MA Films

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0465430/

Dir. Paul Andrew Williams

This is a British horror/comedy starring Andy Serkis, Reece Sheersmith and Jennifer Ellison. It’s essentially a two-part movie like From Dusk Till Dawn, complete with the abrupt switch in tone. The first section is a bungling crime caper and the second section is a slasher film and while both sections are enjoyable in their own right they don’t quite blend together as a whole.

I discovered, when watching it with the director’s commentary, that a lot of decisions about the structure (notably separating the crime and horror sections of the film) were made during editing; there was even an entire character cut out of the narrative because it wasn’t working. While some of these changes are for the better, which you can see watching the deleted scenes, the harsh separation of the two elements of the film does not feel like it was the best choice. The trailers for the movie, the posters and the DVD case all advertise it as a horror/comedy; keeping the horror out of the film for a long period of time creates an odd impatient for the film to arrive at what appears to be it’s main plotline.

In terms of horror the film is occasionally successful. There is little tension to the piece as a whole because the comedy is mixed so readily with the horror, unlike Shaun of the Dead where comedy occasionally takes a back seat to let the horror and drama work, but there are some moments of unexpected gore and actions that work to disgust the audience. The visual production is fantastic and it’s this that builds the majority of the horrific atmosphere; it complements the sick idea of the farmer who steals faces (even though this idea isn’t communicated as well as it could have been) and is one of the films strengths.

What really shines through the piece are the performances from Andy Serkis, Reece Sheersmith and Jennifer Ellison (Steven O’Donnell deserves a mention for being funny, even though it’s essentially the same role he always plays). It’s what keeps the film together and the performances and comedy are why it’s worth watching.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0409459/

Dir. Zack Snyder

Instead of a normal write up I present a liveblog of my thoughts that I kept while watching this, this is entirely unedited from its original presentation:

-         Right now. I’ve read the comic, didn’t have the money or inclination to see the film in theatres and am catching up now on a borrowed DVD.

I’ll be keeping you updated with my thoughts as I go through it.

15 Minutes in: The opening credits were an interesting way to introduce the history but too long given that some of it wasn’t that informative.

Initial impression is that the film is suffering from the same thing all Zack Snyder’s have so far, too much time on the visuals and too little spent on the acting. Lines already feel flat and oddly placed at times.

-         28:50 – Rorschach is good, the voice isn’t what I personally imagined but it’s working in its own way and doesn’t dilute the character for me. Dan, seems passable right now, the others I’ll leave for a bit.

The music is pretty awfully integrated. I had to stop to write this one because I’ve just heard ‘99 Red Balloons’ horribly forced into a scene that didn’t need it. I understand the choices in music but they’re just overpowering and in most cases so far have been detrimental to the scene.

-         29:45 – “I’m glad I ordered the four-legged chicken”

-         37:42 – I assume that Snyder is trying to make the audience laugh with Ride of the Valkyries. If not DAMN.

Directing actors is not something Snyder does well at all. Silk Spectre (who is apparently 67, I ain’t buying it) just blanded out a whole sequence and The Comedian just jumped emotional states in stupid ways that felt quite hammy.

-         54:51 – Pacing is way off. It’s too slow and too ponderous when combined with the flat direction, it’s not particularly engaging whereas the comic was by this point.

The dialogue suffers from being taken from the comic so closely (well, a lot of the film does) because, as with many comics, the dialogue works better when written and imagined than when performed. In one odd way it’s similar to the Mallrats dialogue which, if you watch the film again, is a lot funnier in theory than in practice, in that film ONLY Jason Lee hits the mark.

-         What this highlights is what many other adaptations do as well, that each form media is it’s own world and that must be taken into consideration. What works in a comic may not work in a film (take the x-men costume changes) what works in a film may not work in a book. It’s a case of understanding the inherent strengths and weaknesses in each form.

That said 1:10:16 – One of my favourite chapters of the comic, John’s multi-time narrative, has some good parts and some bad parts. The worse bit being the parts concerning his reformation, the cuts are way too quick and lack the weight they did on reading them. The music is still a major problem.

Overall the visuals have been nice, great attention to detail in the production-design and a good overall aesthetic. In motion I feel Snyder is too slow-mo happy, kinda like John Woo.

Also I’m picking up a lot of Blade Runner influence, oddly. It’s certainly made an impression on Snyder at some point.

-         1:28:24 – Rorschach’s interview and the death of Walter Kovacs scene was good. Probably the best part of the film so far. It was uncomfortable, grim and gave you a proper sense of why Rorschach became who he is.

