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One for Halloween that I’m surprised I’ve never got round to watching. The film has quite a cult following despite bombing at the box office, but then isn’t that always the way. Director Peter Jackson is no stranger, pre-Lord of the Rings, to cult fare; see Braindead and Bad Taste. But a film from 1996 with Michael J Fox? One can only presume it’s because the film skirts the line between dark comedy and outright horror. Occasionally one or the other, or both at the same time.

It’s an anarchic film, with a Beetlejuice vibe throughout. Danny Elfman providing the score helps. The after life is a kooky but also gross affair with the majority of the film’s humour derived from the dead and their interactions with the living. As is the horror.

This is a CG heavy film and it has the sheen to the effects that 90s films have, shiny and plastic looking. Carpets attacking people, or walls are suitably ridiculous looking and may have been better served with practical effects. But this was the early days of Weta and everyone’s gotta start somewhere. Ghosts are amusingly transparent and gross looking as though they all have head colds as ectoplasm runs from every orifice. But Rick Bakers work on John Astin’s The Judge looks great. His barely hanging on jaw highlights a better use of the practical element.

Michael J Fox as Frank suitably looks shabby with his battered Volvo, holy water shooting handgun, and overall conman self. Like a beleaguered McFly he takes the ghosts as matter of fact using them to his own ends. He’s portrayed as someone whose barely hanging on, until, suitably aided by Trini Alvarado’s widow Lucy, he’s given a chance at vengeance and closure. I did find though that whilst everyone else seemed to be in on the joke, Fox preferred to play it dead straight so come the ending, which felt tacked on, his supposed happiness felt rushed and at odds with everything else.

Elsewhere, Jake Busey dials it up to eleven, (should that be twelve?), as killer Johnny Bartlett and most memorably Jeffrey Combs essays another perfect creep as FBI agent Milton Dammers with his Hitler-esque haircut and fear of violations of his territorial bubble. Yet, were he not in the picture you wouldn’t notice as he seems rather pointless plot wise but is an enjoyably insane presence in a sea of insanity. Oh, and it was great to see R. Lee Emery seemingly bringing back his Full Metal Jacket Drill Sergeant for an amusing graveyard confrontation.

Along with the slapstick such as pans to heads and ghosts squished by tires, that dark humour is used to great effect, even in the background. For example, reading some of an article in a newspaper about killer Bartlett being excluded from school for “Masturbating into the English teacher’s lunchbox.” was a surprise.

The humour can be messy, at times childish and/ or gleefully violent, and the film can be overly chaotic, refusing to sit still, but it’s never boring and never not entertaining.

“Thank you. Have a nice day”

What’s to say about Chopping Mall when you realise it’s a Roger Corman production? Well you instantly become aware this is going to have a low budget, amateur hour acting and bargain basement effects. If that’s your bag, you’ve come to the right place.

The premise is suitably ridiculous; several people attending an after hours party at a shopping mall are hunted down by the mechanised ‘Kill Bot’ security after they malfunction due to a lightning strike. Logic goes out the window, or through several store fronts broken glass, and in comes nudity, hilarious dialogue and inept survivors. Shot in a real mall after closing you would think they’d be able to stretch the budget but I presume it was spent on the bots.

The machines themselves come across like demented Johnny 5’s from Short Circuit. Big and bulky with the bizarre ability to shoot lasers from their faces and ridiculous crab like appendages to slice and grab, alongside the ability to taze and stun. They have tank treads which made me think, just go upstairs, especially after a lift is taken out! There’s several scenes where the characters could easily escape leading to some over the top deaths. One characters flammable fate is quite amusing considering it’s blatantly, possibly, a man in a blond wig. Also, she could’ve just rolled out the way.

The characters are a bunch of white, pastel and denim wearing bland types with big hair. We know next to nothing about them beyond surface level information, but then who cares. Mike, the arsehole, forever chewing gum, nerdy Ferdy, brain dead Leslie… and on it goes. But our final girl, the virginal Allison, Kelli Maroney, at least gives good action heroine when called into action in the ‘explosive’ finale.

The film amuses both intentionally and unintentionally. Some of the dialogue can’t truly be serious with lines like, “I guess I’m just not used to being chased around a mall in the middle of the night by killer robots” and “what’s that? Robot blood”. Also, the aptly named store where they tool up, ‘Peckinpahs Sporting Goods’ raises a chuckle.

Elsewhere kills are for the most part tame, barring one head explosion, but there’s plenty of fun to be had in the terrible decisions made by both director, Jim Wynorski, and the characters in the film.

Oh, and the icing on the cake has to be the freeze frames at the end with the actors’ names appearing like a tv show, Suzee Slaters being the best.

Director Stanley Kubrick’s final film is a tale of obsession, lust, desire, being seen and feeling wanted. This is the third time I’ve watched it and it gets better and more compelling with each viewing.

