Day 170: The Great Escape (1963)

Movie #111 – The Great Escape (1963) - 172 min, cert PG.

The movie tells the true story of the mass escape attempt from maximum-security POW camp Stalag Luft III. The Germans have gathered all the prisoners with a reputation for making escape attempts in one supposedly escape-proof camp, thereby putting ‘all the rotten eggs in one basket’. However, by employing such a tactic, they have underestimated the combined ingenuity and resourcefulness of this group of men, who promptly come up with a plan to break out no less than 250 prisoners in a single night. They dig a series of three tunnels, codenamed Tom, Dick & Harry, out from the prison huts, under the wire towards the trees beyond. Meanwhile they forge identification papers, put together civilian outfits and gather intelligence on the surrounding area.

This is undoubtedly a classic war movie. The all-star cast is impressive – Steve McQueen, Richard Attenborough, James Garner, Donald Pleasance, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, David McCallum, Gordon Jackson and more. The film can be essentially split into two parts – the planning of the escape, and then the escape itself and its aftermath as the prisoners who made it out attempt to evade recapture. The first part of the film is fairly light-hearted with the POWs running rings around their guards, fooling them at every turn. There is less comedy in the second part once the escapees are outside the controlled environment of the camp as we see many of them recaptured or shot or both.

It’s curious in some ways that the whole incident is portrayed in such a positive manner, as if the escape was a glorious triumph for the Allied forces over their German captors. The reality is that because of the tunnel being too short, of the 250 that were supposed to escape, only 76 made it out of the camp. Of those 76, fifty were either killed trying to avoid recapture or executed by the Gestapo, 23 were successfully recaptured, and only three made it back to their own lines. I suppose, in some ways, it was a success as the prime objective of the exercise was to tie up large numbers of Germans scouring the countryside for errant POWs, and this it accomplished. But it still seems a bit of a stretch to me to hail it as the spectacular achievement that this movie seems to do.

But none of that detracts from my enjoyment of it. It’s a lot of fun cheering the good guys and booing the bad guys and wondering what might have been had things turned out slightly differently.

Score – 8/10. A good fun war movie, and there aren’t many of them out there.

Next up is a movie I’ve never seen – Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal. It’s well-known for someone playing chess with Death, but that’s all I know about it.

Day 168: Princess Mononoke (1997)

Movie #110 – Princess Mononoke (1997) - 134 min, cert PG.

Set in ancient Japan at a time when much of the country is comprised of isolated villages run by feudal lords, and the smelting of iron was a new technology, one such village is attacked by a rampaging boar spirit. Prince Ashitaka (Billy Crudup) successfully defends the village against the evil spirit, but becomes contaminated by it in the process. The wise woman of the village tells him that the infection will kill him unless he is healed by the Spirit of Woods who lives far to the West. Ashitaka sets off to find this spirit, and becomes involved in a conflict between an iron working village, led by Lady Eboshi (Minnie Driver), and the animal spirits of the forest, led by San (Claire Danes), the Princess Mononoke of the title. The situation is further complicated when a rival village looks to take over the forge while Eboshi is distracted. Ashitaka must negotiate a peace between the various warring factions while finding a cure for his infection.

The movie deals with the price of progress, and how man is unable to develop technologically without there being a knock-on effect on the environment. There are no clear-cut good guys and bad guys in this movie. All the characters seem driven by honest intentions. Even Lady Eboshi, the biggest villain of the piece, is only trying to do her best to ensure a prosperous future for her people.

I established that I’m not the World’s greatest anime fan, when Spirited Away completely failed to move me, so I wasn’t expecting this to do much for me either. I certainly found this more entertaining than Spirited Away, and it held my attention pretty well. I wouldn’t say I’d been converted to the genre by any means, but perhaps I won’t approach subsequent films in this style with quite so much trepidation. I found the plot a little easier to follow, and the characters easier to empathise with.

Score – 5/10. Better than Spirited Away, but I’m still not an anime fan. Ten more movies have passed since I last updated my personal top ten, so it’s time to revisit it. The only movies to achieve full marks were Sin City and Die Hard, and I think they should both make the list, which now looks like this:

1.       The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)

2.       Die Hard (1988)

3.       Pulp Fiction (1994)

4.       Forrest Gump (1994)

5.       The Sting (1973)

6.       The Green Mile (1999)

7.       Amelie (2001)

8.      Fight Club (1999)

9.       The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

10.   Sin City (2005)

Next up is a bank holiday classic – The Great Escape. My 9-year-old son quite fancies seeing this one, so I shall watch it with him.

