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Film & TV on DVD - John Doe News & Reviews

Greetings Film Fiends and welcome to John Doe's Film Blog. 30 years of dedicated celluloid obsession has meant that I have seen a few films. Drawing attention to some of the lesser discussed gems that I love. Cult classics, obscure curios and quality genre pictures. This blogs purpose is to translate some of my passion for these films and with luck, inspire you the reader to go check em out.

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Film & TV on DVD - May 2008

The 55th Sydney Film Festival - John Doe's Wishlist

May 30th 2008 00:56

Top 11 Highlights of the 2008 Sydney Film Festival

Poster for Time Crimes

This is going to be a 2 part post, Part 1 being a Top 11 and then the second part citing runners up. (Translation: films JD wants to see but won’t be able too)

This years Sydney Film Festival is fast approaching and there is an impressive selection of cinematic triumphs scheduled for the event. The program boasts elite titles from around the globe, often well ahead of there official release dates. (Certain films like last year’s confrontational documentary Zoo end up never arriving)

The sad truth is that there is no way Johnny will get to see every celluloid excursion in this post. Is still fun however, to compile and share a selection of movies without thoughts for cash and time restraints.

Like chance the Gardner “I like to watch” and the SFF is treated as a religious holiday by this cinephile and many others. Before the projectors fire up and start rolling, here are some of John Doe’s must see contributions. These are the titles that pique interest, trigger curiosity or release endorphins of joy at witnessing talented Directors cinematic possibilities.

Time Crimes – Los Cronocimenes

Director: Nacho Vigalondo
Screening: June 6 - 8.30pm and June 7 - 6.30pm

Hordes of positive buzz has come Johnny D’s way about this film. What's been read while still trying to keep spoiler free has put Time Crimes at the very pinnacle of a toughly contended must see shortlist.

Time Travel, murder and perplexing morality these are the vibes…confounded paradoxes, JD’s refusal to read any reviews or a synopsis for the film means that he can’t really tell you anything about the actual story. Maybe that’s best, just get excited and watch the trailer below, which may or may not be good because we haven’t watched it ourselves.

Unstick your mind with the Trailer forTime Crimes

Cool retro poster for Choke

Choke (US)

Director: Clark Gregg
Starring: Sam Rockwell, Anjelica Huston, Kelly McDonald, Brad William Heneke
Screening June 6 - 9.10pm and June 8 - 5.45pm

This is one JD has been amping up about for a while, (Read and earlier Choke post here so to catch up to speed) Chuck Palhunick, the writer of Fight Club has penned other books and this is one of them. Telling of a conman who gorges himself in restaurants so he can sue when asphixiation checks in, the novel is a blend of sinister dramedy that thrills, repulses and amuses depending on the page number.

Choke the movie is Directed by Clark Gregg and Stars Sam Rockwell (Lawn Dogs, Safe Men), Anjelica Huston (Prizzi’s Honor, Chinatown), Kelly McDonald (Trainspotting, No Country for Old Men) and Brad William Henke (Dexter)

Choke Clip – The Sex Addicts Meeting

Phase IV Poster

Phase IV (1974)

Director: Saul bass
Screening: June 11 5.50pm

Saul Bass is the graphic genius behind the title designs for Directors like Alfred Hitchcock, Martin Scorcese, John Frankenheimer, Stanley Kubrick and Ridley Scott. He was a talented visionary who amongst other claims to fame is said to have been instrumental as co director of the notorious shower scene in Psycho.

Directing only a handful of films, Phase IV has a premise that could easily have just been a sad rehash of Them or worse a stupid Z grade Sci-Fi about deadly ants with a collective conscience for devouring life. In the hands of Bass we get bold images filling the frame and an careful but anxious pacing drawing suspense from tiny creatures that we see everyday.

Phase IV - TV Spot

Takashi Miike's western

Sukiyaki Western Django

Director: Takashi Miike
Screening: June 7 - 8:30pm and June 12 - 8:45pm
Takashi Miike is a devilish filmmaker who is more than pleased to go to excesses to achieve his blood drenched head games. JD has been a Miike (Ichi the Killer, Audition, Visitor Q) fan for years and the thought of him blending a Fistful of Dollars with Django to make a spaghetti western parody has him tightening his gun belt and adjusting his holster.

Trailer for the Takishi Miike Western Sukiyaki Western Django

A second Takashi Miike film, Crows Episode 0 - Kurozu Zero is also screening.
Starring: Shun Ogruri, Kyosuke Yabe, Takayuki Yamada
Screening: June 8 - 8pm and June 9 - 8.30pm

Poster for Stop Loss

Stop Loss (US)

Director: Kimberly Pierce
Starring: Joseph Gordon Levitt, Channing Tatum, Abbie Cornish and Ryan Phillipe
Screening: June 13 - 6.30pm and June 14 - 11.50am

The is Director Kimberley Pierce’s (Boys Don’t Cry) second film. An anti war study that focuses on an Iraqi grunt forced through bureaucratic red tape to recanter his returning home from a tour of duty.

