movie night

Movie Night: Speed

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Released: 10 June 1994
Director: Jan de Bont
Distributor: 20th Century Fox
Budget: $30 to 37 million
Stars: Keanu Reeves, Dennis Hopper, Sandra Bullock, Jeff Daniels, and Joe Morton

The Plot:
Los Angeles Special Weapons and Tactics (S.W.A.T.) specialist Jack Traven (Reeves) is sent to diffuse a bomb that revenge-driven extortionist Howard Payne (Hopper) has planted on a city bus. However, there’s a catch: passenger Anne Porter (Bullock) must keep the bus above fifty miles an hour or else the bomb will detonate!

The Background:
Speed was the brainchild of screenwriter Graham Yost, who was inspired by The Runaway Train (Konchalovsky, 1985) and thought the concept would be made more exciting if the train had a bomb on it and had to maintain a certain speed. Initially, the entire film was set on the bus and would culminate in a dramatic crash through the iconic Hollywood Sign but the ending was changed and the script was altered in order to sell the concept to 20th Century Fox, with Yost even working with Joss Whedon to refine the script’s dialogue and heavily alter Traven into a more earnest character. Reeves prepared for the role by shaving his head and incorporating his prior experiences on Point Break (Bigelow, 1991), and, after Halle Berry turned down the role of Annie, worked closely with Bullock to develop chemistry between their characters. Speed was a massive financial success; it made over $350 million at the box office and was widely praised for its action and intensity. While the sequel was a dismal critical and commercial failure, Speed remains one of the best action movies of the nineties and, considering that today is Keanu Reeves’ birthday, this seems like the perfect time to revisit the film.

The Review:
Speed begins not on a bus on the Los Angeles highway but in a large office skyscraper where a bunch of well-dressed, successful businesspeople find themselves trapped in a lift and held to ransom courtesy of a bomber we will later learn is named Howard Payne. For now, though, he’s just a maniacal madman who places a bomb on the lift and demands a $3 million ransom for the safety of his hostages, so the Los Angeles Police Department send in their S.W.A.T. team to try and free the hostages before the bomb can go off. The team is led by Lieutenant Herb “Mac” McMahon (Morton), who meticulously co-ordinates his guys with one primary goal in mind: the evacuation of the building’s occupants and the maintenance of protocol to avoid upsetting the bomber and unnecessarily losing lives.

Jack comes up with a unique solution when Harry is taken hostage by a mad bomber.

Jack Traven is a point man in Mac’s team; a bit of a wise-ass, Jack’s snark doesn’t float with Mac, who orders both him and his friend and fellow officer, Harry Temple (Daniels), to investigate the explosive device but strictly forbids them from interfering with it. While Jack remains professional enough to offer words of comfort to the trapped inhabitants, who have no idea of the predicament they’re in, Harry is the expert on explosives and Jack is far more likely to go with his gut instincts regarding the whole situation. Jack deduces that the bomber has every intention of blowing the lift whether he gets paid or not, and showcases his adaptability by rigging a nearby crane to take the weight of the lift, thereby ensuring the hostages’ safety when his hunch turns out to be right (though Payne only blows the lift because of Jack’s interference). Further deducing that their perpetrator is in the building, Jack sets out to track him down, with Harry reluctantly in tow; when Payne gets the drop on them, he takes Harry as a hostage and tries to use him as leverage to ensure his escape but Jack puts into motion his unique approach to such a situation and wounds Harry with a bullet to the leg and Payne appears to kill himself with a suicide vest. Unbeknownst to Jack, Payne survived the explosion and watches with glee as Jack and Harry are commended for their bravery and fortitude; Harry even gets a promotion to detective but warns Jack that they got lucky and that “luck runs out”.

Jack leaps aboard the bus and finds an ally in the annoying Annie, who takes the wheel.

Pissed off that Jack’s interference cost him $3 million, the maniacal Payne strikes by blowing up a bus and its driver right in front of Jack; Payne then calls Jack from a nearby payphone and challenges him to stop him once more. This time, he’s placed his bomb on another bus that will explode once the vehicle goes over fifty miles an hour, and specifically declares his intention to set off the bomb if any passengers are evacuated or if he doesn’t get his ransom in about three hours’ time. Naturally, Jack races to locate the bus and this is when we’re introduced to easily the most annoying character in the film, Annie Porter, played by one of my least favourite actresses in all of cinema, Sandra Bullock. A loud and flighty character, Annie has been forced to take the bus since she lost her driving license on a speeding charge and is the first to actively speak up when Jack dramatically leaps his way aboard the bus. However, when the driver, Sam Silver (Hawthorne James), is injured by an errant gunshot, Annie finds herself in way over her head and taking a central role as the panic-stricken driver of the bus.

Jack is wracked with anger when Payne causes the deaths of a passenger and his close friend.

On the bus, Jack finds an assortment of normal, everyday Los Angeles citizens, including Doug Stephens (Alan Ruck), a tourist on his first visit to the city who offers wry commentary, and Helen (Beth Grant), a regular passenger whose utter terror results in her being another of Payne’s casualties. When he first boards the bus, Jack is first faced with Annie’s loudmouth but the situation unexpectedly escalates when Ray (Daniel Villarreal) pulls a gun on him and demands the bus be stopped. Thanks to Gigantor Ortiz (Carlos Carrasco), Ray is disarmed but Sam is shot in the process, meaning Annie has to take over and, while tensions inevitably flair between the frightened passengers, Jack is eventually able to calm them. He does an equally good job of offering encouragement and support to Annie while remaining focused and pragmatic about the entire situation. Thankfully, he has Harry on the line to offer his insight on the bomb, which is packed full of C4, flanked by a number of decoy wires, and wired into a regular gold wristwatch. Bothered by the unreliability of the timer and the unpredictability of the bomber’s methods, Harry conducts a thorough investigation not just into criminals but into former cops and uncovers the bomber’s identity as a former member of the Atlanta Police Department bomb squad. Unfortunately, Harry’s desperation to nail Payne and help his friend leads to his tragic and untimely death as Payne rigged his home with an explosive booby-trap that kills Harry and, in one of the film’s (and Keanu’s) most emotionally impactful scenes, sees Jack enraged into a frenzy and swearing to make the bomber pay for his actions.

The Nitty-Gritty:
Speed is an exercise in tension and excitement; since the bus is forced to stay in constant motion, and over fifty miles an hour, the sheer level of pressure faced by Jack is reflected in the pacing and frantic nature of the film. Even when the bus gains a police escort, they’re never far out of danger; first it’s the gunman, Ray, then Helen nearly blows the whole thing (literally) by trying to escape from the bus as Sam is safely unloaded in an act of faith on Payne’s part, and then they start to run out of road. Even when Jack directs Annie to circle the airport indefinitely, he has to worry about the bus’s severed fuel line and is constantly having to adapt to new problems on the fly.

Jack is more than physically capable of taking on Payne’s sadistic challenge

Thankfully, Jack is more than capable of meeting Payne’s challenge; a focused and driven individual with a strong moral compass, he isn’t afraid to leap head-first into action but is also switched on enough to consider all of his options, while still acting on instinct the vast majority of the time. He commandeers a civilian’s car in a desperate attempt to warn Sam about the danger on his bus and, when that fails, he dramatically leaps from the car and onto the bus despite the fact that both vehicles are travelling at well over fifty miles per hour. While on the bus, he is as honest and forthcoming with the passengers as possible while still doing everything he can to keep things under control and exudes a confidence that, for the most part, keeps the passengers calm. Disgusted at Payne’s lunacy, Jack walks a fine line between negotiating and satisfying the bomber while making it abundantly clear that he has a personal vendetta against Payne. Desperate to keep the passengers safe, Jack doesn’t hesitate to try and disarm the bomb from underneath the bus and, once he figures out how Payne is monitoring them, he comes up with a genius and often copied/parodied solution of looping Payne’s video feed, thus outsmarting his opponent and safely evacuating the passengers.

The bus makes for some of the film’s most tense and action-packed moments.

Of course, much of the film’s action revolves around the tension and drama on the bus; while Mac works to keep the roads clear and safe for Jack, Annie is forced to plough head-first through the dense Los Angeles traffic, make sudden and hard turns to avoid collisions, and, of course, to make a seemingly impossible leap to cross an unfinished freeway. While it’s perhaps a little unlikely that such a large and cumbersome vehicle would be able to make such a jump, especially with the added weight of all those passengers, it does make for a thrilling scene that’s one of the film’s most memorable moments. Once the bus hits the airport, it’s largely out of danger and Jack’s focus switches to figuring out how Payne can always know so much; after making the connection between Payne’s seemingly random “Wildcat” reference, Jack discovers that Payne has a camera rigged on the bus and has Mac commandeer Payne’s signal to loop the feed. It’s lucky, and seemingly unlikely, that Payne only had the one camera on the bus (and that he didn’t rig up a microphone or other device so he could hear what was going on as well) but, when he figures out that he’s been duped out of his money again, the mad bomber decides to take a more direct approach for the film’s finale.

The film ends with a showdown on, and on top of, a runaway subway train!

After Jack and Annie’s dramatic (and explosive) escape from the bus, Payne disguises himself as a police officer, abducts Annie, straps her into an explosive vest, and escapes into the subway with his money and his hostage. Having eliminated Jack’s “shoot the hostage” strategy, Payne hijacks a subway train, handcuffing Annie to the inside, and makes his getaway, but is driven into a psychotic rage when he discovers his ransom is rigged with paint that makes it worthless. Jack, ever the man of action, pursues and boards the train, drawing Payne into a confrontation on the train’s roof! Despite being Payne older, insane, and handicapped by his missing thumb, the mad bomber is initially able to overwhelm is younger, stronger foe thanks to the threat of the detonator in his hand. However, Jack is able to behead Payne using an overheard railway signal (delivering an odd quip about being taller in the process), ending his threat once and for all while keeping Annie safe. Thanks to Payne’s trigger finger, though, the train is left out of control; with no way to free Annie from her cuffs and few options left, Jack opts to speed the train up and send it crashing out onto Hollywood Boulevard. Unbelievably, the two are left unharmed beyond the few scrapes and cuts they picked up from escaping the bus, and the film closes with them finally acting on the middling amount of sexual tension they shared during the film’s chaotic events while a gaggle of spectators look on.

The Summary:
I hate to say it, but I’ve never really been that big a fan of Speed. The premise is certainly unique, and definitely ends up being much more than just “Die Hard (McTiernan, 1988) on a bus” thanks to the high-octane thrill of a bus that cannot slow down and the many different obstacles that get in the way of that premise. Where it excels is in the performances of Keanu Reeves and Dennis Hopper; whenever anyone tries to tell me that Keanu is “wooden”, I point them to his intense and emotional fit of rage at learning of his friend’s death and his performance is only bolstered by Hopper’s maniacal bomber. Hopper is as much of a highlight as the ever-escalating action on the bus, which ploughs through traffic, red lights, and even inexplicably leaps a gap in the freeway in a bid to stay over fifty mile an hour. Where the film slightly falls, for me, though is in the casting of Sandra Bullock and her ever-grating performance as the flustered Annie (who’s as much of a liability as she is an asset) and the ending, which attempts to out-do the intensity felt on the bus with a runaway subway train and maybe pushes its luck a little too far. It’s an oddly contradictory film as well, feeling both too long and yet well-paced at the same time, but it’s definitely an entertaining and intense spin on the action genre. Speed is worth your time for Reeves, Hopper, and the sequences on the bus alone and is a great showcase of Reeves’ range and capability as an actor and leading man.

My Rating:

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Pretty Good

Are you a fan of Speed? What did you think of the film’s premise and Keanu’s performance? Are you a fan of Sandra Bullock, or did she also bring the film down a notch for you? Did you enjoy the tense sequences on the bus and Dennis Hopper’s maniacal Howard Payne? How did you react when Harry met his untimely end? Would you have liked to see Keanu return in the sequel? How are you celebrating Keanu Reeves’ birthday today and what are some of your favourite roles of his? Whatever you think, go ahead and sign up to leave a comment down below or let me know on my social media.

Movie Night [Judgment Day]: Terminator 2: Judgment Day: Special Edition

Dr. K14 Comments

“Three billion human lives ended on August 29th, 1997. The survivors of the nuclear fire called the war Judgment Day. They lived only to face a new nightmare: the war against the machines”.

Special Edition

Released: 29 October 2001
Originally Released: 3 July 1991
Director: James Cameron
Distributor: Tri-Star Pictures
Budget: $94 to 102 million
Stars: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Robert Patrick, Edward Furlong, and Joe Morton

The Plot:
After narrowly escaping a killer cyborg from a war-torn future, institutionalised Sarah Connor (Hamilton) is haunted by visions of nuclear war and estranged from her young son, John (Furlong). However, when Skynet sends back an advanced prototype T-1000 (Patrick) composed of liquid metal (or “mimetic polyalloy”) to kill John, Sarah must team with a reprogrammed T-800 (Schwarzenegger) to protect her son and try and prevent the near-extinction of the human race!

The Background:
Considering the financial success of The Terminator (Cameron, 1984), a sequel was all-but-inevitable but initially hampered by a number of technical issues, primarily the question of digital effects and a legal dispute regarding the franchise rights. Once these were resolved, Cameron, Schwarzenegger, and Hamilton reunited to collaborate on the natural next step in the narrative, which recast the T-800 as a protector figure. The sequel was afforded a budget fifteen times that of the original and was the most expensive film made at the time; it was also a ground-breaking film in the field of digital effects and continued to employ the services of the legendary Stan Winston for its complex practical, make-up, and model effects. Terminator 2: Judgment Day was a massive success; it received rave reviews at the time, made over $520 million at the box office, and has come to be widely regarded as one of the greatest science-fiction movies ever made, and one of the greatest movie sequels of all time. Fifteen minutes of additional footage were added to the film’s home release, a digitally remastered 3D version was released on 17 February 2017, and the film was accompanied by a slew of merchandise (such as action figures and videogames) as well as directly informing many of its sequels.

The Review:
Some ten years have passed since the events of the first film and much has changed in that time; first and foremost, Sarah successfully gave birth to John, the son of her protector from the future and the fated saviour of humanity in the war against the machines. However, having been imparted with knowledge of the future by Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn) in the first film and following her terrifying experience with the Terminator, Sarah has transformed from a helpless and confused waitress to a strong-willed woman of action and blinkered focus. We’re told by John that his childhood was one of rigorous training and preparation for his future role, which saw Sarah taking him out to Mexico and “shacking up” with as many men as she could in order to learn and impart skills and knowledge necessary to prepare John to be the future leader of humanity, which has driven a wedge between the two as John simply wants his mother’s love.

Burdened by knowledge, Sarah is driven half insane and is desperate to reunite with John.

The burden of knowledge has fractured Sarah’s mind, however; like Reese, she is tormented by dreams of the Future War and also nightmares showcasing (in graphic detail) the fiery destruction of the vast majority of the human race. In an effort to try and circumvent this future, she tried to destroy Skynet before it could be created and, as a result, was arrested and committed to a mental hospital, where Doctor Silberman (Earl Boen) worked somewhat unsuccessfully to help her through her trauma. A calculating and intelligent woman, Sarah attempts to feign compliance after her aggressive and distraught honesty led only to her being denied access to visitors and with no hope of ever escaping the institute. When Silberman sees through this deception, Sarah snaps and showcases her intense aggression, attacking Silberman and his staff without mercy since, to her, they’re already dead anyway. After learning that she’ll never be allowed to see John again, Sarah puts into a motion a plan to escape that goes surprisingly well until she comes face-to-face with the new Terminator and all of her fight and hostility is instantly replaced with a panicked terror; even after John assures her of the Terminator’s new mission, she remains cold and distrustful of her new ally throughout the film.

John starts the film as a delinquent who’s left guilt-ridden at confirmation of his mother’s tales.

At the start of the film, John is little more than a juvenile delinquent; frustrated by his mother’s harsh upbringing and subjecting him to a childhood that was anything but normal, he frequently defies his foster parents and is concerned more with ripping off cash machines using his hacking skills and spending stolen money in the arcades. Having grown up hearing all about his mother’s knowledge of the future and his destiny as the leader of the human resistance, John is well aware of the Terminator, Skynet, and the Future War but never actually believed in any of it. Consequently, he is both stunned, excited, and guilt-ridden when the Terminator arrives and confirms that everything Sarah told him was absolutely true. Determined to make amends for his lack of belief, John orders his protector to help him rescue her despite the obvious risks involved, and is heartbroken when Sarah rebukes his concerns and chastises him for putting himself at risk. Having grown up without a father, John has had to feel the anguish of his mother’s boyfriends and partners leaving over and over, leaving a void in his heart for a father figure that the Terminator fills with startling efficiency and, in the Terminator, John finds a friend, confidant, and partner with whom he can open up to, teach how to be hip and cool, and also the perfect weapon to assist in ensuring that the apocalyptic future never comes to pass.

The Terminator makes a dramatic return, now a protector charged with securing humanity’s future.

Considering that the Terminator instantly became one of cinema’s most relentless and fearsome screen villains in the first film, the decision to turn that characterisation on its head and recast Schwarzenegger as a protector was an inspired move. Thematically, it works wonders for Sarah’s character arc; indeed, her cold-blooded focus on destroying Skynet makes her just as much of an uncompromising machine as her hated nemesis and one of the principal messages of Terminator 2 is that the titular machine ends up learning the value of human life and being more human than those who created Skynet in the first place. For the first twenty minutes or so, however, the film is shot in a way to suggest that the Terminator is the same emotionless killer from the first film, albeit now seen as this bad-ass villain who we can’t help but root for. It isn’t until the Terminator comes face-to-face with the T-1000 that we truly learn that this new T-800 is here to help John, rather than kill him. From that point on, the Terminator becomes a far chattier and more layered character than in the first film; it exposits information, unquestionably follows John’s orders even when it disagrees with the risk involved, and tirelessly works around the clock to keep him and his mother safe. Crucially, the Terminator is noted to be at an extreme disadvantage this time around; not only does the T-1000 have the same files and knowledge as the Terminator, it’s also faster and more advanced and a “far more effective killing machine”. This means that, for all the Terminator’s strength and capabilities, it’s rarely ever portrayed as being anything other than an inferior model. Like Reese, the Terminator is thus forced to flee more often than fighting and to adapt its tactics to utilise more than simple firearms to keep the T-1000 at bay, which goes a long way to furthering the Terminator’s new role as a vulnerable protagonist.

The T-1000 makes for an unnervingly human, relentless, and formidable villain.

