Harry Potter 6

When I saw my first instalment of the Harry Potter Franchise 6 years ago (Chamber of Secrets - as I hadn't read the books when the first one came out) I would never have believed that the release of a new Potter film would have me so excited. Chris Columbus' original two films are dire affairs, full of inconsequential Potterverse tit-bits from the books and borderline dreadful acting from the child leads. 3 films on and the prospect of a new Potter is an event in my calendar. As the books got longer the films have got shorter, with scriptwriters who were prepared to cut out all the fluff and directors who understood how to create drama on a screen the last three Potter films were genuinely good fantasy fiction movies.

So what of Harry Potter 6? This was my least favourite of the books due to lack of plot or anything of any consequence happening (and don't yell 'Dumbledore' at me - it's all just a set-up for book 7). On screen though, I found myself rather enjoying what was ostensibly the same story. Even though I was still confused by many elements of the Potter 'arc' plot (for example why is the fact that Snape turns out to be the Half Blood prince relevant in the slightest? Why does Ginny insist that Harry hide the Half Blood Prince's potion book?), it was everything else that made me enjoy myself. The teen angst will-they-wont-they subplot - which would normally be tedious and irritating - is handled with humour and makes the characters endearing and interesting, which ultimately made me care about what was happening despite my reservations.

Those reservations were in fact many. The scene in which Harry and Dumbledore fight creatures from the deep doesn't work for some reason - maybe because I couldn't get it out of my head that it was nowhere near as good as Gandalf on the bridge of Khazad-dûm. The behaviour of Harry at the end when Snape confronts Dumbledore is totally out of character (and in fact a change from the book which really doesn't work).

Ultimately though the good parts outweighed the plot holes. Rupert Grint is turning into a really good actor, the more comic stuff that they give him to do the better as he's rather good at it. Whether he's bigging himself up as a goalkeeper or desperately trying to unentangle himself from his accidental girlfriend, the lad's got good timing and it papers nicely over the film's many downsides. Add that to some quite spectacular special effects (Death Eaters flying through the streets of London at the start and - my favourite - the fluid and slightly out-of-focus style that is used when Harry watches Tom Riddle's childhood memory of Dumbledore's visit to the orphanage) and I find myself unable to complain. It may of course be a case of the producers covering up the lack of plot substance with comic filler, but the sixth book is only a holding pattern for the big finish in book seven anyway - so it's difficult to think of what they could have done to make it better.

I suspect that die-hard Potter fans will love it regardless, I enjoyed myself despite really not expecting to.

One final aside. There were very few children in the cinema where I saw the film. Perhaps the dark material of the later books is becoming a little too much for the under 10s out there and parents are keeping their kids away? Hopefully by the time 'Deathly Hallows part 2' comes out it'll be a 15 certificate.

Revenge of the Nerds

So I recorded this using my new-fangled 'Sky +' machine the other day. This is a film I've heard about lots of times. Apparently it was brought out as part of a wave of teen / adolescent comedy capers that came out during the early 1980s. So although it isn't quite the original frat boy slacker comedy, it certainly comes close. As such I kind of felt obliged to give it a watch.

Revenge of the Nerds has a very simple plot. A pair of geeky (yet worldly-wise) students move into their new university and are immediately harassed by the jocks of the local frat house Alpha Beta, mainly for the simply reason that they're nerds. They band together with other nerds, form their own fraternity and proceed to do battle with the Alpha Betas until everyone discovers their own inner nerd and lives happily ever after. Despite being a little misogynistic in places, it's actually a fairly funny film despite itself. This might have something to do with the cast; a group of unknowns at the time, but people who have gone on to have big careers (Anthony Edwards of ER, Timothy Busfield of West Wing and John Goodman of numerous Hollywood films). John Goodman in particular stars in a hilarious moment in which he leads his American Football team - full of frat house jocks - in an inspirational chant before sending them off to the showers to change. As they run off he declares with impeccable timing "Damn, we forgot to practice."

Not a classic, but funny enough to make the 80 minute investment worthwhile.

Once Upon A Time In America

I really object to long films. Not because I get bored or start thinking about other things while I'm watching, but because before I watch a film I'm not sure that I'm going to like I can't bring myself to dedicate 3 or more hours of my life. It is for this reason that I have been putting off watching 'Once Upon a Time in America' for so long. This is a film which is the best part of 4 hours long, a film that has an intermission built into it, a film which I'd rather not bother with unless I know I'm going to like it.

I picked a lazy Friday evening on which I had nothing else to do, sat down with my dinner and stuck the DVD in the Xbox. 150 minutes later, when the first DVD ran out, I decided to give up and finish it off on Saturday morning. Rather than seeing an epic of American Mafia history that even dwarfed The Godfather, what I got was an excruciatingly slow-moving tale of growing up in a world where robberies, alcohol trafficking and prostitution are all the norm. This is a world where young lads steal money off of drunks in the street and queue up to have sex with under-aged prostitutes. Not a nice place to be. However rather than setting the scene and developing a story, the film gets bogged down with 'meaningful' shots and knowing looks between characters. They really needed to cut a lot of this supposedly atmospheric stuff out, because I don't think it adds any tension.

