Dogma (1999)

 "Bethany, bless the sink!"

I watched, and enjoyed this film, many years ago but, as often happens as the decades pass- and I am not, you understand, in any way confessing to being middle aged- I remembered very litttle. Last night was pretty much a second first viewing.

And it's superb. As a comedy, it's bloody good, with a constant stream of laughs. Linda Fiorentino is perfect as the star. Chris Rock and Alan Rickman are both brilliant. George Carlin is perfect casting as a down-with-the-kids cardinal. Some dodgy angel wing CGI aside- and we can be forgiving, because it's 1999- there's not much wrong with this.

It is, of course, a very different beast from the very '90s slacker romantic comedies for which Kevin Smith had previously been known, although there's a fair bit of that sort of thing here. But the religious stuff is obviously going to come across as provocative, not least with Bethany working at an abortion clinic and (spoilers!) the plot requiring God's life support machine to be switched off. Casting Alanis Morissette as God is, of course, entirely uncontroversial.

And yet... I don't get this film to be mocking faith, or religion itself, in any way, but rather the reactionary and socially conservative structure that eventually inserts itself around every religion. I've never had any religious faith myself, I wasn't brought up with it and am simply unable to believe in something without empirical proof, but even I was moved by Bethany's drunken nostalgia for a time when she had a childlike, simple faith. But perhaps this film also hints at a deeper truth. Divine or not, this Jesus person seems to have been anything but conservative.

Chasing Amy (1997)

 "Since you like chicks, right, do you just look at yourself naked in the mirror all the time?"

Time for another View Askewniverse film in my meandering marathon... and this one is not only bloody good, but beneathe the humour it explores some rather serious themes. Don't get me wrong, I like good films of any genre, but I tend not to seek out many romantic comedies because, well, I'm a bloke. Sometimes, I feel, even the good ones can have a very superficial, greetings card view of love and relatiobships. Yes, Richard Curtis, I'm looking at you.

This film is not like that. This is real.

I've seen this film before, at uni, but that was, ahem, a couple of years ago. I've lived a lot and loved a lot since then. And, well, 1997 was a long time ago. At least, I hope fewer men today are as much of a dick as Holden.

It's interesting looking back into an age when acceptance of LGBT issues (although the T wasn't thought about much back then) was evolving. The twentysomething characters here don't approve of bigotry, the word "homophobia" exists, although quite new, and, as illustrated by Banky, we have that by now dated trope that men who are bigoted about gay men are in denial about their own sexuality.

But the crux of it all is the sexual politics between women and men. Because Alyssa is completely wonderful- witty, funny, kind, fun and basically an amazing person. Holden is very lucky that she loves him.And she does. She gives up her friendships to be with him. She gives him everything.

He doesn't deserve her. He goes all wobbly because... she dares to have a sexual past while being female. Yep, double standards again. And very immature attitudes to threesomes, ployamory and sex in general, skewered brilliantly by Kevin Smith. He destroys both his relationship with the love of his life and his relationship with his best friend. His heart is broken. Good. Serves him right. But breaking Alyssa's heart is unforgiveable. We get an ambiguous ending... Holden doesn't deserve a happy one.

This film is mature, devastating, superbly acted and written, and has some very nice directorial touches. There's also some bloody good humour, as we'd expect, and a great character in Hooper. Silent Bob, of course, steals the show.

This is, overall, a far more serious film than its two predecessors. It will break your heart. But it's very, very good indeed.

Mallrats (1995)

"And don't ever lose that nipple!"

Finding a quote for a Kevin Smith film is not exactly the most difficult thing ever, which says something in itself.

Ok, this isn't quite as good as Clerks. It's similar- a geek-cum-romantic comedy with slapstick, wit, heart and profound '90s-ness, but it doesn't have the art house look or the hard hitting ending, nor is thereas much depth behind the humour and the cool. This is Kevin Smith by numbers, with a moderately bigger budget.