It opens on Nicole Kidmans wife Alice disrobing non sexually. We see her and her husband, Tom Cruise as Dr. Bill, in the minutiae of their everyday. Touches like the casualness of her using the toilet in front of him or discussing Christmas shopping for their daughter, all point to a comfortable nine year marriage, but there are cracks. This we see at the party they attend of friend, Victor, a great Sydney Pollack.

This is a film unabashedly about sex and desire where the majority of what we see is female led nudity. So much so that it never feels erotic, eventually losing any supposed eroticism where familiarity breeds contempt. The infamous orgy scene feels quaint, I’ve seen worse in TVs Spartacus, but then this isn’t about titillation. I’d argue that whilst it’s about repressed desires, Alice longing to feel wanted and desired, hence her fantasies, it’s also about emasculation and the need to reassert one’s idea of manliness and self worth. This is the journey Bill goes on spurred on by Alice’s drug induced fantasy confession.

The one time we see them have sex comes off the back of the initial party where they both individually flirt with other people. Aroused by the feeling of being desired then they have sex. From here, and one toke too many, Bill is left feeling less than once Alice confesses to her Naval Officer fantasy. Most of his subsequent decisions are based on him imagining them together. This constant state of emasculation continues throughout. Challenged by a group of drunk young men he finds himself in the home of a prostitute, he toys with having an affair, going as far as calling the woman’s home only giving up once the husband answers. Later the humiliation continues as he wakes Alice from a dream where she shares a scene reminiscent of the orgy he attended, her sleeping with numerous men, laughing at him. Her desires are based on what ifs and fantasies where she is able to follow through, his he tries in vain to act out on and each time reality bites back. His unmanning ends as he cry’s in her arms confessing to the ‘adventure’ he’s been on.

The centre piece, the party/ orgy, is seemingly a manifestation of all his desires. Everyone can do what they want in supposed anonymity, but again Bill finds his lust unfulfilled, cuckolded by fantasy at every turn. Yet, it’s here and throughout one can struggle with the film. It’s secret society of privileged white people with rich people problems can make it hard to care.

At almost three hours it takes its time getting where it needs to be, bizarre detours where men are having threesomes with a shop owners ‘daughter’ at a costume store, or Bill running around playing detective, waving his doctor ID around like a private eye, detract, but it’s a film full of deceit, lies and journeys into hidden worlds so we understand why they exist on Bills journey into the dark.

If nothing else Kubrick went out on a high with this opulent swan song, even if the casting of Cruise and Kidman feels more headline baiting, where bizarrely for a real life married couple they have barely any chemistry. But then, wasn’t that the point.

The version I watched was the 2007 Final Cut. Gone is the voice over and original driving ending scene, in its place a film that remains just as puzzling with additional unicorn!

Based on a Philip K. Dick novel, the film sets the scene with its opening scrawl explaining who and what Nexus 6 Replicants are. We’re in Los Angeles, 2019, and Blade Runner Deckard is an ex-detective ‘retiring’ Replicants with them being illegal on Earth. A Los Angeles that’s a dystopian industrial hellscape where it’s perpetually night time and raining. The streets are packed with people and chimneys belch flames into the night sky, all the building pin pricks of light like stars. Overlooking it all, lording it over the city is the Tyrell Corporation, the company responsible for the creation of Replicants and the runaway Nexus 6, based across two large pyramid like structures. The craftsmanship in the model work still impresses today.

It’s the world building that lives long in the memory in Director Ridley Scott’s film. The world is seemingly run by corporations, adverts are everywhere, on the side of buildings, flying high above and glaring into homes. Also, an Asian influence runs through the city with spoken and written languages predominately, and the city is dirty and grimy. It’s a multicultural Hell’s Kitchen with a cyberpunk film noir aesthetic. You’ve the futuristic Tyrell headquarters on one hand, then the decrepit 1940s type hotel where toy maker Sebastian lives and where the finale takes place. Most characters smoke cigarettes with the smoke making the light coming through blinds hazy, characters wear trench coats, and Sean Youngs Rachael is made up like a 40s femme fatale. But let’s not forget flying cars and the Replicants.

Scott avoids Terminator style type machines, here they have 4 year life spans and for the most part are child like in nature. Leon, a burly Brion James, is more brawn than brains. Daryl Hannah’s Pris makes herself up like a doll, and Roy Batty, with his shock of white hair, searches for his ‘father’ to help him with his shortened life span and dramatically rebels when rejected. All of them unable to control their emotions because of their ages. The replicants are trying to survive, to break out of their 4 year life span. Outside of their immaturity they resort to violence because they’re fighting back against enslavement. Which makes lead character Deckard walk a morally grey area, hunting down ‘skin jobs’.

