like them, has the memories and personalities of them, but is it really them; if the copy is that good, it may not really matter, but…?

Sorry. I overthink things. Star Trek is just a TV show… and Tron: Legacy is absolutely just a movie, and not a great one, at that.

 

Damned pesky Martians again

On By ghostof82In Blu-ray, Movies2 Comments

ImageMars Attacks! (1996), 106 mins Dir. Tim Burton, Blu-Ray

The attraction of some films can change over time; rewatching Tim Burton’s madcap comedy Mars Attacks! (which STILL, darn it, isn’t as funny as it really should have been), what struck me most this time around was the cast- its just incredible. In the film’s title credits the names of the cast stretch across the  screen like they are on  the cover of an Astounding Stories pulp magazine, and its like a whos-who of who was hip in Hollywood in the early 1990s.Jack Nicholson, Pierce Brosnan, Glenn Close, Natalie Portman, Annette Benning, Danny DeVito, Martin Short, Michael J Fox, Rod Steiger, Paul Winfield, Jack Black, Lukas Haas, Pam Grier… there’s no way the film could live up to the expectations/weight of a cast like that.

What struck me hardest when watching the film this time, though, was seeing Jack Nicholson in it. There was a time when we took Jack for granted- indeed, a time when watching him chew up the scenery in successive films irritated, a bit like how Al Pacino’s hysterical manic acting irritated in so many movies, it was, with both actors, as if they were fast becoming parodies of themselves. But seeing Jack playing the President in Mars Attacks!, it actually dawned me- wasn’t he great, weren’t we spoiled? I know he’s still around, but I’m pretty certain he’s long retired, now. But back when this film was released, in 1996, he was still a fantastic presence onscreen. Its just a bit odd, seeing him again and realising what we’re missing now. Some of the great actors we grew up with, and grew old with, whether they’ve passed on or are just chilling out in the Californian sun… some of them can never be replaced; this ‘new’ generation are a poor shadow of the greats.

As for the film itself, its always good fun, rewarding the occasional rewatch. Curiously the increasingly dodgy visual effects (CGI really doesn’t age well) just makes the film a little funnier, in an accidental sort of way. Adds a curious charm to it all. The film centers the majority of its humour on the Martian critters, but I always think it needs to have been more anarchic, pushing the edge more: I watch the film these last few times adding in bits of dialogue myself, moments arising that are just begging for better punchlines. Maybe the film was a victim of its budget. It cost $70 million to make, equivalent to $140 million today, so not too shabby at all and no doubt had the execs concerned, spending that amount of money on a sci-fi comedy flick. Especially with Tom Jones singing in it… (but its one of my favourite gags when three Martians replace Tom’s backing singers). ACK! ACK! ACK!

Widely perceived as something of a disappointment when it originally came out (box office wasn’t great), this is one of those films which curiously reward over the years; its odd, sometimes, the films that I choose to dig out and rewatch, compared to, say, other, more highly admired films that are reckoned to be ‘classics’.

 

Noir Christmas

On By ghostof82In Blu-ray, Film noir, Movies2 Comments

ImageParis Pick-Up / Le monte-charge (1962), Dir. Marcel Bluwal, 90 mins, Blu-Ray (Radiance, World Noir Vol.4)

On Christmas Eve, ex-convict Robert Herbin (Robert Hossein) returns to his family apartment in the outskirts of Paris, rooms untouched since his mother’s death a few years prior. Morose, Robert decides to shake his mood with a wander amidst the busy streets of shoppers. Taking a restaurant meal alone, he notices a beautiful Italian married woman, Marthe Drévet (Lea Massari), at a nearby table with her infant daughter. They strike a rapport and Marthe allows him to accompany her and her daughter home to her apartment in a secluded industrial area, on the second floor above a family warehouse. Putting her daughter to bed, Marthe goes out for a drink with Robert, but when they return they discover her husband, dead….

