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Reviews
This Is Not a Love Song (2002)
THIS IS NOT A GOOD FILM
I caught this film at the Edinburgh Film Festival. I hadn't heard much about it; only that it was a tightly-paced thriller, shot digitally on a very low budget. I was hoping to catch the next big Brit-Flick. But I have to say, I was severely disappointed. "This Is Not A Love Song" follows two criminals, who, after accidentally shooting and killing a farmer's young daughter, become embroiled in a deadly game of cat and mouse when the locals decide to take matters into their own hands and hunt them down.
The real problem is that this is yet another example of style over substance in a British film. The camera angles and editing are completely at odds with the story, as are the over the top performances, and the appalling use of slow motion, which only serves to make the whole thing look like an expensive home video. There are repeated attempts to make the film look edgy and gritty, which instead come over as hilarious and over the top(Cue a pathetic, obligatory drug scene, and countless, pointless camera zooms). No amount of cliche's such as this can disguise the fact that this is a pretty bad story.
We've seen this kind of thing many times before, and made a hundred times better, particularly in John Boorman's masterful "Deliverance." But while in the latter film, we actually cared about the characters, in this film, I found myself just wanting them to be hunted down and killed as quickly as possible. Even this wouldn't have been so bad if their adversaries had been frightening or worthwhile, but instead, are merely a collection of stereotypical, inbred-looking countryfolk. Again, another offensive, overused cliche' coming to the fore. Surely there are some nice people in the country, filmmakers?
In its defense, "This Is Not A Love Song" does contain a couple of good, suspenseful moments, but it's hard to see this film doing anything other than going straight to video, or, at a push, getting a very limited cinema release. It's not a patch on last year's Low-Budget hunted in the hills movie, "Dog soldiers". Maybe British Cinema could actually get kick-started again if the right money stopped going to the wrong people.
Ghost Stories for Christmas (2000)
SPINE-CHILLING
Christopher Lee stars as M.R. James, provost of Kings college, Cambridge. James, the foremost writer of ghost stories of his day(and as far as I am concerned, nowadays too), would gather a select group of friends and students to his study each christmas eve and read them his latest tale of horror. This set of spine-chilling ghost stories was aired a couple of Christmas's ago, and had me glued to the screen each time. The BBC is to be celebrated for adapting these stories, as it did so successfully with James's work in the early 1970's.
The set-up is simple: Lee simply sits in his study and recounts each story to his "students". There are no cutaways to actors playing the characters in each tale; the tension instead builds through the occasional cutaway or point of view shot, layered with extremely effective(and scary)music. The best of the four stories is "The Ash Tree", a deeply chilling tale of witchcraft and revenge; the weakest (though still very good), is the opening "The Stalls Of Barchester". "Number 13", the story of a ghostly, hidden room is also very impressive, as is "A Warning To The Curious", which features some seriously creepy shots of dark, disturbing coastline, riddled with Lee's chilling recital of a man pursued by the terrifying forces he has unleashed. Lee reads each story with terrific pace and conviction, and brings James' words to life superbly.
Granted, this is traditional, old-style horror that doesn't rely on shock tactics or sophisticated special effects to achieve its terror. That is precisely why it succeeds so well. The real success of "Ghost Stories For Christmas" lies in its ability to stay with you long after it's finished...especially while you're alone at night. So tuck yourself in, close the curtains, switch off the lights, and switch on "Ghost stories For Christmas".
Dead Man (1995)
THE GREATEST WESTERN OF ALL TIME
Jim Jarmusch's "Dead Man" can certainly lay claims as one of the greatest films of the 90's, and is, as far as i am concerned, the greatest western of all time. Why? Simply because no other Western, not even "Unforgiven", has so accurately depicted the dirt, disease, outright weirdness, and constant threat of violence in the old west so well. Johnny Depp is superb as William Blake, the eponymous "Dead Man" of the title, as he journeys into the hell-hole of "Machine" for an accountancy job, only to be falsely implicated in the murders of two people, one of whom happens to be the son of the most powerful (and frankly, insane) man in town( a superb Robert Mitchum, in one of his final roles). Blake, who has taken a bullet in the heart and will surely die, flees across the country, leaving an increasing amount of corpses in his wake. Along the way, he befriends a trusty Native American, "Nobody", and the two of them encounter an increasingly strange assortment of stragglers, killers, traders and U.S. Marshalls. Jarmusch masterfully blends the horrifyingly graphic violence with superbly funny characters and dialogue. Of particular note are the three hired killers Mitchum hires to track down Blake and Nobody, which includes the superb Michael Wincott as the cowboy who can't stop talking, and Lance Henriksen as the cannibal cowboy who never talks. Gabriel Byrne, Billy Bob Thornton, John Hurt, Alfred Molina and Iggy Pop(!) all deliver superb cameos, and Robby Muller's beautiful, mysterious black and white photography, wrapped up in Neil Young's terrific soundtrack, make for an essential masterpiece.