25th HOUR
Tuesday 29 April 2003
Newham Showcase Cinema, London E6 VISIT

So what, in the name of Rudy Giuliani and his infamous “zero tolerance”, would a man facing seven years in prison be doing spending the night before the start of his sentence roaming the streets of New York? It’s fairly unlikely, wouldn’t you say? But who cares when a great actor like Edward Norton plays the man in question, the director is Spike Lee and the film has a intelligent and thoughtful script?

Well Peter Bradshaw, the moronic reviewer on the Guardian Film website, for one. He gave this great film just one star, one less than he gave the one-joke comedy Johnny English. The man’s an imbecile and I almost let him put me off seeing ‘25th Hour’ on the strength of his review. I’m never believing a word he writes again.

Norton plays Monty Brogan, busted for drug dealing and deeply suspicious on his last night of freedom that his girlfriend Naturelle (the completely gorgeous Rosario Dawson) is the cause of his impending incarceration. Unsure whether she has sold him out, he is unable to talk to her and instead wanders the streets, visits his old school and meets up with his father, a reformed alcoholic Brooklyn fire fighter (played by Brian Cox). As the day wears on he becomes ever more angry at the predicament he finds himself in, realising he is about to lose the life he has grown used to, not just the expensive flat and car but also the friends and loved ones. In one great scene, Brogan’s reflection in a bathroom mirror rails against every member of New York's multi-racial population, blaming everyone from immigrants to corrupt police to Wall Street brokers for his circumstances before realising there is no-one to blame but himself. In this regard, ‘25th Hour’ is actually a very moral film – throughout, Brogan and especially his friends remind us that he deserves his fate and that his punishment is just. They just wish Brogan had taken a decision to change his life earlier, before change had suddenly been imposed upon him.

Amongst those on Brogan’s list of those he hates is (unsurprisingly) Osama bin Laden and Lee’s film must be one of the first to include an unsentimental nod to September 11 and actual footage of Ground Zero. We see it from the flat belonging to Brogan’s city trader friend Frank, which overlooks the site where the World Trade Centre had once stood and where, of course, many of those that died also had time to prepare for the end. In many ways ‘25th Hour’ is also as much a hymn to Spike Lee’s love of New York and its endurance and we are left in no doubt that just as important as everything Brogan will lose will be the city soon to be taken from him.

Frank and another friend Jacob, a unhappy schoolteacher (played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman) who is obsessed over one of his 17 year old students, spend the final night partying with Naturelle before Brogan finds out how he was betrayed and reveals a plan to help him survive prison. The interaction between the excellent cast is clever, sharp and often very funny but I particularly enjoyed the final scenes (that Bradshaw describes as a “cop-out ending,” the idiot). In these, Brogan is driven to prison by his father, who explains how Brogan can escape and start a new life, the potential events of which unfold on screen. Is this the life that Brogan can expect or the one that he is doomed to lose? Lee keeps the answer to this question ambiguous and I thought it was moving and very thought provoking to reflect on what we may miss by the choices we make.

As you can probably guess, I really enjoyed this film and would recommend it to anyone who likes intelligent and stylish films full of great actors. So don’t believe everything you read. Especially not what you read in the Guardian.

JEREMY HARDY VERSUS THE ISRAELI ARMY
Thursday 24 April 2003
UCL Bloomsbury Theatre, London WC1 VISIT

Why, in the name of a political ideal, do people travel to war zones, deliberately placing themselves in extreme danger? I have had the pleasure of meeting people who fought in Spain in the 1930s against fascism and others who in the 1990s travelled with aid convoys to the Bosnian capital Sarajevo and although the causes are very different, in each case the answer to this question has been the same – raising money or signing a petition was just not enough. The most powerful acts of solidarity, the actions that really change the world, involve standing shoulder to shoulder with people under attack.

Leila Sansou’s 75 minute documentary is the powerful story of acts of solidarity by the ‘internationals’ in the West Bank and Gaza, trying to disrupt the activities of the Israeli military occupation by placing themselves between Palestinians and the tanks and armoured vehicles of the fourth largest army in the world. It focuses on the journey to Palestine taken by the British comedian Jeremy Hardy, to document and participate in actions planned by one of the groups, the International Solidarity Movement. The ISM is the organisation that both Rachel Corrie, the American killed by an Israeli bulldozer, and Tom Hundall, the British activist shot in the head while protecting children in Rafah from Israeli gunfire, were both members of.

Jeremy Hardy’s first trip to the West Bank coincided with the murderous assault on Bethlehem just after Easter 2002. Clearly terrified by events he had been completely unprepared for, Hardy’s initial reaction to the ISM activists – that they are vainglorious middle-class peaceniks involved in some sort of ‘radical tourist experience’ – changes to growing admiration after the group are for the first time shot at with live rounds and a number injured. A later visit (after the first is cut short by Hardy's evacuation by the British embassy) includes participation with coachloads of both Israeli peace activists and internationals delivering medical supplies to a Palestinian village, one that has been cut off for a year. In between, the ISM contingent had somehow managed to enter, under the noses of the Israeli army, both the besieged Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and Yasser Arafat’s compound in Ramallah, delivering supplies and acting as human shields.

‘Jeremy Hardy versus the Israeli Army’ is a very effective campaigning and recruiting tool for the ISM and in the bar of the Bloomsbury Theatre after the film, people were asking each other, “would you go”? The footage of ISM members risking their lives participating in solidarity actions is inspiring, as are the experiences of those such as the Jewish activist dubbed ‘an American Taliban’, whose parents in New York have received death threats because of his involvement in the ISM. As a film, however, the main problem is its nominal ‘star’. To be brutally honest, the best scenes are the ones Jeremy Hardy is not in. A great comedian, he quite rightly avoids the film becoming a wholly inappropriate comic odyssey, a joke-a-minute showcase of his talents. But by reining in his humour, we were left watching a fairly ordinary bloke whose flat nasal voiceover sounded like someone explaining the highlights of his holiday video (“and this is me in front of the maternity clinic”). At times, this is what the film most resembles – ‘Wish You Were Here’ reporting from the West Bank, with a grumpy middle-aged Englishman embarrassed about his choice of hat purchases.

Nevertheless, as a rallying point for the International Solidarity Movement and the excellent work it does, this film is definitely work seeing. See www.ism-london.org or www.palsolidarity.org for more information about the ISM.

PHONE BOOTH
Sunday 20th April 2003
UCG West India Quay, London E14 VISIT

Stu Shepherd is an arrogant, confident man, a publicist who believes he is in control as flatters the egos of the clients and media contacts he tells lies to every day. Although always on his mobile phone, his daily routine includes heading at a set time to the last enclosed phone booth in Manhattan. Here he removes his wedding ring before calling one of his clients, a young actress he is trying to persuade to meet him, a woman he fantasises about sleeping with. Only one day when he puts down the phone, it rings – and a ringing phone demands to be answered. Lifting the receiver, Stu suddenly finds his life turned upside down as a voice tells him that a gun is pointing at him and that if he hangs up, he will die.