Day 165: Die Hard (1988)

Movie #109 – Die Hard (1988) - 131 min, cert 18.

John McClane (Bruce Willis) is a New York cop, visiting Los Angeles for Christmas to see his estranged wife and their kids. She works as a high-flying executive for a Japanese-run company in a high-rise office block. John calls in to see her at her office where a Christmas party is in full swing. While he’s there, the place is suddenly overrun by a gang of armed terrorists led by Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman). They gather all the staff together in the lobby, but John manages to escape up the stairwell to another floor. Thereafter, he wages a one-man war against the mercenaries with little help from the authorities who gather outside.

I have watched this film more often than any other on this list. Indeed, probably more than any other film full stop. It’s a film I can watch again and again without ever getting bored of it. This is an action movie in its purest form. The action is non-stop, the dialogue is crisp and witty, the hero is intelligent, and the villain is too. The stunts and special effects are awesome, and the plot is clever, but easy to follow.

Bruce Willis was ideally cast as McClane. Fit enough to carry off what must have been a physically challenging role, but with just the right amount of comic timing to pull off the constant barrage of quips and one-liners that became his signature in Moonlighting. Alan Rickman is also superb as Gruber. The plot requires him to get a lot of screen time, and this might have been a problem with a lesser actor, but Rickman is certainly as good as Willis, probably better.

Score – 10/10. The perfect action movie.

Next up is more Japanese anime with Princess Mononoke. I wasn’t impressed by Spirited Away, but maybe this will be more my cup of tea.

Day 164: Sin City (2005)

Movie #108 – Sin City (2005) - 124 min, cert 18.

Set in the fictitious Basin City, the movie consists essentially of three entirely separate stories. In one, Hartigan (Bruce Willis) is an aging cop trying to put away one last bad guy, a paedophile, before his dicky heart forces him into retirement. In another, Marv (Mickey Rourke) is a tough guy who wakes up next to a dead prostitute and goes on a bloody quest to track down the person who killed her and tried to frame him for it. In the third, Dwight (Clive Owen) is guy who finds himself struggling to maintain the delicate balance of power between the cops and the prostitutes in the red-light district.

This is a truly awesome film. Robert Rodriguez brings Frank Miller’s comic books to life with a skill that has never been approached either before or since. Every frame of film looks as if it has been lifted straight out of the graphic novels and allowed to move. Every scene drives the plot forward, and the pace is relentless. To a comic fan like myself, this has to rank as the greatest comic book adaptation to date, and there have been many.

Score – 10/10. Style and substance in abundance. If you haven’t seen this, you really should.

Next up is Bruce Willis again in the movie that made him a superstar – Die Hard.

Day 163: Rebecca (1940)

Movie #107 – Rebecca (1940) - 130 min, cert PG.

While Maxim de Winter (Laurence Olivier) is holidaying in the South of France, he meets a young woman (Joan Fontaine) working as a companion to rich old lady and they fall in love. They get married and take up residence together in Manderlay, his ancestral family mansion in Cornwall. The house, however, is full of memories of Maxim’s first wife, Rebecca, who died tragically in a boating accident. Max was, by all accounts, devastated by the loss, and has never really recovered. The housekeeper at Manderlay, Mrs Danvers, is clearly still mourning her previous mistress’ death and makes her new mistress aware of her inferiority in no uncertain terms, undermining and belittling her at every opportunity. Things come to a head when a wrecked boat is discovered that still contains Rebecca’s body, and Max is plunged back into despair.

This is not typical Hitchcock fare. He was a master of the suspense thriller, and while there are elements of that here, particularly in the middle section when the new Mrs de Winter is being terrorised by Mrs Danvers, it is predominantly a love story. Hitchcock was adapting a well-known book, so he had little room for manoeuvre within the plot. This was also his first movie after relocating to America from Britain, so he was probably keen to establish a solid foundation by giving the studio what was expected. Still, the movie won two Oscars, including Best Picture, and had 9 other nominations, so he must have done a pretty good job.

There were a couple of interesting tricks that Hitchcock used to emphasise the power that Rebecca has over her successor, even in death. Joan Fontaine’s character is never named in the film. She is always known as the second Mrs de Winter. Also, we never see Rebecca in the film. There are no pictures or portraits of her in the house, so the audience is left to imagine her beauty.

Overall, I enjoyed the film and it certainly deserves its place in the Top 250. But from a personal point of view, I wouldn’t rave over it.

Score – 7/10. Enjoyable enough, but not really my cup of tea.

