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Yay! My Word (and Poster) is My Bond…

I’m just doing a bit of housekeeping at the moment, as I’m away on holidays from today. Don’t worry, there will still be daily reviews and stuff, so don’t worry about your movie nerd fix.

Anyway, just a quick note to say thank you to the guys over at Anomalous Material. I won a competition a few months back and got the snazzy James Bond poster pictured below. Good old Quantum of Solace. Anyway, the poster arrived yesterday and I thought I’d say thanks. If you aren’t reading them, you probably should be.

If you want a look at the poster, click on the image below.

And, in case you’re wondering what a “quantum of solace” is – apart from the logical “smallest quantity of solace which can exist independently” which isn’t really much of a meaning so much as dictionary definition – here’s a snippet of a Bond story in which Ian Fleming explains it:

The governor paused and looked reflectively over at Bond. He said: “You’re not married, but I think it’s the same with all relationships between a man and a woman. They can survive anything so long as some kind of basic humanity exists between two people. When all kindness has gone, when one person obviously and sincerely doesn’t care if the other is alive or dead, then it’s just no good. That particular insult to the ego – worse, to the instinct of self-preservation – can never be forgiven. I’ve noticed this in hundreds of marriages. I’ve seen flagrant infidelities patched up, I’ve seen crimes and even murder forgiven by the other party, let alone bankruptcy and every other form of social crime. Incurable disease, blindness, disaster – all these can be overcome. But never the death of common humanity in one of the partners. I’ve thought about this and I’ve invented a rather high-sounding title for this basic factor in human relations. I have called it the Law of the Quantum of Solace.”

And, while I’m riffing on the movie, check out the following spoof theme for Quantum of Solace. It’s much better than what we actually got:

I love the lyrics, particularly:

Sometimes I wish Roger Moore would come back
With an underwater car or some kind of jetpack
Or a hover-gondola
And a Union Jack

Forget it mate, it’s not the Eighties
He’d rather kick you in the face
We got a new Bond for the Noughties
Because the world’s a terrible place

So true.

Clip from Devil

The guys from Universal Studios Ireland sent over the following clip from Devil. It’s part of a proposed series of films from M. Night Shyamalan that’s he’s deeming “Night Chronicles”. In fairness, the director’s stock has taken a huge fall from its peak with The Sixth Sense (although I’ll argue Unbreakable is his true masterpiece), but it looks like he’s taking something of a backseat on this production – it’s actually directed by Drew & John Erick Dowdle, the guys responsible for the quite good (but not a patch on the Spanish original) Quarantine. Being honest, it could go either way, but the premise – several strangers trapped in a lift and one of them may be Satan – is intriguing enough that it could be the horror hit of the year or it could be terrible.

I guess we’ll see… Check out the clip below.

Batman: Arkham Asylum – A Serious House on a Serious Earth

Batman’s not afraid of anything.

It’s me. I’m afraid.

I’m afraid that the Joker might be right about me. Sometimes… I question the rationality of my actions. I’m afraid that when I walk through those asylum gates… When I walk into Arkham and the doors close behind me…

It’ll be just like coming home.

– Batman explains his unease at going into Arkham Asylum to Jim Gordon

I have to admit, I was somewhat surprised to hear recently that Grant Morrison’s Arkham Asylum is a somewhat “divisive” book. It is, one hand, highly critically praised and the best-selling graphic-novel of all time, yet Morrison scholars are quick to describe it as “much maligned”. I’ll admit that I took my time getting around to reading it – partially due to the fact that DC refused to keep the hardcover in print – but I eventually buckled and got myself the softcover 15th Anniversary Edition. What I found was one of the most densely challenging, cleverly constructed and brilliantly gothic depictions of the Dark Knight I have ever encountered (indeed, it might even be “simply the most” rather than a safer “one of the most”). It’s beautiful, it’s dark and it’s tough – but it’s also immensely rewarding. Come with me into the Asylum.

