Review Category: DVD/Blu Ray

Surprisingly, Peter Hewitt’s 1997 film was the first big-screen adaptation of Mary Norton’s 1952 children’s novel; arriving not long after the BBC series, the Working Title production ditches much beyond the basic premise, instead devising a new story around the tiny Clock family and their “borrowing” habits and giving Arrietty a younger brother into the bargain.

The plot itself is rather slight, revolving around the plight of the Lender family, whose house is due to be demolished after their aunt dies, apparently without leaving a will. In fact, her lawyer Ocious P. Potter (a broadly odious John Goodman, enjoying himself immensely) is keeping the will a secret so he can demolish the house and build Potter Towers in its place, and when the Lender’s young son Pete discovers the Borrowers’ existence, he and the Clock children join forces to save their home. 

And that’s about it. Children’s movies tend to be less about plot and more about the confluence of activity and story, and on these counts The Borrowers scores very highly. Hewitt’s cameras are rarely still, gently panning and tracking through the slower scenes and delivering the punctuating incident with clarity and not a little panache. Jim Broadbent and Celia Imrie are perfectly cast as the Clock parents Pod and Homily, while Mark Williams puts in an appearance as the local pest exterminator and Gregory House himself turns up as a considerate if rather clueless policeman. 

The effects, of which there are necessarily plenty, have generally aged rather well, there being only a couple of instances where they are overly obvious, and in fact the film itself has aged much better in its two decades than might have been expected, due to Hewitt’s decision to give the entire project a very 1950s aesthetic, in spite of the use of mobile phones and suchlike. The whole film has been shot through an orange filter, which combines with the green visual cues to create an ambience of nostalgia that sets the existence of the Borrowers in a familiar yet entirely fictional universe, one that suits them nicely. The use of a largely American cast as the human “Beans”, and even the alternative 4:3 presentation of the film – perhaps a hangover of its arrival shortly before the DVD-inspired 16:9 revolution – are further affectations that help to perpetuate the illusion of timelessness.

The younger cast, quite obviously placed as identification characters for watching children, all acquit themselves impeccably, making this a fast-moving and attractive proposition for junior viewers and adults alike, who will find plenty to amuse in the plot. While Norton aficionados might find the liberties taken with the text somewhat off-putting, for anyone else this is a delightful and inclusive confection. 

THE BORROWERS (1997) / CERT: U / DIRECTOR: PETER HEWITT / SCREENPLAY: GAVIN SCOTT, JOHN KAMPS / STARRING: JOHN GOODMAN, JIM BROADBENT, MARK WILLIAMS, CELIA IMRIE / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Some young people are celebrating, recording everything they do, and things are going really wel,l when suddenly all hell breaks lose and, with the help of the military, they try to escape lots of small monsters and one really big one you see in passing now and then, only to end up in dark underground passages where they aren’t alone. One of the young girls has been bitten and is starting to change…

Yes, Cloverfield really was great, wasn’t it? But this description is for Jeruzalem, a shameless rip off / homage of several movies, of which Cloverfield and World War Z are the most imitated. 

Here, a couple of young American girls are heading to Israel for a backpacking holiday, as one recovers from the death of her brother. They befriend a fellow traveller, an anthropologist with an interest in the occult and religion, and together they stay in a hostel in Jerusalem. But the holiday becomes a nightmare of biblical proportions when a gateway to hell is opened and the gated city goes into lockdown as winged demons appear and a bloody big thing, that’s impossible to make out, strolls around in the distance. Trapped, their only way out is to venture underground, where a series of caves and tunnels could lead them beyond the city walls. Oh, and one of the girls is wearing a nifty pair of smart glasses, and we see the entire film through them. 

As you can imagine, the film does have a certain sense of deja vu about it. Holidaying Americans in trouble? Check. Weird locals offering a strong sense of foreboding? All present and correct. Authority figures unable to help when the chaos reigns down? You betcha. Yes, we’ve seen it all before. But on the plus side, writer/directors The Yaz Brothers, spend their time building things up, so we do get a genuine sense of the city, and it’s nice to see an apocalyptic invasion film set somewhere other than LA for a change. Once the carnage starts, there are some quite atmospheric sequences and the demons themselves, all wide of mouth, tortured of soul and ragged of wing, are pretty creepy and provide a couple of good jumps.