In contrast, the T-1000 is so much more efficient that you would be forgiven for initially thinking that it was another slender human protector sent back to keep John from harm; effortlessly charming and deceptive, it can easily earn the trust of unassuming humans with its candid tones but, when that fails, it can shapeshift into a number of other forms to gain access to restricted areas, equipment, and weapons that the protagonists can’t. Once you set aside the pretty large plot hole of how a machine comprised entirely of liquid metal was able to make the trip back in time when the first film established that “nothing dead will go” through the Time Displacement Equipment, and the question of how it even operates if it’s entirely comprised of ever-changing atoms, the T-1000’s rules and limitations are surprisingly well thought out. It’s established that it can’t transform into guns or bombs because of the additional chemicals and parts that make those up, and than it can’t shapeshift into anything bigger or smaller than its default dimensions. This still makes it an extremely lethal killing machine, however, as it’s easily able to form knives and other bladed appendages out of its limbs, grow an additional arm to help fly a helicopter while reloading, and disguise itself as parts of the environment in order to assimilate additional organic data. As merciless and relentless as the original Terminator was, the T-1000 is made even more callous and terrifying through its nimble speed, its sheer tenacity, and the unsettling way it closes up wounds and returns to the fight within seconds of being downed.

Disgusted by the future his research threatens to bring, Dyson gives his life to prevent Skynet’s creation.

Although the T-1000 remains a constant threat in the film and is so significant as a danger that the Terminator transports its charges all the way to a desolate Mexican desert just to avoid the killer, Sarah’s obsession with preventing Judgement Day leads her to tracking down the man most directly responsible, Miles Dyson (Morton). A simple family man, Dyson has been led to a breakthrough in artificial intelligence and technology thanks to his research on the damaged CPU and severed arm of the original Terminator; these have allowed him to effectively begin the process of Skynet’s creation and unknowingly doom the world to near extinction, something that Sarah is so adamant about preventing that she very nearly kills him in cold blood. Thanks to seeing the monster she has become reflected in the eyes of Dyson and his family, she collapses into a mournful heap before she can go through with it, and Dyson is disgusted to learn where his research will lead. Immediately repentant, he agrees to get the group into the Cyberdyne building so that they can destroy all of his research; this is a poignant decision on his behalf as we clearly see how enthusiastic he was about his work and how he often prioritised it over his family life, however he becomes so willing to eradicate his research that he willingly sacrifices his life to ensure that Skynet can never be created.

The Nitty-Gritty:
It’s tough for me to decide which film I prefer out of The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. As fantastic and influential and ambitious as the first film was, the sequel is bigger and better in every way; the score is more foreboding and haunting than ever as the T-1000’s droning theme raises the tension alongside the traditional Terminator theme to help punctuate the film’s many action scenes. Additionally, the special and practical effects are better than ever and the entire film just looks more expensive and of a higher quality; there’s something to be said for the gritty nature of the first film but it’s equally hard to deny the appeal of the sequel’s slick presentation.

The film’s practical effects are absolutely top-notch and deliver a disturbing vision of the future.

We see this immediately as the film opens on an incredible rendition of the Future War; we saw snippets of this conflict in the first film but, here, everything is so much bigger and more impressive. Even now, I find it difficult to believe that this is a complex combination of miniatures, models, and forced perspective to show Hunter-Killers and Terminators flawing, crawling, and marching along a field of skulls and wreckage and exchanging plasma fire with the Resistance fighters. This is the scene that made me want to see a whole movie set during the Future War and I still feel like this would have made for a more effective and fitting follow-up to the first two films; just imagine an army of CGI Arnolds marching through an apocalyptic wasteland while Brad Fiedel’s iconic, imposing score blares out? Similar effects are used to bring to life Sarah’s disturbing nightmares of nuclear holocaust; again realised using complex miniatures and puppets, these make for some of the most unsettling scenes of destruction in any film and remain as impactful as ever thanks to the sheer amount of time and effort than went into creation a realistic depiction of the end of the world.

A blend of CGI and practical effects help keep the T-1000 a timeless and terrifying screen villain.

Of course, the true star of the show in terms of special effects is the T-1000; largely realised entirely through cutting edge CGI, the T-1000 is an unnerving screen villain that switches in a heartbeat from charming and affable to stoic and ruthless and we see in full detail how it is able to assume the form of those it touches and then dispose of the original with gruesome efficiency. I think what makes the T-1000 work so well is how often its more monstrous forms and sharp implements are represented using practical effects such as puppetry and animatronics that work wonderfully with the CGI effects (which still hold up to this day) so we can see the actor reacting to being shot and close range, cut to a squealing, twisted animatronic, and then marvel at the T-1000 zipping itself back together using CGI. Its abilities and aggression escalate as the film progresses, allowing it to start off largely employing subterfuge and then forming sword and claw-like appendages on its arms, being frozen into a fragile statue of pure disbelief at being bested, and finally being left as this wailing, grotesque mess of limbs and silvery innards before being sent crashing to the molten steel below. Considering that the T-1000 had been a great imitator of emotions and deception throughout the film, there’s something incredibly disturbing at seeing and hearing it thrash about in its death throws, screaming in agony and rage before finally melting away to nothingness with a look of undeniable anguish.

The special edition adds in a number of scenes that expand an already fantastic movie.

The Special Edition version of the film adds some additional footage that was cut from the theatrical version. This includes an earlier, short scene of Sarah’s nightmare of the inevitably nuclear war that consumes humanity and, as part of that, a sequence in which she is visited by Kyle Reese in a dream where he encourages her to get back into the fight and to protect John. As a big fan of Michael Biehn and Reese’s character, I enjoyed seeing this scene added back into the film; it also goes a long way to show just how deep Sarah’s fear and psychosis have progressed and lends some credibility to the argument that she’s been driven more than a little mad by her knowledge of the future and terror of the impending destruction of humanity. One of the longest and most impressive scenes reintegrated into the film is an alternative take on the Terminator’s reprogramming; in the theatrical version, the Terminator simply states that all of the T-800s are capable of growing beyond their programming but, here, Sarah and John have to open up the Terminator’s skull and extract its CPU so that it can learn to be more human. This is fantastically realised in a complex sequence involving a model of Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton’s twin sister, Leslie Hamilton Gearren, and features a tense confrontation between Sarah and John where he basically orders her to trust his instincts regarding the Terminator rather than destroying the CPU. Other scenes include a somewhat unnecessary shot of the T-1000 discovering that the Terminator tricked him and killing John’s dog, and an extended sequence near the end where, after being blown to pieces by the Terminator, it’s made more explicit that the T-1000 is malfunctioning. I’m a fan of this addition as well as it show just how traumatic being frozen and blasted into pieces was for the T-1000 and allows it to be a step slower and a bit more unreliable than usual; it may also go some way to explaining why it decided to try and intimidate Sarah into calling out to John rather than simply assuming her form as its shapeshifting abilities were clearly screwed up after reassembling itself.

The Terminator learns the value of human life and acts as a friend and father figure to John.

The extended scenes also add a lot more to the Terminator’s characterisation; a pivotal story arc of the film is the Terminator learning what it means to be human and taking on more normal mannerisms, such as smiling, quipping, and just considering the impact of mindlessly killing those in its path. When John first orders it not to kill, the Terminator is confused (disdainful, even) at the idea and is forced by its programming to simply follow John’s orders to the letter. It’s not until much later in the film, after it forms a bond with John, that the once terrifying killing machine understands why human lives are so valued and to be cherished. Until then, though, it takes its orders literally, resulting in scenes both amusing and bad-ass as it goes out of its way to wound or chase off the police with its weapons; seeing the Terminator as a straight “man” awkwardly trying to pass as normal makes for some of the film’s best and most amusing moments: its attempt at smiling is painful, the way it regards children is just fantastic, and it absolutely nails the nineties one-liners John teaches it to deliver some of Arnold’s most memorable quips. Even Sarah has to admit to being impressed with the machine’s absolutely devotion towards John; she even comes to trust it enough to leave John in its care as she goes off on her solo mission to kill Dyson and one of the most moving scenes in the entire franchise comes right at the end where she shakes the Terminator’s hand and gives it her respect.

The film culminates in a showdown wherein the Terminator sacrificing itself to prevent Judgement Day.

Indeed, the entire finale of the film makes for one of the most action-packed and emotionally charged I’ve ever seen, especially in a sci-fi action film; following the massive explosion at Cyberdyne and an absolutely incredible car chase that sees the protagonists desperately trying to out-run a helicopter and a truck full of liquid nitrogen, they’re forced into a final showdown at a steel mill. With Sarah wounded from a bullet to the leg and the Terminator’s human façade cracking from all the shots it has absorbed, they’re forced deeper into the red-hot facility when the T-1000 manages to recover from being frozen and blasted into pieces. We then get an absolutely brutal throwdown between the Terminator and the T-1000 in which no words are said and no sounds are heard except for the clang of metal on metal; here, we truly see how outclassed the Terminator is as the T-1000 effortlessly tosses it around and overwhelms it, smashing its face apart with a huge girder and then seemingly destroying it by impaling it on a spike. Thankfully, the Terminator comes with a back-up power source and it struggles back to “life”; despite missing an arm and being beaten all to hell, it manages to recover long enough to deliver the final blow to the T-1000, ending its threat forever, and their mission to destroy Skynet and prevent the future seems to have been accomplished after John tosses the first Terminator’s arm and CPU into the molten steel. However, the new Terminator still remains and John is absolutely distraught at the idea of his friend and father figure sacrificing itself to ensure the future; yet, despite his desperate pleas and orders, the Terminator’s destruction is the only way to end Skynet’s threat and so, after a heartfelt goodbye to them both, the Terminator is lowered to its demise in an absolutely heart-breaking sequence that sees this once relentless and remorseless killer cemented forever as one of cinema’s most beloved heroes.

The Summary:
It’s difficult to express in words how much I adore this film; I love the original, especially for how dark and gritty it is and how it’s much more like a horror film than a traditional sci-fi action flick but there’s no denying that Terminator 2: Judgment Day does everything bigger and better. The Terminator put Arnold Schwarzenegger on the map but its blockbuster sequel made him a mainstream star. After this, he would forever be cemented as the wise-cracking hero in action films for pretty much the remainder of his career as a film star. Not only that, Terminator 2 became the standard template for every subsequent movie in the franchise bar one; with the except of the under-rated Terminator Salvation (McG, 2009), all of the Terminator sequels and even the short-lived television series tried to emulate this film in some way, which has led only to a string of lacklustre productions as a result. Still, that doesn’t take away from how awesome Terminator 2 is; from Sarah’s physical and mental instability and transformation to the ruthless tenacity of the T-1000, to the incredible depiction of the Future War and the ground-breaking special and practical effects, Terminator 2 pretty much has it all. This extended version of the film remains the definitive version for me thanks to a much-appreciated cameo by Michael Biehn and expanding on scenes of our impending destruction and the two Terminators. Although it’s a longer movie at almost two-and-a-half hours, it’s an endlessly exhilarating experience from start to finish and I could honestly put Terminator 2 on every single day and never get bored; everything from the performances, the ominous score, and the explosive action is absolutely top-notch and it’s quite possibly the greatest film in the entire franchise and possibly Arnold’s career.

My Rating:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Fantastic

What are your thoughts on Terminator 2: Judgment Day? How do you think it holds up today, especially compared to the first film and the other sequels? What did you think to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s performance in the film and did you enjoy seeing him cast as a protector this time around? What did you think to T-1000 and its abilities? Were you surprised to find the T-800 was the good guy this time and what did you think to the CGI and other special effects used to bring the T-1000 to life? How are you celebrating Judgement Day today? No matter what you think about Terminator 2, and the Terminator franchise, feel free to sign up and leave a reply down below.

Movie Night: Death Note 2: The Last Name

Dr. K2 Comments

Released: 3 November 2006
Director: Shūsuke Kaneko
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
Budget: $20 million (estimated)
Stars: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Kenichi Matsuyama, Erika Toda, Takeshi Kaga, Nana Katase, Shidou Nakamura, and Shinnosuke Ikehata

The Plot:
The battle of wits and wills between Light Yagami (Fujiwara) and the eccentric “L” (Matsuyama) is taken to the next level with Light joins a task force dedicated to stopping the murderous “Kira” but his delicate plot to advance his career as judge, jury, and execution with his mysterious Death Note is threatened when another killer notebook and Shinigami enter the playing field.

The Background:
Between 1 December 2003 and 15 May 2006, author Tsugumi Ohba and artist Takeshi Obata’s Death Note (or “DEATH NOTE” as it is stylised) was published in the pages of Weekly Shōnen Jump. Originating as a broad concept that saw Ohba visualising the panels in his downtime and Obata incorporating pacing and action into them, Death Note was incredibly successful and widely praised for its art, complex characters, and elaborate twists and turns. This popularity soon translated into an equally well-regarded anime that originally aired between 3 October 2006 and 26 June 2007 and was accompanied by two feature-length specials retelling the story with new footage in late-2007 and 2008, respectively. Director Shūsuke Kaneko didn’t take this task of creating a live-action adaptation lightly; he gambled on filming not one, but two movies back-to-back just to do the source material justice, and insisted on using computer effects to bring the Shinigami to life, which this time included the less mischievous and more good-natured Rem (Ikehata). Like its predecessor, Death Note 2: The Last Name topped the Japanese box office and received a limited overseas release, but far exceeded the first film’s box office with its worldwide gross of over $54 million. Critically, the film also performed notably better; reviews praised it as being stronger, delving much deeper into the characters, and greatly expanding the tension and intrigue between the two main characters. A somewhat divisive L-centric spin-off followed the film’s success, which later received a more direct miniseries and follow-up film in 2016 that also garnered mixed reactions.

The Review:
So, as mentioned in my review of the first film, I haven’t actually watched the original anime or read the Death Note manga, despite being tempted on many occasions to get into both. It’s definitely on my ever-expanding to-do list but, for now, I’m more than happy to call myself a fan of the franchise based on these two live-action adaptations. Again, I’m watching the original Japanese audio version with English subtitles, which isn’t my preferred way of watching Japanese media but it’s ever stunted my enjoyment of the film, and I distinctly remember first watching this sequel back-to-back with the first film years ago when they were included in a late-night double feature. And it’s a good job, too, for as good as Death Note was, it ends of a massive, tantalising cliff-hanger that cries out for further resolution, and much of that film was focused on establishing the rules of the killer notebook, the role of the Shinigami, and the degradation of Light Yagami’s morals. Beginning the last film as an intelligent, if overconfident, law student, Light quickly becomes intoxicated with the power of the Death Note; that many in the general public claim his actions as the murderous “Kira” as being the just work of God doesn’t help, and Light’s ego has become so immense that he’s willing to sacrifice friend, lover, and lawmen alike in order to keep himself from being exposed as the “God of the New World”.

Light is fully prepared to manipulate, and sacrifice, anyone to one-up L.

Death Note 2: The Last Name opens with a quick recap of the previous film and with Light having successfully manipulated events so that his girlfriend, Shiori Akino (Yuu Kashii), was killed in order to gain sympathy from his father, Detective Superintendent Souichirou Yagami (Kaga), and the task force he’s assembled to track Kira down under the supervision of the eccentric, renowned detective, L/ Ryuzaki. Playing the part of a victim of Kira’s brutal wrath, Light joins the team with the express intention of tracking down the man responsible for the deaths of his girlfriend and countless criminals, with none suspecting that he is the true culprit behind the mysterious deaths except for L. L has correctly deduced every piece of the puzzle and has all the evidence he needs, in theory, to pin Kira’s actions onto Light except for concrete proof and an explanation as to how he’s able to kill with just a glance. Because of this, Light is able to give L the run-around and stay one step ahead of him while secretly manipulating events with his Death Note to both take suspicion away from him and to learn L’s true name. Light could learn this simply enough by trading half of his lifespan for the Shinigami eyes, which would let her see the true name and remaining years of anyone he looks at, but e’s determined to usher in his new age and to outwit L with his mind. When another Kira (quickly dubbed “Kira II”) starts issuing threats and killing not just criminals but anyone who even dares publicly speak out against Kira, Light sees an opportunity to realise his goals by manipulating the new Kira to his advantage. So complete is Light’s arrogance that he even goes as far as to manipulate the film’s new Shinigami, Rem (Ikehata), to write new rules into the Death Note to bamboozle the Kira task force, and to surrender both his Death Note (and his memories of his actions as Kira) and himself to a period of isolation all to win L’s trust in order to learn his name and cement himself as the God of the New World.

Both Misa and Kiyomi are determined to continue what they see as Kira’s righteous crusade.

Young celebrity Misa Amane (Toda) is the new Kira in town thanks to acquiring her own Death Note. When she was just a schoolgirl, Misa came home to find her family slaughtered by a sadistic killer and became obsessed with Kira after her family’s killer fell victim to his judgement and she’s only too eager to continue his work, and publicly propose an alliance, as Kira II. While Light primarily targeted criminals, he was known for killing federal agents if they threatened to expose him, but Misa continues his work with a far more brutal flair, felling lawbreakers and lawgivers alike and even killing innocent people just because they speak out against Kira. Thanks to sacrificing half of her lifespan to acquire the Shinigami eyes, Misa is easily able to target and kill anyone and everyone who dares speak out against her hero; the eyes also allow her to deduce Kira’s true identity and seek Light out to forge an alliance, not just as co-Kira’s but also as lovers. Since Misa is absolutely besotted with him, Light is easily able to use her feelings and her naïvety with the Death Note to his advantage; Light agrees to the alliance simply to use Misa’s eyes to learn L’s true name but, sadly, Misa isn’t anywhere near as thorough as Light wen it comes to covering her tracks and ends up captured by L and his task force. With both of them having lost their memories as part of Light’s grand scheme, Misa’s Death Note falls to budding reporter and Kira supporter Kiyomi Takada (Katase); she’s also so pleased to have been chosen as Kira’s “partner” that she trades half her life for the eyes and kills indiscriminately to both continue his work and further her career, but is just as sloppy about covering her tracks and easily apprehended by the unmatched team of Light and L. This allows Light to regain his memories and, in a flash, sacrifice Kiyomi and pin all of Kira’s murders on her in a perfect loop; it also completes the puzzle for L and the task force as they touch the Death Note and become aware of the Shinigami, though this also raises the question of how they’re going to explain that literal Gods of Death and killer notebooks are behind the recent murder spree.

Even with two Shingami to contend with, Light’s main concern is learning L’s true name.

Speaking of which, Ryuk returns, still following Light around and offering commentary, taking amusement in his game of cat-and-mouse with L, and enjoying apples as and when. Thanks to Light having to constantly be on guard and hide his true intentions, Ryuk grows bored and frustrated, and basically disappears for a big chunk of the middle of the film after Light gives up the Death Note and his memories of it. There’s also a new Shinigami on the block, the androgynous Rem; this skeletal, far less mischievous Shinigami is Misa’s constant companion and is watching over her in place of her friend, the diminutive Shinigami Gelus, who had taken a shine to Misa and committed the cardinal sin of protecting her from an obsessive fan with his Death Note, thus dooming himself to oblivion. Unlike the cheeky and outspoken Ryuk, Rem is soft-spoken and fiercely loyal; she vows to punish anyone who threatens Misa and is even forced to turn herself to dust to save Misa’s life after Light manipulates events to put her in danger, which again adds credence to Light’s monstrous nature. The Shinigami are exposed to L and the task force, first through mentions dropped by Kira II, then by observing Kiyomi, and finally after touching the Death Note and conversing with Rem. Interestingly, while Light was stunned by Ryuk’s presence and Misa was awestruck by Rem’s, L initially reacts with a mixture of dear and incredulity. Once he accepts that the Shinigami are real, he’s satisfied that he’s finally wrapped up this strange case, which sees him reluctantly join forces with Light after his nagging suspicions cannot be proven and then subject both Light and Misa to near-torturous isolation in a bid to force a confession rom them. As ever, L’s deductive reasoning is almost supernatural; he’s able to correctly guess everything that’s happening, even without proof, as though he’s read ahead in the script, but even he can’t predict the lengths of Light’s depravity and it costs him dearly when his mentor and father-figure, Watari (Shunji Fujimura), falls victim to the Death Note after Misa is threatened.