Harrison Ford is great as the conflicted Deckard. Doing his job, which he seemingly dislikes, and falling for replicant Rachael, but it’s Rutger Hauer as Batty who steals the film, none more so in the speech he gives in the rain in the finale, “…attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion…”

This is a brilliantly made classic with a great Vangelis score, but as the film ends we’re left with one question. Is Deckard a replicant? I believe, especially in the Final Cut, he is. There’s a couple of scenes where you can see the tell tale glare in the eyes, then you’ve his day dream of a unicorn which pays off at the very end when cop Gaff leaves an origami of a unicorn implying he’s aware Deckards memories are implanted, just like Rachael’s. Yet, maybe that’s one mystery left unsolved, I don’t care what Harrison Ford says.

A melancholy feeling can sometimes run through this film both narratively and with the knowledge that after its prolonged filming period, some two years, Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune never worked together again. Including Red Beard they worked on 16 films together.

Akira Kurosawa’s film concerns the disparity between the approach to health and well being, both physically and mentally. The cost made on doctor and patient alike, and the rich and the poor. It’s at times both a touching film bordering on the sentimental but also one that examines the minutiae of a hard lived life in 19th century Japan. For all the growth and learning, empathy and understanding on display, you’ve a film covering suicide, violence towards women and the abuse of children.

Red Beard himself, another masterful performance from Toshiro Mifune, is a nick name given to Dr. Kyojô Niide because of the colouring to said beard. He is initially portrayed as gruff and demanding. Such is Mifunes performance that he commands the eyes attention when he appears, furrowed brow, arms held behind his back. This aggressive stance though belies a caring nature. Well, apart from one act of violence at a brothel against several men, but even then he retorts, “This is terrible, such violence is bad.” as bodies lie strewn about him. His first reaction to the carnage he had caused is to have their medical needs seen to. He takes excessive money from rich clients to fund his clinic so he can continue to serve the poor and he puts himself in a position to teach a new doctor whose arrogance and distrust would have made most disown them.

Yûzô Kayama as Dr. Yasumoto is young and impressionable. Initially he finds much to distrust and to dislike about the clinic and Red Beard. He trained to doctor the Shogunate, this is an embarrassing step down. He arrives immaculately dressed and tidy of appearance, a counter to the dirty and disheveled look that sits over both doctor and patient alike. Initially selfish, refusing to share his medical knowledge because it’s a key to wealth, he learns empathy from others, both doctor and patient alike. He wears the clothes he entered with for the majority of the film until he learns of patient Sahachis past and the sacrifices made in his patients lives. The removal of his old clothes and the donning of his doctor’s garb is evident of him finally putting away his haughty misplaced opinions and giving into the needs of others.

Kurosawa’s narrative has us learn the lives of the patients, what made them who they were, their secrets divulged. It can feel a bit episode of a medical drama at times as we move from patient to patient, yet all of this is in service of strengthening Yasumoto’s resolve. His learning about them makes him see them as people. We watch his interactions with the insane and murderous or the patient, Sahachi, on deaths door who selflessly puts others above himself by working to get money for fellow patients.

Elsewhere we’ve the poor stealing food to survive, epitomised by the small boy stealing gruel for his family and the tragedy that unfolds there, and that of the rich man whose lifestyle and rich foods are affecting him, unable to speak as Niide lambasts him for his diet, then overcharges him. Each end of a scale showing the needs of the few outweighing those of the many.

So, it’s a film very much about the human condition. Rich, poor, we all end up in the same place but there’s compassion for those who need it most. Red beard who knows nothing but and has made him outwardly hard, Yasumoto who learns there’s more to life than prestige, to put the well being of others first with the patients outwardly and inwardly tragic, this itself eating away at Yasumoto’s resolve.

A great work from both Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune that makes you mourn for any future works, but what a film to go out on. Those three hours fly by, so invested do you become in the lives of others.

Remember when Eric Bana was a thing? Here he is Hector, ostensibly the lead of the picture, well, after Brad Pitts Achilles. The problem is director Wolfgang Petersen has a bland good guy lead who you couldn’t care less about and an Achilles whose arrogance and insolence make you look forward to his demise. Plus Pitt feels miscast, all pout and blankness of face.

Orlando Bloom as Paris continues to prove he can’t act as he bounced from one epic to the next in the early 2000s and Peter O’Toole impresses as King Priam, who manages to make the tedious script work in his favour when mourning sons and a kingdom. Yet it’s Brian Cox as King Agamemnon whose scene chewing steals the film. He looks like he’s having a great time, especially in the memeable laugh he gives at his brothers fight.

In a sea of hairless chests, some impressive battles and one on one fights that farcically can come across like dancing, silly Achilles leaping special move and all, Director Petersen has striven for ‘accuracy’ over mythology. It’s a shame because increasing the films campness may have done wonders.