On the minus side, towards the end there’s too much running about, so the action becomes a little repetitive. Some of the acting is a bit hokey too, and the main character, Sarah, who wears the snazzy glasses, starts to grate with her endless whining. 

But the glasses are the key to what makes the film stand slightly above some of the worst examples of the ‘found footage’ sub-genre of horror. As you’re seeing through the eyes of the main character, you’re also getting other snippets of info as she does, like maps popping up, to show where you are, photos being taken as she snaps her holiday, Skype calls with her Dad, old photos and, importantly, facial recognition, something which brings about a nice little twist towards the end. 

So whilst it’s hardly going to top any lists, is it worth 90 minutes if you’re a fan of horror good or bad? Hell, yes! 

JERUZALEM / CERT: 15 / DIRECTORS & SCREENPLAY: DORON PAZ, YOAV PAZ / STARRING: YAEL GROBGLAS, DANIELLE JADELYN, YON TUMARKIN / RELEASE DATE: 4TH APRIL

Takashi Miike’s Audition likely needs no introduction to certain quarters of our readership. The film is an absolute classic, and it is revered by many as a pivotal piece of Asian horror cinema. Sure, it may have a certain reputation due to that ending, but there’s a whole lot more to Audition than mere depravity and stomach-churning actions.

Plot-wise, the film centres on Shigeharu (Ryo Ishibashi), a long-time widower who hasn’t moved on with his life since the untimely passing of his wife. At the behest of his son, Shigehiko (Tetsu Sawaki), he decides to look for love once more. Calling in the assistance of his film producer pal, Yasuhisa (Jun Kunimura), it’s decided that the best way to find a new beau is to stage a faux audition process in order to land the gig of Shigeharu’s new wife. When Asami (Eihi Shiina) arrives at the auditions, Shigeharu is completely smitten with her, and soon his life will never be the same again. Soon enough, the audience is let in on the fact that Asami was abused as a child, and when her apparent CV-cum-résumé doesn’t seem to add up, events start to veer into the mysterious before finally landing at a tense, nerve-tingling, wince-inducing finale.

Sure, Audition was first released back in 1999, but to elaborate any further on the plot would be a massive F-U to anybody who has yet to see Miike’s film and a move that would ruin one of the most impactful closing sequences that we’ve seen over the past twenty years. But safe to say, Audition is a divine and delicious slice of Asian horror that is worthy of its status as an iconic piece of not just Asian horror or J-horror, or even horror as a whole, but as an iconic piece of cinema. The film is lavishly coloured with the recurring themes of love and pain and the relationship between these two emotions, and Miike really put his stamp on world cinema with a psychological, shocking effort that left a mark on any and all who saw it during its initial release or any of its subsequent re-releases.

Granted, Audition will always be best-known for its closing twenty minutes or so, but there is so, so much more going on underneath the surface of a film whose reputation would often have casual moviegoers thinking that this is merely just another generic J-horror with a few gnarly scenes. It’s not. In fact, this is a movie that transcends any and all labels or tag you could throw on it for the most-part. And just to add some extra sizzle to this steak, the ever-great guys at Arrow Video have brought together a new release of Audition that’s absolutely crammed with some fantastic and informative extras that only bring more to the viewing experience. Any of the extras involving Takashi Miike himself instantly grab the attention, but the Damaged Romance feature is also something that shines, highlighting the career of Miike in a way rarely seen.

All in all, this new release of Audition is one that simply needs to be in your collection. Buy it. Buy it now… and forever fear piano wire!

