Videodrome (1983) – David Cronenberg

Introduction

No fighting! No fighting! Shakira, Shakira!

Ladies up in here tonight 
No fighting, no fighting 
We got the refugees up in here 
No fighting, no fighting 

Shakira, Shakira 

I never really knew that she could dance like this 
She makes a man want to speak Spanish, 
Como se llama, bonita, mi casa, su casa 
Shakira, Shakira 

Oh baby when you talk like that 
You make a woman go mad 
So be wise and keep on 
Reading the signs of my body 

And I'm on tonight 
You know my hips don't lie 
And I'm starting to feel it's right 
All the attraction, the tension 
Don't you see baby, this is perfection 

Hey Girl, I can see your body moving 
And it's driving me crazy 
And I didn't have the slightest idea 
Until I saw you dancing 

And when you walk up on the dance floor 
Nobody cannot ignore the way you move 
your body, girl 
And everything so unexpected - the way 
you right and left it 
So you can keep on shaking it 


I never really knew that she could dance like this 
She makes a man want to speak Spanish 
Como se llama, bonita, mi casa, su casa 
Shakira, Shakira 

Oh baby when you talk like that 
You make a woman go mad 
So be wise and keep on 
Reading the signs of my body 

And I'm on tonight 
You know my hips don't lie 
And I am starting to feel you boy 
Come on let's go, real slow 
Don't you see baby asi es perfecto 

Oh I know I am on tonight my hips don't lie 
And I'm starting to feel it's right 
All the attraction, the tension 
Don't you see baby, this is perfection 
Shakira, Shakira 

Oh boy, I can see your body moving 
Half animal, half man 
I don't, don't really know what I'm doing 
But you seem to have a plan 
My will and self restraint 
Have come to fail now, fail now 
See, I am doing what I can, but I can't so 
you know 
That's a bit too hard to explain 

Baila en la calle de noche 
Baila en la calle de dia 
Baila en la calle de noche 
Baila en la calle de dia 

I never really knew that she could dance like this 
She makes a man want to speak Spanish 
Como se llama, bonita, mi casa, su casa 
Shakira, Shakira 

Oh baby when you talk like that 
You know you got me hypnotized 
So be wise and keep on 
Reading the signs of my body 

Señorita, feel the conga, let me see you 
move like you come from Colombia 

Mira en Barranquilla se baila asi, say it! 
Mira en Barranquilla se baila asi 

Yeah 
She's so sexy every man's fantasy 
a refugee like me back with the Fugees 
from a 3rd world country 
I go back like when 'pac carried crates for 
Humpty Humpty 
I need a whole club dizzy 
Why the CIA wanna watch us? 
Colombians and Haitians 
I ain't guilty, it's a musical transaction 
No more we do snatch ropes 
Refugees run the seas 'cause we own our 
own boats 

I'm on tonight, my hips don't lie 
And I'm starting to feel you boy 
Come on let's go, real slow 
Baby, like this is perfecto 

Oh, you know I'm on tonight and my 
hips don't lie 
And I'm starting to feel it's right 
The attraction, the tension 
Baby, like this is perfection 

No fighting 
No fighting

So I wanted to see James Woods fuck Debbie Harry, but he obviously wasn’t fucking her (I’m watching the film right now; this is how I do shit, you fuck). So, like, I’m watching the lame pornography that they’re playing – it’s as vanilla as SHIT and James Woods totally agrees with me. “To show people what’s really going on beneath the sheets”. I can touch-type at over 100 words per minute.

“Do you know a show called ‘videodrome’?... it’s just torture and murder... I think it’s what’s next.”

Characters:

Congratulations, Dave! I’m drunk. What’s going on here... One 35cl bottle of gin and am now onto beer; wrong way around, right? Nevermind, it’s okay. I’m going to have a smoke and, hey, maybe I’ll even have some drugs, right? But what does the “reader” care.

“I want you to stay away from it.”

“Sounds like a challenge.”

Life is a fucking challenge – I don’t need Dave telling me all this shit, though Debbie looks good. I’ll tell you now I respect her music and I respect her as she puts a cigarette out on her formed breast.

Plot:

You smoke the cigarette that has flesh on it – sometimes, when I was at university, I would lacerate my flesh and soak a smoke in it. Naturally, following this I would lungfully imbibe it.

So, what is the difference? Blood in a cigarette? Life; death? Doing something, or not doing something? There is no difference. Oblivion. All I know is that I’m going to start getting my lunch from a soup kitchen. It’s free, right?