Batman comes home…

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The m0vie blog is on vacation…

… or, as we Irish say, on holliers…

Right, I’m off to Cork for the week. I realise the schedule has been a bit all over the place of late, and I apologise. Hopefully when I’m back the week after next, I’ll get things back on track. In the meantime, there will be fresh reviews daily. See you all the week after next!

Non-Review Review: From Paris, With Love

Mister Morel, I watched Taken, I knew Taken, Taken was a film of mine. Mister Morel, this is no Taken. 

No can do, apparently...

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The Fish Bites Back: James Cameron & Piranha 3D

I kinda sorta almost want to see Piranha 3D. Not because I think it will be good, you see, but because I genuinely want some cheap, visceral 3D action. After all, what’s the point of 3D if it’s simply adding several layours to your 2D watching experience. I realise this makes me sound like an uncultured slob (which, let’s face it, if the glove fits…) but I really want to see a tacky exploitative bit of 3D cinema where things fly out of the screen at me a make me jump out of my seat. It’s not a feeling I’m particularly proud of, but it’s there. Anyway, James Cameron seems to hate me, and people like me. When asked about Piranha 3D, he offered this snippet:

I tend almost never to throw other films under the bus, but that is exactly an example of what we should not be doing in 3-D. Because it just cheapens the medium and reminds you of the bad 3-D horror films from the 70s and 80s, like Friday the 13th 3-D. When movies got to the bottom of the barrel of their creativity and at the last gasp of their financial lifespan, they did a 3-D version to get the last few drops of blood out of the turnip. And that’s not what’s happening now with 3-D. It is a renaissance—right now the biggest and the best films are being made in 3-D. Martin Scorsese is making a film in 3-D. Disney’s biggest film of the year — Tron: Legacy — is coming out in 3-D. So it’s a whole new ballgame.

Okay, I can’t quite argue with that, but it still seems a little bit harsh.

From the looks of it, what James Cameron wants to do to Piranha 3D...

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Non-Review Review: Executive Decision

Are you manly? I mean really manly? In a way, Executive Decision is kinda what I was hoping for when I heard about The Expendables. It’s not an excellent movie, or even an exceptional one – in fact, it can be cynically described as Die Hard on a plane” – but it’s a perfectly serviceable action movie that gets bonus points for never trying to be anything more than what it is. There’s not tangential romantic plot or half-hearted attempts at characterisation: the movie is all business. And that business is attempting to give its audience testosterone poisoning. 

Not quite plane sailing ahead...

 

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Non-Review Review: Jurassic Park

Jurassic Park is one of the “big” blockbusters which defined the nineties. It’s easily recognisable and has thoroughly entrenched itself deep in popular culture – along with Independence Day or Terminator 2. Also, like the two aforementioned films, it’s actually quite good. Of course, coming from director Stephen Spielberg, the man who invented blockbuster cinema with Jaws, can’t hurt. 

I call him "Rex"...

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Non-Review Review: The Player

I love The Player. I really do. When I was in college, I used to organise movie screenings – we’d show The Player once a year and it would always pack out. It was just one of those films that everybody had heard nothing but good things about, but never got a chance to see. Indeed, I would go so far as to say The Player, with all its wacky fourth-wall meta-ness, is my favourite Robert Altman film.

Who would want to kill this producer? Answers on the back of a postcard...

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Geoff Johns’ Run on The Flash – Wonderland, Blood Will Run & Iron Heights

Geoff Johns is pretty much on top of the world. He’s a renowned comic book writer, who has got to work on all his favourite childhood properties – in many cases making them as popular as they’ve been in decades. He’s in charge of DC’s multimedia approach – he’s the guy in charge of the movies and television shows based around the iconic properties. Without his work on the character, next year’s Green Lantern movie wouldn’t be happening. And yet he had to begin somewhere. Although it doesn’t represent his earliest work in comics by a long stretch, in 2000 he took over as writer on The Flash. Despite a string of solid work behind him – and a really successful run for Mark Waid on the title – it was this creative pairing which would arguably propel both writer and character into the spotlight like never before. A decade later, Johns has returned to the book which made him famous, so I think it’s time to begin a trip down memory lane.

Wally's going to have to think fast...

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