The Killing of a Chinese Bookie

An avante garde thriller, directed by John Cassavetes, from the 1970's. A night club owner Cosmo Vittelli (Ben Gazzara), in debt to gangsters, is asked to murder someone else who owes them money.

I can't really recommend the film to anyone much: Vittelli owns possibly the most awful night club I've ever seen, everyone channelling Bertolt Brecht (I actually fast-forwarded through the worst bits, pretty much all of them), although the thriller parts are handled well enough. Apparently, it was significantly cut on release and still bombed.

As an aside, when John Cassavetes died in the 1980's, 2000AD commemorated the event by issuing a Judge Dredd story (Issue No. 627) in the style of the director called "John Cassavetes is Dead", about an old man who's arrested for collecting newspapers.

A Canterbury Tale

This is an obscure Powell and Pressburger film from the 1940's, via my LoveFilm subscription. A G.I. Sergent, his British counterpart and a Land Army girl try to solve the mysterious attacks of the "Glueman" in a Kent village.

The film is less about the mystery of who is attacking young women by pouring glue on their hair and more about the effect the war is having on the individuals and the country at the time (Canterbury was bombed in 1943 as part of the so-called Baedeker raids). It's also a big slice of nostalgia, showing a world that was fast disappearing even before the war.

Dead Man Down and The Numbers Station

Two films from my LoveFilm subscription. The first is a spy thriller with John Cusack and Liam Cunningham. After failing during an assassination, burnt-out CIA agent Emerson (Cusack) is sent to guard a cipher clerk at a remote radio transmission station.

Although the film has a good premise, it lacks substance. Cusack is good enough, and he has good support from Malin Åkerman and Cunnigham, but there's the feeling that there should have been a proper adversary for him, although the limited budget doesn't really help. An opportunity missed.

The second film is a rather good revenge thriller starring Colin Farrell. The vengeance of a criminal, "Victor" (Farrell), against his fellow gang members is jeopardised by his involvement with a neighbour.

Although the film promises to be quite bleak, and even run-of-the-mill, it's raised by the unlikely and awkward romance between Victor and Beatrice (Noomi Rapace), and good support from Isabelle Huppert and Dominic Cooper. Recommended.

Codes and Ciphers - Cicada 3301

Most of my interest in cryptography is fairly light, more along the lines of general theory and a few easy algorithms, but there is something more serious afoot in th' Internet. It's known as the Cicada 3301 problem, an annual competition, or rather challenge, to the best of the best to crack a series of interlinked cryptography and stenography puzzles. This years puzzle (blogged about by one of the solvers) reads like some kind of techno-thriller without any characters.

The idea seems to be that when someone finds a solution, they are then given instructions on how to post it and an address for a formal interview. There's speculation that it's a convoluted recruitment process for a government agency (NSA? GCHQ?) or the commercial equivalent.

Goon

This is an ice hockey film through the LoveFilm Instant service. Doug Glatt, a bouncer at a local bar, attends an ice hockey game with his friend and accidently gets involved in a fight with one of the players, resulting in him being recruited as an "enforcer" (someone who's job is to wade in when a fight starts and lay out the opposition, protecting the better players from getting hurt).

Based on a true story, it's Forrest Gump meets Slapshot. Seann William Scott is suitably monosylabic as Glatt and Liev Schreiber enjoys himself as Glatt's nemesis, Ross "The Boss" Rhea, but the plot is pretty much the trailer, so it compares badly to either of the other two films. An average pizza move, but perhaps more meaningful if you like ice hockey.

The Place Beyond The Pines

Through the LoveFilm Instant service, this is a story of two men, the crime that joins them, and the consequences for both them and their sons.

An unusual crime drama, this is three stories told one after the other. The first is about circus motorbike rider Luke Glanton (Ryan Gosling) who, on finding he has a son, takes up robbing banks in a misguided attempt to support the boy and his mother Romina (Eva Mendes). He is finally cornered by policeman Avery Cross (Bradley Cooper) and the second story is what happens to Cross afterwards when he discovers police corruption in the wake of the confrontation. The third story is about their sons who encounter each other fifteen years later and discover what happened.

It's quite a long film, which is hardly surprising given the content, and it does drag a little in places. Gosling does his best as the troubled Glanton, but he can only play one note and that's getting a bit tiresome now. Bradley Cooper does better as the principled, but ambitious, Cross, and the support is good, if somewhat muted. All-in-all a good movie, but requiring some patience, especially at the end.

Deadfall

Another through my LoveFilm subscription, this is a suitably chilly crime story. After their escape from a casino heist has gone wrong, siblings Addison (Eric Bana) and Lisa (Olivia Wilde) split up to make their way to the Canadian border, only to meet up accidentally at someones Thanksgiving dinner.

Not a bad little thriller, with a good cast (notably Sissy Spacek and Kris Kristofferson), but the plot is a bit thin and the dialogue could do with a bit of sharpening up. Good pizza movie, though, and much better than Killing Them Softly.

Cloud Atlas

Through my LoveFilm subscription, this is the adaption of the book by David Mitchell. Six interlinking stories are told interleaved: the journal of an 19th Century man on an Pacific ocean journey; a young composer in the 1930's trying to work for an aged genius; a 1970's journalist investigating the death of a nuclear scientist; a present-day publisher trying to escape from a care home; a recently freed clone in the 22nd century; a primitive goat-herder in a post-apocalyptic future.

I read the book a while ago and it's probably best that you do in order to enjoy the film, or at least make sense of it. To be able to translate such a conceptually complex book into a film is quite an achievement, and it almost works. The visual effects are quite stunning and there must be an Oscar somewhere for the best make-up: Tom Hanks, Hugo Weaving and Hugh Grant are unrecognisable in some of their roles. Both the main and supporting cast are top drawer, especially Jim Broadbent, but what brings the film down, as in the book, is trying to link disparate stories together: it's too flimsy. Still, the film is worth watching.

RED 2 - Getting the Band Back Together

The first film of the new year is the sequel to the comedy\thriller adaption of local hero Warren Ellis' comic book. Frank Moses (Bruce Willis) is trying to settle down with his new girlfriend Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker), but his former life intrudes in the form of a mad scientist (Anthony Hopkins) and a foxy counter-intelligence agent (Catherine Zeta-Jones).

While not quite as good as the original film, this is an entertaining two hours with lots of bangs and crashes. Willis plays to his strengths; Parker is her usual sparky self, especially when confronted with Zeta-Jones as Frank's former flame; the supporting cast is good, with Mirren and Cox enjoying themselves again, John Malkovich typecasting and Hopkins trying not to be Hanibal Lecter. Byung-hun Lee is also good as Frank's supposed nemesis, and Neal McDonough takes a break from Mob City to be a ruthless government agent. The plot lacks a little substance and the dialog could have done with sharpening, but, as sequels go, it isn't nearly as bad as the Expandables 2.

McDonough is also in The Prototype, a thriller based on the notion of the singularity, a concept talked about by the London Futurists quite a bit.

Looks like fun!

True Grit

Happy New Year, everybody.

While seeing in the New Year with my Aunt and Uncle in the wild and wooly North West, I brought over the remake of True Grit to watch. Fourteen year old Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld) hires aged Federal Marshal Reuben "Rooster" Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to bring her father's killer to justice:

Although the original is considered a classic, I was never that enamoured of it. This improves on it slightly, and definitely has the weirdness of a Coen brother's movie, which can be a little arresting in places, although I imagine it stays very true to the book. The support is good, too, if a little underused (with the exception of Matt Damon reprising Glen Campbell's role as the Texas Ranger LeBoeuf). Not a bad little pizza movie, but requiring a little patience.