Next up is Robert Rodriguez’s stylistic Sin City. I have this on DVD and am looking forward to watching it again.

Day 160: Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade (1989)

Movie #106 – Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) - 127 min, cert PG.

Indy is back. This time he is seeking the Holy Grail, the cup the Jesus used at the Last Supper. He has to enlist the assistance of the World’s leading expert on the subject who happens to be none other than his father, Henry Jones snr (Sean Connery). Marcus Brody (Denholm Elliott) also tags along for the ride. Again there are Nazis also after the same artefact. In fact, all in all, the plot runs along very similar lines to Raiders of the Lost Ark.

It’s a lot of fun, as sequels go, but I really don’t see how it deserves a place in the Top 250. It is certainly better than the second film, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, but that’s not saying much. Sean Connery clearly has a lot of fun hamming it up as the bookish Henry Jones, and it is probably his performance as much as anything that lifts the movie to the position that it finds itself in. But, at the end of the day, it’s a second sequel that just rehashes the same material as the original. There is nothing new here, just a studio cashing in on a tried and tested formula.

Score – 7/10. Pretty good as sequels go, but still just a sequel.

Next up is Hitchcock’s Rebecca. This is another one of those films that I last saw many years ago, and can’t remember much about.

Day 159: Return of the Jedi (1983)

Movie #105 – Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi (1983) - 134 min, cert U.

Han Solo’s friends must rescue him from Jabba the Hut’s palace where he is still frozen in carbonite, then rendezvous with the rest of the Rebel Alliance to launch an assault on a new Death Star which is being built. A small team consisting of Han, Luke, Leia and the droids R2-D2 and C-3PO must take out the force-field generator on the nearby forest moon of Endor, while Lando and Chewbacca in the Millennium Falcon lead the main attack fleet.

I prefer this film to The Empire Strikes Back. Clearly, the relative positions of the two films in the list implies that I’m very much in the minority with this point of view. This is a very jolly, feel-good film, with a nice happy Hollywood ending, while the other is much darker. There’s more action in this film, which appeals to me, and I like the Ewoks – they’re cute, cuddly and a bit of fun.

Score – 8/10. Not as good as the first one, but better than the second.

Next up is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. I saw this film when it first came out, but I don’t recall it being good enough to merit a place on this list.

Day 158: On the Waterfront (1954)

Movie #104 – On the Waterfront (1954) - 108 min, cert PG.

Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando) is a longshoreman and ex-prize fighter. His brother Charley (Rod Steiger) is a key associate of the local crime boss, Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb), so Terry often finds himself acting as hired muscle. Friendly is using threats and violence to control the dockworkers union. When Terry is unwittingly used as an accomplice in the murder of a worker who was speaking out against Friendly, he begins to have doubts about the morality of his actions. He starts seeing the murdered man’s sister Edie (Eva Marie Saint) and she appeals to his conscience, sparking him into standing up to Friendly himself.

I still wouldn’t describe myself as a Marlon Brando fan, but this was considerably better than the other films of his that I’ve seen. He properly acts in this, and acts well. He has a way of moving about and delivering his lines which borders on neo-realism and makes his characterisation entirely believable. The ‘I coulda been a contender’ speech to his brother in the back of a taxi is extremely well-known and often copied – most notably by Robert De Niro in Raging Bull, and is full of emotion, but without being hammed up. On reflection, I may have misjudged Brando’s acting ability.

The film itself is about one man standing up for what he believes in, and turning his back on the people he used to consider friends. It is well-documented that Elia Kazan, the director, made the picture as a direct allusion to his own experiences giving evidence to the House Un-American Activities Commission, and his subsequent ostracisation. As a result of this, the movie does get a little preachy at times. But overall, a decent film.

Score – 7/10. A superbly understated performance from Brando, but not much else to it.

Next up is The Return of the Jedi, the final part of the original Star Wars saga. I know I’m in the minority, but I like this movie a lot.

Day 156: The Maltese Falcon (1941)

Movie #103 – The Maltese Falcon (1941) - 100 min, cert PG.

Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) is a private investigator who, with the help of his partner Miles Archer, runs a detective company. When an attractive woman hires them to follow her husband, Sam gives the job to Miles. When Miles is killed, Sam feels obliged to investigate further and becomes drawn into a web of intrigue based around a missing ornamental falcon, and the various interested parties who are seeking it.

