I normally avoid “Blockbusters” but I rather like “Gladiator” … Russell Crowe (Maximus)  carries the film, and the other main characters played by Joaquin Phoenix (Commodus) and Connie Nielsen (Lucila) are very good too. The supporting cast headed by Oliver Reed (Proximo) and Richard Harris (Marcus Aurelius) are also very good.  I don’t know much about Connie Nielsen (except for her scarey / erotic role in “The Devil’s Advocate”),  but in thisf ilm she sizzles with barely subdued sexuality but … in a good way. The plot goes something like …  Russell Crowe (Maximus) is the General of the Roman army fighting the last battle in Germania. He wins and wants to go home to his wife and son but … Caesar, Marcus Aurelius, on his last legs (Richard Harris), fearful of his immoral son Commodus decides to give his powers to Maximus, with a view to making Rome a Republic run by the Senate.  On hearing this, the immoral son suffocates his father and has Maximus arrested and orders him to be killed. The soldiers botch the killing of Maximus and he escapes (having killed them all) … he is injured but still manages to ride home only to find that his wife and son have been murdered by the wicked new Caesar’s guards. He buries his Wife and child and then collapses  and is picked up by a slaver who sells him to a man (Oliver Reed) who runs Gladiator events. Maximus ends up as a hero Gladiator fighting in the Coliseum. There is some plotting to overthrow the wicked Caesar by his sister (Lucila … the lovely Connie Nielsen) and Russell and a Senator played by Derek Jacobi but the wicked Emporer discovers it, and threatens to kill his sister’s son (next in line) if she doesn’t back off. There is also some implied incest between Commodus and Lucila but … carefully underplayed for the young audience.  Once the plot to overthrow him has been quashed, Commodus, the new Caesar plots the killing of Russell Crowe-Maximus is known as either “Gladiator” or “The Spaniard” in the Coliseum, and, having wounded Maximus (whilst he was in chains), the wicked new Ceasar (Commodus) sets up an unfair battle to the death in the Coliseum … stupid man … we all knew that Russell Crowe would beat him.  Once the new Caesar is killed by our hero, who puts a knife through his throat, Maximus decrees that the Senate will now run Rome (as the old Caesar had wanted) and Maximus then duly dies. Order is now restored in the world and Rome survives. What could be simpler. Russell Crowe is moody and magnificent and the ladies love him for it. The fight scenes are excellently done, and Joaquin Phoenix, as the evil Commodus very nearly steals the film but … not quite. Oliver Reed died(after arm wrestling on location in Malta) whilst making this film, and it is a fitting swan song for him.  I have only one question about this film … where did the General’s dog get to ? It was in quite a few shots in the early battle sequences and seemed intrinsic to the film but then … completely disappeared after about 20 minutes into the Movie. Who knew ?

Gary Oldman 

 I will start with Gary Oldman in “True Romance”; a truly glorious “Baddie”. This film has 3 great bad guys; Oldman, Walken and Hopper but Hopper plays a good guy in “True Romance”…. Oldman’s performance(”It’s not “White boy day” is it ?” )is so magnificently over the top, and may compete with Lee Marvin in “Who shot Liberty Valance” for the number one slot. Oldman is also superbly evil in “Leon”, and the amyl nirate sniffing sequences are hilarious and scarey. Oldman also plays Lee Harvey Oswald in “JFK”, and a hideously deformed character(Mason Verger) in “Hannibal”.

Christopher Walken

Where Gary Olman goes for “in your face” or “over the top” villains, Walken goes for cold, calulating and terifying villains like his Role in “True Romance” … I love the way that in total disgust after shooting Dennis Hopper,  he spits out his (seems like a peach stone)  on the now dead Hopper … (More of Walken to come)

Lee Marvin

“The man who shot Liberty Valance” … This was a rip roaring villain, and completely over the top, not unlike Gary Oldman in ”True Romance” (Am I obsessed with this film ? … only the beginning of it). It makes you scared and amused in equal measure.

Lee Van Cleef

Lee was the “Bad” in “The good, the bad and the ugly” so … it’s official … he’s “bad”

Lee J Cobb

BOY is he bad in “On the waterfront”, and not very loveable in “12 angry man”

“The Usual Suspects” has a great cast, and, to a certain extent, it is an ensemble piece but this is the vehicle that made Kevin Spacey a BIG star and got him an Oscar as well. The plot … some crooks are pulled in for a line up, and they all get together after to do a job and … The job goes tits up. Meanwhile, behind the scenes a terrifying, almost mythical Hungarian gangster called Keyser Soze is pulling the strings or is he? and  … who is he ?

