Films

I'm a little behind the times. I saw Face Off last night. Why would you put two of the biggest names in the film industry (Travolta + Cage), in such a fucking shite film, regardless of whether you thought they are any good?
 
Looking forward also to Tinker, Tailor although slightly apprehensive as loved the television series. Also looking forward to Ides Of March as when Clooney is 'being serious' he's very good.
 
Where can we review new tv series? If you're expecting The Body Farm (BBC) with Tara Fitzgerald and Keef Allen to be interesting, buy a Lee Child thriller now. There seemed to be a confusion with the duties of detective and forensics work (not for the first time), and a body farm with a lab. Confused, and idiotic - two scrotes were supposed to have died in an explosion in a small room, which had been attractively decorated with gobbets of Kensington Gore, representing the goo to which they'd been reduced. But by heck, Everest are making some windows these days - not so much as a crack in the pane. Overall, its debut was a pain in the crack.
 
I wasn't too taken with it either, Kri. Found myself waiting on cats, who normally have to wait if I'm watching something interesting. Ended up looking for a book in the final 10 minutes.
 
Anything with Keith Allen is a no in my book, but I don't understand how they can make this and yet say they cannot afford to make any more of Waking The Dead? Even with Trevor Eve over ranting it was well worth watching.

The Killing - Danish version, last two episodes tonight - has been gripping. I was glad to hear they will be screening the second series 'in the autumn' (which should be now as far as I am concerned), and filming on series 3 on going.
 
On the subject of tranplant type themes in films/tv programmes there was a brilliant childrens tv series called Pig Heart Boy in the late 1990's [I understand it was re shown a few years ago but has never been released for sale]. As for The Killing..I've never been so absorbed by a tv series; even left a play I'd paid to see half way through on the night the last episode was shown [I could have watched it when it was repeated later in the week] because I had to see it. I think @ 70% of the population watched the last episode when it was shown in Denmark. Pre video recorders we went home part way through a works Christmas do to see the last episode of Love for Lydia.
 
Funnily enough, the US version of The Killing finishes on C4 tonight. It started out almost as a facsimile of the original, but there's been some interesting deviations over the second half of the season.

I enjoyed the original a lot, although I thought there were a few too many twists and turns; it got a bit silly at times. Some great moments though.
 
Typically they clash in the schedules as I watched a couple of episodes of the US version before I discovered the Danish version. I very rarely buy DVDs but may have to buy the Danish set and watch it all again. Agree there have been perhaps too many twists, but they have kept the story going really well. I feel a big hole in the plot before the last two episodes so am dying to find out how they get round it.
 
The total quality of the original le carre stuff on BBC was amazing. I missed chunks of it and have now taken to watching on youtube. Its even better than I remember. It should be compulsory viewing for actctors , writers and cameramen.

Thanks for the link Gareth!
 
Can't wait either, G-G. I was riveted by the Danish version but found the US one not different enough. The corny sweater and the gloomy Seattlescape seemed to be too much of an attempt to parallel the original, even if it was acted well.

I gave up on the latter parts of Waking the Dead because it just got more and more hokey - but I suppose everything starts out with its own hook and then looks same-old after a few series. Trevor Eve was just bonkers too often and was a major distraction for me from the storylines. But, spot on, how can the Beeb produce The Body Farm (why do I keep trilling "Ohhh, Body Fa-arm, Body Farm for yoooo"?) it could certainly have kept WTD. Can't figure out the logic there.
 
Oddly I thought the last episode was the worst of the series. Unfortunately for me I am sad git and analyze everything and there were actually two horrendous holes in the plot, but I still loved it and can't wait for series 2.
 
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Anybody seen the Danish film Hanna? Virgin's FilmFlex analysis makes it sound daft, but I've read a v.g. review which makes it sound intriguing in its premise. (Ex-CIA father teaches daughter to become an assassin, among snowdrifts and reindeer.)
 
Tinker, Tailor doesn't disappoint.

Try and watch it at a cinema where the audience aren't expecting car chases and exploding cigars though.
 
On the subject of daft storylines, I finally managed to read the Time Travelers Wife [after several attempts because I found the whole concept so impausable] and watched the dvd which had received awful reviews. Didn't think they could have done a better job; a tad chickflick'ish but it is, in the main, a love story [not usually my cup of tea being a somewhat unromantic kinda gal] similar to Benjamin Button [which I also loved].
 
Thanks for that, Moe and Bets. I haven't been in a cinema for about five years, mostly due to the smell of foodstuffs brought in, and the muttered observations of audience members. There's no better turn-off of seeing people sitting down to a lovely, romantic dinner on screen and getting a whiff of someone's hot-caramel-buttered-popcorn to spoil the image. Or some spoiler whispering, "Yeah, this is the bit where his ex-wife comes in and chucks his soup over him." Thanks, pal. Next time I'll save the entrance fee and just ask you for a scene-by-scene free report.

So, much as I used to like cinemas, now that the majority of folks can't get by without feeding their faces every 15 minutes, I'll probably pass on that experience and wait for it to hit tv, Bets. I do like the sound of exploding cigars - Corky the Cat isn't involved as well, is he? :lol:
 
We're so lucky; no popcorn at our cinema [fantastic restaurant downstairs] and all people take in with them is a cappuccino or a glass of wine. The most noise you'll ever hear is me unwrapping a throat sweet because I always get a tickly cough when I go to the cinema. Won't be able to see Trollhunter there, though, as they don't do 3D. Saw Project Nim last week which made me rather ashamed to be a human [not for the first time].
 
PROJECT NIM:

Tells the story of a chimpanzee taken from its mother at birth and raised like a human child by a family in a brownstone on the upper West Side in the 1970s.
 
betsmate said:
Tinker, Tailor doesn't disappoint.

Try and watch it at a cinema where the audience aren't expecting car chases and exploding cigars though.
Click to expand...

Or do what I did - sit in the front row of a state of the art screen and it's like there is no audience.

A truly wonderful film.
 
Nim was taken from his mother at a very young age. Lived with a hippy type family [was even breast fed] where he was taught sign language so he could communicate with them. After a few years when he became big and dangerous [and he'd bitten a few people..chimps have 5 times the strength of a human] he was put in a research laboratory and made to live in a cage [with diagrams of how to sign to him on the wall; to see him make the sign for 'hug me' was heartbreaking]. Eventually moved to a rescue centre that knew nothing of chimp needs or behaviour and, thankfully a guy from the research place showed them what he needed. Other chimps were moved in to keep him company, but he still died at 26, a relatively young age for a chimp. The man who set up the experiment [and it was just that, an experiment to see if chimps could learn language] pretty much washed his hands of him when the experiment was over. Film was made by the same people who did Man on Wire. As they pointed out in the film, the experiment to teach him to 'talk' didn't really work, but they also taught him to love, and then took that love away from him. Always amazed at how they find the archive footage for this type of film; it so took me back to my hippy days.
 
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Thanks, Colin/Moe - aha, I had read the review of this but forgotten the name of the film to match to it! I suppose because the ending is semi-acceptable (chimp rescued from loveless, contactless life), I might end up watching it. Anything where the words 'animal' and 'experiment' are used generally has me head for the hills, because there's usually a poor outcome for the animal.
 
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