It’s easy to see why this movie is seen as being so important. It is generally regarded as the original film noir. It turned Humphrey Bogart from a supporting actor in gangster films to a leading man with a wise-cracking, tough-talking role that he would forever be associated with. It also marked both John Huston’s directorial debut, and Sydney Greenstreet’s acting debut, and both would go on to have long and hugely successful careers.

Because my blog is so far behind, I’m writing this about a month and a half after I actually watched it and I’m struggling to remember the plot with any clarity. This is not because I didn’t particularly understand it at the time, or even because it is not a memorable film. It’s just that the actual plot doesn’t seem that important. This film is a triumph of style over substance. What it’s about doesn’t really matter. It’s essentially a character piece. Bogart’s performance as Spade is captivating – it’s clearly a part he’d been waiting all his career to play. But it’s not just him, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet and Mary Astor all put in great performances, indeed Greenstreet was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar on his debut.

Score – 8/10. Very watchable.

Next up is Marlon Brando in On the Waterfront. I’ve never been a Brando fan, but maybe this will change my mind.

Day 155: Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)

Movie #102 – Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) - 129 min, cert U.

Jefferson Smith (James Stewart) is the head of the Boy Rangers, a children’s organisation similar to the Scouts. Despite his lack of political ambition, he is chosen as a replacement for a recently deceased senator due to his political naivety and wholesome reputation. He is expected to be easily manipulated by his corrupt boss. Upon his arrival in Washington, Smith proposes a bill that will allow the Boy Rangers to buy some land to use as a national camp. However this land has already been earmarked for another project which his colleagues are trying to push through under the radar. When he refuses to withdraw his proposal, Smith becomes the target of a fiendish smear campaign in an attempt to hound him out of office. In an attempt to prove his innocence he launches a filibuster whereby he attempts to talk non-stop in the senate until his reputation can be restored.

The best thing about this film is, without question, the performance of James Stewart. He was not the first choice for the whole, but is nevertheless perfect for it. He has a wonderful ‘everyman’ kind of charm, and can inject incredible amounts of passion into the roles he plays. This movie made him a star, and rightly so. The script is also very good, as are the performances of the supporting cast.

The movie caused quite a furore when it was first released. It came out at a time when America was preparing to go to war, and the last thing they needed was something that could be seen to be undermining the authority of the government. Many politicians tried to have it banned for bringing the US political system into disrepute.

Score – 6/10. Not bad but I found it a little dull.

Next up is The Maltese Falcon, classic film-noir with Bogart as Sam Spade.

Day 154: The Elephant Man (1980)

Movie #101 – The Elephant Man (1980) - 124 min, cert 15.

Frederick Treves (Anthony Hopkins) is a surgeon in Victorian England. In a travelling freak show, he finds a heavily disfigured man (John Hurt) known simply as the Elephant Man. He rescues him and takes him back to the hospital where he works to care for him and study his case. The man turns out to be quite intelligent and fully aware of the circumstances in which he is forced to live. Treves helps him to integrate into Victorian society, taking him to the theatre and other social gatherings. It all threatens to come crashing down again, however, when the original owner of the freak show comes looking for his biggest attraction.

This film is based on the true story of Joseph Merrick, but David Lynch, the director, takes many liberties with the truth. As a result, much of the plot doesn’t quite seem to hang together very well. The film portrays Bytes, the freak show owner, as a savage man who kept him prisoner and beat him regularly. In reality, Merrick was at the freak show by choice, and was quite well paid there. He objected more to the humiliating examinations he had to endure at the hospital than anything that happened at the freak show.

When all’s said and done, I’m not really a David Lynch fan. I didn’t see the point of the opening sequence with the woman screaming over the elephant noises. Are we supposed to believe she was raped by an elephant? Or was the sheer trauma of being attacked by one enough to somehow partly change her baby into one. Either way seems utterly ludicrous. Plus it all seemed far too easy for Merrick’s abductors to wander into his house and make off with him.

It did have its moments. The performances from Hopkins and Hurt were very good. Hurt’s make-up was also very realistic. It’s also quite fun spotting the cameos from Pauline Quirke and Dexter Fletcher from before they were famous.

Score – 6/10. Good performances from the leads, but a weak plot.

Next up is Mr Smith Goes to Washington. It’s one of those classic black & whites that’s often referred to by people who know about cinema, but that I’ve never seen.

Day 152: The Sting (1973)

Movie #100 – The Sting (1973) - 129 min, cert PG.

