Django Unchained

I almost didn't see this one.. After the slightly lame Gangster Squad I was tempted to cut my losses and check out Cardiff.. Luckily I didn't because this turned out to be the best film of the weekend. 

Christop Waltz was excellent. I've never really seen him before but he makes me want to go and watch "Inglourious Basterds". He plays a bounty hunter who frees Jamie Foxxs character Django and, after a bit of 'bounty hunting' they head off to find Djangos' wife. 

Here's the thing with Quentin Tarantino movies... You never know what to expect. When I watch a Tarantino film I'm always on edge.  Waiting for someone to be shot in the face on the toilet or raped by a couple of gun toting hill billies.. This is one of the reasons I was reluctant to see this one. Plus the fact it was an 18 certificate so I knew anything went.. But in the end this is the main reason I SHOULD have seen it. It's not safe. The same can be said of most 18 certificate films these days. Recent cases in point being Piranha 3D, Drive and The Raid.  I enjoyed all these films in their own way because I was on edge waiting for that '18 certificate' moment.. 

Django Unchained wasn't without its flaws though... Well, one flaw really - it was just too long. This was particularly noticeable during the second third of the film.  I found myself checking the time and here you could have trimmed off a good 20-30 minutes in my opinion. 

But, on the whole I enjoyed it. The script was typical Tarantino, clever and witty and the action was visceral and bloody.. If I get a chance I may well see it again. That, or wait till its out on DVD and I can forward through the boring bits!

Overall an enjoyable **** star movie.

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Gangster Squad

Ok, here's a brief synopsis of Gangster Squad. Set in post World War II L.A its the story of how a group of misfit cops are brought together to take down Sean Penns' mob boss, Micky Cohen. You know the story if you've seen The Untouchables...

I think i must be getting fussy as I get older.. If I had watched this film when I was in my 20's or even 30's I may have enjoyed it more. Instead I found myself cringing at the cliched dialogue and balking at the incompetence of the Squad. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't all bad. Ryan Gosling is his usual slick, smoothness and Josh Brolin plays a solid, dependable ex-soldier.. But there was just something missing.. I'd heard comparisons between the afore mentioned Untouchables and L.A Confidential, but to be honest both these films were better.. In fact watching this made me want to dig out my old L.A Confidential DVD and see how it's done properly..

Overall I've seen worse... But I've also seen better..
***

The Last Stand

Here's my first movie of the year. I went to see this one with Graham and to be honest I think he enjoyed it more than I did..

The film starts off with a 'drugs Barron' escaping from the FED's and, along with a collection of throw-away hench-men heads for the Mexican border.. Cut to Arnie, sheriff of a small, border town and you can guess the rest..

I've never really paid much attention of the acting skills displayed in movies before but I noticed these were pretty poor.. Plus the movie seemed to lack any drama in my opinion...

That's not to say the film's not without its merits. The movie doesn't take itself too seriously and there are one or two laugh out loud moments. Arnie's looking his age but he also acknowledges it..

Not brilliant but not THAT bad... Overall **1/2

My Review Of 2012

I managed to see 47 films this year.  Well, 47 showings that is.  And overall the quality was better than last year.

The highlight has to be The Avengers (I saw it 5 times!?).  I was looking forward to it and, somehow I'd managed to avoid the 'Overhype effect' that The Dark Knight Rises and Skyfall had suffered from (more about them later).  Joss Weadon had done an excellent job.  The writing was the highlight, particularly the comedy.  Being familiar with the characters helped and the action was outstanding.  This was one I was counting down the days till the DVD release... The other super hero offerings were less impressive.. I wasn't expecting the Spiderman re-boot to be much cop.  'Why bother' was the question? Sam Rami did a perfectly good job not that long ago.  But, as it turned out it wasn't too bad.
The Dark Knight, on the other hand suffered from the 'Overhype effect' as mentioned earlier.
I was really looking forward to this one.. So much so that I caught the 7.15am Cardiff train in order to catch a 9.00am showing on the day of release..!?!  Initially I 'think' I enjoyed it.. You get caught along with the feel good hype and it wasn't until the second viewing when I thought it, nah it wasn't as good as The Avengers but better than The Amazing Spiderman.

There was a one or two other four star movies that I didn't see coming! Most notably, The Raid, Cabin In The Woods and Argo. Unfortunately my opinion was in the minority with these and they didn't hang around long enough for multiple viewings.

There was a good showing of sci-fi this year. Particular favorites were Looper, Prometheus and Dredd (the latter making excellent use of 3D).   Total Recall, John Carter and Men In Black 3 weren't THAT bad either....

Comedy was a bit hit and miss really.  Pirates was funny (were funny?!). Ted, The Dictator and Magic Mike all kept me amused  (and Liz in the case of Magic Mike) but I did't get many belly laughs. To be fair I think The Avengers and Headhunters were funnier films.  Headhunters was another 4 star movie I really enjoyed (and the only foreign language film too).

There was only a couple of films I didn't enjoy.  Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter was a particular pile of crap I was unfortunate to sit through.  I don't know if it was me but I just didn't get it.  Also (as expected) Wrath of The Titians was just crap wrapped in CGI (albeit good CGI).  Sequels where pretty lame too.  Taken 2 getting a 12a rating didn't help and Expendables 2 was just terrible (even though I secretly enjoyed it!)

My biggest disappointments were the afore mentioned Dark Knight Rises and Skyfall.  Even though I rated them high I was expecting more.. I even saw them multiple times just to be sure.. I'm sure I'll be proven wrong with repeated DVD viewings.

Toward the end of the year the quality improved (as it did last year). I managed to catch 3 films in December and I enjoyed them all in their own way.  The Hobbit was a no-brainer really and , despite it being over long and 'talkie' the action more than made up for it.  Not only that it was also my first 48 frames per second film (or HFR as it's called) I had mixed opinions of that.. I also really enjoyed Jack Reacher. If this is the start of a franchise, bring it on!

2013 Films have the potential to be awesome! I'm particularly looking forward to Guillermo del Toro's Pacific Rim (which looks like Transformers but with better script, acting and CG),  Oblivion, Elysium (District 9 sequel?) and World War Z.  Super Hero wise it'll be interesting to see if Zack Synder and Henry Cavil (last seen in Cold Light Of Day) can pull off a decent Superman reboot (although, I thought Brian Singer's Superman Returns was pretty good). Also Thor: The Dark World has been earmarked for an October release but I haven't heard much about it yet..  Plus of course there's Ironman 3...