Still, with Sean Bean as Odysseus, look at this as a prequel of sorts to Nolan’s The Odyssey. Yes… a Sean Bean role where he doesn’t die. Now, that’s impressive.

Director Denis Villeneuve returned after a nine year break with a more serious approach to his work. Gone was the playful, occasionally surreal and offbeat approach we saw in August 32nd on Earth and Maelstrom in favour of more tragic and darker material.

Filmed in black-and-white to lessen the impact of blood and violence and giving it a more documentary approach, Polytechnique is based on the Montréal massacre which took place in 1989 when a solitary male killer took out his hatred on ‘feminists’ by gunning them down. Feminist’s in his mind because they were engineering students, roles predominantly in a male field.

Villeneuve refuses to give our killer a name, played with detached emotion by Maxim Gaudette. He could be any young man, and it avoids giving the real killer any form of celebrity which can be a curse to the victims and families afterwards. He is presented as isolated and lonely, his views on women make him what we might refer to as an Incel today. Initially we see him moving through his apartment, watching his female neighbour, moving from one room to the next. He’s portrayed as antisocial, he couldn’t join the army for this reason. He blames his woes on society and its inclusion of women. The film try’s to show his thinking, the method behind the madness via the goodbye/ suicide notes he leaves. But with the short runtime, we’re not given the chance to properly delve into the psyche of the killer. It’s all very surface level.

The film moves between the killer and two survivors, Jean-François and Valérie, Sébastien Huberdeau and Karine Vanasse respectively. We’re given both a male and female perspective. With Valérie she’s a mechanical engineering student seeking an internship. She faces misogyny from the employer who wants to make sure she doesn’t want children as they’re a distraction. She has to lie to get the role, to fit into the male coded role of engineering. Villeneuve shows us it’s not just an isolated viewpoint but that the killers approach is extreme, two sides of the same coin. Jean-François is caught up in trying to survive and help. His story is just as tragic as he struggles to assist those caught up and blames himself for not being able to do enough. He’s not painted the hero which other films may have done. “It’s not your fault, Jeff” stays with you.

Villeneuve takes the characters stories as far as they can go with the incident and jumps forward to show a present where survivors attempt to move on, some more successfully than others, some with hope, others with pain. It paints a picture of an event that has long lasting reverberations, something we wish we could forget, but shouldn’t.

A tense and claustrophobic real life event played out with respect and compassion but doesn’t shy away from the brutality for all the black and white. The run time leaves you with the feeling it’s a tad too sleight, could we have learnt more of the killers motivations, more of the victims lives? But we’re still left with a film that leaves you thinking long after it ends.

Whilst this primarily is about the creation of Facebook it’s more so a story of betrayal, wealth, and friendship centred on Mark Zuckerberg and his relationship with Facebook cofounder Eduardo Saverin.

Scripted by Aaron Sorkin and directed by David Fincher this is a tightly crafted masterpiece that moves at a relentless pace. The structure moves from the beginnings of the social site idea, and the issues that then raised to an occasional flash forward where Mark sits in two separate depositions with those he stepped on via his way to the top. The Winklevoss twins in one corner, Eduardo in another. Fincher keeps us glued as the events play out, the structure keeping things interesting and letting us know early on that Mark does not come out of this the good guy.

Fincher sets this up from moment one. Opening on a date at Harvard between one time girlfriend Erica, a brilliant Rooney Mara, and Mark, who continually talks over and down to her until she finally has enough. Jesse Eisenberg as Mark handles the script expertly, and at speed, talking as he does a million words a minute. His Zuckerberg is an insufferable Mountain Dew drinking sociopath who treats people as commodities. Erica sums him up perfectly, that he thinks girls won’t like him because he’s a nerd, but rather the real reason is that he’s an asshole. He is perfectly unlikeable and she is seemingly the only one who sees him for what he is. Both occasions they interact, her cutting remarks spur him on hatefully to progress with his ideas. “The Internet isn’t written in pencil, Mark. It’s written in ink.”

Mark takes nothing seriously with his aloofness. Drawing pictures on his legal pad during the deposition, the original idea of ‘Facemash’ a misogynist bitter site where men rate women based on looks all speak to someone out of touch with themselves and others, playing a role. The film ends as it began with him being called an asshole. Except now he’s told he isn’t one, he’s trying hard to be one. It speaks to his constant need to fit in and be accepted. We see this also in his relationship with Sean Parker, a surprisingly excellent Justin Timberlake.

I was reminded of Fincher’s Fight Club and the character of Tyler Durden and ‘Jack’. When Tyler reveals the truth and states, “I look like you wanna look, I fuck like you wanna fuck…” Sean is Marks Tyler in the sense that he is everything Mark aspires to be. Sean enables him to create his own friend group where they all work for him and kiss his ass. You see the eagerness on Marks face at the nightclub as Sean relays the founding of Victoria’s Secret. They’re all trying to engratiate themselves with him, they’re not friends. Later in the film when they get the angel investment and everyone’s spraying champagne, Mark stands next to the pool, outwards looking in, alone, having just set up his only friend Eduardo.