Another French noir based on a story by Frederic Dard (The Wicked Go to Hell, Nude in a White Car),  Paris Pick-Up is a finely crafted noir (it looks fabulous; stark black and white cinematography, shot largely on location in deserted, decaying backstreets and alleyways) that  is basically a murder mystery that keeps the audience guessing with several twists and turns .Unfortunately when the film finally plays its hand revealing what is really going on, the implausibility of it undermines all that has gone before, which is a genuine shame, as both Robert Hossein and Lea Massari are excellent. 

I’m beginning to wonder if this is symptomatic of writer Frederic Dard, as this proved to be a similar failing of Nude in A White Car – when the viewer really considers what they are expected to accept, it proves a ridiculous stretch of credibility. I made allowances with that film because of the presumed limitations of its pulp origin, but it arises here in similar fashion. Its rather like watching a murder mystery offering several suspects, but when the final resolution comes, the culprit is revealed to be someone new to the plot never mentioned prior, something of a cheat. The twist in this case- a duplicate, doppelganger apartment – feels similarly a cheat, when one considers what Marthe was supposed to have arranged, over months of time, without her abusive husband twigging to it. Shame.

So the chief pluses for this film lies in its atmosphere, and its moody, evocative setting. Its really quite marvelous, and the performances as I have noted are very good- as the twists arise, the film becomes increasingly disorientating, making me at times wonder if I’d stumbled into a Twilight Zone episode. Like the best of noir, whose plots often feel like webs of ill fate, there’s a feeling of encroaching doom for Robert. The revelation, when it comes, may be unfortunately lacking, but even then, right up to the end, there is a possibility of an utterly dark nihilistic ending  with our protagonist thoroughly undone by his insatiable curiosity and wrongfully arrested (if only the film had ended there!). But again, there’s yet one more twist…

Corrupt Cop Weekend

On By ghostof82In Amazon Prime/VOD, Movies, Netflix4 Comments

Last weekend we watched two films which featured that old staple of many a thriller (certainly noir); corrupt cops. So we’ll start with-

ImageThe Rip (2026), Dir. Joe Carnahan, 113 mins, Netflix Original

Ben Affleck and Matt Damon both star in and produce this Netflix thriller directed by Joe Carnahan, a director I have rooted for for years, ever since I enjoyed Narc (2002), but other than The Grey (2011) have been apologising for him ever since, his filmography a parade of misfires and questionable choices (The A-Team movie?), fast descending into straight-to-video quality pictures. Mind, he’s hardly alone in that respect, its rather sad the number of directors who seem to arrive with a great first film but then slip into gradual ignominy or television work (Neil Marshall, anyone?).

So anyway, The Rip– a Netflix Original, and therein a reflection of the times; at a purported $100 million budget, this is hardly lazy straight-to-video fare,  but its also an unlikely project to thrive in cinemas today, so here we are, a Saturday night on Netflix. The story involves a squad of Miami Drugs officers led by Lt Dane Dumars (Matt Damon) and Sgt JD Byrne (Ben Affleck) who follow some intel to raid a suspected drugs/money stash and then find themselves under siege in a house with $20 million dollars unable to trust the local police or even each other, as their original captain was killed just weeks before, betrayed by someone in the police force, who may be amongst them.  After an awkward, rather confusingly-staged opening in which that captain is killed and the team then being interrogated by Internal Affairs amidst lots of shouting and testosterone,  the film eventually settles down into the raid and then the claustrophobic, paranoid main set up that ensues. It rather has the feel of vintage John Carpenter, rather like some kind of Assault on Precinct 13 mash-up with The Thing, and its at this point really interesting, promising so much,  but then for its last third it degenerates into a long, increasingly silly action sequence in which the films proves dumber than it perhaps thinks it is.

