Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006)

It's a real minefield this. It is definitely funny for a certain demographic (in a childish sniggering down your sleeve at the back of the class at the word penis way) and definitely offensive. But the counter-argument, as I understand it, goes that it is offensive to everyone equally and that the offensiveness is simply a tool to expose the hypocrisy and bigotry in others. Borat is defended as a kind of agent provocateur fearlessly exposing others by the act of making them feel comfortable in their ignorance by indulging in behaviour which makes them seem moderate in comparison. Others may say that anything is fair game in the world of comedy and part of me agrees with that. I certainly wouldn't want to see the likes of Borat censored or banned on the grounds of bad-taste, who knows where that may lead? No, that's not what I would want at all. But I don't have to like it either.

I don't believe for a second the idea that Sacha Baron Cohen is ultimately trying to do anything so laudable as expose hypocrisy in others, except to point at them and say "look, they don't even react when I make Bestiality jokes". What he does, he does very well but the value of the thing isn't worth the cost. If you think a group of people are inherently racist and want to expose that, then reinforcing their repellent and closed-off world-view by portraying them as culturally and intellectually superior is a really dumb way to go about it.

The film itself is pretty muddled. Cohen talks straight to the camera throughout and is accompanied by a documentary producer (played by Ken Davitian) and an unseen cameraman. Sometimes the cameraman exists ("don't film me, film him") and sometimes he doesn't (when Cohen and Davitian flee various locations and he films their departure objectively). The weakness of the plot- go to various niche events and act like a prick so that other people are encouraged to make themselves look half as stupid- then stage an attempted kidnap of Pamela Anderson and get thrown out of a shopping mall- could be covered by the humour of the piece were that not so weak too. I'm sure that it has thousands of avid fans, but then I'm sure that American Pie 4 (or whatever number they've reached) does too. That's the level of humour on show here- fart jokes, gay jokes, naked jokes, sexist jokes. Oscar Wilde it ain't. There is a scene where Borat hitches a lift with some beer-drinking fraternity boys and says ludicrous things to encourage them to do likewise and, being drunk and immature, they do so- advocating the return of slavery, for example. And this is the problem and this is why the film is a failure as an exposé of latent xenophobia, homophobia etc- it is targeted at the people it is lampooning and leaves them with the wriggle room to enjoy it. No-one who came into the movie theatre would have their preconceptions altered at all.

There's no defence of this shit. It is only funny for people who find the later Police Academy sequels funny and it doesn't challenge bigotry at all, it supports it. 0/10. Verily.

The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash (1978)

"the whole thing is brilliantly authentic"

This is a great film. It works if you have a sketchy knowledge of The Beatles because it doesn't rely on obscure references or in-jokes but equally if you do have a nerdy knowledge of the Fab Four (as I probably do) then it is never simplistic or inaccurate. Knowing how possessive and geeky Beatles fans can be, that's quite an achievement.

There are superb Beatles pastiche songs by Neil Innes from The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and hilarious cameos from George Harrison, Mick Jagger, Bill Murray, John Belushi, Michael Palin, Bianca Jagger, Roger McGough, Paul Simon and Ronnie Wood- some as themselves, some as minor characters. There are superb one-liners from the pen of Monty Python's Eric Idle ("Many fans burnt their albums, many more burnt their fingers attempting to burn their albums", "He was supposed to have been killed in a flash fire at a waterbed shop", "In the midst of all this public bickering, "Let it Rot" was released as a film, an album, and a lawsuit") and the whole thing is brilliantly authentic. The Beatles Anthology, the real documentary which followed probably twenty years later and is also exceptional viewing, can't help but look like this and that's a great testament to the direction of Eric Idle and Gary Weis. The budget might have been miniscule (it certainly looks like it) but it hardly matters, there is enough invention and intelligence here to make it all worthwhile.

The only real negative is that the film, sadly, peters out. The frantic pace of the gags in the first three quarters of the film appears unsustainable and it doesn't help that they are parodying a relatively sad period and slower, more introspective songs. It's hard to write a pastiche of something that was fairly ridiculous to begin with and the Maharishi stuff, the Magical Mystery Tour and the slow-motion bust up are all tip-toed around in the least satisfying segment of the film. Swapping references to late sixties drugs like LSD and marijuana for tea just isn't very funny, is it?