The Nitty-Gritty:
Thanks to Light now being officially integrated onto the task force, there are far more face-to-face interactions between him and L this time around. The two play chess, literally and figuratively, against each other, with each throwing out accusations, explanations, and questions in a bid to outwit the other. Even if he couldn’t manipulate life and death with the Death Note, Light is extremely thorough at covering his tracks; he has not only won the support of his father and colleagues thanks to sacrificing Shiori but he has cold hard facts on his side since L cannot pin anything on him, nor explain how he could kill so many so easily as Kira. When Kira II surfaces, Light sees an opportunity to shunt suspicion from him completely and throws himself into the investigation after his sister and father almost fall victim to the new Kira’s wrath. Similarly, he orchestrates events to place Kiyomi into the firing line and, free from his memories of the Death Note, proves himself just as capable a detective as L by cobbling together graphs and data to pinpoint who these new Kiras are. When Light gives up his memories, we see him briefly return to his pre-Death Note character and get a sense of how deeply the book has corrupted his morals and intelligence; for a short time, we see how positive a force he could be, especially when he and L unite against the new Kiras, which only makes his devilish turn back to a callous puppet master all the more harrowing after he regains his memories and is revealed to have manipulate man and Death God alike to his own ends.

Light freely manipulates others, Death Gods, and even himself to outwit L.

The nature of the Death Note and the Shinigami realm is delved into a little more here; as before, the book is filled with rules regarding its use, though Misa and Kiyomi don’t utilise its true potential in the same way that Light did and are content to simply jot down names and cause their victims to die from heart attacks. We get to briefly see the Shinigami world, a desolate realm where the Gods of Death watch humans and live off the years of those they write in their notebooks. The Shinigami cannot use their Death Notes to prolong lives, however, and doing so causes them to turn to sand, as it does to Gelus and, eventually, Rem. As in the first film, the world is dividing in their opinion of Kira. Well, not quite divided, as Kiyomi’s research shows; not only does a sizable percentage of the country support Kira, prominent members of the government have also taken to praising the murderous vigilante. Even Kira’s strongest supporters are shocked, however, when they witness his brand of justice first-hand and when Kira II effectively holds a news station hostage to both deliver a warning to any who would dare oppose Kira in any way and to broadcast a series of live executions. Thankfully, Misa is so besotted with Light that she not only agrees to follow his every order and to kill anyone he asks but she also gives her Death Note to him in order to win his trust. Realising that he can use her to learn L’s new, Light reluctantly agrees to enter a relationship and partnership with her, though he cares little for her or the fact that she’s sacrificed half her life for him (she’s so devoted to Light that she does this again after regaining her memories since she’s forgotten L’s true name and lost the Shinigami eyes when she gave up her Death Note). When Misa resumes her killing spree, she immediately makes herself a target once more and, when the shrewd L is able to figure out that Kira has added fake rules to the Death Note, Light is forced to take even more extreme measures in order to protect himself, remembering his true callous nature and even writing his own father’s name in the Death Note.

In the end, Light is outsmarted but it’s a hollow victory for the doomed L.

Light’s obsession and delusions come full circle by the finale. He fully believes he’s a God now, and it’s hard to deny it given how he’s able to puppet people around with the Death Note, but he ultimately falls victim to his own arrogance and having vastly underestimated L’s deductive abilities. L tricks Light with a fake Death Note, and even fakes his own death at Light’s hands in order to learn the horrifying truth behind his duel identity, all to bring Light into the…well, the light… and expose him. With Light having hidden a piece of the Death Note in his watch and jotting down names with his own blood as and when people threaten to expose him, the game of one-upmanship between him and L escalates to the point where L is forced to his own name in the Death Note in order to circumnavigate his murder at a Kira’s hands and confront Light alongside a shame-filled Souichirou. Held at gunpoint and with nowhere left to run and no excuses left, Light refuses to bow acknowledge L’s intellectual superiority and spits criticism of his father’s broken system and the failure of the law to match the impact he had as Kira. After all his machinations and desperate attempts to cover his tracks, Light’s true nature as a reprehensible, egotistical, power-mad killer rise to the surface during this dramatic finale, which sees his sneaky watch destroyed and leaves him with a bullet in his leg. Raving about his destiny to be the saviour of a new, crime-free world, Light is so convinced of his superiority and Godhood that he outright demands that Ryuk kill everyone present and bend to his will and, in doing so, seals his fate. While the Shinigami will die if they protect humans, they are able to take lives using the Death Note and, similar to how Ryuk despaired of Light’s lack of humanity and compassion at the end of the last film, the Shinigami is somewhat disgusted to see the once intelligent and adaptable Light reduced to begging for supernatural help and writes his name instead. As Light enters his death throes and spits declarations of his he’ll be remembered as a hero, Ryuk solemnly informs him that Death Note users are doomed to limbo rather than going to Heaven or Hell. Sadly, there’s no way to save L; having arranged for his peaceful death, L quietly passes away a few days later after expressing his gratitude and appreciation to Souichirou. Though Souichirou condemns his son’s actions, the official word is that he died by Kira’s hands and that Kira’s reign of terror is finally over, leaving Light’s family mourning their loss, Misa with no memory of her love or the Death Note, and the cackling Ryuk free to cause further havoc as he sees fit.

The Summary:
It’s honestly a little tough for me to pick with is the better film between Death Note and Death Note 2: The Last Name. The first is maybe a little more cerebral in its focus on showing how the Death Note twists Light into this cruel and arrogant murderer, while the sequel is full of twists and turns and an escalating cat-and-mouse between L and Light. Ultimately, I’d highly advise watching both back-to-back as they’re clearly intended to be two parts of a larger whole. While the first film includes more variety in the use of the Death Note, the second really shows just how adapt Light is with the notebook since his would-be successors are sloppy and unimaginative. Both Misa and Kiyomi use the Death Note indiscriminately, lacking even Light’s skewed moral code, and think only in the short-term, giving up half their lives simply because it’s easier to use the Shinigami eyes than to figure out other ways of targeting and killing their victims. I enjoyed the addition of Rem and the brief glimpse into the Shinigami realm and life; she and Ryuk remain a captivating and visual highlight and its fun seeing the differences between the two, with Rem being more stoic and sombre and Ryuk being this cackling maniac at times. The true draw of the film is the intense back and forth between Light and L; it’s maddening seeing that L has figured everything out except for the means and I enjoyed seeing the strange friendship between the two, which is made all the more awkward as L is so peculiar and never truly gives up his suspicions about Light. The two are constantly one-upping each other, with Light seeming to be one step ahead of everyone, but seeing L sacrifice his own life in order to expose Light and watching Light descending into raving vitriol was a truly cathartic moment. While Light may have had a point about the unjust legal system, his superiority complex and sheer lack of empathy ultimately made him no better than his successors and worse than a literal Death God. This results in him become a tragic anti-hero of sorts who fully deserves to be brought down, but there’s little celebration surrounding Light’s death and, indeed, the film ends with the suggestion that Kira’s death has cause crime to increase once more, leaving the moral ambiguity of his actions up for debate.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

What did you think to Death Note 2: The Last Name? If you’re a fan of the anime or manga, how did it work as an adaptation for you? What did you think to the changes made to the source material? What did you think to the new Kiras and how they differed from Light? Were you a fan of the cat-and-mouse game between Light and L? What did you think to Rem and Ryuk and the way they were manipulated by Light? How would you use a Death Note? Whatever your thoughts on Death Note, feel free to share them in the comments or on my social media.

Movie Night: Death Note (2006)

Dr. K2 Comments

Released: 17 June 2006
Director: Shūsuke Kaneko
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
Budget: $20 million (estimated)
Stars: Tatsuya Fujiwara, Kenichi Matsuyama, Yuu Kashii, Asaka Seto, Takeshi Kaga, and Shidou Nakamura

The Plot:
A battle between the world’s two greatest minds begins when Light Yagami (Fujiwara) finds the Death Note, a notebook with the power to kill, and decides to rid the world of criminals. Advised by the Shinigami, Ryuk (Nakamura), Light’s crusade to bring his own brand of justice to the world soon brings him into a game of cat and mouse with an eccentric detective known as “L” (Matsuyama).

The Background:
Death Note (or “DEATH NOTE” as it is stylised) began life as a manga created by author Tsugumi Ohba and illustrated by Takeshi Obata; starting out as a very broad and basic concept regarding Shinigami and strict rules, Ohba and Obata developed a system whereby both of them would draft and storyboards alongside their editor. Ohba would visualise the panels during his downtime and Obata would incorporate pacing and action into them, and was afforded a great deal of creative license when it came to his artwork. Originally published in Weekly Shōnen Jump between 1 December 2003 and 15 May 2006, Death Note was incredibly successful and widely praised for its art, compelling characters, and elaborate twists and turns. So popular was Death Note that was adapted into an equally well-regarded thirty-seven episode anime between 3 October 2006 and 26 June 2007, which received two feature-length specials retelling the anime’s story with new footage in late-2007 and 2008, respectively. Considering how popular both the manga and the anime are, it was perhaps inevitable that a live-action adaptation would follow; director Shūsuke Kaneko didn’t take this task lightly and even gambled on filming two movies back-to-back just to try and do the source material justice. To bring the Shinigami Ryuk to life, Kaneko chose to utilise computer effects so that audiences would be into him being a fantastical and artificial character, though insisted that the animators at Digital Frontier create him as though he were a man in a suit. After topping the Japanese box office, Death Note received a brief cinema release overseas alongside both subtitled and dubbed versions of the film, and eventually made over $31 million at the box office. The film was relatively well regarded by critics, with reviews praising it as a tense thriller and faithful adaptation and placing specific emphasis on the interplay between Light and L. The film was followed by a sequel, just as Kaneko intended, that proved to be even more successful and spawned not only a somewhat divisive L-centric spin-off but also a miniseries and follow-up film in 2016 that also garnered mixed reactions.

The Review:
So, I have to preface this review by saying that, as of this writing, I haven’t actually read the original Death Note manga or watched the anime series; I’ve been meaning to, but never seem to be able to find the time for either, which is a bit of a shame as I really dig the concept and the characters. Death Note (as in, this movie) was my introduction to the franchise; I remember it and its sequel randomly being on Film4, I believe it was, years and years ago when I was taking my undergraduate studies and I stayed up later then usual to watc  h them purely on the strength of the brief screen time Ryuk received in the promos. I was intrigued and have been a big fan of the franchise since…and I hope to one day get around to checking out the original source material. The second thing to note is that I’m watching the original Japanese audio with English subtitles; apparently, there is a dubbed version out there (and, honestly, I would prefer that) but that’s not included in my box set. The film is initially framed as a bit of a mystery, and out of sequence, showing the names of the Death Note’s victims onscreen before they collapse from a fatal heart attack before a gaggle of stunned onlookers, including the police, the press, and everyday civilians.

Disillusioned by the judicial system, Light judges those he deems guilty with the accursed Death Note.

The film follows university student Light Yagama, a young prodigy wo dreams of joining Japan’s National Police Agency and working alongside his father, Detective Superintendent Souichirou Yagami (Kaga). A highly intelligent young man, Light is something of a brash youth who believes he’s smart enough to justify skipping years of on-the-job experience and intuition. Strongly opposed to criminals and in favour of swift, uncompromising justice, Light hacks into the police database and is disheartened to see criminals slip through what he perceives as a broken system, one that he can strengthen and make more efficient. The Death Note gives him the power to do that; initially afraid of Ryuk and sceptical, he tests the books’ power and is stunned at first but soon gets into the habit of offing known criminals. Light’s crusade doesn’t simply stop at murders and rapists; he judges anyone and everyone for their crimes and targets corrupt politicians and, eventually, anyone who threatens to get in his way or expose him. Once the deaths become a regular thing, the press and public have a field day; dubbing the one responsible “Kira” (a Japanese approximation of the word “killer”), cults and online followings start to crop up praising Kira for doing God’s work and punishing the wicked, seeing him as a saviour and begging him to punish more evildoers. This goes both ways, though, as there are also those who see Kira as being just as bad, if not worse, than those he targets but his impact is widespread; bullies stop harassing students and wrongdoers are scared shitless, but even those who “praise” Kira are stunned when the vigilante force strikes down those who dare speak up against him in public. Without a doubt, the power of the Death Note and the fanatical nature of Kira’s followers inflates Light’s ego to breaking point; he sees himself as the saviour of the world, the divine hand of God, and as the only one capable of brining peace, order, and justice to an increasingly unfair world. For all his lofty talk, however, Light has a selfish, vindictive side to him that skews much of good his killings may do; he hopes to use the crisis as a means to fast track his appointment to the National Police Agency and goes to any means necessary to ensure he’s positioned as the only one capable of stopping the mysterious Kira.

The demonic Ryuk observes Light’s killing spree with mild amusement and curiosity.

Light’s constant companion on his descent into madness is Ryuk, a demonic Shinigami with a taste of apples and a mischievous nature. Having grown bored in the Shinigami realm, he drops the Death Note into the human world in hopes of some entertainment; the book itself contains instructions, purposely written in English as that’s the most common language on Earth, and a series of rules that dictate how the book works. Any name written in it will suffer a fatal heart attack within forty seconds unless the writer states otherwise; the writer must picture their victim when writing their name so as not to target those that share the same name, and the book’s power is virtually unlimited. Light spends great deal of time testing the limits and rules of the book (and wasting entire pages on just a few names), witnessing its effects first-hand and eventually detailing more complicated instructions, essentially playing God and manipulating those who would root him out or opposing him into bending to his will. Ryuk is, for the most part, nonplussed by all of this. Invisible to anyone who hasn’t touched the book (unless Light wishes another to see them), Ryuk is similarly incorporeal and is driven only to find some amusement; he makes no effort to assist in any way Light, preferring to remain neutral and throwing temper tantrums when Light ignores him and stops giving him apples to avoid suspicion. ; he offers commentary and is curious about Light’s motives and intentions, but is content to simply let events play out as they do. However, Light is able to manipulate even Ryuk into assisting him by denying him attention and apples unless he helps him locate the surveillance devices placed in his room and spot when people are following him. Ryuk exists by taking the years the Death Note’s victims would have lived were it not for their untimely deaths. Furthermore, if requested, the holder of the Death Note can also dramatically cut their lifespan in order to receive the Shinigami eyes, which allow them to perceive the world as Ryuk does and thus see the real name and lifespan of those around them, and they can also choose to cast away the book, which will cause them to lose all memory of it, though the power and allure of the Death Note prove as enticing and irresistible to Light as apples are to Ryuk.

Stumped by Kira’s mystery, the cops turn to the eccentric L, while Naomi conducts her own investigation.

Souichirou and his team work tireless to solve the mystery of Kira; Souichirou is (somehow) convinced that a singular individual is behind all the killings and his team pledge their unfaltering support to his efforts to bring Kira to justice. However, after hitting a wall in their investigation, they have no alternative but to turn to the mysterious, world-renowned detective known only as “L”. Initially, L contacts them through his assistant and father-figure, Watari (Shunji Fujimura), and appears as little more than a distorted voice on a laptop but turns out to actually a highly intelligent, if socially inept and quirky, young man named Ryûzaki, L’s powers of deduction border on the supernatural; he correctly surmises that Kira’s killings are the result of some malicious intent rather than mere coincidences, though is unable to figure out the cause of the murders since even he has no reason to believe that the Shinigami are real. An eccentric figure always seen sitting in odd positions and snacking on desserts or drinking sugary drinks, never blinking, and his mind constantly pondering the mystery of Kira, L produces complex charts and data to prove his theories that Kira is a single individual rather than a virus, and narrow down that he’s likely to be a university student judging by the time of the unexplained deaths. L also brings in agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); Light is annoyed to find agent Raye Iwamatsu (Shigeki Hosokawa) following him but this is where he really starts to get creative with the Death Note. Ralising that Raye can’t be the only FBI agent assigned to the Kira case, Light uses the Death Note to have him doom his colleagues by writing their name on pages of the book, thereby showing that his quest to usher in a new world now includes murdering even those who would uphold the law if they threaten his work. After witnessing his death, Raye’s fiancée, Naomi Misora (Seto), a former associate of L’s, is left devastated. She undertakes her own investigation and easily singles out and accuses Light using a false name as part of her quest for revenge against the man responsible for her beloved’s death. Kira’s impact on the world is staggering; far more people support his brutal methods than they do oppose them, but those that are against the wholesale murder of any and all criminals make valid points regarding due process and false accusations. One of the principal anti-Kira crowd is also Light’s girlfriend, Shiori Akino (Yuu Kashii), who dreams of being distract attorney and cannot sanction Kira’s particular brand of justice or Light’s support of him. Despite this, Light believes that she would understand that he was acting for the greater good and a higher cause and taking the action no one else could, so confident is he in his appeal and her love for him.

The Nitty-Gritty:
A principal theme in Death Note is that of obsession; once he sees the cult following building around Kira, Light becomes convinced that he’s at the forefront of a fundamental change in the history not just of Japan, but the entire world. Seeing himself as the God of Justice and fully believing that he’s the saviour the world needs, Light dreams of a world without crime, where the guilty and the evil are punished instantly and without compromise, and is so blinkered by his vision for this new world that he never even stops of consider the moral ramifications of his actions. Instead, he simply punishes those he deems guilty without hesitation but he more than meets his match in L; since L doesn’t know about the Death Note of the Shinigami, he’s somewhat on the backfoot when it comes t his adversary, but they’re actually on equal ground as Light is unable to simply strike L down because he doesn’t know the eccentric detective’s real name and doesn’t want to sacrifice his lifespan to learn it. L is able to use this to his advantage, sacrificing a death row convict, “Lind L. Taylor” (Matt Lagan), to learn more about Kira’s capabilities, a cold-blooded tactic that Souichirou cannot condone but he and his team are so baffled by Kira’s killings that they have no choice but to put their faith in the unorthodox L. Light’s reaction to L outsmarting him is outright insult; he’s clearly not used to being outsmarted or made a fool of, so he makes it his mission to figure out L’s true identity and prove his intellectual superiority, which thus becomes his new obsession throughout the film.

Light and L embark on a game of cat-and-mouse to try and expose each other.