I can only imagine that this film has its routes in Europe as it has a European feel to it. The supporting cast of Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Benicio Del Torro, Kevin Pollack, Chaz Palminteri and Pete Postlethwaite are beautifully cast and do a super job. There is sting in the tail and I won’t tell you what it is because it would lessen your enjoyment. This feels like a “guy” film to me and I would doubt if many women would put this in their top ten movies of all time. This is not a sexist remark, as most guys would not put “Pretty Woman” in their top 10 either. No way. Men and women ARE different .. my mum told me.

Pete Postlethwaite’s Indian (was it Indian ?) accent was criticised in some quarters but I thought it was OK, and certainly better than that of Peter Sellers.

This film is in my top 10 of all time and must be viewed (by me) at least once a year. Great plot, great dialogue, quite a lot of throw-away humour, a sting in the tail and great direction by Brian Singer. What do you want from a movie ? … The meaning of life? This movie does not tell you the meaning of life. This is a great yarn, brilliantly told … My kind of film.

I cannot work out why,  but, there is something about this film that won’t allow me to really LOVE it but, whenever it is  on TV, I say to myself “I’ll just watch a bit of it, maybe 20 minutes or so”, and then find myself glued to it right to the end … even though I have seen it many, many times before. Perhaps I feel that is too formulaic or maybe I think that some agents / producers got together and said “Hey guys, lets get some REALLY big stars together with a great supporting cast and make a movie … anybody got an idea for a plot … no … well … let’s do it anyway.”  In fact, the plot is very good (if a somehow familiar Court room “battle”) and it zips along very nicely. The supporting cast are exceptional; Kevin Bacon, Keifer Sutherland, Kevin Pollak and J T Walsh, and the big stars; Tom Cruise,  Demi Moore and Jack are also good. Tom Cruise is the main guy, and heads a team of Armed Service lawyers investigating a death at an army base in Guantanamo bay. His backup law team is Demi Moore and Kevin Pollak. The “bad guy” (we find this out eventually), a Colonel in the Marines, is brilliantly played by Jack Nicholson. It is grossly unfair but Jack (as ever) absolutely steals this picture, and, although he is only in it for about 10 minutes in total, his frightening, vicious portrayal of an under pressure Senior officer is breathtaking. You would NOT want to mess with this guy; “You can’t handle the truth” and “You’ve fucked with the wrong Marine”. I’m suprised that Demi Moore took the role, as her part is one of someone who is a bit “dizzy” and impulsive and doesn’t seem to fit with (what I perceive as) her view of “powerful” women but … Maybe she just wanted to work with Cruise and Nicholson … who wouldn’t and …I bet the pay was good. The Director is the sublime Rob Reiner “When Harry met Sally” and the stupendous “Spinal Tap” and (like a great Alan Parker film), you just don’t notice the direction because the film just flows along and seems so real and seamless (OW-Overused word). Tom Cruise is a fabulous Actor / male lead / star / pinup, and, like in “Rain Man”, you don’t really notice how good he is at holding a film together(because he is so good at it), and is was almost unforgivable that he did not get an Oscar for “Born on the 4th of July”. If you haven’t seen this film then make sure you watch it … “That’s an order”. There is a court room scene, near the end where Jack really rips it up, and he seems so evil that … you might want to hide behind the sofa. In this film, as in most films, Jack Nicholson is fantastic but … that’s another story. OK … I do love this film.

