Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Raiders of the Lost Ark is the kind of film that is absolutely ludicrous, but is absolutely brilliant. On paper, the idea of trying to locate the Ark of the Covenant and rescue it from Nazis really shouldn’t work; but if you get Steven Spielberg to direct it, George Lucas to produce it (and to help with the writing), get a great cast, and it all works perfectly! So perfectly that “Raiders” is one of the most entertaining films ever made; even George Lucas admitted that it was the most fun he had making a film! Just to convince you of its greatness, here’s 5 things you probably already knew.

Harrison Ford
In 1981 Harrison Ford had made his mark as Han Solo and worn some excellent glasses in Apocalypse Now; but he was yet to solidify his position in film history. Between Indy and Decker he was assured of it. Indy is very similar to Han, only this time he is the main character. Some of the sex appeal that Han had is written into the character, and some of the cockiness removed, throw into the mix some archaeo-sleuthing skills and we have cinematic gold.

Steven Spielberg
Always a proponent of the “More is More” school of thought; Spielberg doesn’t hold back in Raiders; and we all reap the rewards. After the initial exposition, the action is almost non-stop, over-the-top, and often ludicrous; but always brilliant. Spielberg’s inspired, outlandish set-pieces are perhaps typified by the opening scenes: the bag-of-sand-idol swap and the boulder escape are so iconic that there few action scenes before or since are so memorable.

Supporting Cast
Inspired. John Rhys-Davies is wonderful as Sallah “Asps! Very Dangerous. You go first!” Karen Allen is a great love-interest/companion; girly enough to squeal when thrown into Indy’s adventures, but ballsy enough to take on the Nepalese at drinking games and stand up to the Nazis (to an extent). Paul Freeman is intense and condescending as Belloq; Ronald Lacey is perfect as the weird, sinister Toht; and a very young Alfred Molina is cool as the tarantula-covered soon-to-be-spike-impaled Satipo.

Shadow Acting
As if to prove that he is not just about fighting, explosions, and elaborate action sequences, Spielberg gets very creative in Raiders. There are many bits of scenes shot with shadow. Not least the first few minutes of the film where we only see the silhouette of Indy; probably the most iconic silhouette in history (not just in cinema!). There are also several shots of other characters talking towards the camera and Indy’s shadow behind them, far more dramatic than just filming two people talking. Also neat how some of the shadows in the Egyptian tombs seem to reflect the two-dimensional carvings on the walls. All very cool, and all serve to make a hugely enjoyable film even more fantastic.

                         

                         

Melting Nazis
It’s always good to see the bad guys get their comeuppance, and even better when they melt! Having made a cast of Ronald Lacey’s head, the sfx guys coated the inside of the mask with various layers of wax; the effect was then achieved by melting the face plus hat plus glasses with a hairdryer! Fairly low-tech, and quite laborious when it requires more than one take, but it still looks pretty great 30 years later! Of course if it was done now it would be all done in a computer, and doubtless wouldn’t look half as good. I’ve argued this before, but when effects are done “in the flesh” they always looks better and more convincing than “pretty” effects done in a computer.

So there we go, 5 reasons to love one of the best action adventure films ever made. Of course there are countless more reasons why Raiders is so good, but then this post would go on for ever! Indy shooting the big guy with swords because he had the runs; the cheesy maps with dotted lines showing where Indy is travelling to; the girl’s eyelids with “I love you” written on them; storing the Ark of the Covenant in a huge warehouse; Toht looking like he’s getting an implement of torture out but it’s actually a coat hanger; and... and...

The Beckoning Silence

The Beckoning Silence is based on Joe Simpson’s book of the same name. It is shot as a documentary including interviews with Joe, as he talks about his influences and what made him start climbing. His main influence is the tragic and compelling story of Toni Kurz and Andreas Hinterstoisser as they tried to be the first people to successfully scale the North Face of the Eiger (their story is brilliantly told in the film Nordwand). The Beckoning Silence features four climbers acting out the drama of Toni, Andreas and the two Austrian climbers also involved; this is interspersed with Joe climbing on the Eiger at some of the crucial points of the fateful climb in 1936.

The film is very well made; there are some stunning shots of the Swiss Alps, and it is quite authentic as director Louise Osmond shot as much as possible on the Eiger. Joe is as engaging in front of the camera as he is when he writes. Understandably the focus of the film is the story of Toni Kurz et al, whereas the book is far more about Joe’s thoughts on climbing: he talks about how he has lost some of the drive to carry on climbing now that many of his friends have died pursuing the same goals that he once did. This still does come across in the film, just to a lesser extent.