On the face of it, this is a film that shouldn’t work. It’s story, played out in an hour and twenty minutes of real time, is largely set within a single location, the aforementioned phone booth. The central character, played by Colin Farrell, who must not move for fear of being gunned down by his unseen assailant, is a somewhat sleazy and seemingly unlikely candidate for our sympathises. And apart from the sniper, Keifer Sutherland’s disembodied voice at the end of the phone, the other characters are largely incidental.

And yet this is a film that shouldn’t work but does. It works because director Joel Schumacher's relentless pace, constantly raising the suspense to greater levels, is matched by a fabulous performance by Farrell. But for me, the decision to have the calm melodic sound of Sutherland’s gunman as a voiceover, rather than a crackly voice on the end of the line, was inspired. It creates the unsettling impression that he is standing right there in the claustrophobic confines of the phone booth with Stu. No wonder the release of ‘Phone Booth’ was pushed back in the US because of the spate of random shootings in Washington. For people suddenly living in fear, the film would have been terrifying.

There are also a number of clever touches such as a shop window banner on the building behind the phone booth that asks, "Who do you think you are?" This is what Stu’s would-be assassin, who has been stalking him and listening to him hustle, wants to find out. Farrell’s performance is so effective because gradually we do find that Stu is not the irredeemable scoundrel that he first appears. And, without giving the ending away, the fact that the story is not neatly wrapped up in a Hollywood display of good triumphing over evil is refreshing, especially as the Washington sniper murders must surely have put pressure on Schumacher to do so.

At just 80 minutes, the film flies by but in a way is the better for it. Definitely recommended.

INTACTO
Sunday 13 April 2003
UGC West India Quay, London E14 VISIT

Like great films such as Donnie Darko and Fight Club, ‘Intacto’ is centred on a complex, intriguing and brilliantly original idea – in this case that luck is a gift and that those with the power to do so can take that gift from others. The film then reveals an underworld where mysteriously fortunate competitors absorb the luck of ordinary people and gamble it, in order to try and stay ‘intact’ when facing the ‘god of chance’, Samuel Berg, a survivor of the Holocaust, in a game of Russian roulette. Federico, whose own good luck was taken from him by his mentor Berg, helps a thief named Tomas, the sole survivor of a plane crash under guard in hospital, to escape and persuades him to compete. Federico tutors Tomas in the game of chance that must inevitably lead to a confrontation with the luckiest person on the planet. Meanwhile, Sara, a police officer who also has the gift and who has survived a car crash that killed the rest of her family, hunts Tomas and is drawn into the game in an attempt to capture him.

It’s just great. There are no clever special effects, just an eerie and disturbing sense of the strange, in the way that luck is exchanged by a vampiric hug, in the weird landscape (shot in Tenerife) and in the adrenaline rush of the contests. The most memorable of these involves participants running headlong through a forest while blindfolded, the losers crashing into the trees and the last person standing being the winner.

Max Von Sydow, the only English speaker in this Spanish film, gives one of his best performances as the owner of the casino in the desert, seemingly unable to enjoy his excessive good fortune. This may not only be as a result of his terrible experiences but also because of the added suggestion that too much luck takes away the capacity to love. The words ‘I don’t love you anymore’ are spoken by Tomas to his girlfriend Ana before he boards the doomed plane that ‘luckily’ she does not take, saving her life – and they are also those said by Sara to her husband before the car crash that she ‘luckily’ survives. It’s all very strange and whilst I am sure that a second viewing will help unravel the story even more (just as Donnie Darko is even better the second time), it’s still streets ahead of some of the derivative plots I have seen recently.

Recommended? You bet. Enjoy it before Hollywood remakes it.

RULES OF ATTRACTION
Sunday 6th April 2003
Stratford Picture House, London E15 VISIT


There is only one small part of ‘Rules of Attraction’ that could just perhaps save it from being the worst film I am likely to see this year. That’s a five-minute section, a speeded up video diary showing the trip taken by one of the film’s many unappealing characters around Europe. It’s kind of clever in a sort of slacker, fresh out of film school sort of a way. It bears no relation whatsoever to the central plot, which makes it entirely in keeping with the other ‘tricks’ that director Roger Avary uses, like rewinding scenes and split screen, all of which are utterly contrived, a bad case of showing off to hide the complete lack of substance to this pointless, irritating film.

And yet Empire magazine has the absolute stupefying audacity to describe ‘Rules of Attraction’ as “America’s Trainspotting.”

As a Scottish friend of mine would say, "Pish". I think I may have to reconsider renewing my subscription.

The recreation of Bret Ellis Easton’s admittedly uninspiring book seems largely intent on moving ahead from one self-indulgent little set piece to another, but broadly speaking can be summarised as follows. Sean Bateman, a shallow unpleasant drug dealing student at Camden College in New England, is lusting over shallow unpleasant Lauren, who used to go out with shallow unpleasant Paul, who is now gay and lusts after Sean. Lauren, meanwhile, is saving herself for shallow unpleasant Victor, away on the aforementioned Europe trip, although Sean thinks (wrongly) that she is sending him love letters. James Van Der Beer, who was Dawson in TV’s dire Dawson’s Creek, plays Sean Bateman as though he was Dawson having a bad day and therefore frowns a great deal. There’s lots of sex and references to sex, lots of drugs, a comedy drug dealer and parties that look more like preludes to rape rather than anything approaching ‘fun’. And a graphic suicide involving a nameless character, who we suddenly discover is the author of the aforementioned love letters.

I wanted to leave after about an hour. Apart from the five-minute section I’ve already mentioned and a good, nostalgic soundtrack, the other hour and forty minutes were just mind numbing…

What makes the stupid illusion to Trainspotting so completely off the mark is that the only similarity between the two is the extensive use of drugs (and New England students aren’t even in the same league as Edinburgh junkies). Trainspotting has a cast of either intriguing or sympathetic characters and a plot that involves its narrator, Renton, on a journey that eventually leads him to ‘choose life.’ In contrast, ‘Rules of Attraction’ has a cast of uninteresting and annoying characters, insulated in their own little selfish bubbles, whose main protagonist makes the Teletubbies look like intellects on a par with Chomsky. Trainspotting’s cultural references say something about Scottish identity – ‘Rules of Attraction’ doesn’t even bother looking up ‘cultural references’ in the dictionary.

Avoid this film like a sudden outbreak of SARS. It’s a complete and utter waste of yours or anyone else’s money.

THE CORE
Friday 28th March 2003
Stratford Picture House, London E15 VISIT

So there’s this disaster that could destroy the Earth and the first effects are starting to be felt. There’s a moment when a scientist tells an assembled group that everyone will die unless action is taken immediately. So the US government spends an enormous amount of money to send a team that must face repeated danger wearing space suits, explode a nuclear weapon and save the planet. Welcome to the plot of Armageddon or any number of other apocalyptic science fiction films over the years.