Special Features: Audio commentary with Tatakshi Miike and Daisuke Tengan / Audio commentary by Takashi Miike biographer Tom Mes / Intro by Takashi Miike / Damaged Romance: An appreciation by Tony Rayns / Interviews / Trailers / Gallery

AUDITION / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: TAKASHI MIIKE / SCREENPLAY: DAISUKE TENGAN / STARRING: RYO ISHIBASHI, EIHI SHIINA, JUN KUNIMURA, TETSU SAWAKI, MIYUKI MATSUDA / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Doug Woods hosts of cable show Man Vs., in which he must survive for five days in a remote location without access to any of the modern props we take for granted, but for the four cameras with which he records his video diary. We join the team as they’re travelling to north Ontario to begin production on Series Three, but once Woods has been left to his own devices, strange things begin happening and to say any more about them would be to completely spoil the effect of the film.

The first ten minutes are all setup, as we are introduced to Woods’ family and the small team he works with, and it’s this section that’s the least effective, as it, slightly stilted way tries to demonstrate how well everybody gets on. But once he’s alone in the wild, Woods’ story quickly becomes highly absorbing.

Chris Diamantopoulos, as Woods, has to carry 90% of the film entirely unaided, and fortunately he’s an excellent choice. Not overly “charismatic”, in a way that might become grating, his emotional reactions feel genuine and you can easily imagine him hosting a cable reality show, with exactly the kind of over-acting you’d get “on camera”. We get to see the unedited footage, though, with Woods’ far more natural reactions to the circumstances into which he’s allowed himself to be placed. His real response to a rain shower on the second evening, having already filmed his professional reaction, is priceless.

Man Vs. isn’t, in spite of its conceit, a found footage film. Yes, we do get to see plenty of Woods’ video diary, but this adds up to only a fraction of the whole and the rest of the film is beautifully shot and non-diegetic. Director Adam Massey evidently knows the pitfalls of the genre and steadfastly refuses to fall into them, instead using the video diary footage to clue the watching audience in to certain things that Woods won’t discover until later. It’s intelligently told, for reasons that can’t be gone into without spoiling its destination, managing to avoid most of the clichés of its premise, while simultaneously embracing them. And Massey is clever enough not to allow any of the set pieces to outstay their welcome, with a clear and sharp focus on the elements that will prove important as the drama unfolds. There’s one shock involving a particular prop that only works as well as it does for having been foreshadowed earlier on.

With an ending that both forces a rethink of the events of the previous 80 minutes as well as potentially paving the way for a (very different) sequel, Man Vs. is a modest but very effective thriller. 

MAN VS. / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: ADAM MASSEY / SCREENPLAY: THOMAS MICHAEL, STORY: ADAM MASSEY / STARRING: CHRIS DIAMANTOPOULOS, CHLOE BRADT, MICHAEL CRAM, DREW NELSON, KATE ZIEGLER, ALEX KARZIS / RELEASE DATE: 28TH MARCH

Ageing exorcist Eloy, travels with his teenage granddaughter Alba, around a sparsely populated Barcelona removing demons; police officer Diana investigates the chaos left in their wake; and Diana’s sister Ona, defends herself against the mounting chaos spontaneously erupting within a mental hospital. As the city is assaulted by an unseasonal heat wave, the countdown to a mysterious resurrection may well herald the end of days.

While any film about exorcisms is always going to fall in the shadow of William Friedkin’s immortal classic, Asmodexia is also hampered by both its inevitable comparison to the number of original and quality horror movies to have come out of Spain in recent years, and that the 2012 Mayan apocalypse, that wasn’t actually prophesised anyway, has long since come and gone (while Armageddon is never specifically mentioned, that the zero hour in question occurs on the 21st of December 2012 it’s pretty much implicit). Despite such immediate comparative handicaps, Asmodexia manages to form a distinct identity.

Rather than the sun-kissed Mediterranean tourist hotspot of lively thoroughfares, vibrant parks and artistic architecture, the Barcelona that Eloy and Alba wander through is instead presented as a scorched urban wasteland of empty desolation, while dank and dark interiors lit by flickering candles give any scene shielded from the harsh daylight an oppressive Gothic atmosphere. As the only people they encounter are lonely and isolated groups, cloistered behind ramshackle defences against the supernatural, you can’t help but wonder if the apocalypse has already begun. 