Thus, a cat-and-mouse game between the two ensues; since Souichirou refuses to allow Light to get in one the case, seeing it as both a personal challenge and too dangerous for his smart but headstrong son, and Light is forced to alter his methods after L figures out that his killings align with his class schedule. After the FBI agents are killed, Souichirou loses the vast majority of his investigation team as many leave to protect themselves and their families and he all-but demands that L reveal himself since, up until that point, he’s remained safely hidden. Watari takes the remaining group to L’s hotel room and the unusual stealth forbids them from openly revealing their names going forward and shares his deductions about Kira’s ability to manipulate life and death, which are so on the money that he may as well have read the script. Through sheer reasoning, L figures out that Kira is someone who doesn’t like to lose, is immature, and who can dictate the time, place, and way a person dies as well as needing to know that person’s name and face; indeed, he knows everything but the who and how, which continue to elude him throughout the film. In this regard, the two are very similar; L is also quite immature and persistent, and Light would very much like to put an end t his rival but cannot without getting close enough to him to learn his real name. after narrowing down his chief suspects to Souichirou’s team and family, L has them isolate in the hotel room and places bugs and camera sin their homes to monitor their families, but Light is shrewd enough to not only discover this but also continue to murder as Kira using a miniature television hidden in a big bag of crisps. Like Naomi, L is convinced that Light is Kira and insists on monitoring him to prove that theory, even after there’s no evidence to support it; it’s intriguing to see everyone so close to nailing their man and yet lacking the crucial proof to pin him to the wall, and Light delights in outsmarting them all, even his father, at every turn.

Ultimately, Light proves a reprehensible monster who sacrifices his girlfriend to clear his name.

While Ryuk can appear overly cartoony at times, he’s an otherworldly being designed to be out of proportion and extreme in his movements and appearance. With his wide, manic eyes, devilish smile, and gothic attire, he certainly cuts an iconic figure, especially when flying about on his bat wings, and a big part of Death Note’s appeal for me is his appearance and the allure behind him and his kind. The other appealing factor is the battle of wits between Light and L; both are morally skewed individuals, willing to put others at risk to prove a point and succeed in their game, but only Light is willing to manipulate and sacrifice those nearest to him to get what he wants. At first, it seems as though the grief-stricken Naomi has taken Shiori hostage in order to force a confession from Light; L watches, fixated on figuring out how Light has been killing people as Kira, but Light pleads with Naomi and is left distraught when Shiori is short and killed while trying to escape from Naomi! With the police closing in and seeing that she’s killed an innocent girl apparently for no reason, Naomi shoots herself in the head and the anguished Light, seen as a sympathetic and wrong young man, is gratefully accepted by L onto Souichirou’s investigation team. However, Light reveals to the audience (and Ryuk) that he found out Naomi’s true name ahead of time and manipulated everything, forcing her to take a hostage and commit suicide in order to clear him from all suspicion and get his police career on track. Even Ryuk expresses disgust at Light’s lack of empathy and inhumanity after learning that he purposely wrote a companion piece for Shiori, thereby sacrificing her for his own ends, and the film ends not only with Light having degenerated into a old-blooded monster and the hint that L still has his suspicions about him, but also with young celebrity Misa Amane (Erika Toda) being saved from an obsessive fan by the appearance of a second Death Note!

The Summary:
Death Note is quite the oddity; the premise itself is both alluring and ludicrous and the leaps in logic are almost laughable at times. The very idea that L could figure out some kind of connection to a single individual screams of convenience and it almost feels like the narrative would’ve been served slightly better by not revealing that Light was behind all the murders, or quite how he was going about it (maybe paint Ryuk as the killer) until halfway through. However, a great deal of the film’s appeal is seeing Light operate undetected, jotting down names without anyone noticing and amassing this huge following and controversial discussion regarding Kira’s morals and methods, often acting in plain sight. I love how he’s easily whittled down to the top suspect and then has to change his methods and go to extremes to avoid being exposed and give L the run-around, and it’s fun seeing these two infallible and super intelligence individuals clash as they try to one up each other. Ryuk, and the very idea of a killer notebook, is an extremely appealing and interesting anti-hero; more of mischievous sprite than a malicious demon, it’s interesting seeing him follow Light around and question him and watching Light become as monstrous on the inside as Ryuk is on the outside. Death Note’s main hook is the game of cat-and-mouse between Light and L, which here primarily revolves around L desperately trying to prove that Light is Kira and Light outsmarting his rival and manipulating events to get his career and his desire to be the God of the New World underway. In this way, the film really excels; it can be a bit daft and cartoony at times, but for the most part everyone plays it completely straight and it ends up being a pretty tense, fantasy-laced thriller.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

What did you think to the live-action adaptation of Death Note? If you’re a fan of the anime or manga, how did it work as an adaptation for you? What did you think to the changes made to the source material? Were you a fan of Light’s and where do you fall on the debate about his actions as Kira? What did you think to Ryuk and the concept of a killer notebook? Would you take advantage of such power? What did you think to L and his massive leaps in deductive logic? Whatever your thoughts on Death Note, feel free to share them in the comments or on my social media.

Movie Night [Spidey Month]: Spider-Man

Dr. K10 Comments

Easily Marvel Comics’ most recognisable and popular superhero, unsuspecting teenage nerd Peter Parker was first b bitten by a radioactive spider and learned the true meaning of power and responsibility in Amazing Fantasy #15, which was first published in August 1962. Since then, the Amazing Spider-Man has featured in numerous cartoons, live-action movies, videogames, action figures, and countless comic book titles and, in celebration of his debut and his very own day of celebration, I’m dedicating every Friday of August to talk about everyone’s favourite web-head!

Released: 3 May 2002
Director: Sam Raimi
Distributor: Sony Pictures Releasing
Budget: $139 million
Stars: Tobey Maguire, Willem Dafoe, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Rosemary Harris, and Cliff Robertson

The Plot:
Academically-gifted but socially inept high school senior Peter Parker (Maguire) suddenly finds himself endowed with the proportional strength and agility of a spider. After his beloved Uncle Ben (Robertson) is killed due to his irresponsibility, Peter becomes a masked crimefighter but is tested when scientist and industrialist Doctor Norman Osborn (Dafoe) becomes the maniacal Green Goblin.

The Background:
After achieving incredible success with the Fantastic Four, Marvel editor and head writer Stan Lee collaborated with artist Steve Ditko to create Spider-Man, whose debut issue became one of Marvel’s best selling titles at the time and whose subsequent popularity has seen him become the flagship character of Marvel Comics. Although Spider-Man enjoyed some success in animated adaptations and even had a live-action series back in the seventies, the story of his big-screen debut is a long and complicated one fraught with legal issues. Development of a Spider-Man movie can be traced back to the early 1980s, when producer Roger Corman tried to get a film off the ground with Orion Pictures. After that fell through, Tobe Hooper came close to directing a more horror-themed take on the character before the Cannon Group began financing a new script and initially brought in Joseph Zito to direct. Cannon’s financial difficulties saw the project fall apart and producer Menahem Golan took the film rights with him to 20th Century Film Corporation, where he divided the distribution, home video, and theatrical rights up and hired James Cameron to write and direct a new Spider-Man adaptation. Cameron was the one who introduced the idea of Spider-Man having organic webbing, which was just about the only element retained from his script as the film rights became mired in lawsuits and Marvel’s legal troubles. Eventually, Marvel recovered and sold the Spider-Man film rights to Sony Pictures Entertainment for $7 million; the studio turned down David Fincher’s pitch in favour of Sam Raimi, who was a life-long fan of the character. Many young, fresh-faced stars were considered for or interested in the lead role before Raimi cast Tobey Magiure, who underwent a physical transformation for the role. Raimi, whose background was more in traditional and practical effects, was convinced by visual effects supervisor John Dykstra to bring Spider-Man’s superhuman feats to life using CGI but still used practical stunts wherever possible. Finally, after decades in aborted attempts and a hasty edit following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Spider-Man released to overwhelmingly positive reviews that praised the cast and visuals while also criticising the Green Goblin’s suit. The film’s worldwide gross of just under $830 million meant that it was a phenomenal box office success; Spider-Man was accompanied by action figures, comic book tie-ins, and a videogame adaptation and also kick-started one of the most successful and beloved comic book trilogies in all of cinema.

The Review:
The hype for Spider-Man was absolutely palpable back in the day; the film came out around about the same sort of time that my friends and I were old enough to travel to the next town over easily enough ad see films and the trailers and marketing were absolutely everywhere. I remember being so excited for the film just based on the brief snippets in the music video for the film’s excellent hit single, “Hero”, and I bought the videogame adaptation for the GameCube the same day that I saw the film based entirely on its trailer and how good the film was. I grew up reading Spider-Man comics from the seventies and eighties and watching the nineties cartoon, and up until this point the only live-action Spider-Man I’d been exposed to was the Nicholas Hammond version from the seventies which, while ambitious, was obviously limited by the budget and restrictions of the time. This was a big deal; a big-budget, special effects laden superhero film during the days when the industry wasn’t awash with blockbuster comic book releases and I remember being absolutely ready for it at the time.

Nerdy outcast Peter Parker finds his life changed forever by an errant spider bite.

Spider-Man is the story of Peter Parker, a nerdy high school senior who is unpopular with pretty much everyone in his school. A regular target of bully and brutish jock Eugene “Flash” Thompson (Joe Manganiello), Peter is subjected to cruel pranks and harassment on a daily basis despite being something of a scientific prodigy. Since his parents died when he was young, Peter has been raised by his doting, loving, and supportive Aunt May (Harris) and Uncle Ben, who provide for him as best they can on their shoe-string budget. He also enjoys the friendship of Harry Osborn (Franco), a spoiled rich kid who is struggling to succeed academically and to live up to the expectations and standards set by his influential father, Norman Osborn. Crucially, though, Peter pines for his neighbour, the gorgeous and popular Mary Jane Watson/M. J. (Dunst), one of the few people to actually show some kind of decency towards him despite hanging off Flash’s arm. Peter’s life changes forever during a routine science trip to a genetics laboratory; fascinated by the institute’s work in gene-splicing the various abilities of different spiders into a “super-spider”, Peter is concerned only with snapping a few photos for the school paper and awkwardly trying to find the courage to speak to M. J. Consequently, he doesn’t notice an errant super-spider biting him until it’s too late and, upon returning home, he crashes out and is subjected to vivid dreams as his body undergoes a startling physical transformation.

Peter initially uses his newfound powers for personal gain, with dire consequences.

When he awakens, Peter is better than ever: his eyesight has improved, his body is muscular and defined and his reflexes are so attuned that time seems to slow when he perceives danger. Most obviously, he can now eject sticky webbing from his wrists and adhere to surfaces just like a spider and Peter is overjoyed at the revelation that he has gained the proportionate arachnid’s abilities. So caught up in his newfound superhuman powers is Peter that he forgets all about his chores at home and easily bests Flash in a fight; concerned about Peter’s welfare, Uncle Ben tries to reach out to his young nephew, understanding that he is going through “changes” that will come to define his adult life, but Peter spitefully rejects Ben’s advice and heads off to try and earn some money at a wrestling event. Wishing to buy a car to impress Mary Jane, Peter crafts a bright, colourful outfit for himself and takes on Bonesaw McGraw (“Macho Man” Randy Savage) inside a steal cage, easily toppling the muscle-bound braggart. However, when the wrestling promoter (Larry Joshua) stiffs him on the pay cheque, Peter willingly allows a thief (Michael Papajohn) to escape with the promoter’s money. This decision comes back to haunt him, though, when he leaves the arena and finds his beloved uncle dying in the street from a gunshot wound. Driven to a mindless rage at seeing his father-figure die, Peter puts aside his apprehension and uses his webs to swing across the city in pursuit of the culprit, only to find it’s the same thief he let escape earlier!

Spider-Man makes an impact upon his debut, riling up Jameson and captivating Mary Jane.

Heartbroken at having indirectly caused his uncle’s death by not using his great powers responsibly, Peter crafts a new costume for himself and vows to honour his uncle’s memory by fighting crime as Spider-Man. Although he quickly gains a reputation as a mysterious masked saviour, Spider-Man’s presence and motives are questioned by the pugnacious J. Jonah Jameson (J. K. Simmons), the editor of the Daily Bugle, who does everything in his power to tarnish Spider-Man’s name by branding him as a vigilante menace. This works in Peter’s favour, however, as he is able to sell Jameson exclusive and improbable pictures of Spider-Man in order to pay his way through college. However, his obsessive dedication to helping others as Spider-Man begins to put a strain on his personal life; Peter is fired from his job for being late and completely misses that Harry is now dating Mary Jane. On the plus side, this means Peter gets to interact with M. J. a bit more; since Harry is constantly trying to impress his father, he isn’t as attuned to her feelings and his solution to any problem is to spend money. As M. J. comes from an abusive home life, she wants more than frivolities; she needs to be seen as more than just a piece of eye candy for a change to have her voice and dreams heard. Although she is amazing by Spider-Man and fascinated by his mystery and abilities, Peter makes an equal impression by actually being there for her, listening to her, and offering advice, which soon comes to cause a bit of friction between him and Harry.

Osborn, obsessed with maintaining his funding, transforms himself into a supervillain.

Amidst all of this personal drama there’s Harry’s father, Norman. An affluent and well-respected scientist and businessman, Norman is absolutely dedicated to both his research and his company, to the point where he often neglects his son and appears to be somewhat ashamed of him for not aspiring to be more. Norman takes an immediate liking to Peter and the two bond over their shared love of science; Norman even offers Peter the respect he’s never shown to Harry when Peter graciously turns down a potential job offer and soon comes to be a surrogate father-figure in the troubled teen’s life. However, Norman is under an immense amount of pressure from his Board of Trustees; his experiments and research into producing a performance-enhancing drug and a weapons-capable glider have failed to impress and, desperate to ensure OsCorp continues to receive military funding, Norman test his drug on himself. The result is a violent and painful physical transformation that also causes his mind to snap, birthing the maniacal and uninhibited personality of the Green Goblin. Succumbing to his darker impulses, Norman avenges himself against the Board as the Green Goblin and comes into conflict with Spider-Man; unlike the petty thugs and criminals he’s fought before, Spider-Man finds the Green Goblin to be just as tough and durable as he but with the added benefit of all kinds of dangerous toys and weapons in his suit and glider. The Green Goblin admires the strength of Spider-Man’s heart and conviction and initially tries to tempt him into an alliance rather than causing death and destruction in needless conflict. Since this goes against his strict moral code, Spider-Man of course rejects this offer but their antagonism only escalates when Norman (who becomes increasingly unstable the more he gives in to the Goblin’s influence) pieces together that Peter and Spider-Man are one and the same. Armed with this knowledge, the Green Goblin targets Peter’s nearest in dearest, putting Aunt May in the hospital and luring him to the Queensboro Bridge (and a final confrontation) by taking Mary Jane as a hostage.

The Nitty-Gritty:
Right away, I need to take some time to talk about Danny Elfman’s score. Initially, I wasn’t that big a fan of it; in typical Elfman fashion, it’s very dark and moody, which didn’t seem to immediately fit for a Spider-Man theme but it quickly grew on me and has since become synonymous with the character. It’s a little scary, a little ominous, but then it builds to this rousing crescendo that perfectly encapsulates the freedom, power, and fortitude of Spider-Man. It builds a sense of mystery and intrigue over the opening title sequence and is peppered throughout the film at key emotional moments but really comes to the forefront for the iconic final swing of the film, which was what sold the composition as a legitimate Spider-Man theme for me even if I hear a little too much Batman (Burton, 1989) and Darkman (Raimi, 1990) in it at times. Before I get into some of the film’s standout moments, I want to take some time to address some negatives. First of all, Maguire’s Spider-Man isn’t too great with the quips. One of the best things about Spider-Man is that he’s constantly babbling witticisms, insults, and nonsense while web-slinging and beating up bad guys. Even when being assaulted by the Sinister Six, he still has a daft comment to make and it’s one of his most enduring characteristics. Here, Peter does quip when under the mask but Maguire’s deliver is very stilted and uncomfortable (“It’s you who’s out, Gobby! Out of your mind!” stands out as a particularly low point) and, as much as I enjoy Tobey’s performance, he seems a little bit lost at times. Though he’s a great Peter and perfectly captures that nerdy, seventies characterisation of the character, it definitely took him a while to grow into the Spider-Man role and I think he just needed a little bit more direction and tutoring on how to work under the mask.

A coming-of-age story about teenagers on the cusp of adulthood and at a crossroads in their lives.

Similarly, I’m not a massive fan of Kirsten Dunst; she’s not so bad here but there just doesn’t seem to be that much chemistry between her and Maguire. She’s pretty enough and conveys a lot of layers to M. J.’s personality but she definitely improved in the sequels, though I can’t help but notice that she’s a bit of a slut (like, she’s dating Harry but flirts with Peter and then snogs Spider-Man?) Finally, some of the special effects obviously haven’t aged too well but I don’t begrudge the film for that as it basically set the standard and laid the foundation for all Spider-Man films to follow. There are also a lot of interesting and relatable themes at work in Spider-Man; crucially, the film is obviously about power and responsibility. Peter was so powerless for much of his life that he easily gets carried away by his superhuman abilities; at first, when he hits Flash, this isn’t a conscious decision on his part but he chooses to spend his day exploring his newfound abilities and to selfishly use them to try and earn money and impress a girl. While many bemoaned the addition of organic webbing to Peter’s repertoire, I always thought it was an inspired change; it made (and still makes) total sense to me that Peter would inherit that ability from the spider bite and it’s not like we don’t get that he’s a science nerd so I always thought (and still do) that this alteration was for the better and should’ve become the status quo. Plus, it plays into another theme of the movie: puberty. Spider-Man is a coming-of-age story for all three of its young characters but especially for Peter; they’re each at a crossroads, on the cusp of becoming adults, and trying to find their place in the world outside of high school but only Peter has the added pressure of actually, explicitly, becoming something else. Considering all of the pressure and confusion raging within him, it’s no wonder that he blows up in front of his uncle or that he selflessly and completely devotes himself to saving lives as Spider-Man after his tragic death.

Willem Dafoe steals the show as the Green Goblin by effortlessly switching personas on the fly.

Conversely, there are a number of amazing performances in the film; Cliff Robertson is superb as the kindly and benevolent Uncle Ben, conveying a stern, but fair, fatherly warmth and it’s utterly heart-breaking to see Peter go off at him in an adolescent rage and to then have to watch him die. Rosemary Harris is similarly loveable as Aunt May; far from the fragile, ignorant, annoying burden she is in the comics, Aunt May is a supportive, wise, and loving while still being a concern for Peter since she’s the only family he has left. Additionally, James Franco more than makes up for Maguire’s stumbles; there’s not a huge amount for him to do in this film and yet he manages to convey all of these complex and conflicting emotions and facets of Harry’s character. Harry craves Norman’s attention and affection but feels inadequate against his father, and Peter; even “stealing” M. J. from him doesn’t bring him the satisfaction he desires since, by then, Norman’s sanity is fraying and his obsession has shifted towards Spider-Man. The absolute highlight of the film’s supporting characters is, of course, J. K. Simmons as Jameson; I remember having such a smile on my  face when I first saw him and, even now, he so perfectly embodies the loud, obnoxious, demanding editor. Though essentially a tyrant who uses his paper to spread his own agenda, even Jameson is shown to have a moral code when he lies to the Green Goblin to protect Peter in a surprisingly impactful moment. If Simmons was having fun in his small role then Dafoe appears to be having the time of his life! Easily the most charismatic and memorable part of the film, Dafoe expertly walks the fine line between over the top and dead serious, switching on a dime between his two personalities and absolutely chewing up the scenery every time he’s on screen. The Green Goblin is fearsome, vindictive, and deadly, incinerating the Board members (some of whom were his close friends) and endangering lives without a second’s hesitation all to satisfy himself and, later, to lure out Spider-Man.