Damon and Affleck are both very good (I’d rather forgotten how well they both work together) and its a shame the film is not as sophisticated as it ought to be- maybe it should simply have stayed the tense siege thriller I thought it was gearing up to be.  Certainly the last twenty minutes or so are a major let-down, although I suppose its what the Netflix execs wanted- ditching the plot for big, loud, messy popcorn nonsense. The film ends with a tease for further adventures for Damon and Affleck’s characters. I suppose if Netflix get satisfactory viewer figures, that would prove inevitable.

Not sure it rescues Carnahan’s reputation though.

ImageShe Rides Shotgun (2025), Dir. Nick Rowland, 120 mins, Amazon Prime

Well, this was much more like it; an absolutely stonking crime thriller with a brilliant lead performance from child actress  Ana Sophia Heger that is guaranteed to melt hearts and maybe horrify too, a performance that demands that this film be seen (but its stuck on Amazon Prime, not even available on disc, far as I can tell, so go figure- this film deserves much better distribution. What’s going on these days?).

While Heger dominates the film from start to haunting finish (that last shot as the credits roll- wow), Taron Egerton proves no slouch as Nate, a recent prison parolee with a price not just on his head but his whole family, having made some dangerous enemies in prison who have a score to settle. His ex-wife is murdered but Taron manages to pick up his estranged daughter Polly (Heger) from school before she can be targeted. They go on the run from relentless gang members and corrupt cops, racing across the American landscape as Nate, realising the odds are stacked against them, desperately tries to instill in Polly some kind of transformation from timid child to a strong survivor…  but will it all just leave her traumatised and utterly broken?

Like The Rip, into its last third  She Rides Shotgun seems to take some strange detour into formulaic action film, not exactly undermining what came before,  but the journey there is far superior and is always chiefly carried by its performances. There’s a great turn by John Carroll Lynch as an absolutely chilling bad guy; with huge physical presence and sense of menace. He’s a familiar face from much TV work like the still-missed Carnivale, and several other shows, stuff like American Horror Story, but also films like Zodiac (2007) and Gran Torino (2008). When he turned up in the film I had that rather distracting “where have I seen his face before…?” mystery that bugged me awhile, because he does seem rather physically transformed here.

They even manage to chuck in an Underworld track into the soundtrack, from their most recent album. Can’t go wrong with some Underworld.

King for a day (well, three)

On By ghostof82In Apple TV, Horror1 Comment

ImageLisey’s Story (TV Miniseries, 2021), Eight episodes, Apple TV

Sometimes Stephen King can be his own worst enemy. The kernel of this story is really intriguing;  a successful writer, Scott Landon (Clive Owen), whose work has inspired fanatical devotion from his fanbase, has dark secrets from his childhood that continue to haunt him, possibly suggesting an insight into King’s own life and career.  But keeping it simple is seldom King’s style; the consensus being there’s no Stephen King book a good editor couldn’t fix . So this decidedly ISN’T the story of a writer enjoying success and wealth yet troubled by fanatical fans. Its instead the story of a dead writer’s widow Lisa (“Lisey”) (Julianne Moore),  and how she copes  when she is hounded by a particularly deranged, and violent, fan who is seeking Scott’s remaining unpublished manuscripts. Managing her grief by going through Scott’s papers and reminiscing on how they met and key events during their marriage, Lisey dwells upon all sorts of magical mysticism derived partly from the Scott’s abusive childhood at the hands of a psychotic father, a murdered brother, and Boo’ya Moon, a  dreamlike dimension where one can magically transport to and heal in, but with the danger of being trapped there forever in between life and death, or, er, something. 

Oh, and this isn’t a two-hour movie. Its told over eight episodes, so all that padding ( “diarrhea of the word processor, “as its been described over the years) so common in King’s writing is pretty much preserved here, especially as King himself wrote the TV adaptation. I haven’t read the book, although Claire has, and she said the series was very faithful to it so I suspect its flaws are all too preserved here.  We binged the series, pretty much, watching it over three days. I wish I could suggest it was worth the time and effort, but King never was a master at sticking the landing, so to speak, with endings that frequently frustrate.  There’s an emotional weight here that is sadly lacking, with a conclusion that doesn’t  hit the height its aiming for… you can see its reaching, but it lands with something of a thud, no matter how hard Owen and Moore try. 