It would be interesting to know what Joe thought of the film Nordwand, because The Beckoning Silence actually came out the year before. This is a great, short film (only 75 min) telling a truly tragic tale. Made even more tragic as Toni died on his fifth day on the mountain; and this guy climbed it in just under 2 hours 50 min!



And this record has just been broken by 20 min!!!

Oranges and Sunshine

This is one of those films that I really knew very little about before I saw it. Emily Watson plays Margaret Humphreys, a British Social worker, who by accident finds out about an international scandal. She discovers that 30 or more years ago the British and Australian governments were complicit in the forced migration of children from the UK to Australia. The children were said to be orphans (though often their parents were very much alive at the time), and so they would be given a fresh start in a new country. It turned out that a lot of the children were essentially used as a slave workforce when they arrived. Margaret sees it as a personal challenge to get to the bottom of what really happened, and soon receives the backing of the Social Work office that she works for. Over the course of a few years, Margaret manges to re-unite many children (by now in middle age) with their parents back in the UK.

Directed by Jim Loach (son of Ken), this is quite an emotional film, but is saved from being overwhelming by the way the story is told and the main cast of three: Emily Watson, Hugo Weaving and David Wenham. Waston is great as the driven social worker; it is strange how sometimes she can be very emotional (especially with her children and husband), but when she is present at parent/”orphan” re-unifications she is strangely distant. This probably is due to trying to maintain some professional distance between herself and the people involved; but her blank face was often a bit odd. Of course then her family get the full brunt of what she is really feeling.

Hugo Weaving, despite only having a relatively small role, is fantastic. Even though his character is quiet, he still has a tremendous presence on screen. He is brilliant in the very emotional scene where he discovers that his mother only died within the last year; despite thinking for all these years that he was an orphan. David Wenham has more of a role to get hold of. His character, Len, is initially very sceptical of what Margaret can actually achieve by interfering; he has tried years ago to find his mother and failed. His attitude therefore is quite aggressive towards Margaret. However, his character mellows as Margaret helps him to find his mother, and by the end of the film he is one of the closest friends that Margaret has over in Australia.

A very interesting, well-crafted film starring a cast that is quite understated in their roles, but who nevertheless are all great. I should add that the reason we saw this was to support out local art-house cinema, The Belmont, as it was in danger of being closed due to lack of funding by our city council. I am very happy to say that it has now been saved. Hoorah! It also resulted in seeing this great movie which otherwise would have passed me by; and that’s the great thing about independent cinemas; finding a gem of a film that otherwise I may not have heard of.

Sucker Punch

Like a lot of people I was really looking forward to Sucker Punch. The trailer gave us a glimpse of something that could be as visually stunning as we have come to expect from Zack Snyder but with a really interesting story to it. Well, this was half right.

Baby-doll (Emily Browning) is committed to an insane asylum by her stepfather, right after her mother dies and she accidentally shoots her sister! She is scheduled for a lobotomy in four days. She then descends into her own subconscious and imagines that she is in some sort of 50s style dance parlour (no explanation). This is where she meets fellow dancers/patients Sweet Pea, Amber, Rocket and Blondie. They decide they are going to escape and to do this they require a map, fire, a knife, and a key. Baby-doll distracts whoever is holding the desired item by dancing. As soon as she starts dancing, she and her companions are transported to another imaginary world which includes guns, robots, dragons, steam-powered soldiers and loud music! In each fantasy there is a wise old man to tell them what to do (Scott Glenn), who is a bit like a games-master Columbo: “Oh, and one more thing: don’t wake the mother!” The girls complete the task and return with the item (sounds like the Crystal Maze on LSD!).

It all sounds fairly nuts, and it is. I should start by saying that it looks glorious, with Snyder’s style being very obvious; particularly in the train fight where the girls are fighting with lots of shiny robots reminiscent of I Robot. The scene is stunning with lots of the slow and zoom camera style that Snyder uses so well. It almost looks like a single shot for a lot of it, but I’m sure that’s not the case. There are many scenes where live action, CG, and miniatures all blend flawlessly to give each fantasy enormous scale. Also worth a mention is the set piece where Baby doll fights three enormous mechanical Samurai; the scope and style are stunning.