Joseph Gordon Levitt (Brick) hasn’t made a misstep since Mysterious Skin and this looks like another engrossing part for him to explore. Channing Tatum was daunting in A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints and from the trailer he seems to be carrying the same energy around.

If treated with the same probing emotion as Boys Don’t Cry this could take something sensational and distill it into humanity.

Trailer for Stop Loss

Redacted Poster

Red Acted (US)

Director: Brian de Palma
Screening: June 20 - 8.30pm and June 21 - 8.50pm

Another film about the military price of oil in the Iraq War, this one has the legendary Writer/Director Brian De Palma (Scarface, Carrie, Blow Out) embracing all the lensing and sound tricks of the mass media to convince that an interpretation of the truth is only half the story.
Employing largely unknown actors and mashing propaganda techniques to study a very real event that drifts between fact and fiction…just like the evening news.
(Read an earlier post that JD did on Redacted by clicking HERE)

Brian De Palma talks Redacted

Ben X Poster

Ben X - (Dutch)

Director: Nic Balthazar
Starring: Greg Timmermans, Marjike Pinoy, Laura Verlinden
Screening: June 18 - 8.15pm and June 19 - 3.45pm

This could be the underground hit of the festival, imdb.com describes the story as "As an alternative to getting bullied at school, an autistic teenager (Timmermans) retreats into the world of online role-playing games.". The trailer makes it look like a complex narrative full of drama and suspense plus fresh visual character development, maybe Donnie Darko will drop in to help?

Ben X Trailer

This poster is a warning

Import/Export (German/Russia)

Director: Ulrich Seidi
Screening: June 7 - 8.45pm and June 9 - 6pm

Bleak cold and piercing, this pretty much sums up the scenery and tone according to those who have seen this German/Slovak drama about how tough life can really get as a human possession. Surrounded in controversy with cries of good taste the viewer is subjected to explicit and grotesque examples of poverty and perversion.

The feel good entry in JD's list

Son of Rambow (UK)

Director: Garth Jennings
Starring: Neil Dudgeon, Will Poulter, Jessica Stevenson
Screening: June 9 - 12pm and June 22 - 1.45pm

Two young lads in the 80’s are inspired to make there own movie version of First Blood after seeing it on VHS.

JD was about the same age as these kids in the era and wanting to make movies. These twerps do it and have a ball, all the while learning lessons in life and experiencing what it means to be a kid.

Trailer for Son of Rambow

Appleseed 2 poster

Appleseed Saga: Ex Machine (Japanese)

Director: Shinji Aramki
Screening: June 14 - 8.15pm and June 22 - 4.45pm

Manga/Anime sequel to the spellbinding 2004 animated science fiction film Appleseed. Reteaming the original creative minds this promises to be another visual arresting study of how to take utopia into dystopia.

Prepare for animated wonders and technological combat, here’s the trailer for Appleseed Saga: Ex Machine. (Best enjoyed by ignoring the tacky American narrator)

So there they are, John Doe’s Sydney Film Festival essentials - Coming Soon: The
Runners Up

Noticed that my esteemed fellow Orblers Bryn and Cib have also done there own idiosyncratic posts related to the Sydney Film Festival, so for further information visit horrorphile.net and moviecritic.com

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John Doe’s favourite Sydney Pollack Films.

May 28th 2008 00:05

15 great Films - A salute to Sydney Pollack.

Sydney Pollack as he lived

“I mean, I don't know anything else that I would try to do, but it's a very frustrating thing to do, because you are trying to take what's a fantasy in your head and make it live through the minds of 200 people.” – Sydney Pollack

A massive loss to the world of cinema, today consummate Actor/Producer/Director Sydney Pollack succumbed to cancer at the age of 73. A huge influence on young Doe’s early ventures into more thoughtful cinema, Pollack was always concerned with the human experience and an omnipresent society that forced character catastrophes.

Taking home Best Director and Best Picture for the year 1987, Out of Africa (1986) won Pollack 2 Oscars in one evening. Viewing any of his adventures in celluloid reveals insightful and evocative character moments, coming from emotive and imaginative visual storytelling.

Not to be ignored - Sydney Pollack the actor in Michael Clayton

Starting his classy career as a TV Director for hire he worked on classics like The Fugitive, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour and Ben Casey. Making his feature film debut with The Slender Thread, (1965) based around a “Suicide hot line” the film is an impressive debut that is rewarding despite over simplifying of a complex problem.