And what about you? You take a good long look at your [[Ikea, prefab]/[parent-bought]/[capitalist]] furniture. Are you awake? Are you dreaming? Is this just the Wizard of-fucking Oz? Here’s a tip: write down your waking-state dreams; remember them. When you begin this process (do it roughly EVERY DAY) the benefits will be []/. “What you see on that show; it’s for real”.

A German gun? I have one too.

Knock, knock.

Slap a woman and she becomes someone else.

“You didn’t hit me.”

Dwgju /0

5464/879+9+/6 /

9///////////////////////////////////////////////

BEEP BEEP DEEP DEEP SLEEP SLEEP

Conclusion:

u becum tv

Positive:

Negative:

Best line:

Out of ten: ()

The Expendables (2010) – Sylvester ‘Sly’ Stallone

 

Introduction

Pending its imminent DVD release and on the advice of a friend, I thought I’d make a pre-emptive strike against cinema by reviewing Stallone’s seventh directorial triumph.

There is tasty torture-porn in it

This film is like a vengeful dog performing penis reduction surgery; it achieves its goals, coming in at a very watchable one hour and a half, but by the methods employed they’ve removed the best fucking bit: the bulbous, purple end. What you’re left with is a mess of pseudo-erotic computer generated gore, a reduction in depth, the inability to procreate and merely a 'length'. That’s how this film is and makes me feel. Like a dog bit my cock off. And I REALLY like dogs.

Characters:

One of the main draws of the film is the cast list. They’re a group of strongmen with dubious and varying levels of acting ability and it features some cameos that last literally seconds from strongmen with dubious and varying levels of acting ability. However, it’s worth mentioning them individually, because that’s all anyone gives a fuck about:

Barney Ross (Stallone): Stallone plays himself, transported – oh, look, I can’t even be fucking bothered. I mean, seriously, I’m surprised that the studios let him get away with this shit. As an ex-heroin addict I know how difficult it is to say ‘no’ to the needle, but when Stallone next goes in for some fucking cosmetic chassis work on his face, somebody else should say it for him.

Lee Christmas (Statham): Ever since I saw Death Race, which features the extraordinarily talented Ian McShane, I have cut a finger off for every subsequent film Jason Statham has been in. Sadly, this means that I now only have four fingers to type with (well, two fingers and two thumbs). He plays what I think is supposed to be an Englishman affecting an American accent who is in a relationship with a domestically abused Charisma Carpenter.

Check the filename, LOL!

Ying Yang (Li): Ying Yang is a non-specifically-defined ‘oriental man’ who constantly receives jibes from his co-stars on account of his ethnically related stature. It’s a fucking awful state of affairs to see a talented Jet Li sink so low for the sake of money; the confused man constantly refers to a family that he openly admits he doesn't have.

Toll Road (Couture): A genial, Hawaiian-shirt-wearing... boxer, or something? His role within the film is, like, totally unclear. He sees a therapist, which the others make fun of, but otherwise does nothing at all.

Hale Caesar (Crews): Crews plays the customary shotgun-wielding, tough-talking black guy who at one stage of the film is destined to save his co-stars. It’s that fucking remedial.

Tool (Rourke): Straight off the set of Iron Man 2, Rourke has the same makeup, hairstyle and character. It’s shocking. The people who did the casting (Deborah Aquila and Mary Tricia Wood) and costume (Lizz Wolf) should be lined up and violated nasally with a lobotomy spike.

Gunner Jensen (Lundgren): Flawed, drug-addicted Gunner is by far the most interesting and morally ambiguous character. A true mercenary, he is brutally violent, vulgar, unstable and racially prejudice. I genuinely hope that this marks a cinematic renaissance for Lundgren, whose performance and acting ability are actually worthy of note.

Plot:

The film starts with the main characters viciously massacring a boat-full of African fishermen. Watch it and imagine this is the case – the dialogue and actions take on a more violent shade of crap.

Sieg Heil, baby!

But it’s okay, because they’re a group of mercenaries who are in due course hired by a mysterious CIA agent called Mr. Church (Bruce Willis) to take out a [Random South American Country]’s dictator (David Zayas), who is being supported by former CIA insurgent James Munroe (Eric Roberts). Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is effectively playing a dramatised role of himself, also vies for the contract, but can’t be bothered to do it in the end as he has aspirations on becoming the president. A real-world allusion? How fucking nifty. However, it’s interesting watching Stallone and Schwarzenegger interact, as there is obviously still a lot of bad blood over the fact that Stallone revealed Schwarzenegger’s father was a Nazi cunt.

They go to this undesignated country, where Christmas takes some wonderful photographs and Ross falls in love. They get ethically confused at some point and decide to go home. After a chat with Tool, Ross decides that he needs to go back in order to save the girl, who it turns out is the daughter of the dictator. So they go back and get her.

That’s the film, really. During this time there is – I must admit – a magnificent piece of vintage waterboarding, as well as a pick and mix of broken bones, blood, and Steve Austin [under]acting. All of this would be great, if there were actually characters in the film; I honestly didn’t give two shits what happened to any of these 'people'... apart from Lundgren.

Lundgren's surprisingly good performance

Lundgren’s performance as Gunner is comparable to Jean-Claude Van Damme’s exposed self-appraisal in JCVD: a post-modern extension of his own career. We see Lundgren begin the film by being a bit too enthusiastic with a grenade launcher, only to be thrown out of the ‘big boy club’ by Stallone. He goes on to do some shit for some fairly bad guys, and ends up getting beaten up by Jet Li, and then shot by Stallone. Oh, yeah, ‘spoiler alert’. Near the very end of the film, he’s a lot better, looking a bit more with-it, and everyone’s forgotten that he betrayed them and he learns to laugh again.

This is exactly what happened in real fucking life. Lundgren was in Rocky IV in 1985, did He-Man in 1987 and then Universal Soldier in 1992. Then he did fuck all. He was thrown out of the ‘big man actor’s guild’ and did a series of utterly forgettable films for some bad men before this one for an even worse man. He’s back in the club and nobody said shit! Watch out for him, because the work is going to come rolling in...

Conclusion:

The Canon 7D boasts a new 18mp APS-C CMOS sensor 

I hate watching films about CIA intervention in Latin America. It’s fucking disgusting that Hollywood makes light of the fact that The Agency they glorify helps to bring to power crooked fascists, only to depose them years later. What does this mean? The people suffer. The common man is the only one who picks up the cheque when the establishment decides new despots need to run the drug trafficking. No fucking gods, no fucking masters.

Positive: Salacious but acceptable violence

Negative: Shit cast, shit plot, unnaturally contracted

Best line: 

Trench (Schwarzenegger): [to Barney] Hey, how about dinner? 

Barney Ross: Yeah, when? 
Trench: In a thousand years? 
Barney Ross: Too soon. 

Out of ten: THREE (Just for the shitty piece of dialogue above)

Iron Man 2 (2010) – Jon Favreau

Introduction

Iron Man 2 is an action comedy film set to the backdrop of the Cold War. It was commissioned by Joseph McCarthy in 1950, entered production hell and only managed to resurface in 2010, which is exactly what happened with Watchmen (2009). Interestingly, Alan Moore refused to watch both films on the grounds that he couldn’t remember “which one [he’d] fucking written”. Oh, Alan – he’s so full of the joys of being one of the most respected graphic novel authors.

As a film, it is a wonderful example of what can happen when propaganda meets a creative medium meets propaganda, and deals primarily with Western superiority over the ‘Red Menace’, African-American rights, anti-Semitism, and Massive Science. As controversial now as it was when McCarthy collaborated with escaped Nazi scientists to come up with the idea, Iron Man 2 is a cinematic gem. With a very ironic self-awareness of irony-within-irony-within-irony (or IronThree, as I will coin it), it’s as entertaining as it is thought-provoking; which is very!

Characters:

Iron Man 2 relaxes after a monster session on Minecraft

Handsome rogue and former class-A drug addict Robert Downey Jr. plays Iron Man 2, a scientist who has been tasked by the government to defeat the Soviet Union in what was then known as The Element Race. The antagonist is Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke), who joins forces with Justin Hammerstein (Sam Rockwell), a wealthy American-Jewish businessman, to attempt to defeat Iron Man 2. Scarlett Johansson plays Natasha Romanoff, a sexy Russian whore and double agent who Iron Man 2 falls in love with. There are more characters, too.

Plot:

At the beginning of Iron Man 2, Iron Man 2 is involved in the inauguration of the US’ first black Lieutenant Colonel, James Rhodes (Don Cheadle). The two form a great friendship on the foundation of an unspoken mutual attraction and their love of nuclear arms. Early in the film there is a very Hitchcockian scene where Rhodes voyeuristically observes Iron Man 2 undress and rim Romanoff, who it becomes clear is his bottom bitch within the harem that is headed by Mistress Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow – my favourite Welsh actress).

As a counterpoint to this, Vanko is shown to have a loveless relationship with a woman whom he refers to only as his ‘bird’. Vanko’s father is revealed to have worked closely with Iron Man 2’s (Iron Man 1) on the development of the ‘Fat Man’, the atomic bomb that was detonated over Nagasaki in 1945. These initial scenes are predominantly of a drunken Vanko shooting hard heroin and shouting at his ‘bird’ “the fucked will fuck the fucker”, a motif that is repeated throughout the film, and, from what I can tell, was the only phrase that Rourke could actually clearly articulate in Russian [or at all].

Hammerstein creates the Rockwell Scale

Iron Man 2’s childhood friend, Hammerstein, has become a wealthy businessman, but is constantly belittled by his former friend, who refers to Hammerstein’s success as ‘kike’s luck’. This flagrant anti-Semitism doesn’t let up, and is never resolved adequately. Resentful of his friend’s prejudices, and aware of the fact that Iron Man 2 has been hired by the US military to research new elements, Hammerstein begins his own research into - a gross molestation of the fourth wall - the ‘Rockwell Scale’.

Whilst Iron Man 2 is busy researching and fucking, Hammerstein and Vanko form an alliance in order to undermine the security of the nation, as well as get one over on that bully Iron Man 2! However, with the aid of a British Intelligence Agent, Jarvis (Paul Bettany), Iron Man 2 manages to discover and synthesise a new element: Iron. In a very convoluted piece of exposition, it becomes clear that it was in fact Iron Man 1 who first discovered Iron, but couldn’t discover it because the technology wasn’t available at the time, or something – LOL, I’m obviously not smart enough to understand this! But, wait – Romanoff steals the plan that Iron Man 2 made for Iron, and takes it to Hammerstein and Vanko, who (with the vast resources of Hammerstein and the genetic knowledge of Vanko (because apparently knowledge is passed genetically (well, it is with Monarch butterflies, anyway))) manage to synthesise a weaker version of the new element, which, in case you’ve forgotten, is called Iron.

Iron Man 2

At the American Expo, which was a national event held in the Cold War Times to show the might of the USA, Iron Man 2 gets ready to show everyone his new element, Iron, not knowing that Hammerstein and Vanko plan on exposing their own, cheaper version of the element. There is a scene showing that Hammerstein and Vanko plan on making the element available to the masses, whereas Iron Man 2 intends on allowing use of it for military applications alone.

When the expo gets in full swing, both parties reveal their hands. There is mass confusion, but Iron Man 2 arrogantly strides across to the Hammerstein-Vanko synthesised unit and administers the only test that has been proven to show the strength of Iron... the Rockwell Scale. Hammerstein is aghast that his own scientific method is being applied against him, and it is at this point that Vanko reveals he has sold vast quantities of the Hammerstein-Vanko synthesised Iron to the USSR, blame being immediately placed onto the new Lieutenant Colonel; at the same time Romanoff discovers the corpse of Jarvis, who Iron Man 2 has killed after the successful creation of Iron, repeating the sin of his father, Iron Man 1, who had killed the original Venko. And, with the uncertainty of world security, unanswered questions, and multiple plot holes the film ends.

But does it? After the credits finish there is a sequence showing the discovery of the Nordic God Thor’s Iron hammer in the desert – wait, what the fuck?

Conclusion:

The fact that they still make films that pit the West against the East makes me as sick as a paraplegic being ordered to swim the breadth of the English Channel to save the lives of his three children.

Positive: Good fun

Negative: A bit too irony

Best line: Iron Man 2 [to Romanoff]: “Don’t just look at it – eat it.”

Out of ten: FIVE ()

It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) – Frank Capra

Introduction

No it’s not. Life is flatulence that eventually fades away, sometimes making walls darker, but on the whole being nothing but a memory of something that kind of once was but isn’t anymore. And nobody who was around at the time is alive to remember. But... watching Jimmy Stewart run around like a kid with too many chromosomes going in for a cuddle makes you feel like, at least for two-odd hours, you are vicariously leading one.

Frank Kafka

It’s a Wonderful Life is cinematic altruism: a Dickensian piece of life affirmation that, I must admit, makes me weep when I see it. I don’t know if it’s the empathy I feel for Jimmy’s everyman George Bailey, or just how fucking sentimental it is, but it gets me. And if it gets me, then it gets you too, and you’re nothing but a liar if you say it doesn’t. A no-good, lonely liar.

