Favourite Films

Action With A Little More…

By Owen Nicholls
20/08/10

This weekend sees the release of action spectacular The Expendables. Truth be told it’s a more than adequate, enjoyable, fun, balls to the wall action movie. But nestling in that, rather high praise for Sly and co’s latest, is a derogatory word. Movie. Not film, movie. Action has been, and always will be, placed into the bracket of ‘movie-dom’ by people, well, people like me. Yet there are examples of pulse-racing, sweat producing, explosion-exploding films that have every right to be put on a par with their dramatic counterparts.

leon

Debates of what constitute a ‘film’ rather than a ‘movie’ (basically anything that a pretentious wanker like me can stroke their oversized beard too) and action (over 13% of the running time must feature gunny bits, stabby bits or explodey bits) could run for days but instead let’s just got on with the list that in no way denigrates the awesomeness of Die Hard, Terminator, The Bourne Films, Indy, etc. These are just my pick of action films with a little more…

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Inception Review

By Lewis
25/07/10

When your last on-screen effort proves to be the biggest selling Blu Ray to date there are inevitably going to be high levels of expectation for your follow up. Seems then, like a strange time to venture out into the woods alone. Not if you’re Christopher Nolan it isn’t. Despite his new found visionary status, naysayers claim that Nolan’s perceived ‘genius’ tag is misappropriated. Both Memento and The Prestige are adaptations, Insomnia is a remake and Batman, well, it’s Batman. With this in mind it’s reasonable to suggest that Inception is not just a big deal for the baying public. It’s a big deal for Nolan as well. Understandable then that Nolan has been so clandestine about the film’s plot ever since the mouth watering teaser trailer hit the net in August of last year.

Dradle, dradle, dradle

Of course Nolan’s involvement goes back much further. It’s widely reported that he first pitched the idea to studio execs when it was just that, an idea. As the narrative suggests, idea’s are simple, realising them is where it gets complicated. Warner Bros approved but Nolan decided to work on the screenplay in his down time. Eight years later and Inception is finally in cinemas.

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Toy Story 3 – Review

By Lewis
13/07/10

If I’m honest, finding myself outside the world’s largest I-max the week before the release of Christopher Nolan’s Inception was initially at least, a little infuriating. Unwilling as I was to pass up the opportunity to check out the gargantuan screen I was forced to choose an alternative movie. Thankfully, amidst the abundant I-max underwater/outerspace/junior-documentary content was Pixar’s latest Toy Story 3. Whilst I am a die hard fan of the prolific animation studio I had failed to engage with Toy Story 2 to the same degree as its ground breaking predecessor but the eleven year gap between instalments offered me a degree of assurance that this was more than just the milking of a cash cow.

The toys are back in town

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Top Five (Easter) Egg Scenes

By Lewis
01/04/10

Deciding that compiling a list ‘Top Five Crucifixion Scenes’ could be deemed a little morbid and maybe even distasteful I opted for what I like to call Secret Option B. As such I have compiled a list of less sacrilegious (Easter) egg scenes to celebrate the more chocolaty side of the holiday.

eggs

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Kick Ass

By Owen Nicholls
26/03/10

The cinematic year has become a predictable beast. Follow me for a second. January and February kick off with the remnants of the epics (Titanic/LOTR/Avatar) coupled with the ‘worthier’ choices of the awards ceremonies. Hitting the end of April right through to September is ‘Blockbuster disappointment season’ as we glide from week to week saying, “This looks really good!” before decrying our childhoods collectively raped. October and November sees ‘Indie heaven’ with offerings from Sundance, Cannes and the like finally hitting British shores, before the inevitable epic hoves into view in December again.

Kick Ass

So what’s been left out? That’s it, March and April. As history decrees it so it must be true. For the average film-fan all you can do in these months is clutch your cock and wait for the summer. Yet every now and again a film pops along in these months that you can’t label, you can’t easily categorise.

The only thing you can say with any certainty is that this film Kick’s Fucking Ass.

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Adam Buxton Talks Film

By Owen Nicholls
29/01/10

In what we at ‘thisfilmison’ hope to be a continuing series, we find people that we think are just the bees knees and ask them all about movies and such. Then we copy and paste their answers for you to read. Because we’re nice like that.

