Ramblings of a Brit abroad

Get your giant Slurpee and a big bucket of Popcorn, sit down and watch a master craftsman at work. Even though he is pushing 80, Clint Eastwood’s latest film, Gran Torino,  in which he both stars and directs, proves that age does not dull the talent.

Gran Torino is the story of Walt Kowalski, a bigoted Korean War Veteran and ex-Ford factory worker who has seen his Detroit neighbourhood taken over by Asian immigrants. Having recently lost his wife, his family wants him to move from the area and into a retirement community. One night he catches his young next door neighbour, Thao, played by Bee Vang, trying to steal his prized posession, a 1972 Ford Gran Torino as part of a gang initiation. A gang he doesn’t want to join. After he stands up to the gang, Kowalski becomes a hero to the local Hmong immigrants and he strikes up a friendship with the family next door when Thao is forced to work for Kowalski to apologise for attempting to steal the car. A fued develops between Kowalski and the Hmong gang.

I wont go into further detail as it will spoil the story for you, but I will say that this is a film well worth the admission money. Eastwood is great as the gnarly old war veteran with almost every line being delivered through clenched teeth as only Eastwood can. I will guarantee that “Get off my lawn” will become almost as famous as “Go ahead, make my day” in the catalogue of great Eastwood lines. It is a film that explores the relationship between Americans and new immigrants, between the older and younger generations and between the different cultures and ethnicities in the area.

If you like your films to be Politically correct…. do not go and see this. The range of offensive terms for various ethnic groups was pretty big but delivered in such a way that everybody got a taste of it rather than just one particular group. Black, Asian, Hispanic, Polish, Italian and Irish all get a share of the abuse.

There is already awards buzz for this film and early numbers suggest that this could be the surprise hit of the year. I would urge any fan of Eastwood to go and see this and even if you aren’t a big fan, go and see it anyway. You will not be disappointed.

Score 9 out of 10

SEE THIS FILM !!!

Quite simply, this is the funniest thing I have seen at the movies in years. Steve Carrell gives a quite magnificent performance as Maxwell Smart, an analyst and would be Agent 86 for CONTROL fighting the baddies of CAOS led by Terence Stamp as Siegfried. The cast also includes Anne Hathaway as Agent 99 and Dwayne ( The Rock ) Johnson as Agent 23. Also watch out for cameos by James Caan as the President and Bill Murray as Agent 13.

The joy of this film is the sight gags, which not only come thick and fast but are beautifully crafted and executed by Director Peter Segal. I can honestly say that I have not laughed out loud so much in a cinema for a very long time. The film pays tribute to the original TV series from the 60’s and had the good sense to enlist the help of one of the original creators, Mel Brooks, to act as a creative consultant. I am sure this is where many of ther best gags came from. The influence of Brooks can clearly be seen throughout the film. Watch out for for such scenes as the miniature crossbow in the airplane toilet and the laser protected room.

Without spoiling it too much, the good guys win the day, but the big winners will surely be the producers who surely have a monster hit on thier hands.

It’s so good, I may well go and see it again.

Score 10 out of 10. My kind of film

Opening day here in the US was yesterday. We got our tickets online for a 5.30 showing expecting it to be pretty full…… it wasn’t. Choose where you want to sit. There was plenty of choice.

Considering this film was 18 years removed from the last outing, the excellent Last Crusade, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, especially from Harrison Ford, who is, lets face it, no longer of action hero age. This latest Indiana Jones film revolves around crashed aliens, a mythical lost city in the Amazon basin, a completely deranged Prof. Oxley ( well done to John Hurt for a great performance ) plus the usual baddies who this time are communist bent on world domination through mind control. Of course, Denholm Elliot and Sean Connery are both absent but the film does pay them a brief homage. Enter Jim Broadbent as Charles Stanforth, Dean of Students and Karen Allen reprising her role as Marion Ravenwood from Raiders of the lost Ark. Also add to the cast Shia LaBeouf as Mutt Williams, Cate Blanchett as head commie Irina Spalko, and surprisingly, Ray Winstone as McHale, a former colleague of Indiana Jones gone bad.

I wont spoil the rest of the story line but you can probably figure most of it out as you go along with the film. It is pretty much the tried and tested formula from Lucas /Spielberg and although it works, I left the theatre feeling a little short changed. I felt they could have done a little more with it and the end was, I’m afraid, a bit predictable.

I’m sure it wont spoil it for you to learn that Mutt Williams turns out to be the offspring of Indy and Ms.Ravenwood, so rest assured that there is a younger actor to take up the reigns if Mr. Lucas and Mr.Spielberg ever run short of cash… not that it is very likely.

Having said that, if you liked the other 3, then you’ll probably want to see this.

Score 7 out of 10

Well, the first of the big summer blockbusters finally arrived last Friday so we made an opening day visit to Cobb Theaters in Lakeland, Florida. A full house. If there had been standing room, they could have sold that as well. The nice thing about our new Multiplex is that it is all stadium type seating so even if you have a basketball player in a hat in front of you, you still don’t have to miss any of the film. Anyway I digress.

