Zodiac (2007)

 "I think he's watching us."

"Well, we're very good looking."

This is an interesting film, to say the least. I suppose I was expecting something more sensational, more focused on the gory details, but instead far more of the run time is dedicated to the puzzle of who the Zodiac was, with all the many little clues, details and complicating factors, not least of which is which crimes, other than the main ones, were genuinely committed by the Zodiac himself.

The whole thing looks beautiful and the directorial style from David Fincher is exquisite. The California of the late '60s up to the early '80s is recreated in convincing and fascinating detail. Indeed, the actual social mores of this time- in which hippes and the like did not loom anything like as large as popular culture may make us imagine- are as fascinating as anything else, not least the detail that Arthur Leigh Allen seems to be let off appallingly lightly for his disgusting child molestation. And the cast is pretty much perfect, although Robert Downey Jr and Mark Ruffalo stand out in particular.

I'm not convinced that Allen was the Zodiac- indeed, I'm not sure any of the usually touted suspects were. But I don't think we can say, despite appearances, that the film does either. It leans into the ambiguity at times, especially with the extraordinary tense scenes where Robert begins to suspect that Bob Vaughn may be the Zodiac, and the two of them are alone in Vaughn's basement.

But the film, I think, is not about solving the mystery: it's about the dangers of obsession with endless if fascinatingrabbit holes such as this, which ruins Robert Graysmith's marriage, Paul Avery's health and career and David Toschi's reputation. Mysteries are fascinating, but they are not more important than our relationships, our children, our lives. And that's a very compelling point from a seriously impressive film.

Hammer House of Horror: The Silent Scream

 "Prisons without walls, cages without bars..."

This is an interesting episode- clever, imaginative, ingenious, with a strong central concept, and anchored superbly with performances from Brian Cox and none other than Peter Cushing himself, however cheap it must have been to film: this is quite blatantly the season cheapie. Either that or Cushing's slary took half the budget.

It's 1980. The wine is awful. A concentration camp guard could be of an age to be running a pet shop. Fairy liquid bottles look different. And attitudes to keeping big cats captive, forty years before Tiger King, are somewhat different. There's also an element of "this entire building is surrounded by film" in the stock footage sequences. Yet all this period charm, as well as the presence of Cushing and the bizarrely young presence of Cox, keeps us watching.

It's not a bad piece of telly. It certainly holds the attention and is both intriguing and well made. Yet it doesn't manage to be scary, and comes across more as a weird thriller than anything to do with horror. It doesn't quite work, yet it doesn't quite fail. It is, regardless, interesting.

Good Omens: The Doomsday Option

"Your car is on fire!"

Mrs Llamastrangler and I are somewhat distressed that there’s only one episode left to go, and a second series is unlikely given the sad, untimely death of the wonderful Sir Terry Pratchett. This is, if anything, the least good episode so far, much of which can be put down to its being Part Five. It’s still bloody brilliant.

We begin with Crowley at the bookshop, distressed that someone has apparently killed the man he now calls “my best friend” (although I love how Aziraphale, now partly played by Miranda Richardson whole role is suddenly no longer a bit part, has such a very English reaction to realising this), spends the whole episode in a state of furious, heroic, utterly David Tennant determination such that it’s tempting to call Crowley the central heroic protagonist of the entire series- I mean, he gets through the impassable hellfire that is the M25 in a burning car to get to Tadfield, where the delightfully British reaction of the local man whom he stops for directions and is too polite to point out that his car is on fire is one of the funniest scenes so far.

Interestingly, there’s far less piss-taking of the American military in the US airbase than there is in the novel, but everyone is gravitating towards there- the Four Horsemen, Anathema and the now-deflowered Newt, and of course Adam- who, having not been properly raised as an Antichrist, is sounding a little more sane. But there’s still time to mention Crowley’s intense dislike of the 14th century, something I was beginning to expect would remain only in the novel. And there is, of course, the ultimate nuclear cliffhanger...

It’s an energetic, fast-paced, apocalyptic penultimate episode. I suspect the finale will be anything but.

X-Men 2 (2003)

"Bobby, have you tried not being a mutant?"

It's rare for a sequel to outshine its predecessor; X-Men 2, helmed again by Bryan Singer (whose reputation has suffered post-Weinstein, as have many, and such behavior in this and all other industries cannot be tolerated, but let us not derail ourselves) may well have achieved it with this adaptation of God Loves, Man Kills.

As per the comics, the film gives us a well-rounded and well-written set of characters, all well-acted and many of whom, handily, have already been introduced. Good writing means that the sheer number of characters does not feel excessive, although I wonder if someone less familiar with the source material would say the same.

While Wolverine is still prominent- and hints are dropped about his origins- there is a much more equal treatment of the characters this time around. Nightcrawler is introduced, and in many ways true to form, but it's a pity that the character's sense of humour is so downplayed. Rogue is more peripheral this time, but the love triangle of Scott, Jean and Logan is very much still there.