While many dislike the Goblin’s suit, I found the costumes and visuals to be impressive and fitting.

Unlike Maguire, Dafoe also knows exactly how to use the Goblin’s restrictive suit to his strengths, altering his voice and exaggerating his movements at every opportunity, and the scene where he talks to himself in the mirror (and to his mask) are all the proof you need that Dafoe made for one of the best supervillains in the genre. I mentioned before that some of the special effects haven’t held up too well and, while that is true (Spider-Man can look a little plastic-y at times, for example), the majority of them hold up extremely well thanks, largely, to Raimi incorporating a lot of traditional, practical effects; the Goblin’s suit and glider, for example, are usually always practical, as is the Spider-Man suit. While I’m not a massive fan of the raised webbing and the mask is a little too stiff, the Spidey suit looks absolutely incredible and is a fantastic recreation of the comic book artwork. I was never really too bothered by the Green Goblin’s restrictive, military suit; he wasn’t really a villain I had encountered all that much so I didn’t really care that he’d been visually altered. Now…yeah, I can see why people would be disappointed (especially considering Raimi dabbled in more faithful designs) but I find the helmet and its permanent, vicious smile to be quite unsettling and there’s something very off-putting about barely being able to see a masked killer’s eyes through a gruesome visage. Plus, the fights between Spider-Man and Green Goblin more than make up for this and I enjoy how they escalate throughout the film from a mid-air scuffle to the Goblin threatening Aunt May and their climatic (and vicious) battle.

Peter is devastated to unmask his foe and find his mentor, whose death only adds to his guilt.

Having pieced together Spider-Man’s true identity, the Green Goblin terrorises Aunt May and kidnaps M. J. (since “everyone” knows that Peter has been in love with her since he was a kid) to goad Spider-Man into a confrontation. Earlier, the Green Goblin offered Spider-Man the choice to join him, something Peter adamantly refused; angered by the insult, the Green Goblin forces him to make another choice: between M. J.’s life and the lives of a trolley car full of little kids. Like any good superhero, Spider-Man finds a way to save both, though at great physical strain on his part. Thanks to a gaggle of prideful New Yorkers, he’s able to lower M. J. and the kids to safety but is violently dragged into a brutal fist fight with the Green Goblin. Assaulted by the Goblin’s superior technology, Spider-Man is bloodied, beaten, and battered, his reflexes and strength effectively neutered by the Goblin’s unrelenting assault. Spider-Man’s vicious counterattack is halted by the revelation that it’s Norman under the helmet; pleading with Peter to spare him, Norman tries to manipulate and prey upon Peter’s good heart in one last cruel effort to kill his foe. Of course, Spidey’s reflexes kick in and Norman ends up skewered on his own glider; with his last breath, he begs Peter to keep the truth from Harry, a decision that weighs even heavier upon Peter when Harry swears on his father’s grave to make Spider-Man pay for killing him. Additionally, the entire escapade has taught Peter that his powers and responsibilities as Spider-Man mean that those closest to him will always be at risk, so he selflessly chooses to walk away from Mary Jane after she suddenly professes her love for him in order to continue putting others first as everyone’s friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man.

The Summary:
There’s something very pure, innocent, and wholesome about Spider-Man; since superhero films didn’t dominate the box office at the time, it was incredibly refreshing to see big-budget, serious adaptations being made of beloved comic book characters. Alongside Blade (Norrington, 1998) and X-Men (Singer, 2000), Spider-Man laid the foundations of the unstoppable juggernaut that we now know as the Marvel Cinematic Universe and changed the way audiences (and Hollywood) thought about superhero films. Fundamentally, though, Spider-Man works as a love letter to the classic sixties and seventies Spider-Man stories; like Superman (Donner, 1978), the film can be cheesy and a little campy at times but that’s all part of the charm and direction Raimi is clearly shooting for. It’s not some gritty reimagining or part of a wider, colourful world of superheroes; it’s a very focused, carefree and yet poignant action/adventure film that exists within its own bubble, one that’s very close to our world but also a little brighter and maybe a little more fanciful and exaggerated but in all the right ways and it totally works for this version of the character. Spider-Man set the standard for how superhero films were made going forward; every subsequent adaptation had an origin story, a bit of a romantic sub-plot, and a villain who was in some way connected to the hero and it took a while for the genre to shake off those trappings but, here, they’re all fresh, new, and entirely fitting thanks to its timeless themes of power, responsibility, and maturity. Furthermore, it set the standard for all future Spider-Man movies. Without Spider-Man, we wouldn’t have Andrew Garfield or Tom Holland, and without Raimi filmmakers wouldn’t have the visual language for how to convey Spider-Man’s costume, powers, and moral integrity. The technology, performances, villains, and scope of the character has changed, improved, and been expanded upon over time, even in Raimi’s sequels, but it all started here with this entertaining and whimsical roll of the dice that hits far more than it misses and still holds up incredibly well to this day.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

Are you a fan of Spider-Man? How excited were you for the film back in the day and where does it rank for you against the many other Spider-Man movies? What did you think to Raimi’s approach to the character? Were you a fan of Tobey Maguire’s portrayal of Peter and the Spider-Suit, and were you excited to see him return to the role? What did you think to the Green Goblin’s suit and Willem Dafoe’s performance? Do you think the film still holds up or do you prefer other filmic interpretations of the character? Whatever your opinion on Spider-Man, leave a comment and be sure to check out my other Spider-Man content!

Movie Night: The Butterfly Effect: The Director’s Cut

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Released: 6 July 2004
Originally Released: 23 January 2004
Director: Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber
Distributor: New Line Cinema
Budget: $13 million
Stars: Ashton Kutcher, Amy Smart, William Lee Scott, Elden Henson, and Eric Stoltz

The Plot:
All his life, Evan Treborn (Kutcher) has suffered from mysterious blackouts and a traumatic childhood but, in his twenties, he finds he can travel back in time to inhabit his former self during those periods of blackout. However, while he attempts to improve the present by changing his past behaviors and set things right for himself and his friends, there are unintended consequences for all.

The Background:
The Butterfly Effect was the brainchild of writer/director duo Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber, who initially faced some difficulty in shopping the concept around Hollywood due to the film’s dark and complicated premise; they wrote the first screenplay in 1995 but no one would touch it until they proved themselves with their work on Final Destination 2 (Ellis, 2003). The duo traded different ideas for sequences in the film and enjoyed working in new twists and turns to the script, and even defended casting the somewhat-controversial Ashton Kutcher since they absolutely believed in his ability as an actor. To his credit, Kutcher fully committed to the role; in spite of his tendency to misbehave when bored, he brought a lot of his own emotions and experiences to the main character. However, despite making over $96 million at the box office, critical reception to The Butterfly Effect was generally poor; reviews criticised the inconsistency of the central premise and saw it as an unpleasant and sloppy affair, though many have come to regard its harsh criticism as being unjust and see it as a flawed but entertaining thriller. For its home video release, The Butterfly Effect was accompanied by this Director’s Cut edition, which added about five minutes of extra footage alongside a completely new, far bleaker ending and the film was followed by two pretty dire, barely-connected, straight-to-DVD sequels and is apparently tapped to receive a remake at some point.

The Review:
It think it’s only fair to start this review by saying that I’m not really, and have never been, much of an Ashton Kutcher fan. Or Amy Smart fan, for that matter. In my teenage years (and still to this day), I enjoyed my fair share of tweener sex-comedies like the American Pie films (Various, 1999 to present) and was more a fan of guys like Seann William Scott rather than Kutcher and, while I enjoy Road Trip (Phillips, 2000), Smart didn’t exactly do much to stand out for me against a sea of other attractive blondes so, in terms of the casting, The Butterfly Effect wasn’t exactly my usual forte. In fact, thinking about it now, I’m not even sure how I became aware of the film; I think it must’ve come to my attention around about the same time I was discovering Donnie Darko (Kelly, 2001), and certainly must’ve been added to my film collection around this time, and I was more than surprised to find how much I enjoyed both the performances and the premise of this movie. To begin with, the film subscribes to a very linear format as we follow young Evan Treborn (Logan Lerman at seven and John Patrick Amedori at thirteen) and his childhood friends, Kayleigh Miller (Irene Gorovaia), her brother Tommy (Jesse James), and Evan’s best friend Lenny Kagan (Kevin G. Schmidt). Evan is the only son of hardworking single mother Andrea (Melora Walters), who grows disturbed by his frequent blackouts; rather than fainting or going into a catatonic state during these moments, Evan simply loses all awareness of what’s happened around him and “comes to” only after the moment has passed, meaning he has no memory of drawing a disturbing picture of a knife crime in school or of why he’s standing in the kitchen holding a knife. Concerned for his wellbeing and desperate to avoid him becoming institutionalised like his father, Jason (Callum Keith Rennie), Andrea takes Evan to Dr. Redfield (Nathaniel Deveaux) who suggests that he start keeping regular diaries to help jog his memory and that his blackouts may stem from abandonment issues with his father.

Evan tries to correct his traumatic childhood with his time travel abilities and ends up a murderer!

To try and rectify this, he’s granted a heavily supervised visit to his father in hospital, only to blackout and awaken to find his father ranting and raving and attempting to throttle him to death, subsequently witnessing Jason being accidentally killed right before his eyes. Not only do Evan’s blackouts continue as he grows into a teen, but his childhood traumas quickly mount up as well; he blacks out during a trip to the basement of Kayleigh’s disturbed father, George (Stoltz), whose physical and sexual abuse of his kids causes Kayleigh to grow up ashamed of her body and sexuality and Tommy to become more than a little disturbed. Tommy constantly manipulates and insults both Evan and Lenny, flies into a rage at the slightest provocation, and even sets fire to Evan’s beloved dog after seeing a tender moment between him and Kayleigh. Eventually, Andrea reaches her breaking point and moves them away, much to Evan’s anguish as it means leaving his childhood sweetheart behind, though he vows to come back to her. When the story jumps ahead to find the now grown-up Evan acing his way through university, he’s stunned to find that reading his diaries triggers a reverse blackout; while his older self spaces out and becomes unresponsive, his conscious mind inhabits the body of his younger self, allowing him to experience moments he missed out on as a child and understand just how depraved George was. Confused, he turns to the only person who can corroborate what he experienced and finds Kayleigh (Smart) working as an abused waitress and deeply traumatised by her disturbing upbringing; when Evan’s questions only cause her further distress and drive her to suicide, he’s devastated when an angry Tommy (Scott) calls vowing to make him pay. Realising that he has the power to change events for the better, Evan travels back in time and delivers a scathing and unexpected tirade to George, altering events so that Kayleigh was spared her father’s wrath and lusts and resulting in the two of them being together in a fraternity at university. However, all is not entirely right in this new timeline; not only does Evan suffer a painful and disturbing convulsion as a new set of memories is crammed into his brain, but he’s now seen as a rich, douchebag frat boy who’s failing his classes. To make matters worse, George misinterpreted Evan’s message and poured all of his abuse into Tommy, who becomes even more maladjusted as a result and, during a violent confrontation between the two, ends up bludgeoned to death at Evan’s hands as payback for killing his dog and ruining Lenny’s life.

Evan’s repeated attempts to change things for the better only lead to more pain and suffering.

This timeline thus goes from bad from worse for Evan as he ends up in prison alongside some seriously depraved inmates who attack him, sexually violate him, and end up in possession of his only way of escaping: his diaries. Thanks to using his strange abilities to convince the religious Carlos (Kevin Durand) into helping him, Evan is able to jump back into his teenage body to try again. Unfortunately, this time he makes things better for himself but much, much worse for Lenny and Kayleigh; in an attempt to keep his dog from being burned alive, Evan unwittingly gives Lenny a sharp tool to stab and kill Tommy, leaving him (as in Lenny) in a vegetative state. As if this (and carrying the memories of his time in prison with him) wasn’t bad enough, Kayleigh has resorted to drugs and prostitution to get by and offers Evan little more than scorn, resentment, and derision when he tells her the truth about his condition and prepares to give up altering the timeline since he constantly makes things worse in ways he cannot predict. Despite her vitriol, however, Kayleigh offers Evan one last inspiration to set things right and he goes back in time to find out what happened when he and his friends left a stick of dynamite in a neighbour’s post box. Originally, this left Lenny psychologically broken as he was coerced by Tommy into placing the explosive that caused the death of her mother and baby but, this time, Evan tries to save those lives and ends up a multiple quadriplegic as a result of being caught in the explosion himself. However, things are much better for Lenny and Kayleigh, who are at university with Evan, caring for him, and in a loving relationship, and even Tommy has turned his life around and found God after tackling the neighbour and seeing himself as a hero. While Evan’s disabled alternative self is seen to have accepted his lot in life, he’s left a broken shell of his former self as he’s now completely helpless without the aid of others, his mother is suffering from lung cancer after taking to chain smoking, and he’s distraught to find that he can’t even kill himself since he’s so immobile. At the end of his tether, Evan tries one last time to set things right, returning to George’s basement once more, only to cause an even worse result when Kayleigh is killed, and he awakens to find himself in an institution under the care of Dr. Redfield and believed to be as crazy as his father was.

The Nitty-Gritty:
I couldn’t talk about The Butterfly Effect without mentioning Michael Suby’s haunting, deeply affecting score; an evocative melody that perfectly captures the desperation, action, and emotion of every scene, the soundtrack really hits its apex during Kayleigh’s funeral. As if Evan’s heartbreak wasn’t evident enough from his stunned, stoic, regretful poise and features, Suby’s rising, poignant music really hammers home the pain and sorrow he’s feeling in that moment. While I remember being mildly invested in the film up until that point, it was this moment that the film really caught my attention and, even now, it often makes me a little teary-eyed; it’s just such a great, incredibly moving score (and scene) and it never fails to draw me into Evan’s anguish. Also key to this is Kutcher’s performance in the role; while I’m not really normally too fussed about him either way, he really impressed me here with the ease at which he jumped between being a relatively well-adjusted young man, to realising how screwed up his childhood was, and the lengths to which he went to try and make things better for himself and his friends. His joy at creating a world where he and Kayleigh are together is quickly dashed when he realises that he’s seen as a privileged layabout in this timeline and his hopes sink into depression and suicide once he accidentally blows his limbs off.

Evan’s time travel ability is unique but he’s unable to make things right for everyone, try as he might.

The time travel mechanic, while somewhat flawed, is extremely inventive; Evan can inhabit his younger body and relive pockets of time he missed, which then fundamentally changes the present, and he’s able to retain full memories of every lifetime upon returning. While this causes brain haemorrhaging that eventually threatens his life, he’s pretty good at keeping track of where he’s been and what he’s lived through, thanks in no small part to his diaries. However, as the world changes in more drastic ways, he loses pages and even entire books of his journals and has to resort to violence and other extreme methods to make a jump. It turns out that his condition is hereditary, passed down from his father who was able to make similar trips using photographs, which makes his name (“Evan Treborn”, as in “Event Reborn”) take on a double meaning (if you think this is lacking in subtlety, I’m pretty sure the directors say in the movie commentary that they originally named him “Chris Treborn”, which is about as subtle as a brick). Quite how the males in the family have this ability isn’t explained, though Evan finds that his grandfather also had it but, when he tries to get answers from Jason, he ends up being strangled by his father for his arrogant assumption that he’ll be able to succeed where Jason failed and create a better life for everyone. Of course, Evan’s aspirations are doomed to fail; every time he makes a change, it has disastrous ramifications for either himself or those around him. He’s able to “fix” him and Kayleigh but at the cost of turning Tommy into even more of a psycho; when he tries to fix this, he improves his life at the cost of Tommy’s, Lenny’s sanity, and Kayleigh’s health; and, when he tries to fix that, he ends up a quadriplegic with a dying mother, but his friends are much happier in this timeline.

Suffering from lifetimes of memories, Evan sacrifices himself to ensure his friends and family live better lives.

His repeated attempts to save and change lives result only in failure or further suffering, driving him to the point of suicide but, desperate to fix his mother and regain his limbs, he tries one more jaunt to his boyhood and ends up accidentally killing Kayleigh and making it so that he didn’t write any diaries beyond that point due to being committed to a hospital. It’s at this point that The Butterfly Effect briefly toys with the notion that everything we’ve witnessed up until this moment has been a delusion of Evan’s, a manic fabrication to cope with the guilt of Kayleigh’s death, since Dr. Redfield sees the same similarities between Evan’s demands for diaries that don’t exist and Jason’s requests to view photographs he never took. Suffering from irreparable damage to his brain, which has been strained to breaking point after being overloaded with about eighty years’ worth of memories, Evan sees only one way out; he makes a daring escape from his room to view footage of his birth, and leaps into the body of his baby self to strangle himself to death with his umbilical cord. Although this leaves Andrea devastated at having lost another child, the knock-on effect is the birth of a happy, healthy girl not afflicted with the time travel curse and better, healthier lives for Kayleigh, Tommy, and Lenny without Evan’s influence. This harrowing and disturbing ending is, of course, very different from the theatrical cut, in which Evan simply scared Kayleigh off when they were kids and seemed tempted to woo her when their paths later happened to cross, but remains one of the bleakest and most affecting examples of self-sacrifice I’ve ever seen. Although Evan wasn’t a disruptive or toxic influence on his friends (at least he wasn’t before he started meddling with time travel), his absence means that Kayleigh and Tommy never went to live wither their father, sparing them from his maltreatment and Lenny from Tommy’s abuse, and effectively ends his family curse and results in improved lives for all at the cost of his own, something hinted at in an earlier scene also new to this version where a fortune teller (Chapelle Jaffe) reveals that he has no lifeline and was “never meant to be”.