It’s in the actual story that the film falters, being far too obtuse for its own good. Very little is made of the encroaching resurrection, and it’s only in the periodic reminders of its inexorability that it appears to have any importance. Despite the nominal connections between the various plotlines, their lack of intersection results in there being no real relation between them. Everything appears to hark back to when the major players were all part of a hippie-like commune, as evidenced by a grainy VHS recording of a flower-power singsong dated some months before Alba’s visceral birth that opens the film, but like pretty much everything else its true significance is hidden for much of the story.

Outwith the gruesome physicality of the exorcisms (which actually look quite impressive), viewing the film requires a degree of concentration to take in the story’s numerous and seemingly unrelated events. It’s not until the very end that the disparate strands truly join together, and at this point a revelatory spin is put on everything that seems to have previously occurred. While the ending is a neat idea, that injury-time exposition is required to explain what’s actually been going on, means that ultimately the film is sabotaged by its own subtlety.

ASMODEXIA / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: MARC CARRETÉ / SCREENPLAY: MARC CARRETÉ, MIKE HOSTENCH / STARRING: LLUÍS MARCO, CLÀUDIA PONS, IRENE MONTALÀ, MARTA BELMONTEW / RELEASE DATE: 28TH MARCH

When we hear about Battlestar Galactica, the first thing that springs to mind is the widely-acclaimed reimagined series that launched back in 2003, but before then, there was the original vision that all began with this. Originally intended as the opening 3-parter pilot, they were lumped together into a singular movie and distributed across cinemas with one big change being that the Cylons kill Baltar, whilst he is reprieved in the TV 3-part version to turn up in later episodes. Despite the big change, the rest of the story is intact and while it is mostly solid, considering the time period in which it was made, it is definitely not a smooth ride.

In all honesty, it felt occasionally creaky and hokey. One aspect it fails at is in its editing and pacing, being incredibly slow and ponderous one minute to quick and adventurous the next, making the experience somewhat scattershot as a result. The effects tend to vary, with some looking amazing thanks to John Dykstra’s wonderful model work, yet when the effects are bad, they are laughable. Also, during the space battle sequences, the film reuses way too many that it just becomes distracting. Sure, you could’ve probably got away with it if you’d just reused it once and did some clever editing on it, but to reuse the exact same unedited shot four or five times is going a bit too far.

But, the main problem is that there is an inconsistency in tone, where the plot instantly turns from dark and disturbing one minute to knock-about comedy the next, and it is within the blink of an eye. In this story, there are intergalactic holocausts and humans turned into living hosts by bug-aliens, yet that contrasts heavily with the many comedic sequences with Starbuck (at least Katee Sackhoff’s Starbuck wasn’t like this) and the many annoyingly saccharine scenes, with the irritating Boxey (must be Anakin’s long distant brother) and the robotic ‘Daggit’. Oh, and that robot Daggit outfit is horrendous. 

However, what makes the whole thing stand up strong is its core concept, as it tackles the themes of political debacles against an intergalactic war, and the robotic Cylons rebelling against humanity (which is something that became the driving force of Terminator with Skynet). The sequences of emotional distress, and the differences in political ideologies that surrounded the Cylon invasion, are impressively well handled and do a great job of adding more dramatic weight to the overall story, which is helped by mostly strong performances throughout. It’s perhaps thankful that in the revived series, creator Ronald D Moore wanted more focus on the politics of humanity’s plight, and much less on the lighter comedic side of an intergalactic holocaust.

Even though the reimagined series is much stronger in comparison, the original Battlestar Galactica is still groundbreaking in many respects, even with all its faults, bringing a whole new level of production value that science fiction on TV had never previously seen before. The show’s unusual concept and design work still stands as a testament to those who have worked on it, even if some of the other aspects are less worthy of note.