Magneto is magnificent and, while allied with the goodies for much of the film, gets his chance to be evil for a bit near the end. Xavier is shown as reasonable and charming, and once again we forgot just how bloody terrifying his mind control powers are. Bobby Drake is well-developed, wit the pathos of his brother betraying him just after he outs himself to his parents. Pyro, of course, joins Magneto's lot. And, of course, Jean dies at the end just as she did in the comics a few issues before returning as Phoenix.

Among all the action and set pieces- I love the epic fight between Wolverine and Lady Deathstrike- there are also plenty of character moments, and the film is gripping throughout. This instalment will be hard to top.

Braveheart (1995)

“The trouble with Scotland is it's full of Scots...”

I’ve seen this film a fair few times but not for many years, and certainly not since, well, Mel Gibson gained a reputation for ultra-conservative religious beliefs and films to match, and somewhat unfortunate comments about Jewish people. So it seems rather pointless for this Englishman to complain about this film being “anti-English”- given the subject matter, which is broadly true even if the chronology is somewhat compressed and William Wallace seems to be both suspiciously older and less upper class than he would have been. But these days it’s far more notable just how pious all the good guys are here.

Still, the film isn’t a bad melodrama and Gibson himself is rather good, and gets some equally good performance out of a cast without a huge amount of star wattage, although I’m kicking myself for not recognising Patrick McGoohan as King Edward I until now. The whole thing looks good and the battle scenes, so often dull and hard to follow, are genuinely dramatic and gripping.

It may play a few tricks with history- Edward I did not die at the same time as William Wallace was hung, drawn and quartered, and Robert the Bruce didn’t have much success until years later- but Braveheart is an entertaining and fun, if rather violent, Hollywood treatment of a somewhat neglected historical saga. Still watchable after all these years.

Pixels (2015)

"Don't tell anyone I killed a smurf..."

I am, to put it mildly, far from an Adam Sandler fan. Worse, this film seems to have left the critics unimpressed. But, perhaps because I'm very old school when it comes to computer games (I was born in 1977 and pretty much stopped buying new games in the early '90s as albums by rock bands replaced games in my limited teenage budget), I found this film pleasantly and nostalgically entertaining. I'll admit, though, that I'm still not particularly enamoured with Sandler as such.

The film looks great, and it's huge fun seeing Space Invaders, Centipede, Pac-Man and Donkey Kong recreated in real life. And Ludlow is an enjoyable piss-take of conspiracy nuts ("JFK shot first!"),  so insane that he actually uses 4chan. The film also makes a good point; those 8-bit games from the '80s relied on recognising the pattern, not something that applies these days.

I love the scenes in London- Hollywood certainly seems to love our visually arresting national capital, and Fiona Shaw gets a great cameo as the prime minister. There's a lot to love. But I'm a little disturbed by the treatment of Fox News as a legitimate news source and the troubling idea that it's ok for  a US president not to know big words. But there's no denying how much I enjoyed this film.

An Adventure in Space and Time

"You can't rewrite history. Not one line."

I'm watching the rerun of An Unearthly Child on BBC 4 as I write this, with a big grin on my face. Admittedly, this is mostly because tomorrow I get to see my fiancée again after eleven long days but, blimey, what a piece of telly that was! A real tribute, and amazing, from my perspective as a fan who knows about this stuff, that a drama is being shown on BBC 2 about this of all things.

The cast is superb, but is very much led by David Bradley, who simply is Bill Hartnell. His mannerisms when playing the Doctor are perfect, and the similarities and differences with the "real" Hartnell are brilliant too: the clip of the interview with Hartnell shown after the programme, presumably a major source of research for Bradley, shows us that he nailed it; Hartnell as himself was irascible, considerably less posh, and very prickly about his status as an actor.

Mark Gatiss' script is excellent too; indeed, this sort of thing plays exactly to the strengths of the arch-nostalgic. Gatiss takes the messy, complex reality of television production and selects he people and events on which to focus. The result is a tight, focused drama with real heart. The presentation of Hartnell, in particular, is a fine line; Gatiss and Bradley don't shy in any way from his difficult side, but we can't help but like this deeply emotional man who cares deeply beneath the gruff exterior, and who delights in his unexpected popularity with children.

The script judges correctly how much to show of his rather bigoted opinions, I think, with just one quip to Waris Hussein about A Passage to India being a "one way trip" hinting at a side of Hartnell which would not much endear him to us. But there's a much greater focus on the tribulations faced by, and solidarity between, "the posh wog and the pushy Jewish bird". We first meet Verity Lambert (the excellent Jessica Raine) on an uber-trendy party straight out of Mad Men. This is her world; metropolitan, sophisticated and mostly populated by women like herself, who stop to turn on the telly to see Valentina Tereshkova do her bit for the cosmic sisterhood. The BBC, ruled by middle aged men in NHS specs who address Verity as "dear lady" is manifestly not her world, and she has to fight against its misogyny every step of the way.