Andrew Garfield as Eduardo Saverin is the standout here. Played as both eager to please and wounded animal, your heart goes out to him. He constantly tries to be his friend, but is used like everyone else. He gets into the Harvard social club, The Phoenix, but instead of celebrating he says it’s a diversity thing. When they talk of Facebook, Eduardo says ‘we’, Mark says ‘me’. It all culminates in the best scene in the film when Eduardo finds out the truth and confronts Mark and Sean, it’s the most emotional you see Mark.

The film is complimented by a great soundtrack from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, that adds to energetic direction and tight scripting that’s both hard hitting and funny. The script though is only ever as good as those delivering the lines and it’s hard to find a bum note here, including the technical expertise in having Armie Hammer play both Winklevoss twins.

With the constant sickly sepia yellow and dark and dingy look that’s very Fincher and some familiar camerawork, see the Sean Parker house party as the camera moves through the window from outside, you could dismiss this as a character assassination piece, how much of it is accurate? But then, would knowing the reality be this interesting. Hell, I’m not even sure Mark Zuckerberg himself is.

‘What follows is based on actual case files.’

Only David Fincher would be the ideal director to craft a film that’s an investigative report doubling up as entertainment. Known for his exacting nature on shoots and his numerous takes and eye for perfection, is it any wonder that both he and screenwriter James Vanderbilt interviewed as many people as possible connected with the case to ensure that all areas were covered as accurately as possible. This search for the truth mirrors that of the three characters in the film, all based on those actually involved.

This fastidiousness runs throughout to an almost confusing degree, especially towards the end as it races to a conclusion of sorts. It leaves it open but at the same time Fincher lets the film tell you what his own investigation revealed and possibly his own thoughts on the identity of the Zodiac.

The film opens on July 4, 1969 and ends on August 16, 1991 with one of the Zodiacs initial victims who survived, Mike Mageau. This framing of 22 years helps to close off the film as there is no final satisfying denouement, no shoot out or big speechifying. This is a film that tells the truth, as they see it, first.

The films zips through time and events, with a wealth of information and Fincher wants to impart it all. We track the time both by the dates and times on the screen and the weariness, exhaustion and mania on our three leads faces. Like them the director wants his audience to think, observe and join in the investigation.

As 1968s ‘Hurdy Gurdy Man’ plays Fincher establishes a sense of time and place. You could very much imagine Zodiac coming from the conspiracy genre films of the 70s. It all feels very lived in alongside his penchant for rain and that sepia tone. He also doesn’t shy away from the brutality of the events, showing only the killings where people survived which helps to avoid a lot of speculation, and he shows all aspects of the investigation including the red herrings such as the phone in calls and the varying appearance of the Zodiac at each crime.

As letters and codes are sent, we see the investigation through three people. Robert Downey Jr is Paul Avery, the crime reporter at newspaper, The San Francisco Chronicle. Cravat wearing, flippant and nonchalant his persona plays very much like Downey is in most films he acts in. Even his little beard is reminiscent of Iron Man. Whilst we see the case take the toll the most on him as he descends into a world of drink and drugs I found him distracting.

Mark Ruffalo is Inspector David Toschi. Eating Animal Crackers, and looking constantly annoyed as the investigation progresses. He perseveres as those around him lose interest and fall away ultimately paying a price for the work he puts in.

Jake Gyllenhaal is Robert Graysmith, a cartoonist at the same paper as Avery who wants to be taken seriously. He is ostensibly the lead towards the latter half of the film, Zodiac itself originally a book that the real Graysmith wrote. Wanting to be taken seriously, initially dismissed, this need ends up costing him his family and he becomes more manic as his obsession takes hold.

And its obsession that’s the central theme. Obsession leading to destruction. Wives closing doors slowly, characters sleeping alone. The first thing Graysmith talks about on his date is the zodiac. Avery looking more and more worse for wear as it takes over his life, abusing drugs and alcohol and losing everything. Toschi is left ‘holding the bag’ a few years into the investigation as people move on and interest wanes and it all falls on Graysmith. He involves his children and sees losing his family as a distraction to his investigation peaking in his interview in a prison with a person of interest, “It was Rik Marshall. Just say it.”, he has to be right, it has to be done.

So, the killer. The film has Arthur Leigh Allen as the main suspect. Fincher throws all the evidence at us, but then throws in Rick Marshall. The killer maybe ambidextrous. Did the Zodiac symbol come from a film reel or a watch? Fincher meticulously plays it all out across interviews, news paper articles and hand writing experts, but the end spiel focuses heavily on Leigh. Fincher maybe doesn’t want to leave it up to us after all.