I must show my hand from the off. I think Meryl is THE best (English speaking) film Actor (of either sex) that ever lived. I mention ”English speaking” because there may be some Actor from Russia, India,  China, Japan or wherever who is better than Meryl but I will probably not spot them as I find sub-titles a bit of a chore and can only speak rudimentary, schoolboy French and German. There are a few actors  coming in a close second; Charles Laughton, Tony Hopkins, Jack, Marlon and Burt(could be a bit wooden sometimes but very good mostly) and a few sneaking up on the inside; R De Niro,Gwyneth Paltrow,  Paul Newman, Kevin Spacey,Katherine Hepburn, Al Pacino and Spencer Tracy (I have to put Spencer in because so many people think he is “up there”, but, although I can admire his “craft”, he never really moved me … dunno why). Some of the above are “Method” actors, and I suspect Meryl has had a good crack at Stanislavski but with her … It doesn’t seem to show and … I’m not a huge fan of method acting anyway(when it shows in the performance). We know she can do accents; “The French lieutenant’s woman”, “Sophie’s choice”(What an awful choice poor Sophie was given) and “The Bridges of Maddison County” but it is her ability to “be”(Woops … this is method acting) whomever she is playing that is so amazing. She is not only an awesome(overused word in film reviews, similar overused words in reviews are “Ensemble”, “Charismatic” and “seamless”) actress, she has a strange beauty and amazing translucent(OW-Overused word) skin. I think that in real life she is very normal and is a Wife, Mother, friend and all round good egg and a bit of a laff,  but once she hears “action”, she becomes THAT person in the film.  She has played many normal / average people in “Kramer vs Kramer” ( I hated her in that for walking out on her little boy … It’s a guy thing… it’s OK, my mum didn’t), “The river wild” (awful film but she was good), “Plenty”(Quite a good film but no cigar) and she was very good in “Holocaust”(TV thing … I have the box series on video but I can’t be arsed to watch it again). I also imagine that, in truth,  every other actress hates her because she is so <industrial language> good and can play absolutely anything and anyone. I am not a student of method acting but I guess that part of being a great method actor is … it shouldn’t show on screen. It doesn’t with Meryl because with her,  it really  is … uhm … seamless (sorry). She was back to her best fairly recently as the awful, wonderfully horrible big cheese in “The devil wears Prada”. A tip to any aspiring actor would be to go and watch her in “The Bridges of Maddison County” then give up and practice Law or anything but acting because, unless you are rather dim, you have seen one of the great film performances and you will NEVER be that good but … This is just my opinion.

I think this film might be a masterpiece. I am not sure why because the main character may be a distant relative of jack the ripper but … for some reason, we like Hannibal Lecter. He delivers some of the best lines in film History and (I’m told) manages to be sexy doing it.  Jodie Foster in the FBI role as Clarice Starling holds the film nicely together but she is a mere muse for the main man. This film belongs to Tony Hopkins, and I can think of very few other actors who could have played it so masterfully. The violence has a kind of Tarrantino-esque comedy about it, and this film came out before we had even heard of “Resevoir Dogs” or QT. There is about 8 minutes of brilliantly directed (Jonathan Demme) horror in the middle where one guard has been disembowelled and  strung up (we see him first through a glazed window, looking like an eagle, suspended form the ceiling), and another has had his face cut off to supply Lecter with a new mask to facilitate his escape. Shortly before Lecter removes his face Lecter gives him a casual warning by saying “Ready when you are Sgt Pembry”. I think we all hate ourseleves for enjoying the horror quite so much, and sadly, the sequels “Hannibal” and “Red Dragon” are very disappointing, over the top and just silly in comparison. I normally avoid horror films like the plague but this one keeps calling me back. “Ill help you catch him Clarice”.

I am not generally, a huge fan of one Stephen Speilberg. I like “Dual” and “Jaws” but few others. I saw “Jaws” in the cinema, just after it was released, and I remember 2 scenes particularly; one when Richard Dreyfuss was swimming under a boat and a head fell out of a hole in the hull, and at the end where Roy Scheider shoots at a bottle of oxygen in the Shark’s mouth, and the Shark explodes into thousands of pieces. When the head fell out of the boat, everyone in the cinema jumped and  gasped with shock and fear, and, when the Shark was blown up at the end … everyone in the cinema cheered. What fun it was. Speilberg was given great credit for this film, notably for denying us a look at the Shark that lurked beneath until well into the film. He modestly attributed that “unseen” shark to the fact that the model shark(s) didn’t work properly when they began filming. Whatever … Not showing the shark made us even edgier, and Hitchcock would have been proud of Spielberg. The supporting cast were very good;  Murray Hamilton (sleazy mayor who wanted to keep the beaches open for the 4th of July Tourist money), Robert Shaw (Salty old shark killer who recounted a story of a local girl, “For 17 years she kept her virginity … not a bad record in this vacinity”), Richard Dreyfuss(The “oceanographer” who knew about sharks and knew that “This one is a BIG one”). The film was a lovely, scarey ride, and the only naff bit was the scene where, near the end,  Robert Shaw was being devoured by an obviously fake Great White shark. I enjoyed the film enormously and still like to catch it when it is on TV but, I still can’t belive that there really is such a job as an “Oceanographer”.