The Summary:
Believe me, no one’s more surprised than me at how much I enjoy The Butterfly Effect. While I’m a big science-fiction fan, enjoy time travel stories, and have a twisted appreciation for a good old bleak ending, it definitely helps when actors I actually enjoy or believe in are involved but Ashton Kutcher really surprised me in this one. It’s a shame that I haven’t seen him do more thrillers or more serious roles as he really brought a surprising level of emotion and anguish to this film, which was a necessity given how dark and unsettling The Butterfly Effect’s content can be. While flawed at times (Evan’s “stigmata” trick really shouldn’t have worked, for example), the time travel mechanic is very unique; I liked that Evan was limited to where and when he could travel back to and how his attempts to improve things had devastating knock-on effects. All of the characters are traumatised in some way, having experienced some horrifying events throughout their childhood, and I liked that Evan wasn’t just trying to make things better for him; he wanted to improve Kayleigh’s life, then Lenny’s, then save his mother, alongside his own selfish desires for happiness. It’s only when he’s been left a heavily disabled shadow of his former self that he acts selfishly, and he pays the ultimate price by first losing his diaries and then having to give up his life to ensure a good future for everyone else. Those who find child sexual abuse, suicide, and the unsettling ending particularly triggering may lash out at this film, but it never fails to make an impression on me, and I feel it’s unfairly overlooked. The score, performances, and concept are all executed really well and it’s definitely a top-tier harrowing, sci-fi thriller for me that I often find myself returning to.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

Are you a fan of The Butterfly Effect? Which version of the film did you prefer and what did you think to the Director’s Cut’s new, disturbing ending? Were you a fan of Ashton Kutcher’s performance in this film and what did you think to the traumas he experienced throughout? Which of the alternative timelines was your favourite and how do you think you would use Evan’s power? Have you seen any of the sequels and, if so, how do you rate them compared to this film? What are some of your favourite time travel and Ashton Kutcher films? I’d love to know what you think about The Butterfly Effect so sign up to leave your thoughts below or drop a comment on my social media.

Movie Night: South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut

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Released: 30 June 1999
Director: Trey Parker
Distributor: Paramount Pictures/Warner Bros.
Budget: $21 million
Stars: Trey Parker, Matt Stone, Mary Kay Bergman, and Isaac Hayes

The Plot:
After seeing the new Terrence and Philip movie, the kids of South Park cause controversy when they freely spout a whole slew of new swear words and profanity. This leads to Kyle Broflovski’s (Stone) mother, Sheila (Bergman), becoming so outraged that she pushes for all-out war against Canada! However, the situation escalates when, after dying, Kenny McCormick (Stone) uncovers a plot between Saddam Hussein (ibid) and Satan (Parker) to use these events as a catalyst to bring an age of darkness to the entire world!

The Background:
Back in 1992, Matt Stone and Trey Parker created a crude animated film using only glue, construction paper, and an old 8mm film camera. After being commissioned to create a follow-up short, the pilot episode first aired on this day in 1997 and a full series soon followed, which saw the duo joined by a team of around seventy employees. The duo also switched to replicating their cardboard cut-out style with computers, and the popularity of the show’s first season led to discussions of a feature-length production in 1998. Right off the bat, Stone and Parker made it clear that a feature-length film would have to be R-rated and eventually got this wish even after studio executives tried to sway them to tone things down. The filmmakers used a variety of additional computer effects to help the film stand out from its television counterpart, something further bolstered by the duo’s decision to make the film a musical, though production was made tense due to several battles with producers and executives regarding the film’s tone and marketing. Despite its vulgar humour, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut released to widespread critical praise and earned over $83 million at the box office, making it the highest-grossing R-rated movie until it was knocked from its perch about sixteen years later.

The Review:
Man, I was so hyped for this film as a kid; funnily enough, though, I don’t actually remember if I knew that it was a musical until I was sitting in the cinema with my friend and the opening sequence started. As surprising as this may have been, it definitely didn’t put me off and only added to the film’s charm. Considering how popular and notorious South Park was when the film released, it’s unlikely that many audiences went into it without at least some knowledge of the show, its crude humour, and its colourful cast of characters and yet the film helpfully introduces us to the snowy, quiet, and apparently unassuming town with its opening song (“Mountain Town”) and by having Stan Marsh (Trey Parker) tour through the streets recruiting his friends to the cinema event of their lives, Terrance Henry Stoot (Matt Stone) and Phillip Niles Argyle’s (Parker) Asses of Fire. Fans of the show will remember Terrence and Phillip from the season episode “Death” (Stone, 1997), which actually contained a similar sub-plot to this movie; the duo (sometimes depicted as crudely animated cartoon characters) are a couple of vulgar Canadian comedians known for foul language and toilet humour but they’re heroes to the South Park kids.

The kids pick up some new curses but Stan is preoccupied by Wendy’s new flame.

This opening song not only introduces the four main characters but also sets up many of the themes of the movie; Stan’s mother, Sharon (Bergman), sings about Stan’s pure-hearted innocence, Kenny’s mother, Carol (ibid), chastises him for skipping church to see the film and warns him that he’ll have to answer for Satan for his actions, and Kyle’s overbearing and controlling mother forces him to not only lie about where he’s going to avoid upsetting her further but to also take his adopted baby brother Ike (Various) along with them. Of course, Eric Cartman (Parker) doesn’t have to worry about his mother, his family, or money troubles like his friends since he emotionally manipulates his kind-hearted and doting mother, Liane (Bergman), with his callous and demanding persona but even he can’t get past the movie rating laws that forbid them from seeing Asses of Fire due to being underage. Stan, however, bribes a homeless man to pose as their legal guardian and get them into the film, which is a typical nonsense Terrence and Phillip affair of fart jokes and baloney but with the added bonus of including a whole new array of uncensored swear words and insults for the kids to pick up (“Uncle Fucka”). While the adults in the audience are horrified by the vulgarity, the kids are captivated and waste no time in impressing their fellow kids with their new vocabulary. Stan, however, is disheartened to find his long-time crush and on-again/off-again girlfriend, Wendy Testaburger (Bergman), has latched on to newcomer Gregory (Parker), an eloquent and sophisticated transfer student who appeals to her sensible and rational mindset.

Following Kenny’s death, Sheila rallies the town against Canada and their vulgar humour.

To try and win her back, Stan goes to Jerome McElroy/Chef (Isaac Hayes) for advice but the smooth-talking womaniser accidentally informs him that the best way to make a woman like him is to “find the clitoris”; since Stan is too young to understand this, he believes that this is more of a spiritual quest and begins a sub-plot revolving around him trying to decipher Chef’s words and win back Wendy’s affections. Thanks to the kids, though, the rest of their class bribes their way into Assess of Fire and, before long, they’re all singing and quoting lines from the film (with the exception of the sensible Gregory and Wendy). Stan, Kyle, Cartman, and Kenny’s blatant use of swears horrifies their teacher, Herbert Garrison (ibid), and sees them sent to the school councillor, Mister Mackey (ibid), and lands them in hot water with their mothers. Although Mr. Mackey tries to dissuade the children from swearing (“It’s Easy, M’Kay”) and the school places a ban on Terrance and Phillip apparel, the kids continue to sneak into the film at every opportunity and Asses of Fire becomes a huge hit all across the country despite concerns that its content is ruining America’s youth. This all comes to a head when the kids try to recreate a scene from the film and, in the process, Kenny burns himself to death trying to light his fart. For Sheila, this is the final straw; not only do the mothers ground their kids for two weeks but she takes her opposition to the movie, and all of Canada, to the next level by reorganising the Parent/Teacher Association into Mothers Against Canada (M.A.C.) and vehemently opposing any and all Canadian products and imports in the town (“Blame Canada”).

The arresting of Terrence and Phillip and war against Canada turn out to be signs of Satan’s return.

After paying off Conan O’Brien (Brent Spiner), Sheila then has Terrence and Phillip arrested for corrupting America’s youth; when the American ambassador (Stone) refuses to let the duo go and insults his Canadian counterpart (Parker), Canada responds by bombing and killing the Baldwin family and before long an all-out war between America and Canada is declared, with Sheila positioned as President Bill Clinton’s (ibid) chief advisor and Terrence and Phillip set to be executed as war criminals. While Kyle is angered at Cartman’s views on his mother (“Kyle’s Mom’s a Bitch”), the kids agree that they have to do something to stop their mothers and the war (“What Would Brian Boitano Do?”) and so unite the town’s kids under the banner of “La Resistance”. While they struggle to come up with a practical plan, Gregory leads them to Christophe/The Mole (Parker), who helps them to infiltrate the United Service Organisations (USO) show where the duo are set to be executed. Their motivations are only bolstered when Cartman is visited by Kenny’s ghost, who warns that this is all playing into an age-old prophecy that will allow Satan to rise up and bring devastation to the world. Having been denied entrance into Heaven, Kenny’s soul is cast down to the fiery depths of Hell where he finds Satan in a toxic relationship with former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. While Satan is trying to focus on his opportunity to finally have his time in the sun (“Up There”) and wants more from their relationship, Saddam is an egotistical and self-centred schemer who’s focused only on sex. Although Kenny tries to convince Satan to leave his abusive partner, Saddam is easily able to emotionally manipulate Satan’s good nature (“I Can Change”) and, when the war culminates in Terrance and Phillip’s deaths despite the best efforts of La Resistance, he immediately usurps Satan’s position to steal the spotlight as the new dark ruler of the world.

The Nitty-Gritty:
As you might expect from South Park, the film is full of crude humour, sight gags, and ridiculous jokes; we see this right from the start as Cartman accuses Terrence and Phillip of having crappy animation and the kids are immediately seen jerking along in stilted movements. Cartman shines even brighter during his big solo where he complains about Kyle’s mother, his little gag with the microphone where he tells Mr. Garrison to suck his balls never fails to amuse, and he even absurdly tries to beat Kenny’s flames out with a stick! Kenny’s botched operation is similarly hilarious as Dr. Gouache (George Clooney) and his attendants slice his charred corpse up, beat him with a hammer, and accidentally replace his heart with a baked potato! The film also dips into comical satire with the “March of War” promotional video, Kyle randomly tapping keys on his computer to “re-route the encryptions” and get a message to the town’s kids (Cartman’s insistence on advertising that they’ll have punch and pie is a riot), and while Chef only has a small role he’s perfectly placed to lampoon the army’s notorious racism. Although created solely for the film, Christophe proves to be a true highlight; a foul-mouthed atheist with a dodgy French accent, the Mole provides some of the best and most absurd lines of the film with his rants about God, his mother (who stabbed him with a coat hanger while still in the womb!), and his “butt for” gag that are matched only by the wacky levels of blood and violence during the final conflict between the American and Canadian armies.

M.A.C.’s campaign against Canada quickly escalates to bigotry, a special chip, and all-out war.

In true South Park fashion, the reaction to a vulgar film is suitably over the top and comical; all of the town’s adults are outraged that their children have become “corrupted” by Terrence and Phillip and resort to more extreme measures when their attempts to ground their kids fail. In addition to burning all Canadian paraphernalia and causing all Americans of Canadian descent and blood to be sent to death camps, M.A.C. employs the services of Doctor Vosknocker (Eric Idle) to create the “V-chip”, an electronic device that is implanted into Cartman against his will and delivers a painful electric shock any time he speaks a swear word. As if these extreme methods weren’t bad enough, Sheila’s commitment to opposing the vulgarity of Asses of Fire expose her as an all-out racist; as Kyle says, she even forgets that her adopted son is Canadian and not only takes every opportunity to attack the physical characteristics of Canadians (which are exaggerated in the film’s animation) but to wage all-out war against them. She’s so obsessed with blaming and punishing everyone else, that she’s willing to put countless lives at risk in a senseless and bloody war simply because of a few swear words, which is just another fantastic example of how clever South Park’s social commentary can be as it parodies how extreme parents and social groups can be when opposing things they believe to be morally questionable.  

Thanks to Kenny, Satan overcomes his dependency on Saddam and the town is saved.

As a result of Sheila’s pompous and fanatical ways, Satan comes across as a far more sympathetic and relatable character; while you can kind of see where Sheila’s coming from, she quickly goes to unbelievable extremes to persecute Canadians under the façade of protecting her son that it makes her thoroughly unlikeable, whereas Satan simply longs to escape his aeons of banishment to the netherworld and claim the world as his own. Not only that, it’s clear that he’s a sensitive and introspective demon who’s being manipulated by Saddam Hussein; when he spreads his army of darkness across the world and begins his reign of terror, he specifically states that it’s in reaction to Sheila’s bigotry and that the world must pay for her actions but he’s quickly pushed aside by Saddam’s own desire for power and conquest. Initially unable to work up the courage to stand against Saddam, Satan finally frees himself from his lover’s toxic influence after seeing him unsuccessful try and fool Cartman with the same lies he used on Satan earlier and, in gratitude for Kenny’s help in seeing Saddam for what he truly is, Satan agrees to restore the world and the lives lost prior to the war. Unfortunately, this means that Kenny has to go back too and, in a surprisingly poignant moment, he reveals his face for the first time and bids a fond farewell to his friends and ascends to Heaven as peace and understanding returns to the world (“Mountain Town (Reprise)”).

The Summary:
Even after all this time, my love and appreciation for South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut remains unchanged; it’s as fun, entertaining, and poignant to me now as it was back when it first came out, when the hype and excitement about South Park was at its most palpable. Indeed, the one complaint I have about the film is that it came maybe a little too soon in the show’s lifecycle, meaning that later breakout characters like Leopold Stotch/Butters (Stone), Tweek Tweak (ibid), Jimmy Valmer (Parker), and Timmy Burch (ibid) either don’t feature (due to not being created yet) or have extremely minor roles. This, however, is a revisionist criticism and does absolutely nothing to reduce my enjoyment of the film; by recycling a few of the gags from the show’s first two seasons and expanding upon the premise, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut proves to be as thought-provoking and surprisingly touching as it is vulgar and controversial. Many like to criticise South Park for appealing to the lowest common denominator with its immature jokes and crude humour but the showrunners often lace their episodes with commentary of modern society and media and the film is no different; by parodying the extreme reaction to vulgar content, the film holds a mirror up to South Park’s own critics and shows how there are things that are far worse than some naughty language. Add to that the legitimately funny jokes, the tight writing, a whole slew of catchy songs, some fun new characters, and the moving reveal of Kenny’s face and you’ve got an extremely humorous, witty, and touching animated feature that I enjoy just as much now as I did all those years ago when I first saw it at the cinema.

My Rating:

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Fantastic

Did you enjoy South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut? Were you a fan of the musical approach and, if so, which of the songs was your favourite? Which of the kids is your favourite and did you enjoy Kenny’s side plot in Hell and Cartman’s troubles with the V-chip? Were you a fan of the film’s satire on the extreme reaction to bad language in films and cartoons? Do you agree that Canada isn’t a real country? Would you have liked to see a sequel made that included some of the show’s later breakout characters? How are you celebrating South Park’s anniversary this year? No matter what your thoughts on South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut, or South Park in general, I’d love to hear from you so feel free to leave a comment below by signing up or on my social media.

Movie Night: Thor: The Dark World

Dr. K2 Comments

Released: 8 November 2018
Director: Alan Taylor
Distributor: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Budget: $150 to 170 million
Stars: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Christopher Eccleston, Stellan Skarsgård, Rene Russo, and Anthony Hopkins

The Plot:
After defeating his step-brother, Loki Laufeyson (Hiddleston) alongside his fellow Avengers, Thor Odinson (Hemsworth) has been fighting disorder across the Nine Realms. However, after Doctor Jane Foster (Portman) is infected by the mysterious “Aether” and targeted by the malevolent Dark Elf, Malekith (Eccleston), Thor must team up with his brother to confront this dangerous new threat.

The Background:
Even before the blockbuster release of Avengers Assemble/The Avengers (Whedon, 2012), Kevin Feige, head honcho of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), promised that Thor would have another adventure. The team-up’s unprecedented box office success meant the MCU entered is second phase with a huge amount of momentum and expectation, but the experience of directing Thor (Branagh, 2011) left director Kenneth Branagh drained and reluctant to return for the sequel. At one point, Patty Jenkins was attached to direct but left due to “creative differences”, a decision that angered star Natalie Portman. Once Alan Taylor secured the director’s chair, the filmmakers set about progressing Thor’s relationship with Loki and expanding upon the gritty, more grounded approach to the merger of science and magic seen in the first film. Although Thor: The Dark World surpassed its predecessor’s box office with its worldwide gross of almost $645 million, the film wasn’t as well received as others in the MCU; while the performances and fantastical elements were praised, many criticised the film’s pace and weaker elements.

The Review:
Like the first film, Thor: The Dark World opens with some narration and scene-setting from the wise and powerful Odin Allfather (Hopkins), who tells the story of the Dark Elves (an ancient, malevolent race from the time before there was light in the universe) and their leader, Malekith, who sought to return the Realms back to darkness using the destructive power of the Aether before he was stopped by Odin’s father, Bor (Tony Curran). Unable to destroy the Aether, Bor buried it deep in a far away Realm and Malekith disappeared for aeons to Svartalfheim at the darkest corner of the cosmos. Sadly, this time around the narration falls into the same trap that so many narrations do in that we end up hearing the story all over again when Jane arrives on Asgard; it would have been just as effective to show the opening scene without Odin’s narration and then have him fill the gaps in later, or flash back to the opening battle later in the film to combine them into one scene.

Still a mighty warrior, Thor has matured a lot, though is preoccupied with thoughts of Jane.

Thanks to Loki’s attack on New York City, the balance between the Nine Realms has been upset and Thor has been too busy setting things right alongside his allies to make good on his promise to return to Jane. Thor still retains much of his arrogance in battle (but then again, when he can explode a Kronan with one swing of Mjölnir, I feel a little pride is understandable) but he’s noticeably changed since learning humility in the first film; he’s far more respectful to Odin, who treats him as more of an equal for his good deeds, but the two disagree on Thor’s feelings for Jane. Odin believes that, since human lives are so fleeting, Thor would be better served turning his attentions towards his ally and comrade, Lady Sif (Jaimie Alexander), but the Thunder God is driven to distraction by his yearning for Jane. This actually sows the seeds for an eventual character arc for Thor in the MCU; since the first film, Thor has been groomed for and expected to take the throne but, here, we see that his adoration for Jane and Earth means that he cannot focus on the remaining Realms in the way a true king of Asgard should. We’d see the culmination of this in Avengers: Endgame (Russo and Russo, 2019), of course, where he abdicates his royal responsibilities and finally embraces his true self but, here, he’s at a crossroads between doing what’s right for him and doing what’s right for the cosmos.

Thanks to being possessed by the Aether, Jane visits Asgard and we see more of the mighty Realm.

Despite her half-hearted attempts to move on from the hunky Thunder God, Jane remains equally distracted by thoughts of Thor; however, when Darcy Lewis (Kat Dennings) alerts her to odd readings nearby, she can’t help but investigate in hopes of seeing Thor return to Earth. Instead, they find odd gravitational and special anomalies at an abandoned industrial district in London that render some objects weightless and transport others to another dimension. Following the source of the signal, Jane is unwittingly sucked into the Aether’s hidden dimension and absorbs the protoplasmic Infinity Stone. Their paths finally cross again when Heimdall (Idris Elba) loses sight of her in this moment and Thor returns to check on her, finding her not only as feisty as ever but also incredibly dangerous thanks to the Aether’s influence. This results in one of the best things a sequel can do and that’s taking a character tied to one world in the first film (Jane) and bringing her to another (Asgard) in the sequel; just as Thor was a stranger in a world beneath him in Thor, so too is Jane a stranger in a world beyond her here. Odin is unimpressed, nay angered, that Thor would bring a mortal to all-mighty Asgard and Jane is both overwhelmed and captivated by the technology and culture of the Golden Realm.