But when there’s a winning formula that allows the opportunity for some great special effects, why change it? So welcome to ‘The Core’, where the danger facing Earth is not a meteor but the discovery that the Earth’s core has stopped spinning. And welcome to a plot that is far, far more ludicrous than almost anything in the genre.

Actually, to be fair, whilst films like Armageddon suffer from an huge overdose of gung-ho American patriotism, the people who wrote ‘The Core’ have made no attempt to come up with anything other than a utterly silly blockbuster. In fact, subversively, the reason the Earth’s core has stopped spinning, threatening to microwave everyone by removing it’s magnetic field, is apparently the result of a secret military experiment, Project Destiny, designed to create earthquakes on demand. The stupidity of the story is instead largely embraced, the characters given well-delivered comic one-liners and we are just expected to accept that a scientist can work out the problem on his own and that a solution can be found in next to no time. It’s all just a prelude anyway to blowing things up in a spectacular fashion.

As the daft plot zipped along, I have so say that I enjoyed the first part of the film immensely. The crash landing of the Space Shuttle in that LA aqueduct where film car chases are usually held was great fun, as was the ‘pigeons gone mad’ scene in Trafalgar Square (although the destruction of the Coliseum in Rome was less impressive, with decidedly average computer generated effects). In seemingly no time, the ship capable of carrying the handsome male lead, the beautiful female lead and the rest of the archetypal supporting characters to the Earth’s molten core was constructed. Then, in a journey that reminded me of Dennis Quaid hurtling though human blood vessels in a miniaturised craft in Innerspace, it was onward into danger and a chance to gradually kill off most of the crew in pursuit of ultimate success.

Overall, this blatant crowd-pleaser worked on its own level, although there were a few things that didn’t. Quite why a great actor like Stanley Tucci chose to play the character of pompous ideas-stealing genius Dr Zimsky is a mystery. His heart couldn’t have been in it and as the supposedly ‘bad scientist’, he just wasn’t bad enough (Gary Oldman in Lost in Space was a proper ‘bad scientist’). Similarly, the general who endangers the lives of the crew by seeking to use Project Destiny when contact is lost (and who is thwarted by a computer geek, just like in Armageddon), is simply not threatening enough. Imagine a kind-hearted soul, the opposite of Donald Sutherland’s insane general in Outbreak. The special effects underground are, it has to be said, less exciting than those on the surface and the film is definitely about a half-hour too long. It really started to drag at the end.

‘The Core’ will in a few years be there with Armageddon and Independence Day, in amongst the DVDs that always seem to be in the sales. But as stupid blockbusters go, it is mindlessly enjoyable and far better than some other explosive action films I have seen, notably the terrible Sum of All Fears and xXx. So if it’s raining and you don’t want anything too deep, there are worse ways to waste a couple of hours than this.

RAINDANCE EAST FESTIVAL: NEAR EAST SHORTS
Tuesday 25th March 2003
Genesis Mile End Cinema, London E1 VISIT

I’ve decided not to count this set of six shorts against my total for films seen this year. I wouldn’t probably have attended had it not been for ‘Kalbe’s World’, which is written, produced and directed by a friend. Still, that’s no reason not to write my impressions of the programme, which included four short films and two close to half-hour documentaries.

‘The Sandwich’ ostensibly told the story of a man working in a sandwich shop and coping with his girlfriend’s drug-induced death. It was, however, the sort of film that gives film festivals a bad name for screening pointless, pretentious drivel made by people who shouldn't be allowed within a mile of a Super-16 camera. It was made even worse by some truly wooden acting. I suppose it takes a certain amount of courage to abandon any pretence of a script and just film any old rubbish, edit it and pass it off as ‘art.’ But sadly when it is aired with other films that demonstrate a greater degree of energy, talent and skill, the filmmakers must have realised they would be found out.

Although I bet they live in Shoreditch and think they are terribly clever, so perhaps they didn’t realise.

‘Looking Out for George’ has two men in bed on a hospital ward. One, Bill, describes what he can see from his window down in the park below to try and shake the other, George, who is on the point of death, from his misery. A slight but quite sweet film, the denouement reveals that the view from Bill’s window is not over a park but an ordinary street, as Bill begins his routine with a new patient.

‘Rave Against the Machine’ was the best of the six films, helped undoubtedly by being the most well resourced, with backing from Channel 4. It tells the story of young musicians who kept the music scene alive in Sarajevo, Bosnia’s capital, during the long siege of the city by the Yugoslav army. Jumping between images of the war, interviews with band members and DJs and mad footage of gigs, it managed in just 24 minutes to explain how music kept people sane in the most desperate circumstances. The film also tells how the people of the city were introduced to dance music by the intrepid pioneers from Desert Storm, driving over the mountains to organise a legendary New Year’s Eve party, and how the energy died with the end of war and the dominance of ‘modern folk’ music. Funny, inspiring and a reminder that even in the midst of war, positive life-affirming events can be created, this film deserves to be shown by its sponsors on terrestrial television.

‘Kalbe’s World’ was also excellent, portraying the life of a young Asian teenager living on an estate in Tower Hamlets. It focuses on his relationship with his sisters and his attitudes towards women, college and his friends. Kalbe is a disarming, sympathetic and funny subject to document, a reminder of many people I know or who have met. Although at times the sound was a bit off and the film would have benefited from a little more editing, his story was told with humour and great insight into life as an 18 year old in east London. Still, I did wonder whether some of the audience who laughed at Kalbe’s ignorant homophobia would have done so if he had been a white kid making racist remarks – I hope not, but then queer-bashing retains a certain acceptability and most people can't fall back on youthfulness as a excuse for not knowing any better.

Lastly, ‘3-D Viewer’ and ‘Two to Tangle’ were two five minute shorts, the first a dull and uninvolving piece about children captivated by the arrival of a stranger in town with a Picture Viewer showing the marvels of the world. Sadly, I wasn’t captivated. The second film shows a leather clad dominatrix walking into a boxing gym and admiring a young boxer working out with a punch bag. This film brilliantly wins over those watching with its ending: taking a knife after the boxer has pounded the bag, the woman cuts it open to reveal her partner, a man in a Gimp mask and bondage gear, curled up inside. After picking himself up, the pair apologetically leave. I seem to remember something similar at the beginning of the latest Bond movie but this is still a smart and funny little film.

A mixed bag then, with 'Rave Against the Machine' and 'Kalbe's World' easily the best. Apparently 'Kalbe's World' will not be receiving further screenings but keep an eye out for 'Rave Against the Machine' if it gets shown on Channel 4.

EQUILIBRIUM
Sunday 23rd March 2003
Cineworld Ilford VISIT

Tonight in Hollywood, some very good films will win Oscars, as will some deemed worthy by the Academy’s impossibly strange electorate. The year’s best film – Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers – will probably not win Best Picture, but then the Oscars have never been fair. But what of the UK releases in Oscar week, this mighty celebration of the filmmaking art? Oh dear, I knew weeks like this would come. We have Evelyn, a syrup pudding if ever I saw one, starring Pierce Brosnan. And two very dodgy sounding comedies, Just Married and National Security, the latter in particular looking like a crime against humanity. Whilst I have been keeping The Pianist in my back pocket for such an occasion, it felt too downbeat, too depressing, at a time when we (by which I mean, our government that ignores its people) have just begun an illegal war against Iraq.

