Shan-12 Reviews

The Siege (1998)

Lame

[2/10 · 5 June 1999]

You would be hard pressed to make a film much worse than this. All that seems to be happening is that the FBI, CIA and the Army seem to continuously be arresting each other. Bruce Willis got a well deserved Golden Raspberry award for his part in this film and as Denzel Washington is a good actor but he has a remarkable talent for choosing to appear in crap. Everyone else doesn't really rate much of a mention. Everything crawls towards an unsatisfactory conclusion and by the end, you're just glad it's all over.

The Truman Show (1998)

Not that bad but Not that good - or even more than marginally original either

[5/10 · 5 June 1999]

Back in 1990, at about 3pm I was watching an episode of The Twilight Zone where a man had caught someone removing a hidden camera from the wall in his house. This leads to a series of discoveries, such that he is on a television station dedicated solely to showing him and everything he does, 24 hours a day. Furthermore, he finds his life has been manipulated, they have set him up with a better job and even his marriage and so on - stop me if you heard any of this before. Obviously on a smaller scale but close to identical, the difference being he has benefitted as much as he has lost out in the invasion of privacy, maybe even more, thereby leading to an intriguing and enigmatic ending.

This in itself isn't a problem really. However, there are problems in this film. The foremost one is that, as with any long running enterprise of any kind, it when things go wrong, it's quite believable that they occur in a cluster.

It is not believable that for such a long running and highly controlled operation as The Truman Show that the operators would miss Truman's father getting back on the set AND him finding people waiting "off stage" where there should have a lift AND not having anything prepared if Truman were to ever want to see what his wife does at work (what, no contigency plan written a long time ago, only something thrown together at the last minute that only just works?) AND the policeman at the "nuclear accident" by name AND the truly clumsy fashion cars block his attempts to leave which might as well scream TRUMAN, you're living in a dome and we're all watching you on TV.

Yes, things would go wrong and almost inevitably a whole lot at once somewhere along the way but it's hard to believe the operators would be so inept so many times in succession over such a short period of time. The script falls down in clumsily presenting these scenes instead alternatively, have things that don't fit together perfectly (the people setting it up only work there, Truman is living it every day and would spot things they wouldn't) but are more subtle with Truman picking them up piece by piece and eventually working things out that way. Becoming gradually aware over time in a much more gradual and subtle fashion than the way that happens.

Ed Harris is excellent and the way (to Truman) his voice looks like it is literally coming down from the heavens is great. Jim Carrey and the rest of the cast do quite well in the acting department.

Of course, just to extrapolate from the ending knowing big business the show could go on after the end: imagine the interviews with Christof, the following and documenting of Truman in the outside world, tours of the dome, even the sale of houses inside it. Inevitably the selection of another child and starting the thing again. There'd still be money in it all.

So anyway, just remember, not bad but could have been better and don't whatever you do call it original, almost exactly the same thing has been done maybe as much as 10 years ago or more.

Addicted to Love (1997)

Not that I'm saying the outcome is predictable but ...

[5 June 1999]

A guy and a girl whose respective boyfriend/girlfriend have dumped them and taken up with each other, plot together to break them up so they can each get them back. Could there be the possibility that along the way, they could end up falling for each other instead? Well do you think?

True Lies (1994)

Not James Cameron's finest moment

[5 June 1999]

It is quite an achievement that after traversing no less than 6 horror films in the golden age of the 80's, (amongst which some of the most exploitive films where women were concerned were made), it wasn't until this film that she was made to look like, well I hate to say it, a slut.

After traversing 2 Halloween films, Prom Night, The Fog, Terror Train and Road Games as a strong character who felt no need to take her clothes off for spurious reasons, or at all actually, she frequently fought killers including the supernatural Michael Myers to a standstill in many of these films. She really is not made to look very good in this film in a long horribly misogynistic scene that serves no purpose to the storyline.

Suddenly hearing something that makes him suspect that his wife might be having an affair, he then spends the next 45 minutes trying to catch her out. Just one point, what about THE BOMB? Hello, the stolen ATOMIC bombs that they're supposed to be finding? And those terrorists they're supposed to be apprehending ?? Instead Arnold's character spends a ridiculous amount of time and men and equipment trying to catch her out committing adultery.

Eventually even the terrorists find this silly (or are a bit upset at being ignored for so long) and put a stop to things, getting the film back on track but it truly is a ridiculous (and far too long) sequence.

Some other stuff like a gun being dropped down a set of stairs and somehow shooting a whole bunch of people doesn't wash either and mystifyingly Chartlon Heston disappears as quickly as he appears. Things pick up towards the finale but it's too little, too late.

Just a note: One of my uncle's cousins, who was the Sri Lankan ambassador to France is married to another film director, who was on the same Cannes judging panel as Jamie Lee Curtis a few years ago and they're still good friends. What does this have to do with anything? Nothing really but I just thought I'd share that with you all. It doesn't improve my chances of meeting her or anything like that.

Six Days Seven Nights (1998)

With previews like these ...