But it's still fantastic, second only to the mighty This Is Spinal Tap. 8/10

The Dark Knight (2008)

"Fan-boys might want to look away now"

I'm really pushed for time this week, so my notes will be brief and lacking in support or explanation for any opinions offered. The purpose of these notes is for me to not have to remember anything and so its a bit of a risk to note down how I feel and not why I feel it. To myself in the future, I apologise. Whilst I'm busy caveating, I should add that my first viewing of last year's biggest film (that's the kind of unsubstantiated guess I was on about, on reflection Mamma Mia! probably beat it) took place in three broken spells on the 320x240 screen of my phone. Hardly ideal viewing circumstances.

The films I avoided last year because of the hype were Wall-E and The Dark Knight. I wish I'd seen them both on the big screen now, but for differing reasons- in Wall-E's case it is simply because it was a beautifully constructed piece of high-art masquerading as a kids' film. The Dark Knight, however, is very specifically designed for the multiplex viewer- with its dark look, booming sound effects and the huge visual impact of its explosions. Seeing it on a phone (or even a big fuck-off telly) can never do that justice.

The film itself is a pale shadow of Batman Begins. I know that it's easy to slag off a sequel, but that isn't what's happening here. The sequel, unusually, is the more lauded of the films. For a long spell in 2008, an IMDB poll had The Dark Knight rated as the greatest film ever made- currently it is merely the 6th best film of all time according to voters there. Personally, I greatly prefer the first film because a lot of the determination that was there to make a really good film first time around appears to have been lost in the desire to make a really great spectacle. The subtlety and intrigue is gone. Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne was troubled yet driven, morally ambiguous and too immature for the role he had created for himself. In this film he is a towering intellectual giant with a clear moral code and a ludicrously husky vocal delivery once he gets that suit on. Far be it from me to suggest that someone has disrupted Bale's process, but I much preferred it when his Bruce Wayne was a three-dimensional human. I'll never tire of that audio clip, by the way.

Fundamentally, Batman is James Bond in kevlar body armour. He goes outside the law and employs astonishing gadgets to bring down world-threatening bad guys in the final reel of the film. Michael Caine is M, Morgan Freeman is Q and Maggie Gyllenhall (a huge, huge improvement on Katie Holmes and the one aspect of the film where the quality is ramped up on the original) is Vesper Lynd. And this is a pretty decent Bond film; the set-pieces are amazing, the villain is charismatic (but it isn't quite worthy of the posthumous plaudits) and the suspense is held pretty strongly for the most part. The problem, as is often the case with this type of film, is the plot- The Joker wants to create mayhem in the only city on the planet with a superhero by bankrupting the numerous crime overlords and turning the tough-on-crime District Attorney into a delusional psychopath. Just because he can. There are twists along the way, but they're not interesting or surprising. You know a twist is coming because it is signposted way ahead by the projected plot being that little bit too straightforward. The intention is to lull the audience and then surprise them. Well either I'm too cynical or there was too much lulling and not enough surprising. Even weaker than the plot, though, is the dialogue, which everyone delivers as if they were Richard Burton on Richard III. That is the weakest thing in the film.

The costumes and visual effects and lighting and stunts and all the dull stuff that only matters if the rest of the film is up to scratch are all great, I should say. But it's effectively just a very effective marketing tool and a great visual spectacle and very probably a great multiplex experience (if a little long) and not much of a film. 4/10

Far From The Madding Crowd (1967)

"Why is love such a misery?"

Thomas Hardy's novel was one of the texts I was set for my A-Level English Literature course and I hated it. I hated the slow pace, the unnecessarily detailed sections (there were, I recall, about three pages describing a barn on a hillside which no-one ever entered or discussed again) and the cloyingly sweet pastoral setting. Dorset in winter isn't idyllic, whatever Hardy would have you believe. While that should make it surprising that I even risked the near-three hour film adaptation, it does also mean that I won't spend these notes banging on "it isn't as good as the book" as I did with Watchmen and The Damned United recently!

Such pressing reasons not to like (or even watch) Far From The Madding Crowd were outweighed by the Kinks connection, my admiration for Schlesinger's sixties films, the cinematography of Nic Roeg and Terry Stamp. I love Terence Stamp. When I was commenting having seen Valkyrie, I said "This is Terry Stamp doing an advert for that life insurance that only the over-50s can have". The guy is basically sleepwalking his way through risible film after risible film these days (his last few films have been Valkyrie, Yes Man, Get Smart and Wanted) but this shouldn't detract from the fact that he is an incredibly talented, charismatic actor with some superb performances behind him. For me, this is one of them. There is a moment where Stamp turns to Julie Christie with cold-eyes and says "this woman is more to me dead as she is than you ever were or are or could be" and you are simply awestruck. He chills you to the bone as he destroys her with spite and malice by completely underplaying it. The words are delivered deliciously, with venom. It is a powerhouse performance, he is breathtaking. The beauty of Jude Law combined with the presence of a young (pre-self-parodying) Pacino. Amazing stuff. But what a wasted talent!