Johnny Hooker (Robert Redford) is a small-time con artist from Chicago. He and his accomplices play a hustle on some guy in the street for the contents of his wallet. Unfortunately, he turns out to be a runner for the local mobster, Doyle Lonnegan (Robert Shaw) who puts out a contract to have them killed. Hooker leaves town and goes in search of Henry Gondorff (Paul Newman), a con artist with a reputation for playing big cons and together they hatch a plot to con Lonnegan out of a hefty sum of money.

This was always one of my Dad’s favourite movies, and I remember watching it with him when I was quite young. I was too young to really understand much of it, but I enjoyed it nonetheless, and it left a lasting impression. I watched it several more times (mostly with my Dad) over the years that followed, gradually understanding a bit more each time. It is a complicated plot, but quite brilliantly kept together by director George Roy Hill. He keeps the story moving forward at a brisk pace, but still gives the attentive viewer a decent chance of keeping up. The final plot twist that is now mandatory for these kind of films, but was much more unusual at the time, is a good one.

Newman & Redford were good friends coming into this movie, having already worked together on Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (also by George Roy Hill) some four years previously, and the chemistry between them is obvious.

Score – 10/10. The original ‘caper’ movie, and still the best. Of the last ten movies I’ve seen, I think only this one deserves a place in my top ten, which now looks like this:

1.       The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)

2.       Pulp Fiction (1994)

3.       Forrest Gump (1994)

4.       The Sting (1973)

5.       The Green Mile (1999)

6.       Amelie (2001)

7.       Fight Club (1999)

8.      The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

9.       Toy Story 3 (2010)

10.   The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Well that’s 100 movies watched and I’m still going, and still on target to finish by the end of the year. Although the blog is beginning to lag critically behind. Anyway, ever onwards - next up is The Elephant Man which I haven’t seen for many a year.

Day 151: Unforgiven (1992)

Movie #99 – Unforgiven (1992) - 131 min, cert 15.

William Munny (Clint Eastwood) is a retired gunfighter. He is widowed and scratches out a living for him and his two children farming pigs. When a young lad calling himself the Schofield Kid turns up out of the blue one day, asking for Munny’s help in hunting down a couple of outlaws, Munny tells him he doesn’t do that anymore and sends him on his way. After he’s gone, Munny rethinks his position, and, deciding he really needs the money, rides off in search of his old partner, Ned Logan (Morgan Freeman). Together they go after the Kid and catch him up. The bounty has been posted by a group of prostitutes after one of their number was attacked with a knife by a customer, leaving her disfigured. They live in the town of Big Whiskey which in run by a fearsome sheriff named Little Bill (Gene Hackman) who comes down very hard on any trouble, administering savage beatings on any bounty hunters who show up.

This is another of Eastwood’s best films. Having watched this only 24 hours after Gran Torino, it’s hard to believe the two were made over 15 years apart as he hardly appears to have aged in between. Unforgiven is set at the end of the Wild West era, at a time when the gunslingers of legend were starting to die out or retire. The West is gradually being tamed, and men like Munny and Little Bill are a dying breed. Their stories are read about in pulp magazines. Our trio of would-be bounty hunters are all flawed – Ned doesn’t have the heart for it anymore, the Kid can’t see far enough to shoot anyone, and Munny himself struggles to ride his horse. Of course, when the chips are down, the fire of Munny’s youth returns to him and he takes on the corrupt sheriff and his men like Clint Eastwood of yesteryear, and it’s great to watch.

Clint Eastwood learned from the masters how to make westerns. He dedicates this film to the directors he studied under – Sergio Leone & Don Siegel, and you can see their influence all over this movie.

Score – 9/10. Eastwood rediscovers the glories of his youth.

Next up is a classic and personal favourite of mine, The Sting with Robert Redford & Paul Newman.

Day 150: Gran Torino (2008)

Movie #98 – Gran Torino (2008) - 18 min, cert 15.

Walt Kowalski (Clint Eastwood) is a retired assembly line worker from a car factory. His wife has recently dies and he lives alone, spending most of his time sitting out on his porch, drinking beer and scowling at the neighbours. The neighbours are Hmongs, a mountain people from Laos who acted as America’s allies in Vietnam, but Walt’s racist views see all Asian immigrants as ‘chinks’ and ‘gooks’. When a street gang turns up to try and recruit the studious adolescent next door, they argue and the disagreement spills over onto Walt’s lawn. At this point Walt appears with his shotgun and the gang leaves. From this point on, he is seen as a hero by the Hmong residents, and he starts to realise that he actually has more in common with these people than he does with his own family.

Clint Eastwood is an extraordinary man. He’s in his eighties, having been acting for over fifty years, and directing for over forty. Yet despite his age, he can still look mean as hell, standing on his front lawn, brandishing a shotgun. Mean enough to chase off a street gang and make it believable. How many other octogenarians could do that? I’ve said before that I’m a fan of his work, and this was certainly no let-down. Yes, he’s certainly old, but is he too old? Certainly not!

Score – 8/10. Not his best work maybe, but probably in his top ten.

Next up is Unforgiven in which Clint Eastwood plays a cantankerous, gun-toting old man. Hang on a minute, does this sound familiar to anyone?

Day 149: Oldboy (2003)

Movie #97 – Oldboy (2003) - 120 min, cert 18.

A Korean businessman, Oh Dae-Su, is on his way home to see his young daughter on her birthday, but goes out on the town and gets very drunk. He is arrested and a friend comes to bail him out. While his friend is on the phone, Oh disappears. When he comes round he is locked in what appears to be a cheap hotel room. He is fed through a small hole in the door, and every so often gas is pumped in to the room to knock him out. When he wakes up, the room has been cleaned, and his hair has been cut. He is given no explanation as to why this is happening, but there he remains for 15 years. After he is released he goes in search of answers.

I went into it with no expectations, but it turned out to be pretty good. It was quite violent in places – the scene where Oh tortures his jailer by extracting his teeth with a claw hammer I found hard to watch, and I consider myself to have a pretty strong stomach. The plot developed well, and the reveal at the end was a good twist, although I didn’t really understand the whole tongue thing.

Score – 9/10. If you’re not too easily shocked, it’s well worth a watch.

Next up is Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino. I’ve not seen it before, but I’m a bit of a Clint fan so I’m looking forward to it.

Day 149: Up (2009)

Movie #96 – Up (2009) - 96 min, cert U.

Carl (Edward Asner) is a cantankerous old widower who lives on his own in the house he shared with his wife for most of his life. He shared with his wife a yearning for adventure and a desire to visit far-flung places, particularly a place called Paradise Falls in remote Venezuela, although it was a dream that never quite got realised. One day, when the outside world threatens to encroach too far on his solitary lifestyle, he takes the radical decision to take his house and head for Venezuela, suspending his beloved house from millions of helium filled balloons. After he leaves, he discovers a stowaway in the form of a boy scout named Russell, and together they go in search of Paradise Falls. When they get there, they encounter Carl’s boyhood hero, the adventurer Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer) who is searching for a mysterious bird and has been for decades.

This is another marvellous production from Pixar who are able to produce animated movies that have something to say not just to kids but to adults as well, in a way that no other company seems to do. As a father of two pre-teenage sons, I’ve seen quite a few films from the Pixar studio now – Up, WALL-E, The Incredibles, Finding Nemo, and all three Toy Story films and every one of them has been a joy to watch. In a lot of ways I actually feel that I’m getting more out of them than my kids are. I’ve seen Shark Tale, Shrek and Madagascar from DreamWorks and, while perfectly enjoyable, they were clearly aimed at kids and kids alone.

Up has a 12-minute prologue sequence in which we meet Carl as a young boy full of dreams and aspirations, he meets Ellie, a young girl full of the same dreams and aspirations and they fall in love. They get married, grow old together, and then Ellie dies leaving Carl to become a disheartened old man. Be warned, if you are prone to such things, you will need a healthy supply of tissues. I have never before seen an animated movie that begins with such a heartbreakingly sad sequence. It sets the tone for the rest of the movie, which is probably the most touching animated feature I’ve ever seen. Of course, it has its fair share of laugh-out-loud moments as well, but the way it gets its audience so emotionally involved in the characters is its stand-out feature.

Score – 10/10. I gave WALL-E 10 and I don’t think this deserves any less.

Next up is Oldboy, a Korean film about which I know absolutely nothing.

Day 147: Downfall (2004)

Movie #95 – Downfall (2004) - 156 min, cert 15.

The movie is an account of the last few days of World War II within Hitler’s bunker, as seen from the point of view of his personal secretary, Traudl Junge

The movie is mostly based on Junge’s biography, so it seems reasonable to consider it pretty accurate in terms of what actually happened. It portrays Hitler as a man who was clearly mad. He was wildly deluded about the state of the war. One moment he would be screaming and ranting at his aides and senior officers, then exchanging pleasantries with his more junior staff and petting his dog. Even when the War was all but lost, he was still having strategy meetings where he issued orders to troops that no longer existed and officers that had been killed or captured long ago.

I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to react to this movie. Was I supposed to feel anger or outrage at the monster that was Hitler? Or perhaps the portrayal was intended to provoke sympathy for a tormented soul. In the end, it just made me wonder how on earth this man was permitted to wallow in his own delusion and fantasy for so long, and at such cost to the people who looked to him for leadership. I came to realise that perhaps too much of the blame for the atrocities the occurred during that time is laid on his shoulders, and that perhaps more fault should be attached to the people who put him in that position and then kept him there.

An interesting film, overall, but it possibly dragged a little towards the end.

Score – 7/10.

Next up is Up, a Pixar film that I haven’t seen yet. I shall watch it with my kids, as they’ve been wanting to see it for a while.

Day 146: Gladiator (2000)

Movie #94 – Gladiator (2000) - 155 min, cert 15.

Maximus (Russell Crowe) is a successful General in the Roman army and a favourite of the Emperor. So much so that the Emperor tells him that he is going to name him as his successor. When the Emperor’s son Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) discovers this, he is outraged. He kills his father and tells his soldiers to take Maximus out into the woods and kill him. Maximum escapes and hurries back to his family only to find that they’ve also been murdered. He is captured, taken to Africa and sold as a slave to Proximo (Oliver Reed), a trainer of gladiators. His prowess with a sword and as a military tactician ensure a swift rise to the top of his new profession, and eventually he is taken to fight at the Colosseum in Rome, in front of the very man who destroyed his life.

Crowe seems ideally suited to this role. He does mean & moody better than anyone which is exactly what this part requires. There are some fine supporting performances from the late Oliver Reed (who died during filming), Richard Harris (as the murdered Emperor), Connie Nielsen (as Commodus’ sister) and Derek Jacobi, a perennial favourite of genre, as Gracchus a senator. I wasn’t so keen on Phoenix, I felt his performance lacked something that I couldn’t quite put a finger on. It’s great to see an actor like Reed bowing out with a really good performance.

The film has an epic look to it, with elaborate sets and fantastically choreographed battle sequences. Ridley Scott has made a broad range of films in his time, from the brilliant (Alien, Blade Runner) to the downright awful (G.I. Jane, 1492: Conquest of Paradise), but this is definitely in the former camp.

Score – 8/10.

Next up is Downfall, an account of Adolf Hitler’s final few days in his bunker in Berlin at the end of WWII. I have seen many humorous rip-offs of Hitler ranting at his officers in German with various silly subtitles attached, but I’ve never seen the original.

Day 144: Metropolis (1927)

Movie #93 – Metropolis (1927) - 118 min, cert PG.

Set in the far future, the gulf in society between the rich and the poor has expanded to the point where the rich live a carefree Utopian lifestyle, while the poor dwell underground and operate the vast machinery that powers everything. This society is ruled over by Joh Frederson who is one of the few people who is aware of what goes on in the undercity. His son Freder descends into it and meets a young woman named Maria who wants to try to bridge the gulf between the two classes. Meanwhile, a mad scientist has created a robot to do his bidding. He kidnaps Maria, gives the robot her appearance, and uses it to lead the workers in a revolution.

I may not know much about movies and movie-making, but it doesn’t take a genius to see that this film was many years ahead of its time. For 1927, the special effects were amazing. OK, a lot of them look pretty tame these days – the flooding of the underground city is clearly a model, but the scene where the robot becomes animated still looks quite good today. Lang doesn’t like to break up his action with too many captions, so a lot of the dialogue is intimated through actions alone. This has the effect of making most of the physical movements of the actors very over the top, almost comically so.

I believe there might be a more complete version of the film than the one I saw. My one had quite a few scenes missing which were replaced with captions to keep the viewer up to date with the plot. I have read that a copy was found somewhere in South America that allowed a lot of these gaps to be filled in, but quite frankly it was quite long enough without these extra scenes. In its entirety it would run to nearly two and a half hours, according to IMDb.

Overall, it was certainly an enjoyable film. Although, probably more so when viewed as an interesting piece of cinematic history than as a story on its own right.

Score – 6/10. An interesting museum piece.

Next up is Gladiator. I have this one on DVD and it’s a great film. Russell Crowe in a role ideally suited to him.

Day 143: The Apartment (1960)

Movie #92 – The Apartment (1960) - 125 min, cert PG.

C.C. Baxter (Jack Lemmon) is a corporate wage slave, just one amongst a sea of faces in a vast office of identical desks. He lives alone in an apartment in the city, but he lends out his apartment several evenings a week to some of the managers within the company so they can take their mistresses and girlfriends there with no questions asked. Baxter is attracted to Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine), one of the elevator girls in the building but discovers that she is the mistress of his boss Jeff Sheldrake (Fred MacMurray) and has been in his apartment.

This is a clever little piece about two downtrodden employees caught in the rat race. Both Baxter and Kubelik are being used by their superiors. They are aware that they are being used, but they go along with it in exchange for promises of rewards that may or may not materialise. Baxter wants his own office and is promised a promotion, while Kubelik wants a proper relationship with Sheldrake, so Sheldrake promises her that he will leave his wife. Both seem reluctant to commit to each other as they are so accustomed to being let down, and it’s only after Kubelik attempts suicide in Baxter’s apartment and he finds himself nursing her back to health, that they start to open up to each other.

Billy Wilder is very good at balancing comedy with drama. He did it well in Some Like it Hot and he does it well here.

Score – 8/10. A very enjoyable film.

Next up is Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, a film famous for its futuristic vision. Like the vast majority of people, I’ve seen clips of it but never sat down and watched it through.

Day 142: Inglourious Basterds (2009)

Movie #91 – Inglourious Basterds (2009) - 153 min, cert 18.

During WWII, a small unit of Jewish soldiers operating behind enemy lines uses a combination of guerrilla tactics and extreme violence to instil fear into the hearts of the Germans. When they learn that much of the German High Command will be being attending the premiere of a propaganda film, the opportunity is too good to pass up. Meanwhile, the owner of the cinema that has been selected for the event has her own reasons to want revenge on the Third Reich.

I wasn’t sure that I’d over-hyped this movie in my own mind to the point where it was almost bound to be a disappointment. But I found it hugely enjoyable. I particularly liked the ending which was hugely unexpected. It’s very rare and quite refreshing to find a movie that is set in the historical past with such a scant disregard for historical accuracy. This is a work of fiction, after all, and Tarantino takes that as carte blanche to rewrite history as he sees fit, and why not?

Score – 9/10. Very entertaining with a wonderful ending.

Next up is The Apartment, a black & white comedy from 1960 which I’ve never heard of. But the cast looks strong.

Day 141: Braveheart (1995)

Movie #90 – Braveheart (1995) - 177 min, cert 15.

This movie tells the life story of William Wallace, the 13^th century Scottish knight and major figure in the Wars of Scottish Independence, from his childhood up to his death at the hands of the English.

How much of this is historically accurate is hugely debatable, but irrespective of this it makes for an impressive spectacle of a film. Mel Gibson gives an excellent performance in the title role, and his Scots accent seems pretty believable to a non-Scot like myself. The battle scenes are done on an epic scale with plenty of blood and gore for added realism.

The film is nearly three hours in length, but it held my attention throughout.

Score – 9/10. Thoroughly enjoyable. My top ten remains unchanged from ten films ago:

1.       The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)

2.       Pulp Fiction (1994)

3.       Forrest Gump (1994)

4.       The Green Mile (1999)

5.       Amelie (2001)

6.       Fight Club (1999)

7.       The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

8.      Toy Story 3 (2010)

9.       The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

10.   Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)

Next up is Inglourious Basterds which I was tempted to go and see when it was on at the pictures a couple of years ago. I bought it on DVD a month or so ago, and I’ve been waiting to watch it.

Day 140: 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Movie #89 – 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - 141 min, cert U.

I normally start these reviews with a brief plot summary, but this film is so unfathomable that I’m not sure I can. There seem to be a number of black slabs that lead mankind to explore the Universe. Or something. There’s a section in the middle when a supposedly failsafe supercomputer that’s in control of all aspects of a particular space flight goes wrong and tries to kill everyone on board.

I got to the end of this film and found myself wondering what sort of strange drugs Kubrick was on when he made it. Maybe it makes sense to him, but it certainly doesn’t to me. The first section goes on for far too long as it observes a group of apes at the dawn of Man as they encounter a mysterious black slab and suddenly realise they can use bones to hit each other with. The second section seems to introduce some sort of plot as the HAL9000 supercomputer develops a fault and attempts to terminate the entire crew of its spaceship. Any concept of plot is then abandoned in the final half-hour section which is some sort of bizarre acid-trip where the lone remaining crew member is pulled through some sort of wormhole in space and ends up in a one-room apartment.

Score – 1/10. A load of self-indulgent claptrap.

Next up is Mel Gibson’s Braveheart. An excellent biopic of William Wallace. I’ve no idea how historically accurate it is, but it makes for a great movie.