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llareggub
Reviews
Invasion (2021)
Days of our Lives with aliens
I started out watching Ep1. Absolutely nothing happened, so I skipped to Ep3. Nothing was still happening, but there was an hilarious aside where one of the groups who are having so many personal issues whilst the planet is apparently being totalled cannot charge their Tesla. The moral of the story so far is if the planet is getting fried, make sure you have a real car. Or steal one. I take it that is a nod to BLM. Then I jumped to Ep 06. Still no aliens. Lots of first world angst. Then I deleted the entire pile of merde, and loaded War of the Worlds, the one with Gabe Byrne. Seen it a zillion times before, but at least the dramatic bits don't send me to sleep.
Deadwood (2004)
Coarse, shallow and nasty
Many people have commented on the boring, filthy dialogue. Few mention the boring, filthy morality. Utterly bereft of decency, with not a single glimmer of humor, I overlooked it in 2004. Maybe I had better things to do with my time, like watching paint dry. Unfortunately, streaming has got so bad that I downloaded this pile of excrement in hope. Having made it through the first, I now have 35 episodes of drivel still to endure. That is not going to happen. The Delete button beckons. It certainly goes a long way towards proving that civilisation ended in 2001, not 188whatever. Some rather good actors must have been short of cash to do this stinker.
Yellowstone (2018)
Dallas with hills
I am not sure why everything on TV of any interest these days seems to come from Paramount Studios, but it may have something to do with the decidedly UnWoke mindset there.
Wonderful stuff here, though. Kevin Costner is JR. All the good ol' boys wear string ties. The female lead should have been Joan Collins, but no one can do that these days. Who ever it is doing the impersonation is not at all bad.
The only problem is the soundtrack. No matter how loud I try to turn it up, I cannot drown out Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention's; "Moving to Montana Soon, Gonna be a Dental Floss Tycoon."
Joe Pickett (2021)
Brilliant start
Standard Hollywood drivel. Tight, realistic start. Holds the suspense for five episodes, then degenerates into a standard quagmire about "Toxic Masculinity." Utter garbage, Recommended by The Australian. I should have known better.
It actually gets worse. Masochism, or boredom led me to suffer through to ep 9. The usual Hollywood feisty, ballsy, ridiculous 70lb female slaughters a 220lb male, bah, hiss, boo! Gorilla. Go, the feminocracy! This garbage is beyond parody. The rebirth of comedy is a lost cause whilst merde like this masquerades as drama.
Rome (2005)
Go beyond Apted
The first three episodes are the standard streaming device of taking a great movie, in this case Richard Harris' Julius Caesar, and padding it out with lots of physically impossible sex. A normal man's organ is not located at his belly button, but modern Hollywood cannot be expected to understand such nuance, when they don't even understand that men have such things. After Apted's three 45 minute pastiches, it suddenly becomes seriously good. This is totally the reverse of the streaming standard, where one takes a great idea and turns it into merde in 45 seconds flat. By episide seven, even someone as dim as I realised I was watching John Milius' prequel to 'I, Claudius', from 1976. Brilliant! Unfortunately, it was produced 15 years ago, and Claudius, 46 years ago. I would love to see something as good this decade. Not holding my breath.
The Last Kingdom: Episode #5.1 (2022)
First GMF, now Cornwell.
A couple of weeks ago, I watched and weeped as Hollywood took George McDonald Fraser's 'Flashman and the Redskins' and turned it into a moronic travesty called '1885'. Now they have done it to Bernard Cornwell. Fraser is dead. All the Master can do is turn in his grave. But I believe Mr Cornwell is still alive, and I understand that he took a very active part in bringing the Sharpe series to the small screen. Amazingly, he insisted upon meeting Sean Bean before okaying him for the part of Richard, as Cornwall apparently wasn't sure Bean was macho enough! What he makes of this drivel I cannot conceive. If he lacks the cash to take on Netflix, I am happy to donate to any crowd funding effort. The rules of historical fiction used to be very clear- one fictional character narrates scrupulously accurate history. Fraser is still the nonpareil, but Cornwell is very close, especially given his enormous range. Please sir, sue the grubs that did this to your art.
P. S. The first four installments were magnificent.
1883 (2021)
Flashman redux starts well, but..
Hollywood starts with a stunningly original idea- steal the Oregon Trail bit of Flashman & The Redskins, but instead of the irascible Sir Harry, the narrator is a pubescent nymphomaniac. It is so ridiculous that it works for the first five episodes. Then someone up at Woke Central must have seen it. By episode eight the sanctimony is up to one's knees and you are wading through self righteous treacle. Does Glenn Close appear in the last two episodes? No idea.