No-one else here hits quite those heights, but there is still a great deal to admire here. Julie Christie plays Bathsheba Everdene with just the right mix of arrogance and insecurity, her independence is stripped away little-by-little until Troy feels compelled to admonish her "don't be so desperate". She skilfully retains a degree of ambiguity in the early stages and it is never truly clear whether Bathsheba is being purposely cruel or simply immature. Smashing performance. Peter Finch, the raving mad prophet of the airwaves from Network, plays Francis Boldwood another man on the verge of a nervous breakdown here- albeit with much greater composure. Here he internalises the trauma, expressing it subtly; a quiver of the eyebrow, a distant glance, a mouth opening wordlessly.

The central performance is given by Alan Bates in the role of Gabriel Oak. His character is the first and last that we see and provides the moral compass for the film. He is always honest, if respectful, always thoughtful and exemplifies the traditional values of moral certitude and diligent stoicism. His response upon being financially ruined by a sad quirk of fate is simply to remark "Thank God I am not married. And this serene acceptance of events is what works against Bates, who is a fine actor, because he has nothing to do but look calm and read his lines. It's no coincidence that the most virtuous character is called Gabriel, is it? Actually, I may as well moan about something that has bugged me since 1991- Far From The Madding Crowd has a character called Oak who is solid and dependable and one called Troy who is handsome but comes with hidden defects. This is like giving them a white ten gallon hat and a black one- great literature my arse! I'll stop now, I've promised myself that I wouldn't talk about the book, only the film.

The mechanics of the film are impressive, Roeg captures the landscape beautifully giving a sense of the absolute surrender to the elements which each character suffers from (indeed Boldwood, through machinery, is the only character who attempts to master his circumstances- as he does with his attempted bribery of Troy, a nice touch- but this proves futile). The soundtrack, including originally composed folk songs, by Richard Rodney Bennett has a lilting pastoral beauty which serves to build the mood of the piece beautifully. These things, in addition to the suppressed passion in the performances, are co-ordinated by Schesinger to produce a slightly arid and slightly too worthy reading of the novel. It is almost as if he was so determined to move away from the small-scale urban setting of his great opening trio of films (A Kind of Loving, Billy Liar and Darling) that this overtook any other considerations. It doesn't ruin the film at all, but it does create a film where there are a few fantastic set-pieces (the unexpectedly harrowing scene where the sheepdog runs the sheep over the cliff, the tension of Gabriel and Bathsheba battling the storm, the carnival, the sword exercise where Troy seduces Bathsheba) interspersed with some disappointing ones (the obvious soft-focus scene where Boldwood first sees Bathsheba, the slow-motion shot of Bathsheba tossing the corn in the cornmarket, the harvest dance and the marketplace scene where Oak looks for work).

And so it's a good film, but still a disappointing one. Worth seeing again, but only when I'm in a patient mood 6/10.

Y Tu Mamá También (2001)

A nice little film this but it is impossibly burdened by the weight of expectation. Not only have I never heard a bad word said about it, I have never heard it discussed in anything other than the most reverential terms. When you watch a film that lots of people you trust have raved about as "the greatest road movie ever made", then it really has its work cut out to live up to that. For the record, I don't agree that it is the greatest road movie ever made. But it is probably the greatest film of all time featuring a girl performing simultaneous fellatio on two men. Not that I can claim to have seen many of those to be fair.

Okay then, it's a road movie in which two teenage friends and an older woman travel to an unknown and ostensibly imaginary beach. It's a coming of age movie with all of the attendant sadness and humour that this entails. The narrative is pretty standard but excellently conveyed by the director (Alfonso Cuarón). There are great performances from Gael García Bernal (as Julio) and Maribel Verdú (as Luisa) but the trio are a little let down by the comparatively lightweight and obvious Diego Luna (as Tenoch). What I loved most about the film was the closure to the storyline involving Luisa- I'm not going to spoiler it in case anyone reads this- which not only contextualised but also legitimised a couple of the scenes I'd been surprised by (in their nature and, more importantly, necessity). It's great when a film invites you to think back over what you've seen and revisit it from another perspective. Like M. Night Shallowman or whatever his fucking name is would if he wasn't so shit and transparent and utterly risible, I suppose.