The leads are indeed very good. Owen and Moore are both solid and have genuine chemistry, and the supporting cast is pretty substantial- Joan Allen and Jennifer Jason Leigh playing Lisey’s dysfunctional sisters,  Dane Dehaan playing Scotts grossly deranged psycho superfan and Michael Pitt playing Scott’s psycho dad in flashbacks fleshing out Scott’s childhood and his discovery of magical limbo Boo’ya Moon… I mean,, you surely get the gist. There’s a lot of story and lots of weird madness and lots of stretches of credibility in a story that might have been from another writer  just a tense drama of an author and his wife troubled by fanatical fans.  But maybe that’s me criticising it for not being what its not.

Is it worth the investment in time regards watching it? For Stephen King’s fans, certainly. For folk less impassioned by his writing, because that’s really where the issue lies with this one, maybe not. There’s a feeling of  everything including the kitchen sink being thrown into this and it could have been more with less, I think.

Melancholy dreams

On By ghostof82In 4K UHD, Movies, Netflix4 Comments

ImageTrain Dreams (2025), DIr. Clint Bentley, 102 mins, Netflix

Robert Grainier, an orphan having lost his parents at such a young age he cannot remember them, lives a quiet life of labour during America’s  early 20th century  expansion, the country’s  landscape changing with intensive logging and the building of railways across the frontier.  As so often happens, by chance Robert finds the love of his life, Gladys, and the couple build a cabin in woods by a stream, and have a child. Robert is away for long periods with his work,  and tragedy strikes leaving him questioning his life, his possible guilt and what everything means. 

This was such a beautiful, poetic film I couldn’t help but fall in love with it. Its like a Terrance Malick film back in the days when he used to stick to script and narrative: clearly Malick is a huge influence on this film. Its a film of few words- more a film of images, most of the films narrative, such as it is,  informed by a gentle voiceover (from Will Patton) and Joel Edgerton’s eyes, alternatively full of wonder, joy, pain. Edgerton is remarkable in a subtle performance of some depth, and is ably assisted by Felicity Jones as his wife, Gladys. A meditation on life, love and loss, its the human condition writ large with a broad cinematic canvas, beautiful to look at, lovely to listen to.  The quiet lives of men who live and die with nothing to mark their passing. The pacing may irritate some, likewise the plot in which, essentially little happens and even that slowly, but that’s how life often is; I would have enjoyed an additional hour of the Old World gradually transforming into the New World.

I do think that the older one is, the more appeal this film may have- the way that this film portrays Robert’s feelings of disattachment and loneliness as the 20th Century leaves him behind, likely intentionally mirrors how many feel today, regards how the world is changing around us so quickly, the familiar becoming strange, and how fleeting life is. By the end of the film, and Robert an old man, he looks and feels anachronistic; on a rare trip to the city he passes a shopfront where a television airs footage of a spacewalk and an mage of the planet from orbit that offers a perspective he never considered; his sense of wonder at it symptomatic of what we ourselves have lost.

Here we are in January and I’ve probably watched the best film that I’ll see this year. Its funny how often that’s happened, over the years. Probably something to do with Awards season and the best films being held back for consideration.

Remembering (or not) Reminiscence

On By ghostof82In Movies, 4K UHD, Film noir1 Comment

ImageReminiscence (2021), Dir. Lisa Joy, 116 mins, 4K UHD

Funny thing, watching Lisa Joy’s misfire Reminiscence last night, a neo-noir film chiefly about memory, is that I could remember so little of it from the first time I watched it back in November 2021. I checked my blog to ascertain the date, otherwise I wouldn’t have had a clue exactly when I’d watched it last; I knew it was a few years ago now. Maybe I watch too many movies, so many its hard to recall so many of them; sometimes I read posts here from years back and I cannot remember the films at all, the titles drawing a blank. Or maybe its my advancing years, the old grey matter failing me? Anyway, like Deadpool 2 a few weeks back (and maybe I’ll get around to that post about watching the Deadpool trilogy  over Christmas, eventually) I found myself rewatching a film and feeling like I was watching it for the first time, I recalled so little of its details – hell, while sections of the plot seemed wholly new to me I remembered fragments, some of the cast, mostly, but even some of the action scenes seemed new to me. Clearly this film wasn’t as memorable as it was intended to be.