Of course, Waris Hussein constantly suffers the racist digs that would have been everywhere in 1963, and can't get served at the BBC bar without Verity's help. There are also hints at his sexuality; he is doubly alienated, and not exactly the sort of person whom one would imagine getting on with Hartnell. And yet, a couple of years later, Hartnell is nostalgic for both of them, trapped in a show he loves but with familiar, friendly faces dropping away. The recreation of the speech from The Massacre may have used a little artistic licence, but it was wonderful, and as sublime a performance from Bradley here as the original was for Hartnell.

The whole thing is beautifully shot, and there are plenty of lovely touches, from the cameos by Jean Marsh, Anneke Wills, William Russell and Carole Ann Ford to the Cyberman who is allowed to puff away on a fag in his fibreglass suit by the 1963 Health and Safety bods. The many recreations- of The Daleks, The Edge of Destruction, Marco Polo, The Reign of Terror and many more are great fun. We open with the 1963 BBC ident, a lovely touch, and there are brief nods to Delia Derbyshire's work on the theme tube and Peter Brachaki's jobsworth genius on the TARDIS control room. We close with a highly appropriate cameo from Matf Smith. But this is Bradley's and Gatiss' triumph, and a triumph it surely is.

The Year of the Sex Olympics

“Do you like to read?”

(Shakes head)

“Well, who does?”

There’s a certain narrative that we’ve all come to expect from reviews of this teleplay, isn’t there? We’re supposed to mention how prescient it is (to be fair, it gets there first at the very start with the caption “sooner than you think”, but...), in 1968, in predicting reality TV, tasteless sex programmes and crappy telly in general, and to fawn on how it’s a great piece of British dystopian sci-fi in the lineage of Nineteen Eighty-Four and (especially) Brave New World. Actually, though, well-made, well-acted and (objectionable subtext aside) well-written though this may be, it’s still a pile of reactionary crap. So much so that even the metatextual fun of its being a TV drama about TV production wasn’t even enough to placate me, and you know how much I love metatextual fun.

The expository dialogue we get fairly on from Ugo Priest (the excellent Leonard Rossiter) establishes the situation; overpopulation has led to a situation in which the masses (low-drives) do nothing all day but watch crap telly about food (to put them off eating) and sex (to put them off sex), the theory being “see, not do”. The theory seems a pile of crap to me, but let’s run with it. Even the elite (high-drives- this seems to be the first society in fiction where your place in society is determined by your sex drive!) don’t read, struggle to understand the concept of paintings as art, dress like hippies (it’s probably a mercy that only a monochrome version has survived; I’m sure the costumes would look garish and horrible in colour) and have very small vocabularies owing to a lack of any meaningful cultural or intellectual pastimes. Never mind how absurdly unrealistic it is for a managerial class to be so under-educated.

Let’s look at what Nigel Kneale is saying here. Everyone looks and shags like stereotypical hippies, so I think it’s fair to take this largely as a stab at youth culture and the “permissive society”. We’re essentially being told that the art and music of the baby boomer generation has no cultural value and is, without exception, a load of dumbed-down crap which will rot the minds of society. No one reads; they just watch telly, because it’s obviously an idiot box. Even the bizarre cod-northern accents are suspect in this context; are we being told that even the use of regional accents on TV constitutes part of this dumbing-down? Then there’s the apparent endorsement of traditional family values as Nat, Deanie and Keten (until outside agencies make everything go horribly wrong) are shown, as a family unit, to be truly happy in the way that makes everyone else, with their flighty, ridiculously exaggerated polyamorous ways, look incredibly shallow. Yes, I know: I’m probably not going to like The Quatermass Conclusion. But all this, as a subtext, is extremely nasty, mean-spirited and spoils the whole play for me. I happen to quite like sex, TV and youth culture.

That’s a shame; there’s a lot that’s good here. Perhaps the problem is partly that this is obviously in the tradition of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. I quite like the novel, but it’s no Point Counter Point. And the whole concept of the Sex Olympics is just absurd to me, even aside from the fact that it looks just like It’s a Knockout. Now, I admit I may not be typical. After all, I’m a man who doesn’t watch porn. I just don’t get turned on by watching other people: do and not watch, so to speak. I’m no puritan- actually, I’m quite the libertine- but the thought of having sex for the pleasure, not of your partner, but the watching public, just horrifies me.

Oh, and I just don’t buy the sadism of the watching public at all. Yes, I know that cruel and evil talent shows like The X-Factor are fundamentally based on the general public’s ever-present sense of bastardry and schadenfreude, and seem to prove Lasar Opie (Brian Cox) right, but murder and death on the equivalent of live Big Brother on E4 is orders of magnitude different.

For balance, though, I ought to mention something I genuinely liked about this programme: the credits mention “custard pie experts”.