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA: SAGA OF A STAR WORLD / CERT: PG / DIRECTOR: RICHARD A. COLLA / SCREENPLAY: GLEN A. LARSON / STARRING: RICHARD HATCH, LORNE GREENE, DIRK BENEDICT, HERBERT JEFFERSON JR / RELEASE DATE: 28TH MARCH

Simpsons did it. To address the elephant in the room (hi Stampy!) it is, of course, hard to take J. Lee Thompson’s classic thriller quite so seriously these days, for fear of Sideshow Bob flashbacks upon Cape Feare. Push it from your mind if you can though, for Cape Fear remains as tense and compelling viewing as it ever was, no matter how many of its shocks may have been replayed and redone for years since.

Unlike the Simpsons clan or the dysfunctional bickering monsters of Martin Scorsese’s remake (which, in turn, inspired the Sideshow Bob spoof), Lawyer Sam Bowden (Gregory Peck) and his family (Polly Bergen and Lori Martin) are a wholesome lot, unfairly victimised by the ex-convict (Robert Mitchum) he helped put away. Stalked by a vengeful Max Cady and besieged at all fronts, the Bowdens and their trusty Private Dick (Telly Savalas) take off in the family houseboat, concocting a plan to take the man down… if he doesn’t get to them first, that is. 

Controversial in its time for its surprising brutality and not shying away from depicting Cady as a predator, with a predilection for underage girls, Cape Fear has aged well in the years since its release. Unlike the remake, it doesn’t need to turn Cady into an unstoppable Jason Voorhees type figure; Mitchum’s genial dapper menace is, in his own way, more terrifying than DeNiro’s scenery-gobbling brutalist ever was. Like his preacher in Night of the Hunter, Mitchum is a compelling and charismatic villain – not a man whom one would want to cross, but with good taste in debonair hats. His cheery nastiness is a fine foil to Gregory Peck’s sturdy hero routine, and a genuine threat to the terrified wife and child (naturally for a film of this vintage, the female characters have little to do but whimper and be chased with the occasional game of table tennis thrown in too, for good mention). This is a classic battle of wits, a game of cat and mouse between hero and villain, old fashioned but feeling surprisingly modern at the same time.

No conversation about Cape Fear being complete without a mention of that theme – a score which resonates even today, even in spite of Sideshow Bob’s nonsense. The Simpsons did it funnier and Scorsese turned Cape Fear into a lurid horror film, but, as is so often the case, the original is king.

CAPE FEAR (1962) / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: J. LEE THOMPSON / SCREENPLAY: JAMES R. WEBB / STARRING: GREGORY PECK, ROBERT MITCHUM, POLLY BERGEN, LORI MARTIN, TELLY SAVALAS / RELEASE DATE: 28TH MARCH

Celebrating twenty years since its release, Barry Levinson’s film of Louis Carcaterra’s 1995 novel, is a solid production filled with solid performances telling a solid story, but in an unspectacular fashion that suffers by comparison with Scorsese’s Goodfellas and Leone’s Once Upon a Time in America. Despite a cast that includes Brad Pitt, Robert de Niro and Dustin Hoffman, Sleepers is best remembered for the controversy surrounding the authenticity of its source material.

In an extended preliminary segment, we are introduced to four essentially decent kids in New York’s infamous Hell’s Kitchen district in the mid-1960s, making ends meet mostly respectably. That is until the friends almost kill someone during an accident, which sees them sentenced to a spell in the Wilkinson Home for Boys. There they encounter Kevin Bacon’s Nokes, a sadistic guard with a predilection for abusing his charges. What is in essence a prologue, lasts the better part of an hour, and while it is basically just the set-up for the second half of the film, it manages to tell an almost self-contained story in its own right – albeit one that never quite conveys the horror Levinson no doubt intends, thanks to some thoughtful but less than effective directorial choices.

We then relocate to the early 1980s, when the cruelty of the past is exposed, after two of the boys encounter Nokes in a bar and enact their revenge in front of the other customers. A third boy, Michael (Pitt), is now an assistant DA, and takes on the prosecution with an intent to lose the case, opposite Dustin Hoffman as an alcohol-soaked lawyer way past his prime. Throughout all of this, the boys’ confidant has been Father Bobby Carillo (de Niro), and now the defence rests upon the willingness of the most upstanding member of the community to perjure himself in court.