This is a moment for mindless escapism. For a blatant Matrix rip off stuffed full of actors you vaguely recognise but can’t quite name. And Sean Bean. ‘Equilibrium’ – your moment had arrived.

Although Saddam Hussein’s appearance in the back-story introducing the, erm, ‘plot’ almost ruined everything, ‘Equilibrium’ basically delivered the goods in the no-brainer stakes. Was it any good? That would be missing the point. There is a moronically simplistic plot borrowed from better films/books, about a post Apocalyptic dystopia where emotion has been outlawed and feelings banished through a drug called Prozium (sounds vaguely familiar…). Anything likely to encourage ‘sense crime’, like perfume or books or the Mona Lisa, is incinerated (rather like in Fahrenheit 451). People betray each other without hesitation, there is a ruler, ‘Father’, whose face appears on giant screens, and an untamed region beyond the city (all familiar from 1984). Christian Bale, who starred in last year’s Reign of Fire, plays John Preston, a member of the Clerics, sort of black robed warrior-priests, whose job is to track down and eliminate ‘sense offenders’ (reminiscent of Blade Runner). Preston stops taking his medicine, for reasons I already cannot remember, and starts to develop emotions, spurred on by listening to Beethoven, feelings for a woman he has arrested – and a lovely little puppy (I swear, I am not making this up!). Then after some tiresome toing and froing, he hooks up with the resistance for the big finale.

Even in a plot as daft as this, there are enormous holes: in a city supposedly without emotion, people keep grinning inanely or thumping tables in anger. Let’s not even ask how families can seemingly still exist and how couples can still produce children (do they have another drug to 'get their groove on'? Viagra maybe?). Who cares? The main reason for seeing this film is the aforementioned Matrix rip off, whereby the Clerics are trained in gun-kata, a martial art based on the use of firearms. The sadly too infrequent fight scenes are hugely fun to watch, even if it is impossible not to recognise where in the Matrix they have been pinched from. Even Bale’s trenchcoat is lifted from Keanu Reeves’ iconic outfit. Bale is, nevertheless, impressive as the cold-blooded, impassive fighter and the final samurai sword fight is gloriously gory. I have no doubt that this film will have little trouble attracting a cult following.

Would I recommend seeing this film? Well no, not particularly. But I would recommend the fight scenes, so when this comes out on DVD, maybe pop down the video shop and check them out. Meanwhile, 'Equilibrium' is a harmless enough reminder that this year sees not one but two Matrix films. I can hardly wait.

CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND
Saturday 15th March 2003
Stratford Picture House, London E15 VISIT

Like Catch Me If You Can, ‘Confessions of a Dangerous Mind’ is a colourful film about the life of an extraordinary character, set in an era – the 60s and 70s – that directors just love. Whilst the story of a teenage con artist in Catch Me If You Can may be greatly exaggerated, however, it is basically true. The story of Chuck Barris, creator of US television hits the Gong Show and the Dating Game (copied here as Blind Date) is, on the other hand, undoubtedly pure fantasy. It is based on Barris’ autobiographical claims that, as well as being a successful TV producer, he was also a part-time hitman for the CIA, responsible for 33 kilings. He alleges that he used his role as chaperone for Dating Game winners travelling to places like Helsinki or romantic West Berlin as a cover for assassination.

Imagine Cilla Black as a secret agent quietly bumping off enemies of the Crown whilst Emma from Essex realises Steve from Solihull was the wrong choice and she should have picked number 3. Barking mad, I think you’ll agree…

What makes this film so funny and entertaining is the decision to largely treat Barris’ story as if it were fact, rather than the delusions of a man increasingly depressed by allegations that he was chiefly responsible for the dumbing down of television. It also helps that Sam Rockwell (who I have only seen previously as one of the convicts on death row in The Green Mile) does such a great job of portraying Barris as a sleazy but likeable hustler. The parts of the film involving the game shows provide loads of fun moments (including ‘unfit for broadcast’ sexually explicit pilot versions of the Dating Game and cameos by Brad Pitt and Matt Damon as two unsuccessful contestants), whilst Drew Barrymore manages to be less annoying than usual. George Clooney’s CIA recruiter Jim Byrd is suave and very funny convincing Barris to rationalise his hitman persona: “Think of it as a hobby. You’re an assassination enthusiast.” Clooney’s character is also in the film’s most powerful image, when after telling Barris about a mole killing off agents, we see Byrd sitting on a swimming pool diving board, a red stain spreading in the water below him as he dies from a gunshot wound.

In his first film as director, George Clooney has managed to create a very entertaining fable that, at just under two hours, seems to fly by. None of it is believable, of course, but rather like modern “reality” television, that’s not the point – the truth has no bearing on what we watch, even when it claims to be ‘real’, because everyone on film or TV is trying to be something they are not. Amazingly, Barris is still alive, still thinking up game shows. His latest, he says, is for three old guys to be each given a loaded gun and then to look back on the inadequacies of their lives, with the winner the last to blow his brains out.

Somehow, I have a feeling that something similar has already been considered by a twenty-year-old producer fresh out of a media studies course. It’s only a matter of time…

FAR FROM HEAVEN
Sunday 9th March 2003
Genesis Cinema Mile End, London E1 VISIT

Todd Haynes' new film ‘Far From Heaven’ is, I have read, a homage to Fifties melodramas made by Douglas Sirk. Having no idea who exactly Sirk is and having never seen one of his films, I thought I might have a problem understanding why the critics have been so generous with their praise for this film. And so initially it proved, until after a slow start this luscious and wonderfully acted film began to relieve its dark heart, full of secrets, hypocrisy, racism and homophobia.

‘Far from Heaven’ tells the story of Cathy Whitaker, living in suburban Hartford, Connecticut, at the tail end of the 1950s. Cathy has what on the surface seems a perfect life, with a big house, children and a successful salesman husband, Frank. She is also seen as something of a liberal, a patron of the arts and (according to the local magazine article) ‘kind to negroes.’ But this is an America before the victories of the civil rights movement, one where conformity on family and especially race were rigidly maintained – a time that for many, especially black Americans, was very ‘far from heaven’ indeed.

So when Cathy catches Frank with another man, their perfect life begins to unravel, with Frank seeing his homosexuality as a failure to be an all-American male. Increasingly distressed by Frank’s drinking and moodiness, Cathy turns for support to her educated black gardener Raymond (played by Dennis Haysbert, the presidential candidate in 24). But spending time together cannot fail to go unnoticed by the town’s gossips, those that police the boundaries of acceptable behaviour, leaving both Cathy and Raymond increasingly ostracised.

What is so good about this film is that what are often jarring moments of racism and almost comical attitudes to homosexuality are set against the most stunning settings of a town where it always seems to be autumn, the streets carpeted with the most exquisite red and gold leaves. The clothes and the sets have also been clearly designed to replicate the Technicolor films of the period. Julianne Moore, who plays Cathy, is completely brilliant portraying the well-meaning liberal who fails to see the line that could not then be crossed, a woman whose increasing unhappiness never prevents her from remaining the supportive, respectable middle-class wife. Dennis Quaid as Frank is excellent too, showing clearly the confusion and sense of shame that being gay could bring at a time when gay men were almost always in the closet (and were camp caricatures, with cravats and berets, in the eyes of most of society).

If I have one criticism, it is that this is cinema as spectacle, where you enjoy the acting and the way the film has been presented without expecting any real surprises in the story. You know there could be no happy ending – a sudden abandonment by Cathy of her life for a new and happy future would have been far too contrived. But see ‘Far From Heaven’ anyway, make sure you see it on the big screen rather than wait for its DVD release, and marvel at the spectacle that Todd Haynes has created. You’ll never be able to look at films that have tended to sanitise the era, like Grease for example, in the same light.

SOLARIS
Saturday 1st March 2003
UCI Greenwich Filmworks VISIT

Now I can see why this film has made a lot of enemies. Die-hard science fiction fans will hate it because its not really sci-fi, more a psychological drama in space. Fans of the Stanislaw Lem novel will probably say it’s nothing like the book, because films never are (I bought the book last week but decided not to read it until after seeing the film). Fans, meanwhile, of cult Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky's 1972 version will hate it just because its not ‘their’ film, not three hours long and stars a major Hollywood star.

Fans, on the other hand, of George Clooney’s arse will come away satisfied by its brief cinematic debut.

Approaching ‘Solaris’ without any of the baggage of a fan, I have to say that I enjoyed George Clooney’s performance in an undoubtedly intelligent film. Director Steven Sonderbergh also directed Clooney in the magnificent Ocean’s 11 but this is a very different story. Clooney plays Chris Kelvin, a psychologist mourning his wife’s recent suicide, who is asked by his best friend, a scientist on a space station orbiting the planet Solaris, to investigate mysterious events that have effected the crew. On arrival, Kelvin finds that his friend is dead and that only two of the team members remain alive. Both are initially unable to explain what has happened, until Kelvin’s experiences the phenomenon for himself, when his dead wife Rheya – or something that appears to be her – suddenly appears, constructed from Kelvin’s memories by the influence of the strange energy of the planet below. Although Kelvin understands that the impossibility of her existence and Rheya herself comes to accept that she is not human, Kelvin’s confusion and grief make it impossible for him to let her go.

Clooney is impressive as Kelvin, powerfully conveying the character’s emotional crisis in the sparsely scripted scenes on the space station and displaying his usual charisma in the flashbacks to Chris’ life with Rheya. Natascha McElhone, who plays Rheya, is simply wonderful, managing to simultaneously appear both human and alien and remain a complicated and sympathetic character. Another strong point is the film’s visual impact – cold and grey in space, warm, red and brown in Chris’ memories of Earth – which is fantastic to look at. There is even a brief reference to 2001, with the cockpit lights of the ship that carries Kelvin to the space station reflecting in the visor of his helmet. The other supporting characters are, however, something of a waste of space, but then this is a film that focuses on the two leads who are at times completely captivating. And it does raise interesting questions about free will, creation and critically: can a person love someone that looks, behaves and holds the memory of a dead loved one, but really isn't that person?

The negatives? Well, unlike 2001, I’m not sure this is a film I would necessarily want to see more than once. I’m struggling for a word here but it’s all a bit… solemn, not really provocative enough. Without giving away too much, the twist at the end doesn’t really work, is just too tidy and fails to leave enough to reflect upon. And to justify its ending, the script needed more about the mysterious power of the planet Solaris itself.

Still, worth a look for the brilliant central performances. But see it at the cinema - I suspect this film needs the expanse of the big screen and will lose much of its impact on DVD. With that in mind, I can thoroughly recommend UCI Greenwich Filmworks (about ten minutes walk from North Greenwich tube and the Millenium Dome) for what seemed like the biggest screen I have ever seen a film on. Now a possible venue for watching LOTR: The Return of the King when it comes out later this year.

THE MAGDALENE SISTERS
Tuesday 25th February 2003
Curzon Soho, London W1 VISIT

It has often seemed that the Catholic Church has a greater preference for the fire and brimstone and divine retribution of the Old Testament. The fear of everlasting damnation, particularly in countries where the church and state were until very recently inseparable, was a powerful means of exercising absolute control over people’s lives. Peter Mullan’s powerful film ‘The Magdalene Sisters’ portrays a Catholic Ireland in the mid 1960s where New Testament notions of forgiveness, mercy and love have no place. Nowhere was this clearer than for the 30,000 allegedly ‘fallen’ women forcibly detained in the Church’s notorious Magdalene asylums, where they were made, often for years and without pay, to launder clothes in penance for their ‘sins’. None had committed any crime but were seen as ‘sluts and whores’, held for having children outside of marriage or for ‘promiscuous’ behaviour.

The film concentrates on four women sent to the Dublin Magdalene Laundry. One arrives after she is raped by her cousin at a wedding; one after her ‘bastard’ baby is taken from her; another is a emotionally damaged ‘backward’ girl who is abused by the laundry’s priest; and one is an orphan seen as overly flirtatious with boys. Stripped of their humanity in rough uniforms and subjected to endless work, beatings and humiliation, they find themselves trapped in what was effectively a concentration camp – one that not only punished but also sought in an Orwellian way to make the inmates love and embrace their punishment. There is one moment where one of the four has the opportunity to escape through a unguarded entrance but cannot leave, her individuality already robbed from her by the conditioning she has endured. Another ‘sister’ who has been held for over forty years, believes the nuns who run the laundry are her friends, even when she lies alone, dying.

I don’t think I have seen a film that made me quite so angry as this. It’s not just that the unfolding story is so harrowing and the sense of injustice so brilliantly illustrated. It’s also because the story is relentless, it just keeps rolling over you like a bank of thick fog. There are moments of humour but the director never lets you forget the horror facing his main characters. So it is amusing to see the head of the laundry, Sister Bridget (a fantastic performance by Geraldine McEwan), in throes of joy watching Ingrid Bergman play a pious nun in a special Christmas screening of the sentimental film The Belles of St Mary’s. But then you are jarred back and realise that this terrible individual sees her acts of degradation and violence as equally pious. Funnier still is the act of revenge against Father Fitzroy, whose laundry is mixed with poisonous weeds to cause an agonising rash during an outdoor service and his subsequent naked dash across the fields. But this is followed by a overwhelming scene where Crispina, who has that morning been abused by the priest and therefore also suffers because of the sabotage of his clothes, begins to shout over and over again, ‘you are not a man of God’ as the embarrassed townspeople look on. It’s almost too painful to watch when later, her punishment is forcible removal to a mental hospital.

It is hard to believe that the last of the Magdalene asylums did not close until 1996 and harder still to comprehend how ordinary people and the Irish state condoned their existence. Perhaps the most frightening aspect of this story is that parents were so indoctrinated by the Church that they could willingly abandon their own children to slavery. ‘The Magdalene Sisters’ is therefore as much a warning against religious fundamentalism (and a reminder that the ‘Taliban’ are far from unique) as the story of a terrible crime.

I am sure that there will be protests about this film but I would strongly recommend it as an important reminder of the danger of seeing religion as just fluffy old vicars, coffee mornings and Songs of Praise. Terrible cruelty can be committed by the 'pious' in the name of salvation. Never were the words of the prayer that say ‘deliver us from evil’ more hypocritical or more bitter. For thousands of Irish women, no deliverance ever came.

THE HOURS
Tuesday 18th February 2003
Stratford Picture House, London E15 VISIT

One of the real benefits of trying to stick to ‘One Film a Week’ is seeing an unexpectedly enjoyable film that I would otherwise have avoided. ‘The Hours’ certainly fits into this category. I fully expected the title to be a warning about how long this film would seem to drag on for, the more so after failing to understand the critical acclaim About Schmidt has received. But fortunately, this turned out to be a wonderfully written, intelligent film.

It tells the interwoven stories of three women whose lives are linked by Virgina Woolf’s book, ‘Mrs Dalloway’, moving between the novelist herself in the 1920s, a reader of her book in the 1950s and a modern woman whose life seems to echo that of the book’s heroine, Clarissa Dalloway. Nicole Kidman, complete with the now notorious prosthetic nose, gives a powerful performance as the suicidal Virginia, convalescing in Richmond after a breakdown. Suffocated by suburbia and impatient to return to the vitality of London, Virginia is still inspired to write her novel, the story of a day in the life of a woman hosting a party but feeling increasingly out of control. Meanwhile in 1951, pregnant housewife Laura Brown is reading Woolf’s novel and planning a party for her son and loving husband, whilst also contemplating suicide. Julianne Moore captures wonderfully the sense of utter bewilderment at the way her life has turned out. The final strand and the best part of the film is Meryl Streep’s Clarissa Vaughan, nicknamed ‘Mrs Dalloway’ by poet and manipulative former lover Richard (a scarily skeletal Ed Harris), who is dying of AIDS. Clarissa is not only arranging a party in Richard’s honour to celebrate his latest prestigious poetry prize, but also caring for him and trying to maintain her own relationship (with CJ from The West Wing, would you believe?) Like Virginia and Laura, Clarissa finds herself forced to "face the hours" of her life, the ghosts of her past and the sense that she has missed out on happiness.

The film’s themes are explored as the parallels between the three women’s lives are made clearer, including a link between Laura and Clarissa that I won’t reveal. If it all sounds rather slight, then it’s because I haven’t really done justice to David Hare’s clever screenplay. The soundtrack too, composed by Philip Glass, is the best I have heard since Amelié. All in all, this is a film whose Oscar nominations are more than justified, so don’t be put off by the critics’ endorsement. Now and again, they are right. This really is worth seeing.

DIRTY PRETTY THINGS
Saturday 8th February 2003
UGC Trocadero, London W1 VISIT

On the day that Tony Blair announced his intention to halve by September the number of asylum seekers coming to Britain, ‘Dirty Pretty Things’ seemed like an appropriate film to go and see. But what I really want to know is this: does the actor Ross Kemp (who once played Phil Mitchell in EastEnders) ever argue with his wife about the treatment of refugees and asylum seekers? I know this might seem a weird question, but stick with me for a moment. You see, Kemp apparently really wants to be a Labour MP but unfortunately he is married to Rebekah Wade, who in her capacity as editor of Britain’s most charmless newspaper is currently running the Sun’s sickening, racist ‘Asylum Madness’ campaign. Now maybe Kemp does get into blazing rows over dinner and maybe he just doesn’t want to rock the boat. Whatever. But if the man has an ounce of decency in him, he might want make a point of taking the wife out this Valentine’s Day to see ‘Dirty Pretty Things’, just so she can be reminded that refugees and asylum seekers are first and foremost people like you and me.

Except not quite like you and me, as this excellent film reveals. ‘Dirty Pretty Things’ is set in a twilight world where people live just to survive and are disposable, invisable, exploitable labour for London’s service industries. It tells the story of Okwe, an Nigerian doctor and illegal immigrant, who drives a mini-cab by day and by night works as a porter in the Baltic Hotel, where he is friend to a Turkish woman, Senay, who works as a maid (played by Audrey Tautou, the star of the brilliant Amélie). Thanks to the khat leaves he chews to stay awake and so keep working, Okwe also manages to find time to play chess with another friend, a funny and philosophical Chinese mortuary assistant. Then one day, Okwe discovers a human heart blocking the toilet in one of the hotel rooms but, as an illegal, can do nothing – just as he can do nothing about the discovery that the sinister hotel manager is at the centre of illicit trade in human organs. Or just as those desperate people who sell their kidneys for the prospect of a passport cannot go to hospital, even when faced with death, for fear of being deported – placing Okwe, with his medical training, in an terrible ethical dilemma.

However, this film succeeds primarily because it is a gripping thriller with a twisting and intelligent plot, rather than some sort of worthy documentary on asylum and immigration. From the moment that Okwe discovers the secret of the Baltic Hotel, through the great moment of revenge on the hotel manager to the extremely sad ending, ‘Dirty Pretty Things’ is utterly engrossing. Chiwetel Ejiofor, who plays Okwe, is a revelation and surely destined for stardom, whilst Audrey Tautou is wonderful too in what I think is her first English-speaking role. Perhaps the only negative I can think of amongst so many well-developed characters was the portrayal of the two immigration officers chasing Senay. Although on screen only briefly, both were little more than pretty ropey pantomime villains. My dad was an immigration officer before he retired and although we had the most tremendous rows about his job, I can’t remember him going to work looking like an extra from the Sweeney!

I was very moved by this film. I think that Ross Kemp would be too, although I am less sure about Rebekah Wade. For anyone without the hardened heart of a Sun editor, this is one of the best films you will see all year.

Highly recommended.

CATCH ME IF YOU CAN
Thursday 30th January 2003
Stratford Picture House, London E15 VISIT

Steven Spielberg's latest film, 'Catch Me If You Can,' is very different to last year's hugely entertaining Minority Report but definitely still falls into the ‘great story and confident storytelling’ bracket. It is based on the escapades of Frank Abagnale Junior, who in the mid-1960s impersonated an airline pilot, a doctor and a lawyer to successfully fleece millions of dollars from US banks in a series of cheque frauds. What makes the story remarkable is that when he was finally caught and sentenced to 12 years in prison (in solitary confinement), Abagnale was only 19 years old. This is a frothy, satirical and enjoyable film, with Leonardo DiCaprio starring as Abagnale and demonstrating that, when properly cast (in this case as a much younger character), he can be both talented and charming. Everything, in fact, that he failed to convey in Gangs of New York (see below).

What also makes this film a success is that, as well as the humour and the Fugitive style plot – with Abagnale always one step ahead of the FBI – the story is also strongly character-driven. Devastated by his parents’ divorce, Frank Junior runs away from home and whilst it is clear that the first of his scams are to find money to survive, his efforts are later to try and unite his mother and the father he adores. Frank Senior (wonderfully played by Christopher Walken) has not been averse to passing a bad cheque or two in his time and Spielberg implies that the father is in part to blame for the behaviour of the son. As young Frank Junior becomes ever more skilled as a forger and impersonator, however, the life of a fugitive becomes an increasingly lonely one, with only fleeting meetings with a father sinking further into depression. Abagnale's only moments of genuine honesty are with dogged but dull FBI agent Carl Hanratty (a strong and very effective performance by Tom Hanks), with whom a ‘surrogate father’ relationship develops despite Hanratty’s relentless pursuit of his suspect.

There are many great comic scenes in Abagnale’s journey from airline pilot to ER doctor and eventually to Louisiana state prosecutor. The most memorable include a rather different use of a bath full of model aeroplanes, Abagnale’s attempt to transform himself into James Bond (complete with the Aston Martin DB5), his ability to even make a profit when propositioned by a call girl and his final escape from Miami airport, surrounded by a bevy of air hostesses. Throughout, DiCaprio gives a thoroughly convincing performance of a crook that everyone can nevertheless admire, even though the idea that all Abagnale’s crimes were ‘victimless’ doesn’t really hold water. For example, when almost exposed whilst posing as a doctor, when a child is brought in covered in blood, you realise that Abagnale always played with people’s lives with no thought of the consequences for anyone but himself. He was also willing to unceremoniously drop people, like the trusting and emotionally vulnerable fiancée he later claimed to love, when they were no longer useful to him (and perhaps because acknowledging this would distract from the heroic but tragic figure Spielberg is painting, we never do find out what happened to her).

Still, this film is well acted, properly paced and a very entertaining period piece, with great music and even stylish opening titles, all of which is more than can be said for January’s other DiCaprio film (the one with all the Oscar nominations - why?!). The way that Abagnale becomes poacher-turned-gamekeeper by working for the FBI, using his skills to catch other fraudsters, is handled with tension and humour. And the answer to the one question that Hanratty can't answer - how DID Abagnale fake his Louisiana Bar exams - is intriguing: he was so clever that he apparently studied for just two weeks and passed them legitimately. No wonder he was such a talented grifter.

Definitely worth watching.

ABOUT SCHMIDT
Saturday 25th January 2003
Newham Showcase Cinema, London E6 VISIT

All films are made to entertain, but I have this theory I would like to share – great stories and confident storytelling can cope with only average or even mediocre acting. This explains why big dumb summer blockbusters can so often be immensely entertaining. However, great acting on its own is never enough. It must have a good story. Of course, sometimes directors can get both story AND acting wrong – and then you get Star Wars: The Phantom Menace....

Although I could never work out the fuss about Jack Nicholson’s performance in As Good As It Gets, I decided to see About Schmidt, his latest film, for three reasons. Firstly because of it’s star, one of the most watchable actors ever to grace the screen. Secondly, because his performance was reputedly Oscar-worthy. And finally, on the strength of Peter Bradshaw’s five-star review on the Guardian website where Bradshaw claims the film “ might just turn out to be an American classic.”

Praise indeed, hard to live up to and, unfortunately, far from the truth. Whilst there are undoubtedly some very funny and observant moments in this melancholic comedy, I have to disagree with the overwhelmingly positive reviews this film has received. About Schmidt is neither as good, as clever or as entertaining as the critics have claimed or the director may have hoped for.

The film revolves around Nicholson’s character, Warren Schmidt, whose life faces crisis point when he retires as Vice President of an insurance firm in Omaha, Nebraska. Reminiscent of Willie Loman in Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, Schmidt finds himself without a purpose after years of routine, filling in puzzles and following orders from his wife, Helen, whose many quirks he suddenly finds immensely irritating. Helen has her heart set on travelling around the country in thr giant Winnebego parked in the driveway. But whilst Schmidt wonders whether he did the right thing marrying her, he is also facing the prospect that his daughter, Jeannie, is soon to be married to a ponytailed waterbed salesman he does not consider worthy of her.

Suddenly wife Helen dies, leaving Schmidt with a big empty house and the discovery that she had, many years ago, been having an affair with his best friend. Revelling in his new-found freedom, Schmidt completely lets himself go, gorges on junk food and (after previously being forced at his wife’s wish to urinate sitting down) pisses all over the bathroom. His innermost thoughts he writes down in long letters to Ndugu, a Tanzanian orphan he sponsors for $22 a month through a charity he sees advertised on late-night TV. Then, hoping to be closer to Jeannie before her wedding, Schmidt embarks on a road trip to see her but, in the course of a soul-searching journey, he ‘discovers’ things about himself he had never before realised.

Whilst Nicholson plays an shallow old man extremely effectively, the trouble I have with About Schmidt is that, in the absence of a more dynamic and involving story, his slack-jawed, emotionless stare soon becomes very boring to watch. Some have apparently seen this as great acting – though half the time it seems like Nicholson is barely acting at all – but on its own it is just not enough to entertain. By contrast, the character of Warren Schmidt does come to life when Nicholson’s rich melodic ‘Jack’ voice narrates the ranting letters Schmidt writes to Ngudu, which illuminate the complex and often hilarious thoughts inside his head. Sadly, these brief scenes reveal a great deal more about the character of Schmidt than much of the rest of Nicholson's time on the screen.

Another problem is the number of tired clichés in the story, from the awkward retirement dinner, the uncomfortable conversation with his replacement at the insurance company (to illustrate Schmidt is no longer needed), to his discovery of his old files dumped with the company rubbish (to really ram the point home!) Later, when Warren drives to the town where he was born, hoping to find some solace through the recollection of his past, he discovers, rather like the hitman Martin Blank in the film Grosse Point Blank, a store where his childhood home once stood. No really, that old chestnut. By this point, I couldn’t help hoping that this scene would suddenly spark into life with Warren Schmidt engaged in a gunfight with a Basque-whacking killer and with the store blown to smithereens.

There are, it has to be said, some fine moments in this film. Jeannie’s sexually opinionated mother-in-law to be, Roberta, played by Kathy Bates with characteristic skill, muses on the state of Jeannie’s sex life and attempts to seduce Schmidt in her hot tub - both scenes are very funny. Schmidt’s meeting with a younger Winnebago couple, who invite him to a dinner with disastrous consequences, is almost too unbearable to watch. And Schmidt’s toast to his daughter at her wedding reception is genuinely riveting – at any moment he seems about to say what he truly thinks and to ruin her day. Once again, though, it is the opportunity to watch Nicholson both move AND talk – basically to act – that brings this moment alive.