I felt that the film played out in a fairly unimaginative way. There are the usual highs and lows; but rather than taking me along for the ride, I felt very little for the characters and their stories. Without that I guess there isn't really much else.

This was a real disappointment for me. As a huge fan of De Niro and mafia films in general, I was hoping for a lot more. It also didn't help me cure my aversion to long films; it's going to be a long time before I sit down to another 240mins of cinema.

Che - Part 1

I'm a bit of a Leftie. Well when I say bit of a leftie I actually mean that I'm a massive Communist - not one of those Social Workers Party, newspaper-selling, slogan-screaming, endlessly dissecting Marx, destroying conversations by insisting that "class is what it's all about!" types - but definitely a red nonetheless. I owned a poster of Che Guevara when I was a student - not exactly original I'll grant you, but it's the kind of thing you've got to do if you're going to be a socialist at University. I think it's in the induction pamphlet somewhere.

Anyway, the scene is now set for you. As a Leftie I doubted that I would have much trouble enjoying a film about Che Guevara - the man (in case you don't know) who was instrumental in the Cuban revolution of the late 1950s and became a worldwide symbol of revolution, struggle against oppression and resistance. He also became a symbol of terror and tyranny for those who didn't agree with his politics. So who is most likely to make a film about his life? Those who adore him or those who hate him? You don't have to watch Che for very long to work out that it's the former who are behind this film - phew!

This film is part 1 and concentrates on Che's involvement in the Cuban revolution. We see him leading troops in battle, conducting military tribunals, treating injured soldiers and organising local people. He argues loudly about not interfering with peasants, about respecting the local people. He frets about the fact that he is not Cuban and dutifully carries out a multitude of tasks assigned to him by Fidel Castro - including those he feels are beneath him - without complaint. Generally, the film presents Che as one of the nicest guys in the world; he's also intelligent, articulate and just.

The film is interesting in that it told me a lot about Che's life during the revolution, and indeed the revolution as a whole (assuming that the film is largely true of course). I'm kind of expecting part 2 to be much less reverential towards him, kind of like part 1 is setting him up for a big fall when things start to go wrong. If certainly hope it is, because as much as I admire what Guevara did and what he stood for I'm certain he couldn't have been that much of a paragon. The film kind of looses credibility by treating him with too much reverence, which is a shame as there is a lot of good stuff in it.

Looking forward to part 2 now, should be in the post as I write.

The Reader

Here's my first review of a film seen on a plane. Not much different from other reviews, apart from the fact that they decided to reset the entertainment system 5 minutes from the end so I had to fast forward through the whole thing to finish it.

Anyway, The Reader is the film for which Kate Winslet won an Oscar for best actress. I am a bit fan of Winslet, she's a down-to-earth lass who comes from my local area and has put in a fair few awesome performances. Now she finally has the Hollywood accolade she deserves. As a result I was expecting something pretty spectacular from her in The Reader.

Winslet's character is a lonely woman living in German in the 1950s who has a romantic summer encounter with local teenager Michael Berg. She seems to be a woman of contradictions, eager to keep her own company yet at the same time yearning to spend time with this youth. The boy reads to her and then they have sex - this is their relationship. As the story moves on a few years, the dark secret of Winslet's character is revealed - her involvement with the Nazi regime.

The film is interesting on a number of levels. Firstly there is the reaction of the post-war German population to the knowledge that everyone over the age of about 20 was probably complicit in the Nazis' crimes on some level or another. Secondly there is the nature of the relationship between the two characters. The obviously paedophilic nature of their relationship is never emphasised, maybe this is a comment on the reaction of the German population to the post war situation - in the clamour to blame someone for the Nazis' crimes, other transgressions are perhaps forgotten about.

Thirdly, and for me most importantly, there is Winslet's character herself. She is a study of how ordinary people react during desperate times. This is a woman who was a loner, going nowhere in life. Suddenly she was given a job by the Nazis, suddenly she was important. What would I have done in that situation? How desperate and lonely does someone have to get before they abandon their principles and start looking the other way? If Germany condemns one woman, why not condemn the entire population? As Michael Berg says to his lecturer - "Everybody knew!"

The entire film is about this character's desire for absolution. She wants to be punished for what she did and at the same time her nation is happy to use her as a scapegoat in order to absolve themselves of the same guilt.

Winslet carries this all on her shoulders. With a fantastically understated performance she manages to bear the burden of post-war Germany's Nazi guilt and desire for forgiveness. Needless-to-say, I thought she and the film were brilliant.