While the cast is undoubtedly excellent, the speech and behaviour patterns can result in the performances feeling a little affected, a problem compounded by the almost ubiquitous narration from the author’s alter ego “Stokes” (Jason Patric) which – while no doubt taking its cues from the novel – has a tendency to spell everything out beyond that which is necessary, removing much of the emotion from the characters’ situations. The result is a film, which feels at once both classy and stolid, like a cordon bleu meal served on a cardboard plate. The tension is entirely in waiting to see if the characters will do what you know they will, and there are few, if any, genuinely unexpected moments. Even Carcaterro’s shocking “true story” has now had its legitimacy almost entirely disproven, and what remains is a cold, if enjoyable enough, white elephant of a film. 

SLEEPERS (1996) / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: BARRY LEVINSON / SCREENPLAY: BARRY LEVINSON / STARRING: JASON PATRIC, ROBERT DE NIRO, BRAD PITT, KEVIN BACON, DUSTIN HOFFMAN, MINNIE DRIVER / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW 

Are there any filmmakers working today as diverse as Joel and Ethan Coen? Ever since they followed their blood-soaked, noir-ish debut Blood Simple with the frankly insane Raising Arizona, the brothers sent a message that they weren’t going to be pigeonholed. It’s something they’ve maintained right throughout their impressive career. In the last few years they’ve given us three vastly different genres in as many films, with the Oscar-nominated Western, True Grit, a touching drama about a struggling folk singer with Inside Llewyn Davis, and their current madcap comedy Hail Caesar!

Burn After Reading, their 2008 black comedy was the follow-up to their Oscar-winning drama No Country For Old Men, and typically for the brothers, it couldn’t be more different. The plot follows a group of characters who could only ever exist in a Coen Brothers movie – a disgruntled former low-level CIA employee (John Malkovich), obsessed with writing his less than Earth-shattering memoirs; his unfaithful wife (Tilda Swinton); serial philander George Clooney; plastic surgery-obsessed gym employee Frances McDormand; and, in Brad Pitt, probably the dumbest character the brothers have ever created.

When a draft of Osborne Cox’s (Malkovich) memoirs falls into the hands of McDormand and Pitt, they attempt to sell it, to fund a series of operations she’s obsessed with having. This sets off a typically Coen-esque tragi-comic chain of events involving the CIA, Russians, copious bed-hopping and the most eye-wateringly uncomfortable chair you’ll ever lay eyes on.

The plot, by their standards is a little light, but ultimately that plays second fiddle to a collection of delightfully quirky characters, and an excellent cast. Pitt’s hilariously dumb, and given a good run for his money in the idiot stakes by Clooney (who the brothers seem to delight in casting in these type of roles). Malkovich is brilliantly pretentious. Coen regular (and wife of Joel Coen) McDormand adds another quirky character to her repertoire. Only the always excellent Tilda Swinton feels slightly short-changed in a thankless role.

There are a number of recurring themes and motifs that are consistent throughout their work, allowing disparate films to all retain the brother’s trademark style, including a gift for brilliant character names (with Clooney’s Harry Pfarrer the standout here); a propensity for sudden, unexpected moments of extreme violence; and copious, hilarious swearing (take a bow Malkovich). Resolving the fate of lead characters off-screen, something, which they experimented with in No Country For Old Men, is also revisited here, although to lesser effect.

For comic brilliance it never reaches the heights of The Big Lebowski or Raising Arizona, but is considerably more accessible than much of their work. If you’re not familiar with the delights of two of the most entertaining, quirky filmmakers working today, Burn After Reading is an excellent introduction. If you’re a fan, Burn After Reading is mid-league Coens. Not one of their classics, but a consistently hilarious treat.

BURN AFTER READING (2008) / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: ETHAN COEN, JOEL COEN / SCREENPLAY: JOEL COEN, ETHAN COEN / STARRING: JOHN MALKOVICH, GEORGE CLOONEY, FRANCES McDORMAND, BRAD PITT / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW