PREMIUM RUSH, d. David Koepp, USA, 2012

I just saw Premium Rush – a movie about bike messengers in New York City who get caught up in some illegal dealings involving a crooked cop and a (legal) immigrant friend of theirs… Didn’t sound like it’d be up to much, and also started out feeling VERY much like Crank… But ended up going in quite a different direction, although being stylistically interesting in some sometimes slightly similar ways (good ways, I might add!). 

The film is really well cast, I thought. From the one true bad guy (Michael Shannon; who managed to be remarkably sympathetic – quite a feat given just what a ‘douchebag’ his character in fact is) to the central protagonist (amazingly, a young white guy! ) and his fellow messengers and bikers – not to mention the cycle cop and the kids on school buses – there were no real cracks in the acting. The cycling politics were interesting (especially when our hero has the bad guy shouting in his face that everyone in the city hates him – which is possibly true! – and when, in passing, we see the aftermath of what happens when messengers use the sidewalk instead of the road)… But interesting not just about cyclists’ place vis-à-vis cars and pedestrians, but also in terms of the motivation and risks to those who choose to cycle at breakneck speed around Manhattan rather than work in an office… and how significant those motives are to their involvement in the cyclist community. It’s not deep or anything, but it is thoughtful(!).

And while there is – of course: *yawn* – an element of ‘romance’ to the film, whereby the main female protagonist is introduced to us largely via our hero, Wilee (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), she is at least an excellent cyclist and an active participant in the narrative as well as the action: she (Vanessa, played by Dania Ramirez), like Gordon-Levitt, is also immensely engaging and likeable, which certainly helps. The visual (re)presentation of the characters is also not too bad when it comes to gender: Vanessa wears a sleeveless top, sure – but also, loose shorts like Wilee, and she’s not overly objectified, ‘even’ in scenes where she easily could be (such as the flashback sequences in a bar). Similarly, the film avoids sexualizing/objectifying its other key character, Vanessa’s roommate Nima (Jamie Chung), who walks around in flats and plain work clothes. (Nima is, though, very much a female character in terms of her role, and the particular predicament she’s in that sets off the film’s core narrative.) And even if the gendered stuff seems okay, nothing is simple: it’s fellow bike messenger Manny (Wolé Parks) who wears a vest and tight lycra shorts – and Manny is, you guessed it, a Black guy. He’s also referred to (by Wilee) as being ‘roided up’, and is framed as a sexual predator, albeit not an aggressive one. In contrast to them all, Wilee predictably remains un-raced and un-gendered in that he’s just who he is, dressed in loose shorts and a t-shirt, with his physique correspondingly treated just that bit differently from both Vanessa’s and Manny’s… So you know, it’s not as if there aren’t some issues around the film’s representations of both gender and race – but it could be one hell of a lot worse!

Actually, it might be. The way the Chinese are ultimately represented is... problematic at best. But at least interesting-problematic, rather than just crappy-problematic. (And it maybe gets away with it because sympathetic or not, Michael Shannon's bad guy really IS bad!)

Oh and the action in this movie is pretty great. I really enjoyed the cycling scenes – even the ‘race’ between Manny and Wilee, and even when Wilee uses his cycling skills to send the poor cycle cop flying!

A fun movie, some nice action, and an interesting take on cyclists and how and why they do what they do. Also, Wilee’s bad luck with sandwiches did elicit my sympathy – as did, of course, the play on Wil E. Coyote and the Road Runner inherent in his name (even if Gordon-Levitt is not quite Tommy Lee Jones!).

THE BOURNE LEGACY – d. Tony Gilroy, USA, 2012

I have very little bad to say about this film, but not that much especially positive either. To be fair, the latter in particular could be because I saw it too late at night, but who knows! 