[3 June 1999]

Harrison Ford (who should have known better) and Anne Heche are flying from (a) to (b) and crash. They run in to some pirates who they must obviously evade and equally obviously fall for each other along the way after initially hating each other. Meanwhile, back at (a) or (b), their respective girlfriend/boyfriend are cheating on them with each other. You can get all this from the preview, so why bother watching the film? There really is no point as everything you need to know is there as well as a very good impression of what to expect - which is not very much. The best thing to do is rent another film with a preview for this one. That's all you'll ever need to see of this one. Probably too much actually.

As for all the drama over the casting of Anne Heche, well the whole point about acting is continually being something you're not in real life. The whole motion picture industry is all supposed to be make believe, isn't it?

Zaat (1971)

The film is a bad enough joke. Why make it worse?

[1/10 · 16 May 1999]

O.K, own up! Who gave it 10?

Sometimes you have to ask yourself, why bother making a film, let alone watching it? This would easily fall into that category. Dreadful in all respects.

Cat's Eye (1985)

A surprisingly good adaptation of Stephen King.

[7/10 · 29 December 1998]

A movie divided into three parts, each separate story linked by the passage of a cat through it. The first two parts (Quitters' Incorporated and The Ledge) are well done adaptations of two short stories that are amongst Stephen King's best writing. Admittedly, they read better (you can find them both in the Night Shift collection) because a lot has to do with what the characters are thinking, which you can't really do on screen. However, they come about as close as possible here. The third part of the movie, I think is written specifically for the movie and wraps things up nicely. Well worth seeing.

The Night Flier (1997)

Once again, a case of reading the book (in Nightmares and Dreamscapes)

[2/10 · 26 December 1998]

Would have better strengthened considerably by making it as a

50 minute episode of the Outer Limits. Too much superfluous material and stuff like the chief bad guy looking like he'd escaped from The Phantom of the Opera didn't help. The whole 'Night of the Living Dead' sequence was extremely silly and quite unnecessary. After all, if the dead were to punish anyone for their sins, now remind me exactly who was killing everyone again?

Warlock: The Armageddon (1993)

How to use your VCR as a tool of torture ...

[1/10 · 26 December 1998]

Well, after setting the cause of CGI graphics back years, this woeful film has to be the first time Satan has been defeated by a set of truck headlights...

The Hills Have Eyes Part II (1984)

... and they went blind after seeing this.

[2/10 · 26 December 1998]

Things I hate about sequels include discovering previously unknown (and unheard of) brothers of the main villain killed in the previous film. I also dislike films that dismiss the previous one as a dream. Guess what, this did both of them! Or at least more inventively, the survivors of the first film had flogged the story of the first film and then admit to the new members of the cast that 'it actually happened and to us and that's why were in trouble because we decided to shortcut through the same bit of desert and got stuck'. Oh dear. Of further interest is the blind girl amongst the characters, being blind obviously improves your survival chances manyfold. At the start, one of the survivors of part 1 is telling his psychiatrist why he can't go back to the desert and then promptly disappears for the rest of the film. Smart man ...

The Specialist (1994)

Disaster Area

[2/10 · 25 December 1998]

Never has the one film made so many past and future Oscar nominees and winners look so stupid. Even the brilliant James Woods, who fights hard but even he can't save this junk. A note to Sylvester Stallone: Why is it that you have to tediously play the same role in every film, even when it doesn't fit? He's always the decent 'good' man who is wronged by everyone else and who always does the right thing. WAKE UP! Your character in this film was a government assassin. AN EVIL, EVIL man who blew people up for money. So, having him suddenly discover a conscience because a young girl is in the car they're about to zap is especially puke-worthy. It's not like he didn't know what he's been doing all these years. This problem is all the more so in that crap-fest Assassins, where he also killed people for money. So, in this film and that one especially, why didn't you play it as such and drop all the really sickening moralising O.K?

Greedy (1994)

This is an important film for the whole family to see.

[25 December 1998]

This is an important film for the whole family to see. Not because it's a work of art, because it isn't. However, the warning that this film is trying to give is that greed can be all consuming (In this case, trying to get Kirk Douglas's money). It shows how even the best of people can slowly be perverted into doing things that they normally would not. Not all at once but in stages, creeping up on them before they fully realise it. This is obviously most noticeable in Michael J Fox's character, being the central one but it's important to look at the others. Phil Hartman's is the most purely after the money from the start but the others range in increasing degrees with the amount of doubt about their motives and show some conscience before it is overriden by their stronger desire for money, even to the point of not following decent human behaviour that they normally wouldn't otherwise. Worth watching because there are many lessons to be learned and a couple of nice twists. Keeps you wrong-footed (quite literally) until the very end.

The Alchemist (1983)

It's a shame this film couldn't make itself disappear.

[1/10 · 25 December 1998]

Apparently, this film sat on a shelf for 4 years before being released. Not long enough I say ...

Bachelor Party (1984)

Regardless of what you think of the film as a whole ...

[7/10 · 25 December 1998]

... this has one of the funniest scenes of all time involving a car

sun roof. Crude, rude and highly vulgar but still hysterically funny.

Frightmare (1974)

Terrible!