Iron Man is the tale of Tony Stark ( Robert Downey Jr. ), an MIT graduate by the age of 15 and now the worlds foremost weapons developer and manufacturer. Whilst demonstrating his latest weapon in the desert in the Middle East, he is kidnapped and forced to build another weapon for terrorists. Needless to say, that is not what he does and the first Iron Man is created. Now, I don’t want to give anything away, but these are some nice twists in the plot, a little romantic interest with Miss Pepper Potts ( Gwyneth Paltrow ) and great performance by Jeff Bridges as Obidiah Stone, Stark’s No 2 at Stark industries. There is a nice little cameo for Director Jon Favreau, but the star of the film is the special effects. Downey is very believable in the role of Stark and no doubt Audi came up with some major cash as there are vehicles all over the place in the film.

If action / adventure is your bag, then I urge you to go and see this. Although I think it will look pretty good on the small screen when it eventually comes to DVD, the big screen with the Dolby sound system turned up loud definitely added something. I don’t think it will give anything away to say that Iron Man 2 will soon be in production. Oh yes, if you do go and see it, wait out the credits for the final scene. I couldn’t figure out why nobody was moving when the very long credits rolled, but one of the ushers tipped us off that it wasn’t quite finished. He was right !!!

Spend some cash and see this. Rating 8.5 out of 10

Loosely based on the book ” Bringing Down the House” by Ben Mezrich, this is the tale of a bunch of M.I.T. students who take on Vegas at the Blackjack tables. Ben Campbell ( Jim Sturgess ) is a straight A student who needs to raise $300,000 to allow him to attend Harvard Medical School. He is recruited by his Maths professor, Micky Rosa ( Kevin Spacey ) to join his team of card counters who run weekend trips to Vegas. Whilst his initial interest is only to get his tuition money, greed and excitement take over blurring the lines between his life as a student and that of a high rolling weekend gambler. Add to this his smart and sexy teammate, Jill Taylor ( Kate Bosworth ) and he begins to loose control. Although counting cards isn’t illegal, the stakes are high and he attracts the attention of Casino Enforcer, Cole Williams ( Laurence Fishburne ).

This was a really enjoyable film and appeals to teens upwards. This I know as my 16 year old daughter also really liked the film. There were some very good performances from both the main players and from the supporting cast and it gives an outsider a really good view of what Vegas can do to people.

The screenplay is well written and has a very good twist at the end which I shan’t reveal as that would spoil it for you.

Oh well, I guess I’ll have to read the book now and play spot the difference.

Score 8/10

Once again, thanks to those nice people at Netflix, we got to see another movie very soon after its DVD release here in the US.

Now, I quite fancied seeing this on the big screen, but as per usual, never got round to it so we spent yesterday evening in the company of Johnny Depp as Sweeney Todd. He was joined by a large chunk of the “Harry Potter” gang, namely Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman and Timothy Spall. The story revolves around Benjamin Barker, a Barber ( Depp ) who is falsely transported to Australia by Judge Turpin ( Rickman ). He returns to London to gain revenge and reclaim his daughter. He sets up his Barber Shop above the Pie Shop owned by Mrs. Lovett ( Bonham Carter ) and a sinister partnership develops with Mrs. Lovett baking Todd’s victims into meat pies.

This film has Tim Burton written all over it. It is shot in a style similar to Sleepy Hollow which is a drained colour with certain dream sections shot in full colour. Depp gives a Oscar Nominated performance and has a good singing voice. Yes, this is, I believe, the first musical slasher movie. Whilst, I am not usually a fan of musicals, this was strangely watchable, although Mrs. Adams got a little tired of the amount of bloodshed and gave up about half way through. I would recommend this film to an adult audience and especially to those with a stronger constitution.

Watch out for a cameo by Sasha Baron Cohen ( Borat, Ali G ) as Signor Adolfo Pirelli, a character from Todd’s past who meets a particularly grisly end, as do most who cross his path.

Score 8/10

Thanks to the nice people at Netflix, we received a copy of “No Country for Old Men” on the day of it’s DVD release here in the US.

It is the story of a Vietnam Veteran, Llewelyn Moss ( Josh Brolin ) who stumbles across a gun battle in the desert with no survivors. There he discovers a massive haul of heroin and a trail of blood that leads to another body and 2 million dollars in cash. So he decides the best thing he can so is keep it. Big Mistake!!! Hot on his trail is Anton Chiguhr ( Javier Bardem ) in an Oscar winning role, as a psychopathic killer bent on retrieving the case of money by any means. Death and mayhem ensue with Chiguhr dispatching many of his victims with the aid of an air powered abattoir gun and a shotgun with a silencer.

In to the mix comes Sheriff Ed Tom Bell ( Tommy Lee Jones ) who tries to make some sense of the chaos going on around him in this small area of rural Texas, but with little success. All he discovers is bodies.
This is a stripped down crime thriller, expertly crafted by writers/directors Joel and Ethan Coen, with little in the way of camera tricks apart from some spectacular gore, a very strong plot line and great performances, most notably by Brolin and Bardem. The latter quite rightly won the Best Actor in a supporting Role at this year’s Oscars as he gives a performance of a man so detached from real life that he can decide whether someone lives or dies by the toss of a coin.

I would thoroughly recommend this film to anyone as long as the smaller kids are tucked up in bed. And if you tend to not like graphic murders with an awful lot of blood, then you probably shouldn’t watch it either.

Score 9/10