Malekith might be a bit of a weak villain and a waste of Eccleston but damn, does he look bad-ass.

Malekith’s plot can only occur at a specific time when the Nine Realms are in perfect alignment known as the “Convergence”, which temporally sees brief portals to the Nine Realms open up and cause all kinds of disruption and conveniently comes around at the same time as the Aether is discovered. Having fled to the further reaches of the universe with what little remained of his army following his defeat, Malekith is also awoken when the Aether is disrupted by Jane and immediately restarts his campaign to claim its awesome power. Considering how strong and complex a villain Loki was in the first film, it is admittedly disappointing to see him followed by Malekith, a character whose motivations basically boil down to wanting to spread darkness and discord throughout the known universe simply because he wants to. Indeed, Malekith is so obsessed with his plot for power and destruction that he willingly sacrificed a great number of his own people during the great war with Bor. However, I don’t really know much about the character as he’s only popped up in a couple of the Thor comics I’ve read, so all I’m really looking for in a superhero villain is someone who looks cool, is vaguely threatening, and for the hero to butt heads with (anything else is just a bonus for me), so my main gripe with Malekith is that the filmmakers completely wasted an actor of Eccleston’s talents since the Dark Elf disappears for massive chunks of the film and is mainly just seen posturing and monologuing until the finale.

Loki steals the show in every scene he’s in and completely overshadows Malekith.

It doesn’t help that Loki returns to this film and not only overshadows Malekith at every turn thanks to Hiddleston’s effortless charisma but also steals every scene he’s in. Following his defeat in Avengers Assemble, Loki is brought before his father to explain his actions; Loki is unapologetic and even arrogantly justifies his actions as simply being his divine right to conquer and rule lesser beings such as humankind. Odin, however, is unimpressed, countering that it was Loki’s destiny to die and that only Odin’s mercy spared him from that fate so that he could grow to hate him. Indeed, Odin specifically states that it’s only because of the mercy of his wife, Frigga (Russo), that Loki has been condemned to an eternity in the dungeons of Asgard rather than execution for his heinous acts. Ever the petulant child, Loki remains an emotionally complex and damaged character; he is deeply resentful of his father and brother, and yet still has much love for his mother and truly believes that he was simply doing what was destined of him to do and that his actions pale in comparison to the blood Odin has spilt in his aeons of conquest. Although they lack the numbers they once had (largely because of Malekith nonsensically killing most of them), the Dark Elves are quite a formidable army; wielding energy weapons and grenade-like devices that cause miniature black holes that destroy everything in range, their numbers are further bolstered by Algrim (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), a Dark Elf that Malekith transforms into Kurse, a monstrous being of pure rage and animalistic strength.

Malekith’s army, led by the monstrous Kurse, storm Asgard and kill Frigga.

Having infiltrated the prisoners being taken to Asgard, Kurse causes a jailbreak; though he amusingly decides against freeing Loki, the God of Mischief directs him in Odin’s direction and unintentionally causes his beloved mother’s death when Kurse delivers a fatal stab wound to Frigga after she chooses to protect Jane. Just as Frigga’s death sends Thor into a blind rage, scarring half of Malekith’s face in the process, so too is Loki distraught by her loss; united in their grief, Loki agrees to assist Thor in once more defying Odin’s decree to remain on Asgard and use a secret exit to track the Dark Elves to Svartalfheim. Seeing Thor, Jane, and their allies interacting with Loki is a source of great amusement since none of them like or trust him but are forced to rely on him, and Loki of course uses the situation to his advantage to fake his death as part of his ultimate scheme to seize Asgard’s throne. In a surprising twist, the consequences for Loki’s brain tampering are seen in Doctor Erik Selvig (Skarsgård), who has been driven to near madness by what he saw and learned while under the spell of Loki and the Tesseract. Despite his unpredictable and wild demeanour, this proves to be valuable information in helping Thor and his allies oppose Malekith’s plot. Unfortunately, the Warriors Three – Volstagg (Ray Stevenson), Fandral (Zachary Levi), and Hogun (Tadanobu Asano) – are still largely used for little more than comic relief and to add recognisable Asgardian bodies to the fight scenes but Thor: The Dark World does manage to squeeze in a far larger role for Heimdall; he not only takes down a Dark Elf ship with nothing but knives(!) also suffers a crisis of conscience when his duties as Gatekeeper are rendered superfluous by Malekith’s looming threat. Similarly, Odin is greatly expanded upon; grief-stricken by his beloved’s death, he prepares to fortify Asgard’s defences and sacrifice as many Asgardian lives as it takes to ensure ultimate victory, once more pushing Thor into taking matters into her own hands.

The Nitty-Gritty:
In a nice change of pace, much of the Earth-bound side of the story is set in good old Blighty so we get to see London under threat from cataclysmic destruction rather than the United States, which is nice, and much more of the film takes place on Asgard. Jane’s arrival causes much consternation among the Asgardians, who believe her to be largely inconsequential and meaningless even though she possesses the Aether, with only Thor and Frigga treating her with any kind of respect and kindness. While awestruck by the beauty and magnificence of Asgard (she has, after all, effectively paid a visit to Heaven), Jane still manages to hold her nerve; she openly challenges Odin’s boorish attitude towards her and even slaps Loki right in the face for the destruction he caused in Avengers Assemble. As for Loki, he adds a great deal of comedy to the film through his witty criticisms of Thor’s plan, demeanour, and actions; he even assumes Steve Rogers/ Captain America’s (Chris Evans) form in an amusing scene and seems to live to mock and critique his brutish brother.

Thor: The Dark World wonderfully expands the cosmic scope of the MCU.

While Thor masterfully introduced the idea of the MCU’s vast cosmic universe, Thor: The Dark World expands upon it wonderfully; as mentioned, a great deal takes place on Asgard and just the film’s very existence was further proof that there are many competing legends, stories, and warmongering races out in the galaxy just waiting for their time to strike. Accordingly, the film is much bigger and action-packed in its scope; unlike the first film, Thor is at full power for the entire movie and we get to see him and his people in far more battles than before. The opening depiction of Asgard’s war with the Dark Elves effectively set up how desperate and obsessed Malekith is with obtaining the power to achieve his goals, the prison breakout was a great way to showcase Loki’s indifference (however true or false) to the fate of his adopted people, and Malekith’s merciless campaign against Asgard made sure that both Thor and Loki would have personal stakes in the battle against Malekith. Of course, it’s not all perfect: the destruction of the Bifröst Bridge was this big, emotional event in Thor but it’s since been rebuilt and the status quo has returned as a result, which kind of undermines the first film’s ending (though, to be fair, that already happened in Avengers Assemble so I’m really not sure why a line or something wasn’t added in to Thor to downplay this event or at least plant the seeds of hope for Thor).

Loki plays on his brother’s affections to weasel his way to a position of power once more.

Still, the costume design remains incredible; of all the MCU characters, Thor may very well be my favourite both in terms of his character and his visual representation. His always looks fantastic, as do all of the Asgardians, and I really like the threatening and somewhat alien design of the Dark Elves; Malekith may be a bit of a weak villain in terms of characterisation but he definitely cuts an intimidating figure. The film also beautifully and naturally continues the ongoing sibling rivalry between Thor and Loki; Loki’s deceptive nature is key to tricking Malekith into freeing Jane from the Aether and, while he initially appears to have double-crossed his brother and reverted to his vindictive ways, it turns out that Loki was simply playing a role to give Thor the opportunity to try and destroy the Aether. So committed to this role is Loki that he even shields, an actively saves, Jane from attack and ultimately dies in Thor’s arms in an emotionally weighty scene after suffering mortal wounds to destroy Kurse. Of course, this is later revealed to all be part of a grander deception by Loki as the film ends with the twist that he has somehow disposed of Odin and taken his form as king, a surprise that the third film would unfortunately simply explain away in anticlimactic fashion rather than capitalise on the potential of Loki ruling Asgard under the guise of his father.

Thanks to his allies, Thor is able to end Malekith’s dark ambitions and save the Earth once more.

Of course, there has to be a big, climatic battle between Thor and Malekith at the end of the film. Having absorbed the Aether, Malekith wields incredible cosmic power that more than makes him a match for Thor’s brute strength. Easily able to take Thor’s blows, and even his lightning, the battle between Thor and Malekith rages through the Nine Realms thanks to the Convergence, which makes for a striking visual as they topple and tumble between the Realms (and, amusingly, all over London) and Malekith teleports around, renders himself incorporeal, and attacks with tendrils of red energy. Unlike in the last film, where Thor took out the Destroyer in a triumphant return to full power and bested Loki in a dramatic battle between siblings, Thor actually has help this time around as Jane, Selvig, Darcy, and Darcy’s intern Ian Boothby (Jonathan Howard) construct and place the specialist scientific equipment needed to send Malekith packing back to Svartalfheim, where he is subsequently crushed by his own ship. It’s definitely a bigger and more bombastic finale than the first film, which was obviously much more focused on Thor proving his worth as a hero and a warrior, but Phase Two of the MCU was all about kicking things up a notch and Thor: The Dark World definitely does that while still addressing and hitting the same emotional beats and themes of the first film.

The Summary:
Honestly, to this day I still don’t understand why people don’t like Thor: The Dark World; it’s very similar to how I don’t get why people rag on Iron Man 2 (Favreau, 2010) but I think some of the problem might be that the first films were so well done and Phase One of the MCU was such a massive surprise in terms of success and consistent quality that expectations were maybe a bit too high going into the sequels. Now, obviously Thor: The Dark World isn’t quite as good or memorable as the first film (primarily because of how weak Malekith is) but it’s a really good follow-up to the themes and characters set up in Thor and Thor’s character progression in Avengers Assemble. I like how the scope is so much bigger, how the society and inhabitants of Asgard are expanded upon, and how well it sets up the Infinity Stones and contributes towards the larger overall narrative of the MCU’s second phase. The film is far more action-packed while still being humorous and heartfelt, developing the complex relationship between Thor and Loki while also showing how much Thor has grown as a character since the first film. Maintaining the franchise’s incredible costume design, special effects, and visual style, there’s a lot to enjoy in Thor: The Dark World and I definitely feel like it’s worth another look with fresh eyes.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

Are you a fan of Thor: The Dark World? If not, what is it about the film that you dislike, specifically? What did you think to Malekith as a character and a villain? Did you enjoy Thor’s character progression and the expansion of his relationship with Odin and Loki? What did you think to setting more of the film off-world and in a location other than the United States for a change? How are you celebrating Thor’s debut this month, if at all? Whatever you think about Thor: The Dark World, sign up and leave a comment below or drop a line on my social media.

Movie Night [K-DAY]: Cloverfield

Dr. K5 Comments

In the absolutely bonkers science-fiction film Pacific Rim (del Toro, 2013), the monstrous Kaiju first attacked humanity on 10th August 2013. The attack ended a few days later on August 15th but, in that time, San Francisco, Sacramento, and Oakland were completely devastated and the Kaiju War officially began. Accordingly, August 10th became known as “K-DAY” and is, for me, a fantastic excuse to talk about some giant monster movies!

Released: 18 January 2008
Director: Matt Reeves
Distributor: ParamountPictures
Budget: $25 million
Stars: Michael Stahl-David, T.J. Miller, Lizzy Caplan, Odette Yustman, Jessica Lucas, and Mike Vogel

The Plot:
To celebrate Robert “Rob” Hawkins’ (Stahl-David) new job in Japan, his friends are throwing him a farewell party that is being recorded by his best friend, Hudson “Hud” Platt (Miller). However, Rob’s party, and his issues with friend and potential love interest Beth McIntyre (Yustman), are interrupted when a gigantic creature suddenly emerges from the sea and rampages throughout New York City!

The Background:
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Cloverfield owes a great deal of its existence to Godzilla; producer J. J. Abrams first thought up the idea of creating an American counterpart to the famous kaiju when visiting Japan and partnered with writer Drew Goddard and director Matt Reeves to bring the concept to life. The film’s creature, a mysterious beast whose exact origins were left intentionally vague, was designed by legendary special effects artist Phil Tippett and his studio to be biologically functional but also more like a force of nature than a malevolent aggressor. Cloverfield went through a number of different titles, built an incredible amount of hype through the heavy use of viral marketing, and was shot entirely using a found footage approach that left some audience members feeling sick. The film went on to gross over $172 million worldwide and was widely praised for its atmosphere and effects, though the camera techniques and allusions to real-world terrorist attacks like 9/11 were criticised. Although Reeves had an idea for a sequel, the film was followed by a couple of loosely-connected films before a direct follow-up was finally announced in January 2021.

The Review:
Cloverfield was such a strange and intriguing movie at the time; we’d seen found footage films before, of course, but they were still quite new and their marketing tended to be very surreal and metatextual. This was probably one of the first times I remember my friends really getting into a film’s viral marketing; they trawled through the website reading titbits about Slusho! and Bold Futura, and message boards were alive with people desperately analysing the vague trailers for any kinds of clues as to the monster’s identity, with many claiming that it would be Cthulu. Personally, I stayed away from all that; it was fun to see but I was hooked on the trailer alone and didn’t really see the need in wild speculation. It turned out, of course, that a lot of the viral marketing and expanded lore seen online was ultimately inconsequential to the film but it was still a fun, immersive, and unique way to promote the film.

Rob’s a regular guy whose sole focus during the attack is rescuing Beth no matter the danger.

The film primarily revolves around six characters caught up in the chaos of its events but the main character is Rob, a pretty average guy who is about to leave New York City for a new job in Japan. Rob’s just a normal, everyday sort of guy but he’s clearly a likeable and popular bloke as he has a lot of friends and acquaintances at his big leaving party, but he starts the film in a bit of a bind as not only is he leaving behind his friends and family for a foreign country but there’s also tension between him and his long-term friend Beth. Prior to the film, as seen in frequent cutaways to previous footage recorded by the camera, Rob and Beth hooked up and spent a fun-filled day at Coney Island but clearly his plans to leave caused a rift in their relationship and, despite the fact that he’s leaving, he’s clearly in love with her and wants to be with her, and so is kind of miffed when she brings a date to his party. His personal drama is put on hold, however, when a violent earthquake and power outage suddenly hits and the city is attacked by a gigantic creature. Rob’s first and primary overwhelming concern throughout the chaos that follows is getting to Beth and ensuring her safety; he fully plans to go through with this alone but his friends, scared out of their minds at the monster’s presence, don’t want to separate so they willingly follow along, which ultimately leads to many of them dying all so that Rob can get to Beth in a desperate attempt to get everyone out of there alive.

Beth and Rob’s relationship is on the rocks but he risks everything to save her.

Tensions are frayed between Rob and Beth at the start of the film; after they slept together, he didn’t call or talk to her since he felt it was better to not get too attached as he was leaving for his new job. This left Beth heartbroken, however, and as hurt as Rob was by the whole thing, but neither of them were properly able to convey their feelings towards the other before the monster’s arrival. Their relationship is easily one of the most relatable in the film; having been friends for years, they had a spur of the moment romance but each felt like they couldn’t properly commit to their feelings because Rob had been offered a lucrative position as vice president of his company and she would never ask him to give that up just like he felt he had to go through with it despite his feelings for her. Beth is absent for a large portion of the film but Rob’s entire motivation is centered around finding her so that they can all leave together, no matter how great the danger is. When they find her, she’s seriously injured and trapped in her apartment but they manage to get to her in time and she’s incredibly grateful that he came back for her; with her safe, the group is finally able to make efforts to escape but, unfortunately, rescuing Beth cost them precious time and they’re left stranded in Central Park. With the military preparing a massive bombing run to try and destroy the creature, Beth and Rob seek shelter and admit their love for each other before presumably being killed in the ensuing attack.

Rob’s brother and friends opt to go with him to find Beth, with disastrous results.

Rob is primarily aided in his quest to save Beth by his brother, Jason Hawkins (Vogel), and his fiancé, Lily Ford (Lucas); at the start of the film, Jason is annoyed that Lily has tasked him with carrying the camera and recording farewell messages at Rob’s party, so he quickly passes the job on to Hud so that he can enjoy himself. Jason and Rob have a very relatable and realistic relationship; Jason loves his brother but recognises that he’s kind of a douchebag and not good enough for Beth. Still, he adamantly encourages his brother to seize the opportunity with Beth and is the first one to suggest getting out of the city after the creature attacks. His decision to head to the Brooklyn Bridge costs him his life, however, when the creature inadvertently destroys the bridge and kills him in the process, which devastates both Rob and Lily. Lily is the pragmatist of the group; of them all, she’s the most responsible and serious and initially just wants Rob to have a great leaving party so that he knows how much they all love him. Constantly annoyed at Jason’s childish antics, she’s forever having to keep him and Hud on track so that things go off smoothly, but her sensible demeanour gives way to abject terror when the creature appears; though she and the others try to talk Rob out of risking crossing the city to rescue Beth, she’s the first to willingly agree to go with him and actually ends up being the only one of the group to unequivocally be seen surviving the events of the film.

Hud continues to document the events, regardless of the danger to himself and others.

The group, and the chaotic events that surrounded them, are constantly recorded by Hud, a well-meaning but somewhat socially inept friend of Rob’s who has an excitable personality but also a reputation for being a bit of a screw up and a bullshitter. He’s perfectly happy avoiding any responsibility that’s more complicated than putting up a goodbye banner but finds the job of recording the guests quite enjoyable, despite the fact that he keeps cutting people off and getting distracted by Marlena Diamond (Caplan). Even when the group are stumbling through the darkness and surrounded by rats, with sounds of destruction rumbling on the streets above, Hud continues to respond to the stress with awkward humour, nonsensical rambling, and terrified sarcasm, which may annoy his companions but is a completely understandable way to react considering the circumstances. Since she’s a friend of Lily’s and merely an acquaintance of Rob’s, Marlena is a bit of an outsider at the party and with the group and is initially annoyed by Hud’s badgering and awkward advances but is left shell-shocked by the creature’s attack and having seen it eating people. With little other choice than to accompany the others in order to survive, she briefly bonds with Hud after saving him from one of the parasites that accompany the creature, though she falls ill and eventually explodes in a shower of gore from the creature’s bite.

Clover rampages through the city, dropping deadly parasites and shrugging off the military’s might.

The military also plays a minor role in the film; completely outmatched and underprepared for the creature’s attack, they throw everything they have at it and fail in every attempt to do anything more than further enrage it. In the end, they’re forced to level the entire city in a last-ditch effort to destroy it and even this is left ambiguous by the film’s abrupt ending. The creature itself, often referred to as “Clover”, is largely obscured and hidden for the majority of the film; indeed, when it first strikes, the characters believe the disruptions are because of a terrorist attack and Clover’s initial destruction of the Statue of Liberty and arrival in the city is certainly framed and presented in a way to mirror such tragic events as 9/11 (buildings are half-destroyed and burning, the streets are littered with rubble and wreckage, and people are covered in ash, dirt, and debris). Clover’s movements appear to be a sporadic and mindless rampage as it flounders around seemingly at random, crashing into buildings and leaving confusion and destruction in its wake; this is reflected perfectly in Hud’s frenzied filming style as he desperately tries to get a good look at the creature while being overwhelmed by fear and panic.  To make matters worse, Clover is covered by these smaller crab-like parasites that scuttle around and attack everyone in sight, including our main characters, and make for a tense and dangerous secondary antagonist as their bite proves to be devastatingly lethal.