The other thing about Y Tu Mamá También which I thought was fantastic was it's visual impact. Even the sex scenes, though pretty graphic and often involving fumbling awkwardness of teenagers shooting their load too quickly, were beautifully lit and shot. This, for me, was the best thing about the film. Ooh, stop the press I've just remembered where I've seen the disappointing Diego Luna before, it was in Gus Van Sant's Milk where I said "Diego Luna is crap in this. Absolute crap". Fair enough, now I know he's always a shitty bag of bollocks I'll avoid his films from now on.

And (ignoring that digression) though all of the praise above is earnest and deserved, I still have reservations about the film. It is just a genre film, adding in nudity and racy dialogue doesn't change that, and the ending was pretty flat- I've praised the Luisa storyline and as good as that is the Julio/Tenoch storyline simply stops with an air of "I don't know where this would go next, let's just kill it". There's also a really underdeveloped plotline involving Tenoch's family's political influence and the simmering but unacknowledged (other than in one scene) class conflict between the boys. I know that I always look for class conflicts- I'm English, what can I say- but on this occasion it isn't merely present, it is demonstrated to be a source of latent hostility and inevitable divisiveness and then forgotten again. Even the boys' eventual parting points to it- they go off to privately and publicly funded colleges- without exploring it. It just feels a bit elephant in the room-y to me. But then I am hyper-sensitive to these things.

Anyway, recommended but over-rated and don't watch it with the in-laws. 6/10

Tape (2001)

"Claustrophobic"

In many ways this is just my kind of film. By that I mean 'the kind of film I would want to make, were I ever to try. I won't obviously. It is a very intense, claustrophobic vignette which is heavily reliant on dialogue and requires investment from the viewer.

The film is about our perceptions of others and of ourselves; how they are formed, how they are distorted and how inaccurate they can turn out to be. The storyline- three old friends meet up and come into conflict over an event long buried in the memory- is hardly original, some of the acting is melodramatic, some of the relationships and events implausible; but these are necessary evils to facilitate the exploration of the key themes. In an hour and twenty minutes a film cannot introduce, explore and ultimately resolve issues, draw a plausible character arc for each main player or simply tell an interesting story without reverting to clunky, wordy exposition and stagey performances. This is no time for nuance.

And so Tape sees Ethan Hawke playing a borderline sociopath, Robert Sean Leonard his staid, pretentious oldest friend and Uma Thurman a girlfriend from their mutual past. You can't see how Leonard would ever be able to tolerate the obnoxious Hawke but, as I said, you have to let these things slide. The whole thing is played out in a small (presumably bespoke) motel room which heightens the conflict by requiring constant proximity. The viewer is made to feel trapped within the room with the protagonists, like an unseen eavesdropper. The handheld cameras (there must be about thirty on the go at once!) can become extremely intrusive and, in moments of extreme tension, pans rapidly between two faces again and again like a spectator at the world's fastest tennis match. This isn't comfortable viewing. The cramped set is emphasised by Hawke's hyperactive, bundle of nervous energy performance. His naturally quite feminine mannerisms are kept to a minimum as he plays the tough-guy. He bounces around the room cutting down the space in the same way that a boxer cuts off the ring, a boorish bullying performance that doesn't really convince. Physically he's fine, but his emotional transmission is weak- especially for the first hour. Curiously, his performance picks up the less he is given to do.

Thurman and Leonard, though, are great. The theatricality of their acting would normally piss me off but in the circumstances was fine. He has probably found his niche on House M.D. now, but holds his own well here. Uma uses her could-be-ugly-but-is-actually-really-beautiful face brilliantly, she is all wide-eyed shock and arched eyebrow scorn. The harsh lighting and unflattering camerawork simply emphasises her great bones and that helps her to project the emotions she wishes to.

And so in spite of the exposition, the blatant signposting ("what's in the bag Vince?"), the An Inspector Calls/Sleuth type telegraphed twists and Hawke's comparatively weak turn, I liked it. I liked the way the audience's sympathies were subverted and questioned and I really liked the way a frantic pace was maintained in a real-time film. 6/10