The Vietnam War (2017)
Sheehan meets Burns
A very strange Doco. Ken Burns' efforts are always thought provoking and usually masterful. Neil Sheehan's book was simply mind blowing. So why is this collaboration so mediocre? Whining. The coward who blubbers into the camera every ten minutes made my stomach heave. It is a grand project. It should have been done way before 2017.
War of the Worlds (2019)
Needs an Editor
With proper editing, this turgid, moronically woke snoozefest could have made a half decent 90 minute telemovie. But only in the comedy category. All the women are strong, feisty Lady Macbeths. All their sons quite naturally are pathetic wimps. All their girls have two or more disabilities on top of a simple inability to act, but are strong and feisty. I cannot believe there was not a single transgender victim in the entire six and a half centuries running time. The really shocking thing is that this drivel is about the best from 2019.
COBRA (2020)
The Towering Inferno Meets Peyton Place
Not even lockup could make me finish this. I spent the first two episodes painting my kitchen cupboards as I watched. This saved fast forwarding the Peyton Place bits to try to keep some eye on the main plot. By episode three, the 'main plot' had evaporated so I turned off the television and settled down to the far more entertaining spectacle of watching the paint dry.
Nightfall (2000)
Accidentally hilarious
Asimov rarely translates well to film for some weird reason. Alex Proyas' I Robot is the only one to come near classic status, and it had almost nothing to do with the book. This one is an accidental comedy- Asimov comes to Bollywood. It has most of the standard touches, but I have marked it down for the lack of a big, synchronised dancing scene. Otherwise, it is well up there amongst Plan Nine and the recent, excerable Foundation as the worst Sci-Fi movie ever..
Succession (2018)
PC Dynasty
Whoever got the idea that stringing together half a dozen 80s cliches would result in a work of genius? The writing has all the originality of a Xerox Machine. I was waiting for someone to call Brian Cox "JR". The soundtrack has the appealing timbre of fingernails on a blackboard. But the acting takes this appalling drivel to new levels. Sarah Snook obviously went to the Millennial School. She doesn't act, she sneers, with a gigantic bum. But who is the prat who went to the Steve Buscemi School? It's bizarre. Why, on God's green earth would anyone attempt to emulate Buscemi?
Event Horizon (1997)
Utterly moronic
Sam Niell wears an 'Australian' flag on his shoulder, which consists of an 'Aboriginal' flag over our national one. Niell is a Northern Irish Kiwi and wouldn't know an Aussie if one kicked him in the balls, which I should rather like to do. The RNZAF consists of several Cessna Caravans. The RNZN has several Rubber Ducks, but they can't afford the oil to fill the two stroke engines. No-one has noticed the RNZ army since about 1917.
Victoria (2016)
The Duke without a Nose.
The Iron Duke had a bit of a schnozz, to put it mildly. To see him portrayed with a standard face completely blew it for me, even after seeing Lord Melbourne portrayed as a healthy 40 year old. The PM's wife, Lady Caroline Lamb, had famously shot through with Lord Byron some time before, and Melbourne himself was infamous as a flogger. The truth would have made a far more interesting bodice ripper than this pathetic Mills & Boon soapie.
The Last Kingdom: Episode #4.1 (2020)
Sexist White Males rape, loot, hump & pillage.
True to the spirit of Bernard Cornwall's wonderful Historical Fiction, but with it's own plot, this story is in keeping with human history for all bar the last 30 years. The story is wonderful. The soundtrack is probably the most annoying I have ever heard; the phony Danish accents only slightly less so. The simple solution is to watch it with the sound muted, English subtitles turned on, and Wagner playing at maximum volume on your stereo.
47 Ronin (2013)
Hollywood & the 21st Century at their worst
Someone took 1962s wonderful Chushingura, spent $175 Million turning it into a 21st century CGI festival & put Keenau Reeves in the lead role. The only question is; Why?
Reeves would easily be out acted by one of the statues of Easter Island, the original story was Shakespearean in it's tale of human perfidy without the silly supernatural overlay, and there was no way the producers were ever going to recoup such a ridiculous outlay, especially as they appear not to have hired a scriptwriter.
One must assume the Mafia needed to lose a lot of money for tax purposes. It worked, brilliantly. One of the great dogs of this sad century.
The Expanse (2015)
Eat your heart out, Gillette
As a normal toxic male, I hate Gillette with a passion. But there is still Schick. Why is it that not one single male on this show can afford a razor? The really noisy explosions in a vacuum are pretty hilarious, too.
The White Queen (2013)
Hysterical fiction
Mills & Boon does The Wars of the Roses. Complete with the bodice ripping bits. Peyton Place with codpieces. Laughable sets & costumes, but the real failure is the appalling script and wooden acting. This period of British history is labyrinthine & utterly compelling. It takes a special talent to turn it into a boring soap opera. If you want real magic, try Sir Ian McKellen's Richard III.