I watched the directors cut and still the film was relentless and moved at a pace where you try to keep up. Enthralling.

Director James Cameron returns to The Terminator 7 years later for this bigger, and some might say, better sequel. I sit in the ‘first film is my favourite’ camp but only in that I enjoy the grit, violence and misery of the predecessor. But this is easily the best film in the franchise.

He avoids repetition by having Arnold Schwarzenegger play the ‘good’ version of the T-800 and having Linda Hamilton go from the mousy waitress of the original to a hardened PTSD suffering survivor. He also introduces the T-1000, a stealthy Robert Patrick, as an alternative unstoppable killing machine modelled on Liquid Metal. On top of this there’s an undercurrent of humour, and the need for belonging and family.

We see some of this humour initially when the Terminator gets his motorcycle leathers and shades then ‘Bad to the Bone’ plays or his quip at the end about needing a holiday. Also, the theme of family comes across both with John Connors need for stability and parents. He tolerates his foster family whilst yearning for a mother who plays soldier and protector first. The Terminator becomes a father figure, and it’s in some of the midway scenes where machine and John bond that pay off in the conclusion so effectively, “I know now why you cry”. Cameron shows this with a cold blue light throughout, a coldness of the present and the possible future and representing the nature of the machines. But outside of that, as John bonds with the machine, this father figure, as Sarah becomes a mother not just a protector to her son, it moves to warmer orange hues. We see a combination of both in the end factory scene.

It’s easy to say this is Arnold Schwarzenegger’s film but for me, Linda Hamilton is the star. Her transformation from the originals ditzy waitress to hardened warrior is believable down to the commitment of the actress. Toned and muscular she is a far cry from her past but she’s not played as a hard ass but rather someone with deep rooted psychological scarring. The mania on her face in the frozen video footage of her relaying her nightmares at the hospital is a nice counter to Michael Beihn’s frozen interview footage in the first film when he relays the future; no one takes this seriously. If anything her cold approach to the future war and even her son could be seen as robotic, initially detached and cold she only has eyes on the mission. It comes to the fore on the attack on Miles Dyson’s home, relentless in her mission, like a machine, before the realisation of her actions, seeing his family, bring her back.

Edward Furlong, all surly attitude, is the epitome of a 90s teenager with his cringy phrases, “hasta la Vista, baby” and Public Enemy T-shirt as future resistance leader, John Connor. Furlong in his first feature role impresses when trying to earn his mother’s affections and finding a surrogate father figure in the machine. Scenes of him high fiving the Terminator, to his determination at the task at hand, to his acceptance of the machines fate in the finale impress.

Schwarzenegger has more to do this time round as the Terminator and with his acting style, he was seemingly born to play a robot. Robert Patrick as the T-1000, never blinks and is never far from a Tom Cruise sprint. You believe he’s an unstoppable killing machine. His frame, the irony of his police uniform, a great counter to the black leather clad Arnold.

The Terminator doesn’t kill a single person. It narratively ensures he is the hero of the film, the film excels in the amount of gun shot wounds to legs, but it’s not really an issue when you have the T-1000 butchering people left and right. The film can be brutal when it needs to be, foster parent Todd gets the point. But most famously Sarah’s nightmare watching her waitress self and children on a playground get annihilated by a nuclear bomb lives long in the memory. Plus the action is relentless. Be it the dam chase, or the metal works finale Cameron continued to push the visual effects envelope. It still impresses some 35 years later.

One of the 1990s action film highlights. Cameron brings his expertise in action and strong leading actresses, with this film arguably the peak of his career. You can keep your space Smurf’s.

Director David Fincher’s third film finds him in his usual dark, subversive, self destructive world that we’ve come to love from his work. A film of organised and controlled anarchy that enjoyably stretches credibility that works mainly because of Michael Douglas in the lead role of Nicholas Van Orton. He is excellent, excelling as he unravels at the insanity he is thrown into.

It opens on 16mm footage of Nicholas’s childhood. A child of wealth but with a distant father. I will say it reminded me of the opening credits of Succession! From here we cut to Douglas’s Nicholas who is a near spit of the father. Like dear old dad, Nicholas is affluent with his live in maid and estate home. Fincher shows us he has everything, but at the same time has nothing. He works on his birthday, he is aloof with those around him. As he puts it he is “Satisfied avoiding society”. He is accepting of his loneliness, actively keeping those at a distance, including his brother, Conrad.

His brother is the counter to Nicholas. He is shown to be embracing life. It can be a tad disconcerting seeing Sean Penn playfully spraying his brother whilst pretending to sneeze; little bits like this are a bit on the nose for Fincher, kind of ramming home the opposite nature of the two brothers. One dines in a fine restaurant, the other claims to buy crystal meth off the head waiter. The film isn’t going for subtly, rather it wants to spend its time hitting you over the head with plot.

