Brazil (1985)

"I won't look at your willy."

This film is, of course, a work of genius from the unique mind of Terry Gilliam- Kafkaesque, nightmarish, surreal, perhaps similar in visual style to his recently directed Crimson Assurance bit of Monty Python’s Meaning of Life, but announcing Gilliam as a true auteur. It’s also a true cinematic classic, managing to present a fundamentally bleak view of civilisation with the darkly humorous approach that is of course the only sane one.

Gilliam may be a native of Minnesota, but this film is full of the influences of his twenty years in Britain. It is, obviously, full of that Orwellian fear of tyranny, and the petty details of that tyranny, that is constantly found in British science fiction. It is set in a deliberately timeless and anachronistic time and place, but there are plenty of visual nods to the Nazi’s, and in particular to the phenomenon, in the words of Hannah Arendt, of the banality of evil.

It’s very Pythonesque, of course, but should certainly not be reduced to that. The casting of Michael Palin against type is a masterstroke, as is the starring role for the excellent Jonathan Pryce. A parade of British character actors play a parade of entertainingly disturbing grotesques, as does Robert De Niro, whose insane casting somehow works.

It is, of course, obstructive to see a film about the reality of, well, fascism, in 2020. The Kafkaesque evils inherent in computers are shown here, as well as the effectiveness of information control by those in power. Where the only news is Fox News, truth no longer exists. And, while the UK is not yet at risk of fascism or anything close, the blatant cronyism and disrespect for constitution norms we see here are particularly chilling.

A superb film from a director who, with this film, has well and truly outgrown Monty Python.

Doomsday (2008)

“In the land of the infected, the immune man is king."

 This s easily the greatest Scottish post-apocalyptic Mad Max movie with mediaeval knights and steam locomotives ever made. Bar none.

Yes, the start is perhaps a bit ropey, very exposition-heavy and quite blatantly nothing but exposition, exposition, exposition as it gives us a backstory of a Scotland (well, Britain north of a reconstituted Hadrian's Wall- that would be just south of Wallsend's high street, a bizarre way to think of Mrs Llamastrangler's home town) quarantined because of a nasty virus, causing the British government to abandon and brutalise people in ways that probably mean Nicola Sturgeon died crying "I told you so" although, to be fair, the PM's Glaswegian functionary is just as evil to Londoners later.

But then it gets good. Really good, proper B movie fun. Proper Mad Max aesthetics and car chases, cannibalism, Molotov cocktails, glorious ultraviolence, Siouxie and the Banshees, loads of gore, not a lot of sentimentality in spite of  Major Eden's potentially tear-jerking backstory, and Malcolm McDowell holding forth speechifying splendidly in a mediaeval castle, presiding over a medieval society. In the twenty-first century. This is top B-movie stuff. And very well-directed too. There are Roman echoes, with Hadrian's Wall and some of the Mad Max lot evoking painted Picts.

The cast is superb, from Sean Pertwee's horrible end to David O'Hara's cynical baddie to the ever- sublime Malcolm McDowell, but the badass Rhona Mitra holds it all together. A film most definitely worth watching.

Hook (1991)

"When are you going to learn to stop acting like a child?"

"I am a child!"

It's rather obvious that the reason I'm blogging this film now is the sad passing of Robin Williams, so it's worth starting with a few words about a comedian and actor of great talent.

I've never been a great fan of Hollywood's popular comedies, which always have the main character learning some heartwarming lesson about family values rather than just, you know, being funny. Robin Williams may have been good at these, being both a superb comic actor and very capable of pathos, but for much of his career he was ill-served by film unworthy of his talents. There are, of course, a good number of quality films starring Williams but his best performance, for me, is a straight role in One Hour Photo.

Hook, although it somewhat fits the definition of a Hollywood comedy as defined above, is nonetheless quite a good film, if not brilliant, because of the spectacle, the sense of wonder that fantasy always brings, and a particularly sublime performance from Williams, who shines here, far outshining the pantomime villainy of Dustin Hoffman, who gets top billing for some reason.

The conceit- a sequel to Peter Pan in which J.M. Barrie simply passed of his neighbour's children's true stories of his own and Peter Pan eventually grows up and becomes a lifeless, Reagan-voting asset stripper who missed the '60s because he was an accountant- is a good one. Yes, he's a bad father as per many such scar actors in such Hollywood films, but the Peter Pan stuff actually makes this interesting. His fear of flying is a nice touch. And Robin Williams brings the role a real depth, far more than is in the script.

This isn't the greatest film ever, but it's fun and, indeed, bangarang. I love the montage with Peter getting his mojo back, and the late Bob Hoskins is great, far outshining Hoffman. Well worth a watch, and nostalgic to see some actual world-building spectacle from the days before widespread CGI.