This film is very high up in my top 10 films of all time. This worries me slightly as the film is the definition of sleaze. JJ Hunsucker (Burt Lancaster) is a vicious gossip columnist, and Sidney Falco (Tony Curtis) is an I-will-walk-on-anyone-to-get-ahead press agent. Falco spends his life trying to get snippets into JJ Hunsucker’s column. I have watched this film many times and, like Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal in “When Harry met Sally”,  I still can’t work out who wins “Man of the Match”, as Lancaster and Curtis are both riveting in their respective roles. This is a very “dark” film, and none of the people in it have even one redeeming quality except the boyfriend of JJ Hunsucker’s sister; he plays in a jazz band and is a bit TOO wholesome and squeaky clean. I doubt if he has heard of heroin, let alone used it. The film was released in 1957, and captures the taste and smell of that decade. It is shot in Black and White as all “noir” films should be. ”Sweet smell of success” is like all great films because, while it plays in front of your eyes,  you believe you are watching something that rings true; Horribly true, but true nonetheless. The film might be derided in some quarters for taking itself a bit too seriously but, it was released over 50 years ago, and still captures the 1950s like few other films ever did.

Robert “Call me Bob” Redford’s first bash at directing got him an Oscar for Best Director. Timothy Hutton also got a best-supporting Oscar. IMDB says .. “The accidental death of the older son of an affluent family deeply strains the relationships among the bitter mother, the good-natured father, and the guilt-ridden younger son”. When it came out it in 1981, it blew me away. Sadly, the second viewing in 2008 did not blow me away. However, I thought Mary Tyler Moore was magnificent as the cold mother who loved her eldest son (killed in a boating accident) but was cold to her surviving, remaining younger son (Hutton). I wanted to shout at her “Stop being so self absorbed you bitch and give some motherly love to your poor son. Everyone is hurting but YOU are supposed to be the parent”, and I wanted to ring her irritating husband’s  (Donald Sutherland) neck for being so bloody understanding. Perhaps it was the first of its type in the ’80s and was therefore (at the time) very moving and thought provoking. Second time round it seemed somewhat slow and pondorous. I remember having a good weep the first time but the second time, I only had slight “Moisteye” (A small village in  Wales where everyone cries a lot) . Does It deserve a third look to see if I was right the first or second time ? I think it does but … No rush.

Forgive me. I was wrong. This film is a Turkey. I have seen  it about 3 times now, and I have concluded that … It was NOT Serge Leone’s finest hour. It can’t make its mind up whether it is 1) A straight gangster film 2) A farce 3)  a spoof or … 4)  an “Art Film” … James Woods is a fine actor but … not in this film … after the film has been running an interminable length of time we are shown that “Max” (James Woods) doesn’t like being called “crazy”, and if so-called, he loses the plot (what plot ?) and lashes out. I can only imagine that this “Don’t EVER call me crazy” routine  was included late in the day as an after thought and it just looks … clumsy at best, and is normally a poor “device” in other (normally poor) films I have seen. The scene in the Hospital where babies are “swapped” around is also a mistake, as it is done as a sort of lame nod to Busby Berkley excess and seems to be trying to say “what fun we are having … what a lark …  what a jape”. If a film makes you cringe because it is gauche then … It has failed. This did. (I bet R D Niro and James Woods are embarrassed by this film) … I was.  Verdict … “The good, the bad and the Ugly” … YES …”Once upon a time in the West” … YES … “Once upon a time in America” …. NO.  Conclusion … 2 out 3 ain’t bad.  There were some very tenuous, ludicrous links in the plot, and I can imagine Serge chatting in the editing room and nobody daring to ask the rhetorical question … “Uhm, Serge my old mate … How the <industrial language> are we going to save this pile of Doo Doo”. It is nowhere near as cringingly unwatchable as “Bonfire of the vanities” but … very few films are.  I believe the phrase is “Style over content” or, as we say in Northern England … “All fur coat and no Knickers”.