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Pride and Prejudice

By Nina
28/01/10

When asked what my favourite movie was, I had a long hard think about what “favourite” means to me. My favourite movie changes on a weekly basis, depending what mood I’m in. But what is that one reliable film, that I can watch over and over again and never get tired of? To be honest there are many more credible and better movies out there, but for me favourite is the one film I put in my DVD player when I’m feeling poorly, had a bad day, just broke up with someone, or just bored. So, it is pretty clear this film has immense powers of cheering me up. Therefore fully deserving of my “favourite” film.

Ok so it’s an adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel and one of the most beloved books of all time. I still have my A’level copy on my book shelf with all the notes written in the margin and fell in love with the story then, however I’m not a big fan of reading unless I have an excess of free time, so the film does the job in 129 minutes and it does it, so so well.

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History of the Vampire Film

By Will
25/01/10

With the release of Daybreakers and the current Twilight saga in full swing the vampire’s  charm seems as enticing as ever for cinema goers, so here’s a not so little history of the evolution of this immortal creatures place in cinema.

From the Ancient Greek bloodsuckers Empusa and Lamia to modern day half human, soulless, zombie hybrids the idea of monsters living by night and sucking our blood  seems to be woven into the collective subconscious. But the forms these fiends have taken and the ‘rules’ of their existence and possible demise are as varied as the hundreds of cultures they derive from.  From having iron teeth to having the ability to turn into a firefly, any number of supernatural capabilities can be attributed to what we would call vampires. So the next time some smug know-it-all tells you that vampires don’t have a reflection or that they always sleep in a coffin or even that they can’t go out in the day feel free to don your best Stephen Fry manner and politely tell them to go suck themselves.

All that said it is generally accepted that the vampires of popular western fiction are based on the ‘vampirs’ of medieval Serbia and Bulgaria. This is certainly the basis for the two books that did such a huge amount to popularize the genre in the West, John Polidori’s 1819 The Vampyre and the better known Dracula by Bram Stoker from 1897, and it is from these that Hollywood takes its cues. (more…)

Christmas Films For Every Mood – #2 Gremlins

By Owen Nicholls
22/12/09

After the hugs and fun and burps of Elf in Part 1 of ‘Christmas Films For Every Mood’ it’s time to get a little darker and dirtier with a movie that puts the Claws in Santa.

Urgh, I can’t belive I just wrote that. I feel dirty. Like those pictures of Father Christmas I’ve seen on the internet where he gives out presents to naked women. Dare I make a bulging sack joke? No, I want my presents this year.

gremlins

And we all know Santa doesn’t visit writers that make really, really, shit inneundos.

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Christmas Films For Every Mood – #1 Elf

By Owen Nicholls
22/12/09

“Tis the season to be jolly, fa la la la la, la la la la”.
“Tisn’t”
“Tis”
“Tisn’t!”
“Tis!”
“Tisn’t!!!”
“Tis times infinity…Face!”

elf

Whatever your views on the yuletide season, whether you’re merrily enjoying Christmas, happily celebrating Hanukkah or kicking back to Karenga’s joyous Kwanzaa, the one thing we can all do as people of this fair Earth is sit down and watch Bruce Willis kill some thieves (not terrorists).

So please join me on a day-by-day journey of films, for all occasions, but with that over-riding theme of featuring at least one Santa hat, some baubles and a good old fashioned singsong. And Zooey Deschanel in an elf outfit. Thanks Jesus!

continued…

The ‘New’ Christmas Film
Elf
It’s hard to make a new Christmas hit to fit with all the certified ‘Holiday Classics’ but with a smattering of smut and a big dollop of cheese, Jon Favreau managed it.

Will Ferrell’s particular schtick of ‘grown-up baby’ may have some removing the turkey from the oven and replacing it with their heads (make sure its gas first kids!) but this is one example of it working perfectly.

Enthusing the whole piece with a ‘fuck cynicism’ edge, Ferrell is quite simply wonderful as the Man/Boy/Elf not knowing how to cope with the Big Bad Apple. The fish out of water premise may have been done a million times before but writer David Berenbaum wrings every bit of fun he can out of the set-up.

Most importantly for a Manic Pixie Dream Girl obsessive like myself it features the wonderful Zooey Deschanel as an actual Manic, er, Elf Dream Girl. Sadly she’s turned in the raven locks for blonde, but boy that elf costume does something to me.

As a superfluous bonus it features Zooey singing! For those of you that haven’t discovered ‘She and Him’ the band that Ms. Deschanel and M. Ward formed a while back, Volume One is out in the shops now with Volume Two on it’s way. Happy Tidings indeed.

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