But you know what? If this is what Kevin Smith comes up with when he's relatively uninspired, I'll take it. It may not be his best work, but it's still awesome. In fact, it's awesome for the deliberately Road Runner-esque scenes of Jay and Silent Bob trying to get past the security guard and destroy the stage. Stan Lee gets an awesome cameo. The Easter Bunny gets a damn good kicking. Some excellent points are made about Superman's sex life.

The performances are superb. Jason Mewes is excellent as Jay, and we see a lot more of him and Silent Bob, always a good thing. But it's the central comic performance of Jason Lee who holds the film together. The Blind Date-style conclusion is neatly done and, unlike in Clerks, the two sets of lovers are back together by the end. The slacker will forever remain a '90s trope; sunce the 2008 crash, and certainly now, it stands revealed as a luxury from a more prosperous era. But the geek, nonetheless, shall inherit the Earth/.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)

“ Ding dong, the god is dead.”

 I'm struggling to think of any film I've ever seen that's worse than this two and a half hours of empty, cynical, pointless drivel. The only consolation is that I have this blog and at least I get to put thid film over my knee and give it a sound spanking. I pity those who had to see this film without such an outlet.

So why so execrably awful? Well, there’s the obvious things which have often been pointed out- unlike Marvel, who carefully nurtured all the main characters in their individual films before bringing them all together in The Avengers, DC saw fit to follow the flawed but ok Man of Steel with this- a continuity-heavy crossover with a Batman we haven’t properly met, no soul and a music video sensibility of scene following scene at a bewildering pace without slowing down so we can get to know and care about the characters.

Then there’s the direction from alleged pervert Zack Snyder- technically well done, competent, but devoid of any individual style or personality. But worse than any of this is the message of the film. We expect Hotham, and the world of the Batman, to have a certain darkness, although branding people is a bit much. Yes, it’s nice to have an older, veteran, perhaps cynical Batman from the start. But Superman should be a contrast yet he’s depicted as a self-doubting throwback to less cynical times, a throwback to liberal times who is stranded in that godawful year 2016. But that’s lazy; the character of Dioetman is essentially the optimistic creation of two idealistic Jewish youngsters in the far darker days of 1938. The character of Superman has seen off much bigger bastards than Trump and Brexit and I hate the implication that morality and liberalism are outmoded values in these right wing, nativist days- and yes, those placards held by the anti-Superman protesters outside Congress are very anti-immigrant- where the simple fact is that we liberals can, and will, smash their stupid faces in. To suggest otherwise is not only to misunderstand and disrespect the character of Superman but send a very cynical political message that nothing matters and there’s no point. “No one stays good in this world”, says Superman.

So, yeah, I hate what this film is saying. But that’s not all; it’s over-complicated, confusing fanwank where all the attempts to make you sympathise with the characters fail both because of the clinical style and the fact that we’ve yet to get to know these characters- the only character here who is actually likeable is Laurence Fishburne’s delightfully quotable Perry White. Oh, and Luthor. I love Jesse Eisenberg’s witty, fast-talking Luthor, an eccentric Nietzchean, er, “superman”. But the film is full of good actors who are either woefully miscast- Jeremy Irons and, yes, Ben Affleck- or playing shallow, badly written characters. It’s a terrible script, a terrible film and a terrible basis for a cinematic universe. Even Justice League is not quite so bad as this.

Justice League (2017)

“What are your superpowers again?”

“I’m rich.”

 I'd intended to start this blog with a quip about that notorious moustache. After all, I mentioned it to Mrs Llamastrangler and she was amused to find the CGI on Henry Cavill’s upper lip so very obvious. But sadly I can’t continue along those lines as this film is an utter mess. It’s a turf, a stinker, a mind-bogglingly bad film. What went wrong?

D.C. can make good films. I enjoyed Suicide Squad and Wonder Woman. But they simply have no Kevin Fiege. There no quality control, no consistency of tone, no building up the characters in their individual films first. So we get these big epic films about iterations we don’t really know of characters who have barely been introduced to us in this version of the D.C. Universe. The pacing is atrocious and the script is lacking in sparkle. And the odd wittty line, presumably late additions by Joss Whedon after Zack Snyder was sacked, just jars with the po-faced and dull tone. This is a film about superheroes that fails to be fun. That’s quite an achievement.