In essence, I liked Jeremy Renner, I liked Rachel Weisz, and was very happy to see Zeljko Ivanek (whom I remember always as Ray Fisk in Damages) in the movie. I also liked how they had Pamela Landy (Joan Allen) back in the film (in a scarily convincing turn of events), and Oscar Isaac (of whom it was all too easy to believe his only sin was to have fallen in love!)…

What I did not enjoy, though, was the really rather boring and repetitive central heterosexual ‘romance’ around our Bourne-esque protagonist and his partner-in-escape; nor the glaringly conspicuous ‘united colours of…’ aspect of the movie’s having various ‘diverse’ ethnicities represented across the range of Treadstone/Outcome agents (and even a woman, shock horror): really, WTF is the point, anyway, when the film is in fact focused quite intently on a young white male with a number of similarities to Matt Damon? None of these ‘faults’ can be laid at the door of the actors – Renner included, who was excellent. However, the lack of thought and range of diversity of relationships (as much as ‘colour’) did detract from the whole thing, for me.

And don’t get me started on the Asian Terminator-like character…

The fight scenes were a bit crappy, too (not helped by the iddiot jock sat right in front of me who guffawed in that moron-like way only they can EVERY frickin' time someone got hit. Gah.): they were over-edited and as a result there were too many flailing limbs and insufficient evidence of actual fighting. Hardly a major cmplaint, but when the action is about the most exciting thing a film has to offer, it really should be better than it was in this one!

The echoes of Renner’s role in The Hurt Locker were also slightly problematic, and set up a slight dissonance, I think, which was a shame.

All that said, for what it was (and it was nothing special), the film was interesting and had plenty fun parts, and some great acting. It also acknowledged that the early parts in which wolves are apparently tracking human prey is not the norm (the suggestion being that perhaps the Bourne clones aren’t ‘human’), which I appreciated – having been pretty pissed off when the early scenes implied that’s what wolves do. (In fact it gave me flashbacks to sitting through The Edge (1997, d.  Lee Tamahori), in which a bear chased Anthony Hopkins and a Baldwin brother relentlessly, and made me wish it would just eat them already, to get over the ridiculousness of it all.) 

Really, I just wish it had mixed things up a bit: much as I love Weisz, I just would’ve been that much more interested in a film that had her in the crazy doctor role, and  Ivanek on the run with Renner. Now that would’ve been doing something new and interesting!

IN TIME, wr. and d. Andrew Niccol, USA, 2011

I only went to see this having been invited out by a couple of Korean friends; we had no plans what to watch, and since I don't speak Korean and they don't speak English, we didn't have much of a discussion! Only when I into the theatre did I realise the film stars Justin Timberlake. Oh my, I thought. Does he act?


Well, no. He doesn't. But the fact that his and the lead actress's (Amanda Seyfried) acting is so wooden it often gives the feel of a school play is not necessarily damning of the whole film. It's certainly an interesting film, and fantabulous acting is not always, to my addled mind, essential to enjoyment. (Remember, I think Van Damme is ace.)


Plus there's always Cillian Murphy. He acts just fine, and also wears cool Matrix-like clothes which help make up for Timberlake and Seyfried's shortcomings, although his boots do look rather too big for him - to the extent of being distracting at times.


The film seems as if it's based on a short story by Ray Bradbury or Philip K. Dick (which is a compliment), and is clearly inspired by the likes of Logan's Run (d. Michael Anderson, USA, 1976). I can't find any sources saying it is, though. But the idea of making time into the global currency, and of manipulating the system so that most people remain poor while a few get rich (having up to a million years of life ahead of them in this currency), is a fascinating and inventive one - and one that works nicely as a dramatic device, too: you'll know this if you've seen the film and watched as Will Salas (Timberlake) runs towards his mother as she's - quite literally - running out of time. The repetition of this moment later in the film is a nice device, too - and one element that indicates that even if In Time isn't brilliantly scripted or acted, it does have its virtues. The way in which advances in genetic engineering are thrown into the mix is also intriguing, and enables the film to enter into current pop culture as well as more philosophical debates about the ethics of genetics and their relationship to wealth and power. That alone makes the film worth a watch.


What IS a bit rough, though, is the painfully overt way in which the film operates as a parable about the current 'global' banking crisis. It's just too heavy-handed, really. A shame, as it's not such a bad parable to have, now is it? But it has nothing of the subtlety (ha ha) of the anti-Communist sci-fi flicks of the Cold War era, so it wears a bit thin rather quickly for me. 


The 'love conquers (or at least battles) all' is a bit naff, too, really - although I suspect I'd have found it less so had the two lead characters been defined as older than they are by the plot; that would have added a more convincing and compelling twist. That said, the film's message that living life to the full - and having the opportunities to do just that - is more important than a long life as such, is not a bad one; nor is the notion that love - of life, of other people - can motivate people to challenge 'the system' (even if they're one of the wealthy ones). It might be naff, but that doesn't make it wrong!


[Mild spoilers in this paragraph]
The under-developed comments about Will's father, the way in which Cillian Murphy's "Timekeeper" character dies, and the failure to look much beyond heterosexual romantic relationships as a way/motive to 'challenge the system' are some of the film's failings... and there are many more. But despite its wooden stars and pop philosophy, I quite enjoyed it, and think its ideas work well on the big screen. I'm not convinced it's better than TimeCop, mind you.

The Lovely Bones, d. Peter Jackson, US/UK/NZ 2009.

I never read the novel, so can fortunately spare you any "the book's better" comments on this one. That said, I can imagine that a written version of this story's notion of heaven and 'limbo' might be less problematic (for me, at least!) than the filmic version: one thing I really did not enjoy about the film was its depiction of a sort of happy afterlife/happy ever after for the women murdered by a serial killer. It reminded me of the one Catholic funeral I attended: too much talk of "everybody dies" and not enough acknowledgement and acceptance of what has actually happened when a life - a child's life, or whatever - is taken through the deliberate actions of another. To me, this is not a necessary element of a positive message about moving on from such a death (rather than dwelling on 'revenge'). Similarly, I dislike the narrative trick of killing off the bad guy without anyone living being able to face him about his behaviour: it seems trite to punish somone in a way that is so clearly a narratve device, and bears absolutely no relation to the harsh reality of making your protagonist the victim of a serial killer....

Rather more positive things to say about this film are that its star, Saorise Ronan (Suzy Salmon) is brilliantly cast, and Susan Sarandon - as Suzy's grandmother, Lynn - is pretty cool, too. Also, it's fab to hear the Cocteau Twins in a contemporary film, even if they are used in the weird limbo sequences that I am not so sure about!

The film makes an interesting contrast, I think, to the very many and more familiar TV shows about serial killers, where the emphasis - and usually the viewer 'identification' - lies with the police, or individual detective/s, investigating the murder or multiple crimes. In this sense, it makes a change, and does at least allow for some thought about the wider impact of a murder - other than as a mystery to be solved. In this respect, it's also quite pleasing to have the murderer truly unmasked by another young woman - Suzy's sister, Linsey (Rose McIver). This makes up somewhat (though not much, for me!) for the film's bizarre portrayal of Harvey (stanley Tucci)'s numerous female victims as all acceptance and happy lightness: Linsey is persistent and defiant, yet manages to avoid the violence resorted to by her desperatebut ineffectual father (Mark Wahlberg).

I'm not sure what I think about "the kiss", and the importance it's imbued with by the film: the notion that Suzy's using Ruth (Carolyn Dando)'s body as a conduit through which to have her first (and only) kiss - from Ray Singh (Reece Ritchie), whom she was meant to meet at the mall shortly after her untimely death - is a more pleasing end than her body being discovered before it end sup in landfill is one that does not really sit right with me. This is not to deny the significance and beauty of a first kiss (for those lucky enough to have it with someone like Ray); it just again seems to be too much in the land of fantasy - along with the fluffy clouds and trees of the film's limbo-land - to indicate a real, genuine acceptance of the horror done to and experienced by Suzy and the oher murdered women.

Remaking FOOTLOOSE? WTF?!

What is the world coming to?

I mean, who feels the need to remake anything with Kevin Bacon in it? Why not just watch and re-watch the original, Bacon-tastic version, over and over and over again?

The only people I can think might want Kevin Bacon movies remade are people who lost all their money to that con man and don't want to be reminded of it. But otherwise, I repeat, WTF? Just WHY?????????????????

The mind boggles.