The Nitty-Gritty:
I mentioned at the start that Cloverfield’s marketing was immersive and a fun way to engage to audience and that’s fitting because in ties directly in to the found footage approach and first-person perspective of the film. Obviously, this genre isn’t for everyone; it’s wild and chaotic and unpredictable, the focus shifts and the camera is constantly moving about so we hardly ever get a clear shot of what’s happening, or the creature. One of the issues with found footage films is obviously the question of why the hell anyone would keep filming and carrying around a camera during something like this but Hud explicitly states that he’s recording it so that people can see “how it all went down”, which is a pretty good way of justifying his continued filming, and Hud’s sheer terror is perfectly conveyed through his erratic camera movements and tendency to get easily distracted, which is admittedly disorienting but extremely effective at conveying the panic and confusion caused by the creature’s attack.

Clover’s attack is purposely analogous to the horrors of a terrorist attack.

It’s pretty obvious what the filmmakers were going for with Cloverfield; not only are they crafting a wholly American monster film, they’re clearly paralleling the creature’s rampage to a terrorist attack. The film released some seven years after 9/11 but obviously the event was, and still is, very raw in the minds of people and audiences everywhere; everyone remembers where they were when they first heard about that day and scenes of the destruction, devastation, and confusion caused by the attacks continue to be powerful and horrifying. Evoking such imagery works massively in Cloverfield’s favour; in conjunction with the wild found footage approach, the entire event is seen as disorientating and appalling, and it’s perfectly understandable for the characters to initially suspect another terrorist attack. However, they are perhaps even more terrified when they review Hud’s footage and discover that “it’s alive!”; stunned and panic-stricken, they have even less idea of how to survive and react to such an attack so focusing on getting to Beth and escaping seems like the best idea simply because they’re desperate for a tangible and attainable goal to focus on in all the madness.

Clover’s mystery was as terrifying as its design and mindless rampage.

The monster fan in me remains fascinated by the creature; thanks to the film’s erratic filming style, we hardly ever get to see it and, for the majority of the film, its exact dimensions and biology are left to our imagination, which only adds to its intrigue and horror. Some of the best and most memorable screen monsters earned their reputation by being seeped in shadow or hidden for much of the film, and Clover is no different; generally, we just see a leg here, a flash of its body, and hear its braying roar echoing across the city. When we do see it, it’s this tangled mess of gangly limbs and a massive mouth full of fangs and we learn next to nothing about it, which only adds to its awe and mystery; Hud wildly speculates that it came from the ocean or possibly from space, both of which are subtly hinted at throughout the film, but ultimately its origins are meaningless and its horror only augmented by its mystery. Clearly, it’s a durable and dangerous creature; it causes an incredible amount of destruction in its mindless rampage and easily shrugs off the military’s weapons, even high-powered missiles and bombs, and is able to leap high enough to swipe a helicopter out of the air. Although it is said to eat people, it doesn’t seem to swallow and digest them as it spits Hud out after gobbling him up at the film’s conclusion. So great is Clover’s threat that the military decides to sacrifice the entire city of New York to destroy it, which leaves our final two survivors trapped, terrified, and presumably killed in the process, though the film leaves it ambiguous as to whether this actually destroyed the creature and a final, post-credits message when played backwards seems to suggest that it’s still alive…

The Summary:
Cloverfield is quite the intense and terrifying experience; found footage movies are difficult to get right as it’s so easy for them to come across as cheap and disorientating as anyone can grab a camera and just fling it about while shouting and screaming but Cloverfield uses this filmmaking technique extremely well to convey the mystery and sheer awesome terror of its rampaging monster. The characters really help sell this film, which is great because it’s much more focused on them than the gigantic creature; they react to both their interpersonal dramas and the appearance of a raging monster in a believable and realistic way and I enjoyed their banter and rapport, which was the right balance of familiarity, fear, and amiability. The star of the film is obviously the monster and Clover is one of the most intriguing, mystifying, and terrifying kaiju ever put to film; its biology makes it seem horrifyingly probably and its abilities are rooted in some kind of realism. Add to that the parallels to terrorist attacks and the sheer awesomeness of its rage and you have a creature that made an immediate impact that I just wanted to see more of and learn more about, only to be continually let down with follow-ups that largely ignored the best part of the film.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

Were you a fan of Cloverfield? Did you get caught up in the viral marketing and what did you think the creature was before the film released? What did you think to the found footage approach to the film and are you a fan of that genre? Were you a fan of Clover? What do you think its true origins were and what did you think to the parallels to terrorist attacks? What’s your favourite kaiju movie, and how are you celebrating K-Day today? Whatever your thoughts on Cloverfield, kaiju, or monster movies in general, please do sign up to leave a comment below or respond to my social media and be sure to check back in for more giant monster content in the near future!

Movie Night: Wishmaster

Dr. K1 Comment

Released: 19 September 1997
Director: Robert Kurtzman
Distributor: Live Entertainment
Budget: $5 million
Stars: Tammy Lauren, Andrew Divoff, Wendy Benson, Ricco Ross, and Robert Englund

The Plot:
Gemologist Alexandra “Alex” Amberson (Lauren) unwittingly frees an evil genie, the Djinn (Divoff), from an ancient jewel. As the Djinn twists people’s wishes into deadly curses in his quest to acquire souls, Alex finds herself the only one capable of stopping the Djinn and his brethren from wrecking Hell on Earth!

The Background:
Wishmaster was helmed by Robert Kurtzman, who had gotten his start in the industry surprising special effects sequences and working with the likes of Robert Rodriguez and Sam Raimi; in fact, it was Sam Raimi who recommended him to direct the film and his fast turnaround time with limited money on The Demolitionist (Kurtzman, 1995) meant he was ideally placed to quickly deliver an effects-heavy horror film. Wishmaster proved to be the ultimate fan service to fans of horror; not only was it produced by the legendary Wes Craven, but it featured numerous cameos by horror icons such as Robert Englund, Tony Todd, Angus Scrimm, and Kane Hodder alongside veteran writers, producers, and directors of the genre either showing up, getting involved, or being referenced in the film. The film also made a horror icon out of Venezuelan actor Andrew Divoff, who relished the opportunity to play a villain despite the heavy make-up required to realise the Djinn’s more monstrous appearance, which went through numerous design phases. A worldwide gross of just over $15 million meant that Wishmaster was only a modest box office success and the film was widely panned by reviews that criticised the effects and performances. Others, however, enjoyed the film’s commitment to its genre and its gory scares and it has gone on to be regarded as an overlooked cult classic that is sadly forgotten compared to other, more mainstream horror franchise. Wishmaster also spawned a franchise, though Divoff only returned for the second film and they were criticised as getting worse and worse as they wore on.

The Review:
In the pantheon of horror icons and villains, you’d be forgiven for forgetting about the Djinn since he never attained the same level of popularity and notoriety as his closest equivalents, the likes of Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) and Pinhead (Doug Bradley). However, I would argue that you’re doing yourself a disservice to not look into the Djinn’s efforts, especially the first two movies, simply because the concept of this malevolent, sadistic wish-granting demon is pretty unique and fascinating within the genre and Andrew Divoff’s performance is so damn captivating. The man oozes menace and a twisted glee at toying with and torturing his victims, his gravelly rasp of a voice makes him stand out even when he’s not made up into this truly horrific, demonic being, and he carries himself with an unsettlingly physicality and intensity at all times, never blinking, always watching and waiting to prey on the ignorance of others. The Djinn’s threat and seriousness is established right from the beginning with a helpful narration from horror icon Angus Scrimm and, later, from folklore professor Wendy Derleth (Jenny O’Hara), with both emphasising that the Djinn are not colourful, friendly characters as popularised by Disney but rather demonic creatures from the “void between the worlds” who must be feared above all else.

Alex is suddenly beset my gruesome visions after unwittingly freeing a demonic Djinn from an ancient jewel.

Back in 1127, the Djinn brought terror and suffering to a Persian empire but was sealed away within a special fire opal using an incantation by the emperor’s (Richard Assad) Zoroaster (Ari Barak) before he could bring his cohorts into the world. While it’s not made clear exactly how the emperor summoned the Djinn before this, the creature is trapped within the jewel for centauries and the gem is sealed within a statue of Ahura Mazda, finally making its way to then-present day America after wealthy art collector Raymond Beaumont (Englund) purchases it. However, crane operator Mickey Torelli (Josef Pilato) shows up to work drunk and accidentally causes the statue to break while unloading it, killing Beaumont’s assistant (Ted Raimi), and the jewel ends up in the hands of Regal Auctioneers and under the eye of their head appraiser, Alex Amberson. Alex is a very sporty, very active young lady who enjoys playing tennis with her best friend, Josh Aickman (Tony Crane), and even coaches a basketball outside of work, but she’s somewhat unlucky in love; a string of dead ends with boyfriends have left her cherishing the close friendship she has with Josh, even though he would like them to have something more, since dates “are a dime a dozen” and she doesn’t want to lose what little she has left. Thankfully, she’s distracted from this awkwardness by the jewel, which stuns her with its beauty and uniqueness, but she’s disturbed by strange visions and the results of her initial analysis after blowing and rubbing the gem. Luckily for her, Josh is capable of running additional tests with his laser equipment, so she takes it to him to take a look at, however she’s soon being haunted by the Djinn’s voice and bombarded with gruesome images of the death and suffering he’s causing after he breaks free from the gem.

To better collect the souls he requires and satisfy his lusts, the Djinn assumes a charismatic human form.

The Djinn’s first victim upon escaping is poor, lovesick Josh; caught in a horrific explosion caused by the Djinn’s breakout, Josh is left begging for his pain to end and the Djinn is only too happy to grant his request by increasing his agony a thousand fold until he dies, much to Alex’s horror and heartbreak. For Alex, this all hits a little too close to home as she’s still carrying the grief and survivor’s guilt from a house fire from her youth that saw her parents killed, though she was able to pull her sister, Shannon (Benson), to safety. At first, Alex believes that the shock of Josh’s death is causing her horrifying visions, which she’s previously suffered from and had therapy for in the past, but it’s actually because she unwittingly summoned the Djinn, who’s out in the world causing havoc with reckless abandon, having assumed the face and identity of “Nathaniel Demerest” to walk freely among men once more. While Alex meets with Beaumont to track the origins of the fire opal and discovers the horrifying truth of the Djinn from Derleth, Demerest conducts his own search for Alex, which causes him to cross paths with numerous victims and Lieutenant Nathanson (Ross), from whom he’s able to learn her location after causing a criminal (Dennis Madalone) to go on an unprovoked shooting spree. Determined to bring his fellow Djinn over from the dark dimension, the Djinn confronts Alex, killing Derleth and demonstrating his power using a “free” wish that proves he is an eternal force that cannot simply be killed or wished away by conventional means. When Alex refuses to give into the Djinn’s demands, the unholy demon is forced to resort to threatening Shannon in order to intimidate Alex into expending her remaining wishes, driving Alex to find another way to outwit the malevolent force she unwittingly unleashed.  

The Nitty-Gritty:
Of course, as mentioned, Wishmaster is absolutely chock full of appearances and contributions from some of horror’s greatest icons; Angus Scrimm, Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Tony Todd, Josef Pilato, Reggie Bannister, and Ted Raimi all show up in one form of another (with all but Scrimm and Pilato meeting fittingly horrendous ends), Wes Craven produced the film and even Harry Manfredini does the music, resulting in one hell of a treat for die-hard, long-term horror fans. Horror villains generally fall into a couple of categories, from the unstoppable slasher villain to the unhinged psycho to the more supernatural wraiths and such, but the Djinn is almost in a league of his own. An unholy amalgamation of the likes of Freddy, Pinhead, and Daniel Robitaille/Candyman (Todd), the Djinn can only be called into being when summoned from the jewel that imprisons him and, upon being unleashed, will grant his summoner three wishes. However, the Djinn isn’t bound to just the one who summons him; he can freely walk the Earth, granting wishes to any that he encounters in exchange for their soul, but once the summoner has made their three wishes, the barriers between worlds will be broken and the entire Djinn race will flood the Earth. Although the Djinn cannot directly cause harm or hurt or kill others and is compelled to grant whatever is asked of him, he’s a master manipulator with a silver tongue and fully capable of twisting wishes to suit his own sadistic pleasures; even simple requests, such as to ease one’s pain or to be granted a million dollars, are perverted into a gory end and he’s constantly finding little loopholes to get past people or cause them suffering.

This under-rated horror is full of some horrific, gory effects, though some haven’t aged too well.

If there’s any reason to watch Wishmaster beyond Divoff’s magnetic and menacing presence, it’s the fantastically gory and unsettling special effects on show. We’re treated to an absolute orgy of blood and viscera in the opening sequence alone, in which the Persian emperor wishes to be shown “wonders” and is horrified to watch as his subjects are absorbed into the stone walls of his temple, trample over each other in a panic, suffer from horrendous diseases and injuries, turn to trees and human lizards, and even have monstrous jaws burst from their stomach. By far the most gruesome visual in this ghastly carnival of horrors is the depiction of a man’s bloodied and screaming skeleton literally forcing its way out of his body and pouncing on another in its pain and distress! And the harrowing deaths just keep coming once the Djinn is in the modern day; he coerces a cantankerous and bitter hobo (George “Buck” Flower) into wishing for an antagonistic pharmacist (Reggie Bannister) to die from cancer, resulting in the druggist collapsing and convulsing as a wretched form of super cancer eats him alive. He also grants a sales clerk’s (Gretchen Palmer) wish for eternal beauty by turning her into a mannequin, and renders a medical student (Brian Klugman) blind when he walks in on the creature ripping off and assuming Demerest’s face. The Djinn’s twisted sense of humour is at the forefront of every wish he grants; when Nathanson wishes to have unequivocal evidence of a known criminal’s guilt, the Djinn causes said criminal to shoot up the police station and even rip a guy’s jaw off! Though a security guard almost spares himself by sending Demerest away, he dooms himself to probably the poorest effect and death in the film when he goads the Djinn into turning him into glass, a death only surpassed in weakness by the fate of self-assured doorman, Johnny Valentine (Tony Todd), whom the Djinn “simply” leaves locked in a Chinese water torture cell.

Since she can’t kill the Djinn, Alex wishes to undo his actions by resetting time, banishing him once more.

The film is then nicely bookended by the Djinn granting Beaumont’s wish for his big gala to be unforgettable, which results in one of his guests turning to glass and shattering, mutilating a bunch of others, and still more being set on fire or ripped asunder when Beaumont’s pictures and statues come to life and go on a blood-soaked rampage, with Beaumont himself puking up a hideous, squealing tentacled creature! It’s not just the gore where Wishmaster shines, however; the Djinn himself is one of the most disturbing and monstrous creatures ever brought to life. A hulking, demonic creature, he glistens with an unsettling ooze, intimates with his red eyes and prehensile horns, and resembles something more akin to popular images of Satan rather than Robin Williams’s whimsical genie. The Djinn actually has a couple of forms in the film; when he escapes the jewel, he’s this putrid, slug-like monster (Verne Troyer) capable of little more than crawling, and undergoes a sickening metamorphosis (Walter Phelan) after ending Josh’s suffering that more than recalls the body horror of Hellraiser (Barker, 1987), and even has a ravenous beast at his beck and call in his dark dimension. Once he assumes his Nathanial Demerest guise, his external horror may be subdued but his charm and menace are just as palpable thanks to Divoff’s captivating screen presence, and there’s an intriguing complexity to his villain since he’s capable of practically anything you can imagine but his magic is restricted to the wishes of other, lesser beings. After attempting to trick Alex by assuming Derleth’s form, the Djinn abandons his façade and reveals his monstrous true self to her, granting Alex a taste of his hellish dimension, a bejewelled void of ancient evil where he delights in the torment of the souls in his possession, and manipulates her with the agony of the souls he has claimed. Functionally immortal and impervious to physical harm and at the brink of ultimate success, the Djinn doesn’t think twice to grant Alex’s final wish, that Torelli hadn’t been drunk at the start of the film, and thus unwittingly undoes the entire movie since the statue never breaks and the fire opal is never discovered, leaving the Djinn trapped once again and allowing all lives and souls lost to be restored and the unknowing Alex free to pursue a life with Josh.

The Summary:
I can see why Wishmaster didn’t quite reach the same heights as some of its competitors; the writing and dialogue is a little stilted and some of the acting isn’t quite up to par, with Tammy Lauren struggling with her delivery and comebacks and being a pretty weak main character and the wealth of horror icons hamming up their cameos at every opportunity. Some of the visual effects also leave a lot to be desired; obviously, the film didn’t have a massive budget and CGI was still finding its feet, but it probably would’ve been better to avoid computer effects entirely rather than date the film so noticeably. However, the practical and make-up effects are nothing short of extraordinary; Wishmaster is full of some of the most disturbing and gory deaths you’ll ever see from a slasher/horror film and there’s some really creative stuff happening here. Unlike Freddy and Pinhead’s initial outings, Wishmaster takes its fantastical concept and runs with it right away, depicting its demonic villain as a being of unparalleled power who can conjure all kinds of bizarre nightmares from the most innocent of wishes. Indeed, the titular genie is the star of the show here, and Divoff steals every scene he’s in with his creepy, menacing intensity and his purring growl of a voice. His Djinn easily stands up as one of the best under-rated horror characters ever and I loved how he exuded this hatred and contempt for humanity and being bound to their wishes when he’s capable of such incredible and horrendous feats. The film suffers a bit in terms of pacing, mainly being a showcase for the gruesome effects and a wet dream for horror fans everywhere with its gratuitous cameos, but I enjoyed the way the opening and ending paralleled each other and the Dijnn’s taunting, sadistic personality. Overall, I think this one is well worth your time and adding to your horror collection; it’s a unique and entertaining horror piece that has a lot of grisly visuals and effects to offer and is well worth a little bit more time in the spotlight.

My Rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Great Stuff

Are you a fan of Wishmaster? Do you agree that it’s an under-rated horror film or do you think it’s better left forgotten? What did you think to the Djinn and Andrew Divoff’s performance, and where would you rank him against other horror villains? Which of the horror cameos was your favourite, or did you find them a bit too self-indulgent? What did you think to the kills and the effects on offer? Are you a fan of the Wishmaster sequels? If so, which is your favourite and would you like to see the franchise revived someday? What would you wish for if approached by the demonic Djinn? I’m always up for discussing Wishmaster so sign up to leave your thoughts below or feel free to leave a comment on my social media.