Sleeping Dogs (1977)
Neill shines
Apparently, this was Sam Neill's second outing. I have no idea what was his first, but this one grabs you and doesn't let go. The fact that it was Roger Donaldson's debut probably helps. At the time, Australian cinema was in a golden age. The poor cousins over the Tasman decided to emulate them. Like Australia, the only way the Yarts could destroy the government was with government funding. This dystopic story of the fascist Muldoon government was largely funded by Robert 'Piggy' Muldoon!
Utu (1983)
Atmospheric western set in NZ. Pity about the plot.
The film opens with British soldiers slaughtering an entire Maori village in the 1860s. No reason, it is just what filthy imperialists did. A native born Kiwi soldier returns from the Boer Wars to teach Commando tactics to the nasty, colonialist British snob who commanded the post. The first Boer War started in 1880. During the second, an Australian, Harry Morant, was shot for killing a wounded Boer prisoner after his own commander was murdered. The British Empire wasn't perfect, but it wasn't a cardboard cutout. Amusingly, the Maori 'army' hired by Murphy for this travesty of history was a gang of thugs known as 'The Mongrel Mob'. Great cinematography, atmospheric music. One dimensional plot.
633 Squadron (1964)
Homage to a Beautiful Areoplane
Who cares about Cliff Robertson being in the Pommy Air Force? There were Yanks who joined up before FDR got in. The Sikh and John Mellion show how diverse were the anti Fascist forces. But, oh my God, in the days before Computer Graphics, they used real De Haviland Mosquitos. The only sound more gorgeous than the wonderful soundtrack is two 27 litre, double overhead camshaft, 1.500 horsepower Rolls Royce Merlins at full noise.
Darkest Hour (2017)
Oldman's Triumph
Garry Oldman first came to my notice as Sid. He now steps into Albert Finney's gigantic shoes, and does not disappoint. But a note of disapproval- it was not the Labour Party which brought down Chamberlain in 1940, it was Leo Amery, single handed, with the greatest, most passionate Cri de Coeur ever heard in a parliament until the Man himself unleashed the 18" guns of the English Language.
P.S. I should have mentioned Sir Roger Keyes turning up to the debate in Full Dress. A bit of Drang for Amery's Sturm. But it was Chamberlain's own party that delivered the Coup de Gras: Greenwood just sank the boot into the corpse.
Kokoda (2006)
Competition improves the genre
Kokoda is not perfect. Nor is Beneath Hill 60. What they share is being 21st century Australian war movies. With a miniscule budget, both crafted a realistic but reverent portrait of accidental heroes on strange Queensland sets, Tamborine and Townsville respectively. Malick did an overblown Hollywood $50million extravaganza in Mossman a couple of years beforehand, proving all war is pointless. Sorry, Terrence, but you are dead wrong. Civilisation is worth protecting. I had no idea this was Alister Grierson's first outing. It seems so much more accomplished. There is a script waiting for you- Peter Ryan's "Fear Drive My Feet".
Operation Dunkirk (2017)
Monty Python without the Humour
Others have summarised the monumental plot failings- Krauts driving Shermans, 1940 Pommies with Thompson Guns & 6*6 GMC trucks & Jeeps, everyone waiting around for the Seppos when it took 18 bleeding months for them to grow the spine necessary to take on Fascism, needing an algorithm! from the Krauts to complete the Chain-Home radar system that the Poms had perfected years before; but the stupid, Millenial rewriting of history meant I have no idea how this dog ended. Presumably Barack Roosevelt instituted a Renewable Energy Target, and Adolf Bush was stuffed.
The SS had shaving problems, feisty, up front women ran the world, but what made me finally turn off and delete this garbage was the vicious, amoral sadism that permeates every Millenial exercise in so called drama.
Utter, irretrievable crap. We are in a lot of trouble.
Valkyrie (2008)
Homage to Luchino Visconti
I have only seen half at this stage, but it seems to me to be a gigantic, and very well done homage to Visconti's masterful 'Gotterdammerung'. Normally if I see Tom Weirdo in the credits, I don't bother even starting the spools, much less finishing. But when one sees Branagh, Nighy, Stamp & Wilkinson amongst the first XV, you know you have a team that can compensate for even a half-wit at Five-Eighth. He actually does not do a bad job, but the Fullback is Singer's never-ending cues back to 'The Damned'. It actually works better without all the sexual weirdness that Luchino just had to inject into all his sumptuous, high camp melodramas. If I get to the Macbeth bit, it gets a 10 and I will be very happy indeed! In any case, you are not wasting your time and you can then Google "Luchino Visconti" and really begin to live.