Trying to choose John Doe’s personal favourite is more intense than being hunted by secret government assassins, or even sticking your tongue down Barbara Streisand’s throat.
“I mean, movies are like your kids or your fingers and toes or something, it's pretty hard to pick favourites.” – Sydney Pollack

The Director chats to his distant star

In a corner, the teaming of actor Robert Redford (The Way We Were, This Propertry is Condemned, Havana etc) with the Director created some of his greatest triumphs. The espionage story Three Days of the Condor deserves to be mentioned first for the sheer cunning of its tight pacing and unbroken tension. Watching it today it still retains its intelligence and prophetically echoes truth. (Read John Doe’s full review of Three Days of the Condor by clicking HERE)

Director Sydney Pollack talks about Three Days of The Condor

Jeremiah Johnson is the complete antithesis of Condor save the starring Redford credit. Turning his back on the technologies and machinations of early frontier culture, it’s about a mountain man’s survival against nature and natives. Capturing the mood and rhythm of the wilderness in its cinematography this expressive tome uses minimal dialogue to tell a universal examination of our primal will to live.

Director Sydney Pollack talks about Jeremiah Johnson

See the poetic opening minutes of Jeremiah Johnson

Sneaking in at an honourable number 3 is The Yakuza starring Robert Mitchum. Samurai swords and triad gangsters set this gentle tale of redemption, sacrifice and love in motion. Respectfully staged to genuinely observe the clashing cultural ideals of Japan and the US, this introspective film achieves a quiet nod to its subject. (To read John Doe’s full review of The Yakuza click HERE)

That’s Johnny’s top 3 and here are the remainder of his favourite films Directed by Sydney Pollack.

They shoot horses dont they?

4. They Shoot Horses, Don't They?
5. Bobby Deerfield
6. The Electric Horseman
7. Out of Africa
8. The Slender Thread
9. Havana
10. Absence of Malice
11. This Property Is Condemned
12. Tootsie
13. The Way We Were
14. The Scalphunters
15. Castle Keep

Sydney Pollack you will be missed, hope your now seated in that big cinema in the sky having a laugh with Kubrick, Hitchcock and Welles

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Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) – Trailer Included

May 23rd 2008 00:01

The Crystals of Fond Memories Skeleton

Thank you to the wonderful people at Paramount Pictures who were nice enough to send me a red carpet ticket to the premiere. Seeing Cate Blanchett and Jack Thompson was a fun bonus

Indiana Jones 4 is here

Director:Steven Spielberg
Starring: Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Ray Winstone, Cate Blanchett, Shia LaBeouf, Ray Winstone, Jim Broadbent, John Hurt

“This isn’t going to be easy” - Mac

It’s been 19 years since Indy rode off into the sunset at the end of The Last Crusade and now the hero returns. This installment is a tongue in cheek and foot in mouth comic book film that whizzes along at the pace we expect from the adventures of Dr Jones.

Set in the 1950’s, Elvis Presley’s Hound Dog blares over the opening credits as a supped up hotrod toys with a convoy of military vehicles. On board the trucks as prisoners are the “obtainer of rare antiquities” himself (Harrison Ford) and an old pal named Mac (Ray Winstone).
"I have a bad feeling about this" - Indiana Jones

“Quicker than you can say Dr Jones you have a telegram from Cairo” the bullwhip is out and the fists are flying. Escaping the deadly clutches of a band of Cold War stereotype Russians led by Irano Spalko (Cate Blanchett) the intrepid archaeologist is intercepted by a tenacious Brando wannabe named Mutt. (Shia LaBeouf)

What the kid has is enough information to launch this latest roller coaster ride towards clues that will see them embark on the journey of discovering towards the legendary Crystal Skulls of the Ancient Incans.
"Legend says that a crystal skull was stolen from a mythical lost city in the Amazon, supposedly built out of solid gold, guarded by the living dead. Whoever returns the skull to the city temple will be given control over its power." - Indiana Jones

Age shall not weary them...

John Doe says:
Before JD begins the review I think its important to put some perspective on what kind of fan boy walked into the land that hides the Crystal Skull. Raiders of the Lost Ark and its sequels rank right alongside George Lucas’ other mythic tales in the Star Wars trilogy as the two most influential films of young Johnny’s life. Indiana Jones and Han Solo, the greatest characters that a twelve year old boy could ever hope to worship.

Aware of the inherit danger of hyped up expectations Mr Doe managed to breath through the excitement. Realising it would take a real radical error to quash the nostalgic appeal, the sentimental attraction.

