Wednesday 11 March 2009

Flash of Genius

Starring Greg Kinnear,Lauren Graham,Dermot Mulroney,Alan Alda,Jake Abel, Daniel Roebuck and Mitch Pileggi

Directed by Marc Graham.

Originally today i was going to watch a Clive Owen film called Duplicity they didn't have the print. Instead they put this on, its about an inventor called Bob Kearns(Kinnear) who creates an automatic windscreen wiper for cars back then it was a big deal. He takes his pet project to the Ford motor company, but they soon steal his idea. Furious that they stole his invention he begins a lengthy legal battle that almost costs him his sanity and his marriage.




OK i missed i don't know a few minutes of the film i couldn't quite into it properly and its the kind of movie that's probably best suited as a TV movie of the week. My initial thoughts were it was going to be a comedy since Kinnear is known for doing fluffy romantic comedies. The main problem with it is its too dull and let's face it, whose going to watch a film about a man who creates windscreen wipers. On a side note you've got appearances from actors like Mitch Pileggi and Bill Smitrovich who appeared in 90's shows The X Files and Millennium.



With FOG I liked Kinnear's turn as a professor who goes all nutty when his idea gets nicked by the end of it i couldnt help noticing he looks like the spitting image of TV detective Inspector Sledge Hammer! I expected him to get a 44 magnum and shooting executives and jurors in the courtroom. Okay that didn't happen. I wonder if you lot remember the comedy series? Probably they should get Kinnear to play the role of the aforementioned TV tec' if someone decides to do a remake.

Furthermore, trust me i know what i'm doing!

Monday 9 March 2009

Watchmen the final word.



Starring Patrick Wilson,Malin Akerman,Matthew Goode,Billy Crudup,Jackie Earl Haley,Carla Gugino and Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

Directed by Zack Snyder.

Right now theres probably billions of opinions and reviews that are related to this film i thought ive give my two cents or two pence on what i think about it. As a fan of the graphic novel i can safely say that Snyder and co have done a really faithful job of transferring it to the big screen with a few exceptions here and there most notably the original ending to it.



The actors are bang on in their portrayals as their four colour incarnations in particular Jackie Earl Haley as Rorshach. Ive got to give kudos to Patrick Wilson who plays one of my favourite characters, Dan Dreiberg aka Night Owl.


The film currently no 1 in the U.S box office charts although its fallen short of the film companies expectations. I was talking to a freind who went to see a friday night showing and he told me some people left halfway I guess a lot of people wanted to see a slam bang action pic judging by the bombastic trailers. Another reason i bet parent's in the USA didn't want to take their kids to see a computer generated willy.To top it off its almost three hours long. There's also not many comic related films that have an eighteen rated certificate.



I've often thought that Watchmen is more like a drama which looks at the implications of having costumed characters in the real world. Originally back in the late eighties film maker Terry Gilliam was lined up to direct it he backed out claiming rising production costs and it would take five hours to tell the story properly.



Even Alan Moore, has distanced himself from the film adaptation claiming its unfilmable and its best suited to its graphic form. Since Gilliam's attempt other's have tried and failed at one point Bourne Supremacy director Paul Greengrass was going to set the story in the current day as opposed to its early eighties instead of one single film it would be part of a trilogy i don't think it have would worked as it would have made a mockery of the source material and treated fan's of Watchmen like dirt.


I saw Watchmen with a mate whose not into comics and he enjoyed it and he commented on the film's climax which he liked and he thought it was thought provoking. Although i would have liked to have seen original ending as it is the graphic novel, where a giant alien type squid kills 15 million New Yorkers. The writer David Hayter altered it because of what happened in the terrorist attacks in America several years ago.

The ending just a minor gripe but i'm glad that its done by someone who didn't want to make vast changes, contemporise it, or even have Arnold Schwarzenegger as Dr Manhattan. Film's that are based on comic books are fast becoming a genre in their own right and Watchmen has become a welcome addition to it.

Its really late and i'm off to bed...