Oh, some of the cast are good. Henry Cavill is well cast, and Ezra Miller is an inspired choice as an awkward young Flash. But Ben Affleck is both bad and wrong as Batman, Jeremy Irons is good but miscast as Alfred, and Ciaran Hinds gives us a generic and forgettable villain. And Jason Momoa’s Aquaman, incredibly, gets most of the best lines. And the amount of exposition just beggars belief. And don’t get me started on the sheer quantity of poor CGI.

This is, hands down, the worst superhero film I’ve ever seen.

Suicide Squad (2016)

"We're bad guys. It's what we do."

Well, I don't care what the critics say. Oh, this film may not be right up there with the greatest- sorry, DC, Deadpool was better- but it was stylish, cool and great fun. Here's your warning: this is a positive review.

I never read the Suicide Squad comics; Batman aside (I certainly read a lot of that) I was more of a Marvel kid and tended to read specific DC titles for the writers- Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman and the like- rather than following titles religiously as I did with Marvel. So I'm not writing this as an uber fanboy and can't comment on how the film compares to the comic.

Also... I'm aware that this is the third film of the DC Universe and I haven't seen the others yet. I'll be approaching the DC films as I did the Marvels- obviously I won't watch any Batman II film before a Batman film or anything like that, but I won't be necessarily watching and blogging DC Universe films in strict order, within reason. Anyway...

This is an awesome film with awesome characters, most notably Deadshot and Harley Quinn, and both Will Smith and Margot Robbie are awesome. Jared Leto, too, was a nicely old-fashioned psychopathic Joker, rubbish though his emo band may be. I'm not sure, yet, about the brief glimpses I've had of Ben Affleck as Batman but, well, we'll see about that. 

This was a stylishly directed film, fast-paced and with plot beats perfectly laid out for maximum entertainment value as a blockbuster should. The use of its mainly rock soundtrack was awesome. And I'm genuinely puzzled at the critics' insistence on the supposedly uneven tone- I found no such thing.

Yes, perhaps this is a case of relatively low expectations making me like a film (It has that in common with Citizen Kane...) but I had a good night at the pictures tonight and I'm curious about the previous two DC Universe films. Bring it on.

Daredevil (2003)

"I want a bloody costume!"

Oh dear. Oh dear oh dear.

I remember seeing this at the pictures when it came out. As far as I can recall I didn't hate it. I may not have been overwhelmed but I was, at least, moderately whelmed. This time, though... oh dear. I'm afraid this review is going to be quite the spanking.

Please understand that this film isn't awful merely because it stars Ben Affleck, which is never a good thing, or even that Affleck is in even worse form than usual. Jon Favreau is awful (he should stick to directing), Jennifer Garner phones in her performance, and while Michael Clarke Duncan is a good actor he's miscast as the Kingpin. He has a kind face. You just can't cast him as a baddie, although it doesn't help that the Kingpin's lines are the worst in the film. Only Colin Farrell manages to shine by, wisely, chewing the scenery with gusto as it's the only thing you can do with lines like that.

And that brings us to the script, a steaming pile of dung. It beggars belief that anyone seriously thought this script was ready for production. It's clear from the performances that the cast doesn't exactly believe in it. None of the characters are well-developed. Far too much time is spent on a totally unnecessary recap of Daredevil's origin- why are superhero films always doing this?- and Daredevil doesn't act or feel like Daredevil. He kills. He beats people up and generally behaves like a homicidal Batman. It just feels wrong.

At least we can keep ourselves entertained by counting all the names of comics creators here. I'm not sure how Joe Quesada feels about giving his name to a rapist, but Kevin Smith gets a cameo as "Jack Kirby" (and Frank Miller gets a brief cameo as, naturally, does Stan Lee) and Jack Murdock has recently fought "Miller, Mack, Bendis" and is seen fighting John Romita.

Still, this film is a turd. It's not even entertainingly bad. For the morbidly curious only.