He was partly right, what John D received was an uneven experience that had as many dips, turns and jumps as an out of control mine cart. In the appropriately fast paced story there were moments of magic, some impressive action set pieces and varied success with gags.

Sinking to the level of its imitators (Eg: The Mummy, Tomb Raider) this doesn't feel like an authentic Indiana Jones adventure, it was familiarity that saved it from being a monumental disappointment. There is something sadly generic, or is that geriatric about this chapter of the saga. If it were a stand alone film with no history attached it may have been viewed as a wasted opportunity that slips into parody.

Stuffed with references to both the preceding trilogy and Star Wars this is a movie that tries very hard to please everyone. The in jokes are laid on thick and fast in an attempt to please geek boy fans. Some work others are just clumsy. It is strange that all the witty lines in the trailer worked, but when they were in the context of the scenes they seemed to mostly fall flat.

Steven Spielberg (Emperor of The Sun, Jaws) is in his element here, doing what he does best escapist entertainment. Credit has to go to the restraint used that tapers glaring CGI FX, the camera is always in movement and technically is brilliant. Still embracing modern cinema technology and exploiting it to its full visual potential, by doing so though, the film has an uneasy aura that doesn’t quite sync with the earlier films.

George Lucas (THX 1138)has said that this film is like a “a B Science Fiction film from the 1950’s”, you can see what he is talking about and it succeeds sporadically. Other times its just to silly. The ludicrous conceits pile on way to swiftly. Sure all the series had its impossible achievements, (Eg: Indy swimming to the sub in Raiders, Jumping out of a plane with an inflatable raft in Temple of Doom etc) but here there is little effort to achieve suspension of disbelief.

Lucas’ influence is also felt with an American Graffiti era opening 15 minutes that over sells giving the audience a sense of time and place. What should come naturally is punctuated to early and a haphazard similarity to the preceding films often feels forced and changes the whole tone.

The script does its best to acknowledge Indy’s age and hence passes a lot of the more daring-do to Shia LaBeouf. Unfortunately, Harrison Ford does look like a man in his 60’s and so his ability to get in down and dirty fist fights with men much younger or perform some unbelievable physical stunt contradicts what we are seeing in downtime. Effectively replacing any excitement with a farcical air, it felt like a pair of aging cinema lords decided to try and be new millennium hip.

Harrison Ford (Witness, Mosquito Coast, Frantic) does manage to retain his dignity despite the unintentional mocking, but his delivery is so lethargic and wooden that he fails to capture the characters essence. The body language is different too, when not evading commie scum or plummeting down ridiculously large waterfalls we suddenly see the old man of action disappear.

Part of the problem with the film not fully engaging is the part of the villain as played by Cate Blanchett (I'm Not There, Lord of the Rings, Coffee and Cigarettes). Rightfully she apologised for her lousy Russian Accent that drifts into a British and Aussie twang repeatedly, but this is not a fatal flaw. There is a crucial element to her portrayal that is missing, she carries absolutely no threat or menace. There is never any question of danger, she seems inferior and never makes the audience quiver like Major Arnold Toht or Mola Ram. Worse still one second she realises she is in a cheesy actioner, then blinks into taking it all deadly serious, its like a lesson in flaky character continuity.

It takes a real skill to remove all of Ray Winstone’s (Sexy Beast, Scum, The Proposition, The War Zone) frightening testosterone soaked teeth, but that’s exactly what happens. Miscast, its like they have removed his spleen and replaced it with crazy putty, his character should have been a Peter Lorre type, what we get is more akin to Tom Hanks. (That’s a bad thing by the way)

Thank god for Karen Allen (Animal House, The Wanderers, Cruisin) as Marion Ravenwood. Everytime she smiles you see the same dame from 20 year earlier, just not drinking men under the table anymore. Though the screenplay does its best to remove her independence and take away her spark, vying to make her a romantic damsel Allen still manages to let you know its their in her eyes.

John Hurt (Elephant Man, Ten Rillington Place) too is his usual splendid self, eccentric and unfettered by ego he happily plays along as a brain wiped professor. Of all the cast he is the one who seems the happiest to be there. Unlike Shia LeBeouf (A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, Holes)who didn’t exude the giddy thrills you know he had off camera.

Writing this review has been very painful for John Doe, it isn’t unlike writing an essay on “Why My Mother is a Slut”. Such is his attachment to this fictional universe that just like The Phantom Menace in time he hopes to appreciate it for its nostalgic positives, rather than try and compare it to what he perceived as the celluloid Holy Grail when he was a much younger movie lover.

If you haven't already seen it - The mighty teaser trailer for Indiana Jones 4