Characters:

The fabulous Mr. Stewart plays George Bailey in this capitalist reimagining of the story of Job. Rather than losing everything, however, and still being expected to worship a God who doesn’t give a shit, Bailey gives everything and, in essence, questions why good things don’t happen to him. Or do they?

They do at the end of the film when all of the people he has helped throughout his life pull through and – BETTER LATE THAN FUCKING NEVER - help him. However, there is no particular accolade to this; Bailey is rewarded not in the sense of posterity, or being immortalised, like his brother who is a war hero, or Sam Wainwright, his successful counterpart. No, Bailey’s reward is as humble as his own generosity.

Plot:

The film, on the one hand, is typically American – it expounds the virtues of prudent capitalism, saving money, and the independent, small entrepreneur, whilst emphasising the importance of community spirit and charity. Bailey is arguably hard-done-by, having dedicated his life to ensuring the fulfilment of other’s dreams and ambitions, which is, on the surface of it, a very sad story. However, through abandoning his own lofty aspirations and ideologies he is taught that life can be just as fulfilling without them.

On the other hand, it’s a grim tale of a man who, through Catholic guilt, is pushed to the brink of bankruptcy and works out that due to the system he is within is worth more dead than alive. It takes an angel to talk him out of it. Mr. Potter, who is the antagonist of the film, gets no comeuppance, and I can only assume he lives a long and satisfying life.

So, there are two strange concepts working against one another here. The majority of the film doesn’t bother with all the holy stuff, and it only actually comes into play in, like the last thirty minutes. I find the intervention of the supernatural very, very, very depressing:

Cage improvised many lines and actions

Bailey, throughout his life, had struggled to subside, ensuring that his brother, extended family, peers, colleagues and lovers all got what they wanted, generally at his expense. He also worked tirelessly to ensure that the community was offered a fair domiciliary plan, creating a bank that loans out more money that it brings in, and constructing high-quality houses so that all of the residents can avoid the clutches of the monopolist, Mr. Potter. During this, he finds the time to court and marry a woman, have three fucking children, and renovate a very old property that he himself has aided in the disrepair of.

Oh, wait, of course he also saves his brother’s life, reinvigorates his father’s industry, wins the Second World War by killing Hitler, and develops Keynesian economics.

So, it pisses me off that, when his backwards, unproductive, absent-minded uncle (who was obviously only hired due to nepotism) loses eight-fucking-grand, Bailey, who has defeated every obstacle from smallpox to HIV, contemplates suicide and is only saved when a fucking angel intervenes. What? Really?

REALLY?

I’ve watched a man, for around an hour and forty-five minutes, struggle to come to terms with his own existence, succeed, but only to be thwarted by a stupid relative. And then, in the last fifteen minutes, or something, an angel swoops in and God takes the credit. That’s not fair.

Okay, I get that he needed to be ‘reminded’ of his own worth and all of that, but I would have found it a lot more interesting to see him work all of that out for himself, or through the plethora of selfish cunts that he’d helped over the years. Oh, again, they come in at the last fucking minute to help him out with his crippling financial situation. Oh, get the fu -

Conclusion:

I can’t criticise this film, because it elicits an emotional response from me. It works. It’s a perfect film in a lot of ways, because it asks nothing of the viewer and merely gives. I like that. It’s a Wonderful Life is the acceptable face of capitalism.

Herzog with an AK-47

Nevertheless, I would HEART to see Werner Herzog do a version of it.

“LOL? Wat?”

I didn’t expect you to understand. Herzog’s recent reimagining of the nihilist classic ‘Bad Lieutenant’ took what was originally a tale about the Catholic road to redemption and turned it into an existentialist journey, where no redemption or justice could be found. What was in effect a story about Harvey Keitel suffering from severe guilt over his amoral behaviour and attempting to find salvation was turned on its head, with Nic Cage playing a crooked cunt with absolutely no morals, and no need for salvation.

Now, if Mr. Herzog could get his hands on the often contested rights to It’s a Wonderful Life, remove the pseudo-Christian perspective, I would be very interested to see the result...  

Positive: Touching, universal, Jimmy Stewart, brilliant

Negative: Actually, nothing – not even the religious aspect is particular preachy

Best line: Clarence: “Clarence!”

Bailey: “Clarence. Clarence.”

Out of ten: NINE ()