It also contained one of the only pieces of genuine acting I’ve seen so far in the film in Rorschach’s “God didn’t butcher that little girl” speech. Well done, kudos to Jackie Earle Haley and it’s the best piece of drama that Snyder has managed in his career!

-         1:40:26 – The minor fall, the major lift, the utter failure of music. (at this moment in the film Dan and Laurie were having sex to the song ‘Hallelujah’)

-         1:46:02 – LET’S ROCK OUT FOR SOME POOR EDITED FIGHTING WOOP WOOP.

Also I loved the directors note that must have said “Malin, when you role please hold that stupid pose while we sweep up to look at the craft, it doesn’t matter how it looks, it’s in the comic.”

-         Snyder has proven, over multiple films, that his strengths are as follows:
1)Action
2)In-camera speed changes
3)Following a comic book
4)Directing angry scenes

His weaknesses are:
1)Direction of scenes requiring emotions that aren’t anger.
2)Conversational direction
3)Overuse of Slow-motion and in-camera speed changes

The acting in the film is occasionally good, often just adequate and sometimes terrible. The film is, as of 1:52:03, a mess. It’s not awful but it’s not great and, unless a lot changes, is basically going to resolve as forgettable.

-         2:01:43 – Comedian father revelation utterly fails in light of the lack of it having any basis in the viewers mind before that moment.

Same problem occured bubastis appears.

AND AS I TYPE THIS JOHN AND LAURIE’S SPEECH ON MARS HAS ALL EMOTIONAL DEPTH STOLEN BY THE SUDDEN MUSICAL INTERRUPTION

-         Now while I know losing the giant space vagina octopus was really an improvement for the movie, a part of me misses it. It was just so strange that I couldn’t help but love it.

Couple of issues with the ending. John’s “You’ve not succeeded” line really needed to be in there, delivered to Adrian. I’m not sure if I’m convinced that having Dr Manhattan be the force the world unites against works as much a totally unknown threat but I wouldn’t EVER say the space octopus needed to be in it.

Overall the film was kinda dull compared to comic. It was poorly paced and too much time was spent getting it to look authentic than to actually tell the story. The direction was mediocre and didn’t work with the actors in the way the film needed, it was just flat and meant many of the performances had no life.

The real killer of the movie, honestly it’s worse element, was the fucking horrible music mixing. So many times it completely trashed the scenes that were happening and was a complete and total failure on every single level, it’s astonishingly bad from a filmmaking point of view.

I will say that ONE thing was better than the comic, Rorschach “DO IT” shout worked better by having the chance to be performed more completely than in the few panels it had originally.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1129428/

Dir. Steven Sheil

Since the start of this year I have been reading much of Stephen King’s library of novels, he has always been one of my favourite authors but there were many books I had overlooked. In going back to his work I reawakened my love of horror, of the supernatural or just plain disturbing. To his end I was drawn back to an old love of mine, horror films, and this happened to be the first one I have watched in a while.

Mum & Dad is a microbudget horror which tells the story of a young polish woman, Lena, who is kidnapped and ‘adopted’ into a horrific Texas-chainsaw style family with a penchant for torture and murder.

It’s a claustrophobic horror that rarely leaves the house in which Lena has been confined. This works well, both for the story and the £100,000 budget that the film was produced on, as it keeps you trapped inside the experience that Lena is going through. It’s disturbing and uncomfortable without ever using cheap “jump scares” or resorting to the Saw “torture-porn” style of staring at gore, it creates it’s horror in atmosphere, in confusion and in the mounting insanity of the situation Lena is experiencing. It is the kind of horror that never uses fantastical elements and keeps the sense that the events are possible, that there are people in this world who are that sick (Fred and Rosemary West being the prime example for this film) and that plays upon your mind when watching it.

It’s an exceptionally strong film given its low budget and mostly unknown actors, who all perform exceedingly well, and I never once felt that it suffered from a lack of funds. The direction was solid and confident, and I’m not just saying that because I’m getting taught by the director at the moment, it really does work well. The actors inhabit their characters perfectly, especially Perry Benson as Dad, and it has well thought out, impressive visuals throughout the whole movie.

The one element that I felt did not work was the visuals of the planes. They were supposed to evoke the setting of Heathrow Airport but they felt oddly unimportant as the film went on and acted more like screen wipes than settings.

This film, combined with my earlier horror reading, has planted the seed of what I want to do with my MA. I want to examine horror; I want to see how it works and what new kinds of presentation can be explored in a genre that has, in a very short time, acquired a very strict set of rules and clichés.