So there’s an irony in me writing about how my memory failed me when watching a film about memory, but what I wanted to discuss was casting, because its this that really failed this film. I can understand the logic of hiring big-name actors for big-budget movies, the old adage that stars sell movies, and to an extent its correct, it works, but Reminiscence was never THAT big a film ($54 million, so no cheapie, but certainly not as reckless as so many now) and it was always a niche film in its subject; sometimes star names can set expectations in audiences that undermine the films.  It happened back in 1982 with Harrison Ford in Blade Runner; everyone expected exciting sci-fi thrills with the guy who played Han Solo and Indiana Jones- its easy to forget how that impacted the film when it turned out a different beast entirely.

Hugh Jackman plays Nick Bannister, a Navy vet from some undetailed conflict abroad (over resources, presumably) who’s back home in civilian clothes in a society sinking as surely as the flooded city he’s living in, a guy whos let himself go somewhat, disillusioned and stuck in a dead-end job. Its a part played better by Ralph Fiennes in 1995’s similarly-themed Strange Days. With all respect to Jackman, he has the acting chops but he’s just miscast here- he’s muscled like an Adonis.  What I’m really thinking regards the character Nick Bannister is someone like James Woods in Videodrome– that’s the kind of casting this film needed. While mentioning Strange Days though, Juliette Lewis seems a much better fit for Reminiscence‘s femme fatale, Mae, played in the film by statuesque Rebecca Ferguson. Ferguson is just too beautiful, too perfect, to really carry the role of being a streetwise, selfish survivor on rotten streets, and a drug addict in the bargain. Its almost laughable how she’s miscast; she’s okay but there’s too much emphasis on, say, her nightclub scenes and that whole 1940s Rita Hayworth sense of sultry feminine perfection. There’s a balancing act there with her character (like Jennifer Connelly’s singer/romantic interest in Dark City) which the film fails to really help Ferguson with; she has to be attractive enough to break Bannister out of his funk, but gritty enough to convince as the streetwise player she really is.

Of course, when Reminiscence was made, both James Woods and Juliette Lewis were too old to play the parts, but what I’m suggesting is casting towards that type, analogues, so to speak, of those actors. Casting in Hollywood films now is so… aspirational, too much towards some ideal. The reason why 1970s American Cinema rings so true is the casting in those films, and the pot of acting talent available then. Every actor now seems perfectly toned from the gym, which is fine if you’re casting a superhero movie but hardly good if you’re casting a character gone to seed.

As for the film itself, second time around, with some distance from original expectations and marketing hype, now that its (presumably) aired on TV occasionally or available on streaming or relegated to bargain-bin special offers on disc, well, it makes one wonder what happens to movies that just ‘exist’ and no longer weighed down by having to be memorable or important. It’s neo-noir sensibilities, its sense of place, is perfectly fine; it looks fantastic, but the plot structure is questionable, and it absolutely exceeds its reach regards the emotional highs it tries for. I suppose in an ideal world, with better casting and a better script, it could have, should have, been a futuristic Chinatown, but it falls far short of that. For all that, its not really as bad as its reputation possibly suggests. Its just flawed and misguided; would have fared better had it been made for Apple, maybe. Maybe then it could have taken some chances with casting etc. Maybe its simply that Hollywood studio films just can’t do leftfield stuff anymore, there’s too many cooks, too many boxes to tick, but Blade Runner might whisper in my ear that its always been like that.