A lot of the other set pieces are also stunning, but that’s where it all stops. For a start, the fantasy scenes are just set pieces joined together with some filler. A lot of it is just a jumble of ideas, with no real coherence. For all the ideas in the film (crazy, amazing, confusing and weird), they seemed to run out when entering Baby-doll's fantasy worlds, because every transition was the same: starts dancing, camera pans around her head and suddenly we’re somewhere else.

One of the main problems is the lack of character development. We have a vague bit of background of Baby-doll, but nothing of any of the other girls. Consequently, when they are in danger (though you never really feel that they are) we don’t really give a shit about any of them, because we don’t know them. Possibly the only character who develops at all is Blue Jones (Oscar Isaac), the baddie of the film; the warden of the mental institute/pimp of the parlour. This film really proves that you can have a great-looking flick, but if you don’t have decent characters, then you’re dead in the water.

A lot has been said of this film being misogynistic. I’m not sure that’s the case; I think it is just misguided. This is the first thing that Snyder has really written and directed (300 and Watchmen were both graphic novels, Dawn of the Dead was written by George A Romero). So I’m surprised that no-one really said “Whoa Zack! This doesn’t make any sense!” If this is what happens when he tries to write then perhaps he should stick to directing only. Well, he hasn’t written Man of Steel, so let’s see what becomes of that.

After all my negative points I did enjoy the film; like I say it looks amazing, and there is some great action. It’s just that you come away from it feeling a bit disappointed and hollow. Kind of like eating a Pot Noodle! It’s a guilty pleasure and you really fancy one; but at the end of it you don’t feel satisfied at all! For all its style I don’t think I’ll be buying it on DVD.

Thunderball

After the giddy heights of Goldfinger, Thunderball is a bit of a damp squib. It starts out well enough with a pre-credit scene where James punches a woman in the face! But, Oh, James thinks that dude looks like a lady (or something), and so a good scrap ensues, involving the classic Bond move of pinning his assailant to a wall with a chair! Having won the fight, 007 then escapes using a jetpack covered in tin foil and proudly showing a lovely helmet!

The great song is then belted out by Tom Jones (though he did manage to sound quite effeminate at times), before we are transported to SPECTRE’s hideout to find out (#2) Emilio Largo’s cunning plan.

                                                You just wouldn’t sit down would you?

The plan is to hijack a plane carrying two nukes, and use them to extort £100,000,000 out of NATO (but essentially the British Government). Largo (Adolfo Celi) is a really nasty piece of work: inviting Bond aboard his yacht; inviting him to dinner; all this time of course James is trying to locate the nukes. Helping him in this is Domino (Claudine Auger) Largo’s bit of stuff, so naturally Bond seduces her. When Largo is moving the nukes from their safe storage to the handover point in exchange for his ransom, 007 is there, (of course!), along with a lot of aqua-soldiers to have some sort of underwater knees-bent running about fight! Largo escapes, Bond follows for a dramatic finale aboard his yacht (the Disco Volante) where Domino shoots him in the back with a harpoon!

If FRWL was all about the Orient Express, then Thunderball is all about the ocean; and it looks great. Factoid: Lamar Boren who was the underwater cameraman, was DOP on the 1964 Flipper TV series! The only downside of this is that it is harder to act underwater (presumably). The underwater fight at the end is essentially 10 minutes of silent movie, with the occasional thwunk of a harpoon, and some over-acted deaths that would give a lot of Zulus a run for their money! I think that perhaps it is this focus on underwater action that gives the film a slightly surreal feeling and so the pace of the film suffers.

Sean is of course as suave, unflustered, and great as ever; “Yes, I thought I saw a spectre at your shoulder. - What do you mean? - The spectre of defeat.” Claudine Auger’s Domino is perhaps the finest Bond Girl yet (can of worms?) Honey Ryder didn’t do much; Tatiana was pretty, but pretty pathetic; and Pussy had a great name but not much more. Domino is sexy, vengeful, puts up with a bit of torture and then shoots Largo with a harpoon! Adolfo Celi is good as Largo, but he must have turned up on set on the first day and thought they were having a laugh when they told him to wear an eye-patch!

There are a few more gadgets in this outing: Jetpack, hoses and bullet-proof shield on Aston Martin, Geiger counter watch, re-breather, jam trousers (no wait that was an Eddie Izzard sketch). Of course they were all needed for the mission.

                 

Thunderball has a lot going for it; I think its main problem other than the underwater-ness slowing it down a bit, is that it is coming hard on the heels of Goldfinger which was a great film. Probably whatever fourth film was made, it would never have lived up to Goldfinger.

Order of preference so far:
Goldfinger, From Russia with Love, Dr No, Thunderball