The problem is that’s there’s no real surprise to any of it. Twists don’t really work because the premise of the film, the title itself, lets you in on what’s happening from the off. From his being handed the pen, to the new interactions he suddenly has once at Consumer Recreation Services, the company behind the elaborate game, you spend your time pulling at all the narrative threads. Twists upon turns upon twists, one after the other slowly stretching credibility, but as mentioned a continually excellent Douglas anchors the film. They’re in on it… no, they’re not… he’s been drugged, the company seemingly can orchestrate something this elaborate, conveniently Nicholas acts exactly how they need him to to push on their game, and so on. The biggest stretch though is the end tumble, but at this point it’s all a bit messy and it suits the narrative with Nicholas’s rebirth, out with the old and in with the new.

Regardless of these hard to swallow moments it works both down to Douglas, who effortlessly carries the film, and Fincher’s expert direction and control of its central narrative. The film is about the unravelling of a man, bringing him back to a life he never embraced. Embrace a life not lived before you become like your father. His brother uses the game to wake him from the stupor of his life by removing those comforts that were isolating him from feeling alive. You could say, the things you own end up owning you, but wait… that’s another Fincher film.

Directed by Jules Dassin I was immediately struck by how American this felt. Opening on the poker game, table and men wreathed in cigarette smoke, fedoras in place. Then further on the film noir, pulp crime elements that run throughout this tale of four men planning and executing the perfect heist of a jewellers.

All of this is evident when you learn the director was a blacklisted American, named a communist, who went to Europe to find work. Here he crafted a brutal, cynical and tense crime film that even today earns its reputation as one of the founding modern heist films.

The characters, as one would expect, are all flawed, fatalistic individuals. With this type of film it’s no spoiler to say that it was never going to work out well with the structure following a rise and fall approach. It’s the characteristics of most of them which become their undoing.

Sour of face and desperate, always deadly serious, Jean Servais plays Tony le Stéphanous with a smile reserved for friend Jo’s young son. He is hard bitten and out of prison punishing his former girlfriend for her unfaithfulness with gangster Grutter by beating her with a belt. Making her get undressed with the act off camera it loses none of its violence.
Youngest of the group and played as green to their criminal world, Carl Möhner, is Jo. Wanting the money for his family, especially his son, it’s the son himself who contributes to their later unravelling.
Filling out the crew are Mario, Robert Manuel, playful and enjoying the risk but faithful to the last and Italian playboy César, whose lustful appreciation of women is the catalyst for their fall. Note worthy also is that César is played by director Dassin.
Elsewhere the hoods are violent or dope fiends and the women are, barring Jo’s wife Louise, played by Janine Darcey, exotic and lustful. They are dancers and singers, playthings of the men.

A lot of this will be familiar to those watchers of crime films and noirs of the Hollywood period and to the relative French works but it’s the brutality and the meticulousness that stands out here. None more so in the famous heist itself. The run up is more playful, with them crafting a key, timing the run, observing the route, casing the jewellers. It’s playful music, all the characters excited. There’s initially no dialogue so we focus primarily on their actions and activities before the experiments with the alarm system which feeds into how the heist itself plays out.

This is then continued in the heist itself. The brilliant shot of the shadows thrown by the ascending elevator before the cut to silence beyond the noises they make, the slightest sound heightens the tension such as accidentally pressing a piano key, then a sock over a hammer. You’ve also the superb little touches like the small genius act of the umbrella through the roof to catch the falling debris from their excavation. We’re as tense as them with every cough and scrape ratcheting up the suspense.

Later as things fall apart the brutality continues. Especially a rescue turning to a discovery of a betrayal and the price the person must pay, a character pulling away, a gun fired. Post heist bodies fall meeting brutal ends and acts of desperation and selflessness mean paying a steep price.

A landmark film that’s both exciting and nerve wracking down to the brilliant direction and acting. Its influence has been felt through most heist flicks since and it’s easy to see why, but this remains the template.

Point Blank is an adaption of the first in a series of novels by Richard Stark, ‘The Hunter’, about a career criminal known only as Parker. Here Walker, as he is known in the film, is played with steely cold detachment by Lee Marvin. Having read some of the series of books and having seen Payback (‘99) and The Outfit (‘73), Marvin’s version of Parker is by far the closest facsimile of the book character.

Lee Marvin is excellent here. Having forged a career as a no nonsense tough guy with those granite features, silvery hair and sharp suits he exudes menace and erupts with violence given any opportunity. He also amuses with his constant hunt for his money, blinkers on, he is single minded in his pursuit. His deadpan confusion when being asked as to why he has created all this mayhem, “I want my money. I want my $93 grand”, or his test drive with an associate, bring a subtle violent humour. Any hint of emotion though exists only in the dreamlike flashbacks to his time with partner Lynne and friend Mal.