Something Borrowed, d. Luke Greenfield, USA, 2011.

This, I have to admit, is another film I watched on a flight. It was - I thought - the best of a bad bunch on offer, since I'm no huge fan of childrens' animated films or much else that was available! I secretly (well, apparently not that secretly) quite like romantic dramas of this ilk (think Bed of Roses, My Best Friend's Wedding and that dreadful one with Derek from Grey's Anatomy - erm, I will have to resort to looking it up...), so I though it might be all right.

Call me shallow, but the biggest problem I had with the entire film was one that's not all that unusual, I find, for US films based around a premise that requires the viewer to go along with their assumptions and assertions about what constitutes attractive, and what does not. In this particular film, we're expected to accept that the protagonist - played by Ginnifer Goodwin - is plain/ordinary-looking, while Kate Hudson is held up in contrast as gorgeous, and - most problematic for me - the man of their affections, Dex (played by one Colin Egglesfield), is repeatedly told how handsome he is: in essence, there's a lot of the whole 'Women who look me don't attract men who look like you' dialogue... the problem being, Goodwin is attractive, and Egglesfiled is nothing special! (Don't get me wrong, he's an attarctive guy and all. But seriously, he's NOT devestatingly gorgeous or owt... http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1148573/ )

This doesn't make the film bad, in itself, but it doesn't help. 

In general, it's just not a film that does or says anything very exciting, at all. Its visually plain, narratively uninspiring, and relies too heavily on bizarre romantic drama/comedy conventions to have any worthwhile comment to make about relationships. The one interesting aspect of it, for me anyway, was its use of flashback - actually not that common in the genre; more the stuff of fabulous B-action movies starring Jean-Claude! - to show Goodwin's character, Rachel's realization of how her conformist, unchallenging behaviour has put her, Dex and Darcy in the situation they face in the film, and how given that she can't change her past actions, she needs to change the way she acts now. Of course, Dex is equally incapable of radical change - equally beholden to convention (with the mildly perceptive addition of observations about the role of his Father and/as social convention in all this) - and this either adds some complexity to the plot or drags the film out longer, depending on your take on it as it passes the 90-minute mark!


What the film fails to do - as most do, to be fair - is to move beyond painting the protagonist and her friend as horribly unsuited to each other as friends, which is a shame and makes no sense, given the premise of the film, of course (that Darcy and Rachel are very close, very best friends). It also fails to make the "happy ending" for the protagonist genuinely morally difficult: the narrative makes her hard decision easy, retrospectively. Annoying stuff!


Worth it for romantic drama fans, though. And for anyone who thinks Hudson and Egglesfield are gorgeous, while Goodwin is plain, perhaps?

Red Riding Hood, d. Catherine Hardwicke, UK, 2011.

I watched this nearly two months ago on an Emirates flight, so my review's hardly fresh! But I did think it was worth listing, as it was much more entertaining and interesting than I'd anticipated, and of course I always love re-tellings of fairy tales (as you'll know if you ever had the misfortune to be taught narrative theory by me, lol).

Frankly, the first part of the film - at least the first quarter, if not a little more - is a bit plodding, and not very inspiring. It's a bit TV movie, and not in a good way. However, once it becomes evident that it will in fact be more than a regular re-telling of the tale with an all-too-filmic romantic emphasis - prefaced by the appearance of the flamboyant Gary Oldman character, perhaps unsurprisingly - things definitely start to pick up. From then on, the film has some genunely interesting twists and turns, and its commentary on Europe's rich history of demonising so-called witches, and the wider but complex dangers of making assumptions about people based on appearance, are worth watching. I also really enjoyed the way in which it used language as a tool - the notion that werewolves can communicate with certain humans was a nice addition to the tale, and works well to further the plot if you're paying attention (which I'm not sure I was!).

In particular, the film's approach to familial, sexual and friendship relations is refreshing and often midly surprising. This helps make the plot twists less expected, and works towards what I, at least, found quite a pleasing ending.

Just as importantly, perhaps, is that this film looks good, and I think it would be real fun to watch on a big screen, in a darkened room. It did lose something on the back of an airline seat in cattle class!