The 2026 Reading List

On By ghostof82In Books, Movies, Music1 Comment

ImageHere’s the books I’m either reading or should be reading as I start 2026. There’s a curious musical thread in there – a biography of composer John Williams, a book about the working partnership of composer Bernard Herrmann and Alfred Hitchcock, John McKie’s book about Prince and the making of  Sign o’ the Times, and Mark Kermode’s Surround Sound: The Stories of Movie Music. 

The last two were Christmas presents, so I’m three-quarters through the McKie book and have dipped into the Kermode book. McKie’s book is one of the best books about Prince that I have read; having read several books about Prince its clear that there’s no way we’ll ever really understand Prince ; he was such a musical genius and (deliberately) a mystery that as far as ‘knowing’ him… well I doubt we ever will. At times Prince seems hardly human, almost alien, which sounds like hyperbole but its clear that he was so unique- he had such a talent and focus (obsession?) on music, and such wealth and fame that its difficult to relate to him, his life experience was so different to ours (something which, to be honest, I suspect harmed the quality of his music in later years).  McKie’s approach (chapters using the titles of the Sign o’ the Times songs, examining the story behind each and using that to branch out to other examination of Prince’s life and work before and after the album) took a little getting used to but I think it works very well indeed.

Sadly, I’m a wee bit cautious regards Mark Kermode’s book; having had a browse (well, its chapter on Vangelis’ Blade Runner score was irresistible, albeit frustratingly light), I was perturbed to see no entry at all in the book’s index for James Horner, for instance- a glaring oversight for a book supposedly about movie music. Or maybe that’s less an issue and just betraying my own leanings. From what I’ve seen Kermode’s book seems to lean more towards current trends in film music and the new wave of composers working today than I expected, but we’ll see.

I expect my ‘classic film music’ itch will be better served by the Herrmann/Hitchcock and John Williams books (can’t wait to read about Williams working on his 1970s scores). I can only hope that we might see a similarly detailed biography of Vangelis one day.

The end of the world x2

On By ghostof82In Horror, Movies, Netflix1 Comment

IO (2019), Dir. Johnathan Helpert, 96 mins, Netflix Original

The Great Flood (2025), Dir. Byung-woo Kim, 109 mins, Netflix Original

Last night I watched, by accident really, two Apocalyptic films; both turned out to be pretty poor. The best of intentions, certainly- both seemed to be ambitious, rather than just exploitation nonsense, but neither really worked. The first one I watched, a Netflix original from several years back, IO, got bogged down in existential, environmental anxiety to the detriment of actually moving its plot forward (it was rather like watching paint dry) while the other, a recently-released Korean flick for Netflix, The Great Flood, was actually just the opposite, racing forwards so frantically that it just got sillier and dafter as it sped to its non-ending conclusion. Indeed, that seemed a common issue for both films- bad endings. Not in the sense that either ending was actually bad for  either film’s characters, they were fairly optimistic endings, as far as their narratives went, but just bad in the dramatic sense.  Both films had endings that left one with that empty, “that’s ninety minutes/two hours of my life  I’m not getting back” kind of feeling.; no number of beers can make that feel good.

Both films took liberties with viewer intelligence and any relationship with actual science; in this respect, I suppose they were both more Twilight Zone-like fables, rather than actual realistic dramas.  They were possibly dafter than your usual Hollywood  blockbuster disaster flick. Its hard to watch something when you’re stuck thinking “no fucking way” regards the central premise.

ImageIn IO, a global ecological disaster, pre-film, has rendered the Earth uninhabitable, poison air killing all living things on land and in the sea, other than in isolated pockets (presumably because they are high up, above the cloud level). Prior to the final loss of all human life, one hundred ships fled Earth to gather at a space station orbiting Io, moon of Jupiter. So in the near future (no year is set, but it all looks pretty much present day) one hundred spaceships capable of travelling to the Jovian system, each containing, what, fifty, sixty people (that isn’t ever clear either) and a space station somehow built and orbiting Io, capable of housing and sustaining all those people for an indefinite period, and not only that, but construction facilities there sufficient to build an interstellar spaceship big enough to embark on a ten-year (don’t get me started on that) voyage to a New World at Proxima Centauri, 4.3 light years away. I can imagine Stanley Kubrick or Arthur C Clarke collapsing in a life-threatening fit of the giggles at that lot.