Director John Boorman could have gone the easy route, making a straight up crime film, but this is infected with a 1960s feel, a pop art infused film where events seem to move between the aforementioned crime genre and a dream like reality. None more 60s than when Walker visits the club with the loud singer and bright colours and imagery playing as he beats up two men. The films flashbacks are a case in point, the fun happy times that took place before the heist at Alcatraz where he is betrayed and left for dead by wife Lynne, and ‘friend’ Mal. from the start and occasionally throughout Walker remembers an idealised past. A happier time when he first meets Lynne, dark of hair and smiling or seeing Mal at the reunion. He feels like a different Walker, more alive, as all three go cavorting on joyful car rides or dive into oncoming waves. But making his escape and on the hunt for his money he becomes cold, ruthless, someone else.

At one point Chris, Lynnes sister, played by Angie Dickinson in bright oranges and yellows which counter the coldness of the opening, tells Walker he died at Alcatraz when admonishing his indifference. In the cell he questions, as he lies there dying, was it a dream, did it happen, this betrayal by wife and friend? Yet he somehow escapes by swimming from the island. From here you could read into the narrative a spiritual aspect. The character of Yost, played by Keenan Wynn, initially states he’s after the Organisation but appears only to Walker directing his revenge as though an avenging angel, guiding this restless spirit. Walker never directly kills anyone, rather he is the catalyst as deaths are either accidental, suicides or at the hands of others. You can’t get into heaven with blood on your hands.

He is the motivation for all this mayhem, and him imagining all this in the cell maybe why he looks so confused when confronted by Brewster: “You're a very bad man, Walker, a very destructive man! Why do you run around doing things like this?” But then it could just be a straight crime film with European sensibilities from John Boorman. Yet, as the final reveal of the man behind it all takes place at the end we witness Walker vanish into Alcatraz’s shadows, the film coming full circle at the place he was never supposed to leave.

Off the back of The Rewatchables podcast I thought I’d give this another spin. I grew up with it, catching it on TV when I could. It wasn’t until I saw it on Blu-ray did I realise how much had been cut. Chain smoking by all, the implied ghostly oral sex of Ray, and lines such as “Yes. It’s true. This man has no dick”. The SNL connection meant little to me as I was three the year this came out. I was in it for the ghosts, I had the action figures, the Ecto-1 car; this was very much a part of my childhood.

The film is very much an 80s classic. That theme tune that you can’t help sing along to, “who you gonna’ call? Ghostbusters!”, the as mentioned constant smoking by most, and the overall look and feel to proceedings. It’s enjoyable the balancing act between how tactile a lot of it is and how badly aged most of the effects are. You’ve the Proton Packs, their gobbledygook devices for capturing ghosts, the traps, the Psychokinetic Energy Meters rubbing shoulders with the effects such as Zuul and the lightbulb clearly in its mouth when it first appears in Dana’s fridge, yet you can’t help but chuckle. But some effects still impress regardless of how fake they look such as the initial library ghost or the undead taxi driver. All of this adds to the films charm and doesn’t detract.

The film never takes itself seriously. No one dies in this film, its humour is front and centre and it’s all the more entertaining for it. This is down to the cast and their great chemistry.

The first standout is Bill Murray excelling as sleazy and sarcastic Peter Venkman. Not once taking anything seriously regardless of the circumstances. Asking old librarians if they are menstruating is just the tip of the iceberg. Dan Aykroyd is excitable as Ray, and Harold Ramis is “I’m always serious” Egon. The main three are different enough for us to wonder why they are so joined at the hip. Peter obviously in it for money and fame, the others have an active interest. Then there’s Ernie Hudson as Winston, the straight man to the main cast. He’s under utilised and I would’ve like to see more. He initially is on the outside and whilst by the end he’s joyous at being a part of the team, his late arrival still means he feels very much on the periphery.

Elsewhere second standout is Rick Moranis as geeky Louis who is suitably pathetic and thanks to Moranis, hilarious. The highlight for me is when he’s possessed and hanging out with the team, mimicking their actions. Then there’s elegant statuesque Sigourney Weaver as Dana, pushing that PG rating when possessed by Zuul who is brilliant in her dual role even when suffering through insufferable Peter.

Flaws wise, well, the villain Gozer is pretty inconsequential when weighed up against her pets and the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. She doesn’t make much of an impression looking as she does like an 80s pop singer. Also, the reasoning behind her appearance and subsequent mayhem is a lot of waffle where I can never really remember the why, but then I don’t particularly care and I don’t think the cast or director Ivan Reitman do either.

An 80s classic that for me is even funnier now than it was back then and I think that’s come with age and appreciating the lunacy and the cast. But I’ve no time for most of the sequels. Now they are a reason to be afraid.