[2/10 · 24 December 1998]

This film is utterly vile and should not be watched by anyone. It shouldn't have been made either but there's not much we can do about that now. Ends at a point when things were potentially going to get interesting, given that half a dozen people had disappeared in the same place and you'd think someone would come and look, thereby rumbling the evil fiends

in this film. (Though unfortunately not the director and scriptwriter)

Kalifornia (1993)

If it's not good enough for the lead actor ...

[2/10 · 23 December 1998]

In an interview, David Duchovny said he hasn't been able to watch even the first hour of this film - and neither should you. The scene where he asks the owner of a house where a murder was committed if he can look around - change the name he gives and he could had lifted his performance from just about any episode of the X-Files. He's on autopilot for the whole film. Brad Pitt overacts appallingly.

Children of the Corn (1984)

Two problems with Stephen King adaptions

[1/10 · 23 December 1998]

1) When they add or change material from the source novel or short story.

2) When they don't add or change material from the source novel or short story.

This is one of the latter and shows the danger of stretching a 20 or so page story to an hour and a half. Oh yes, it was pretty terrible too. (1/10)

Species II (1998)

You can't say that you didn't know what you're getting, can you?

[22 December 1998]

The first film ripped off A for Andromeda. This suspiciously sounds like the Incredible Melting Man. The mere (sharp) drop in the quality of the film xeroxed should be warning enough.

Species (1995)

Based on a highly original idea - Just not theirs.

[3/10 · 22 December 1998]

The fact that space is so vast and would be so difficult to traverse, the idea of sending radio signals to the target civilisation, so that they can assemble something that can present a message/launch an invasion (trojan horse) whatever was a highly original one and quite a radical new idea - when used by the BBC in A for Andromeda IN 1961. (It even pre-dates Dr Who). This movie shamlessly rips this off right down to the fact that a hybrid alien/female human is produced from the information. I'm surprised they weren't sued (though I did hear there was legal action about something). The movie is quite terrible after a promising first half and Forest Whitaker gives one of the worst performances of all time. The logic of the film is suspect, how does a thousand soldiers from the base manage to be in the all the places, the escaping Sil is not at the start and why do you need to get the bunch of no hopers in this film who had nothing to do with the project to find her. Why not just use the army who are trained to do it - or even the Federal Marshals. This lot would be the last on any list? Worst of all, the end of the film seems to just be that of the film post-production party where everyone goes to get drunk and tries to bonk each other. Everyone in this film has done much better work elsewhere and couldn't sink any lower (at least until I saw Natasha Henstridge in Maximum Risk). Woeful.

The X Files (1998)

Fight the Franchise!

[2/10 · 21 December 1998]

This movie was little more than two episodes tacked together. Two not very good ones at that. The first half of the film was just a complete rehash of the bee episode and the second half was just a poor rip-off of Alien. I couldn't see where the money went either. To confuse the issue further, one of the guys from Millennium gets blown up, except he wasn't playing his Millennium character (wouldn't it have made sense to have used someone else?). Also I am sick and tired of Scully continually not seeing crucial evidence that could convince her that Mulder is possibly sometimes right (as we know he is 99% of the time at least). I mean, this time a spaceship the size of Kansas is overhead for at least a minute and yet somehow she's looking into the ice until the instant it disappers, then she looks up. Stupid, isn't it, how something like that happens every single time like clockwork? A horrible movie but maybe there's hope. After all, the first Star Trek was hopeless but they got better after that.

Vampires (1998)

If you like this sort of thing, you should also see ...

[20 December 1998]

If you like this sort of thing, you should also see the six part TV series by the British Channel 4, Ultraviolet. Easily the best take on humans vs vampires in the modern era and much better than all the movies on the same theme. I don't know where you could get a copy but at least keep an eye out for repeats in the UK/AUS and I guess cable channels in the US. Another in a long line of, it's not how much money you spend but the quality of the writing and performances of an excellent cast.

Blade (1998)

If you like this sort of thing, you should also see ...

[20 December 1998]

If you like this sort of thing, you should also see the six part TV series by the British Channel 4, Ultraviolet. Easily the best take on humans vs vampires in the modern era and much better than all the movies on the same theme. I don't know where you could get a copy but at least keep an eye out for repeats in the UK/AUS and I guess cable channels in the US. Another in a long line of, it's not how much money you spend but the quality of the writing and performances of an excellent cast.

Air Force One (1997)

The Worst Action Film of the Year (Any Year)

[2/10 · 13 December 1998]

This film was just awful. What made it worse was that it was crudely cobbled together from a lot of other films. The escape pod from Escape from New York. The plane to plane transfer from Cliffhanger. Even the 'strangle the bad guy with his parachute, break his neck and kick him out of the plane' is almost a complete carbon copy of a scene from Drop Zone. Then when Air Force One crashes, it looks like a scene from a bad video game, the effects are that bad. You expect the words Game Over to appear. The film conveniently ignores political reality (Kazakhstan has 40% Russian citizens and lots of Russian soldiers, they couldn't and wouldn't do this. As for the speech at the start where the President says the right moral thing - when was the last time you saw that happen?). At the end of a preview screening in Sydney, someone yelled out "That was garbage" - and people applauded.