We can’t even get a man (or woman) on the moon, nor Mars, even for a temporary visit, never mind all the way to Jupiter to establish a colony of survivors there. Its bullshit, all for the expediency of some positive alternative to living on the Earth, because the central drama of IO is that Sam (Margaret Qualley), the beautiful young daughter of a dead ecology scientist has endeavoured to ‘fix’ the Earth’s nature problem where tens of  thousands of scientists failed, and offer some alternative, a chance for everyone to return to Earth.. Turns out, IO is some teen fantasy disaster flick with the emphasis on boring and being pretentious. I’m too old for this shit.

ImageThe Great Flood, meanwhile, starts with a more interesting premise, a sudden, global flood that we soon learn has been caused by an asteroid impact in Antarctica that has melted all the ice and presumably caused a terrible tsunami that threatens all humanity.  An Na (Kim Da-mi) lives in on the third floor of an apartment building as the city floods, her floor already taking on water as the film opens,  and has to get herself and her infant son Ja In (Kwon Eun-sung) up through the various floors to safety. Just how high can the flood waters rise?  Initially its like an Irwin Allen flick, An Na having to circumvent obstacles along the way, but things soon escalate when a hired-gun Hee-jo (Park Hae-soo) from An Na’s employer turns up to assist her with the imperative that she and her child must get to the roof where a company helicopter will be waiting to take them to safety. There are references to An Na’s husband, who died in a car accident when it somehow crashed into a river or lake- more allusions to water and drowning, and some science experiment in AI at An Na’s workplace.

What initially seems to be an increasing series of coincidences becomes its own tsunami of revelations that only get dafter- none of this actually real, its all a computer simulation training An Na to reach some satisfactory conclusion, so the film quickly derails viewer expectations (no bad thing in itself) when everything resets and we’re suddenly in Tom Cruise Edge of Tomorrow (2014) territory, with endless iterations of An Na trying, and failing, to rescue her son. Like the Tom Cruise character in Edge of Tomorrow, An Na  starts to remember and learn from her previous attempts and failures (she dies a lot) to find a way of succeeding.

What derails the movie, other than general viewer confusion seeing a Irwin Allen-type disaster flick turn into a Matrix/ Edge of Tomorrow mash-up, is the child,  Ja In. I’m not blaming the young actor, he was likely only following directions, but he’s unbearable; a stupid, irritating, endlessly whining, capricious child that cannot seem to follow any instructions and sulks and wails endlessly. Its hard to root for a film that has a central narrative intent on saving a child that you just wish would get shot in the head or thrown into the flood water immediately every time he appears onscreen. Children ruin some movies.  Never mind humanity, ditch the kid and save the film. And somehow this kid will be the salvation of the human race?

Well, maybe not- and therein lies the films strangely non-conclusive ending and another leap into IO-level scientific implausibility (oh boy, it was one of those nights): .it turns out humanity is extinct and the simulation is being run by a fleet of orbiting space stations above Earth, in order that, once An Na succeeds in certain emotional and goal targets, she and her child can be 3D printed endlessly as artificial humans who are, in the films conclusion, despatched down to Earth to repopulate the planet.

I think sometimes films can be just too overloaded with ideas, and this was one of them. Its always risking audiences switching off when they feel too disorientated with confusing twists and turns that stretch credibility to breaking point. I wonder how many Netflix viewers abandoned this one midway.  Ever the trooper, I stuck with this one to the bitter end, but as with IO, felt rather the fool after it was over. It was a disaster movie night, for sure.