However, the scene where Schmidt tries to conduct a séance with his dead wife, sitting on top of the roof of his Winnebago with a collection of her tacky figurines – and then receives a ‘sign’ in the form of a shooting star – is the kind of sappy nonsense worthy only of a bad TV film. And whilst the final scene, where Schmidt receives a painting from Ngudu and a letter written on his behalf, does bring a lump to the throat, it felt like it was intended to manipulate the audience's emotions rather than say something important or insightful. I was left wondering: is that really it? Are we really left with the unbelievably banal idea that Schmidt can find genuine redemption for a life without meaning because he has money, because of the meagre sponsorship of an African child? Is this really what the Guardian meant by an American classic, comparable to, say, a proper classic examining a man facing a crisis in his middle-class suburban life – like American Beauty?

Warren Schmidt’s feels he is a failure, that his achievements have been modest, that he has built little of substance and has even failed in his mission to stop his daughter’s marriage. At one point, Schmidt tells himself "once I am dead, it will be as though I never existed."

Frankly, as soon as I have been to the pictures a few more times, I fear the same can be said about this film.

8 MILE
Tuesday 21st January 2003
Stratford Picture House, London E15 VISIT

So for the last ten days, I have been desperately avoiding reviews of 8 Mile, the first film to star Marshall Mathers III, aka the rapper Eminem. In fact, one morning last week I came close to cracking my head on the radiator trying to switch off the radio at 7am, as even BBC Radio 4’s Today programme joined in the water-cooler gossip that Eminem’s performance is worthy of an Oscar nomination. Is this, incidentally, what people mean by dumbing down at the BBC? In a way, I am almost sorry to have missed this particular debate, as it would probably have been as funny as the time the opera-loving Today presenter, James Naughtie, tried discussing Ms Dynamite’s Brit award nomination, evidently without a clue what he was talking about.

So why all the effort? After all, checking the reviews is usually essential. But for some reason, I really wanted to make up my own mind about this film. Maybe it’s because I liked Eminem’s intelligent film spin-off single, ‘Lose Yourself.’ Maybe it’s because normally, we understand instinctively that the words ‘rap star’ are about as likely as ‘pop princess’ to share a sentence with the words ‘acting talent’ (if you saw Britney Spears’ lame film Crossroads, you’ll know what I mean). Could Eminem be the exception? Anyway, I had to know – 8 Mile had suddenly become my first ‘must see’ film of the year.

And you know what? Eminem gave a surprising and very accomplished performance for a first-time actor. Perhaps not Oscar material but, considering the pretty good performances that members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences sometimes choose over great ones, not beyond the realms of possibility. He gives a credible and, considering his hyperactive image to date, very restrained portrayal of circumstances that are obviously very familiar.

Set in 1995 around Detroit's Eight Mile Road, the dividing line between the city limits and the suburbs, the film is centred on Eminem’s character Jimmy ‘Rabbit’ Smith, who lives in a trailer park in a rundown, multi-racial neighbourhood. Rabbit is desperately trying to escape his dead-end factory job by breaking through in the highly competitive world of hip-hop and the film begins and ends at a local club, The Shelter, where rappers engage in 45 second "battles" for lyrical supremacy. Between the painful first scene, where Rabbit suffers the ultimate embarrassment of choking on stage, and the perhaps inevitable triumph, Rabbit hangs out with his friends and copes with problems involving work, his drunken mother (played by Kim Basinger) and his new girlfriend Alex.

As well as Eminem’s charismatic performance, 8 Mile is intelligent enough to understand that the issue that defines much of the US is race and that hip-hop is unquestionably the soundtrack of urban black America. A white rapper like Rabbit is inevitably an outsider who rightly has something to prove to his friends and rivals, as well as to himself. Refreshingly, there is no obvious happy ending, no record contract or sudden fame – in the end, Rabbit wins a rap battle and then goes back to work at the factory. The cinematography of the film, meanwhile, looks great, with washed-out colours capturing the neighbourhood’s decay and there are some very funny moments, such the drive-by shooting of a police car – with a paintball gun. Other comic scenes involve the film’s idiot jester and only other white guy, Cheddar Bob, who always says the wrong thing and later accidentally shoots himself in the groin. And the moment that drew a collective shudder of horror throughout the audience, when Rabbit's Mum tries to discuss her sex life with her son, saying her younger boyfriend “won't go down on me,” is a classic!

Negatives? Well there are a few. Although the film drops (almost) all of the homophobia associated with Eminem, the misogyny is still very evident, with all the female characters (the lying ex, the cheating girlfriend, the mother looking for a free ride from her boyfriend’s insurance payment) coming across extremely badly. The deeply pessimistic idea that the neighbourhood is beyond saving, that the only way ahead for the few with talent or looks is to leave the less fortunate behind and escape, is just taken as read. It is summed up by the meaningless destruction of burning down a derelict house, one that in its better days Rabbit says he had aspired to live in. The occasions when Eminem actually gets to show the lyrical talent that has made him a global star are brilliant but sadly too infrequent. And the final individualist message – that to succeed you just have to go it alone – is somewhat strange considering Eminem would probably still be working in KFC and living in a trailer were it not for the patronage and support of NWA’s Dr Dre.

But still, considering the terrible star-vehicle films other 'artistes' have offered in the last few years, it seems unfair to be overly critical of an otherwise very entertaining couple of hours. Moreover, there is the simple fact that hip-hop could take lounge jazz (playing in the Pizza Express next door to the cinema last night), drag it round back behind the bins - and kick the living shit out of it....

Recommended - definitely worth seeing.

CITY OF GOD (CIDADE DE DEUS)
Saturday 18th January 2003
UGC West India Quay, London E14 VISIT

I had intended to see 8 Mile on Saturday night but my regular film-viewing compadré Z is equally curious to know whether Eminem can act. So instead I headed for the windswept and soulless UGC cinema on the Isle of Dogs, for a subtitled film in Portuguese I had repeatedly heard was good. It turned out to be stunning.

Cidade de Deus is the story of the corrupting influence of violence on life in the Rio de Janeiro slum known as the City of God, beginning in the 1960s when it is just a dusty rural township with no roads or electricity. Three boys – L’il Dice, Benny and Rocket, the film’s narrator – are the brothers of small-time hoodlums known as the Tender Trio, who rob bottled-gas lorries. L’il Dice, however, aspires to more. Given a gun and the chance to kill for the first time, he returns to a robbery at a motel to casually murder its occupants, giggling at the power the gun gives him. By the 1970s, the slum has grown and the influx of cocaine and weed (explained brilliantly by a story of the changing ownership of one apartment by different drug-dealers) has provided opportunities for those willing to use violence. L’il Dice, having killed all but one of his rivals, has become L’il Zé, vicious and paranoid and the most important criminal in the city. There are, though, still rules in the City of God and many residents welcome the absence of robbery and other crimes that L’il Zé can impose but the corrupt police cannot. In one almost unbearable scene, L’il Zé captures two young children who have been shoplifting and, standing over them as they cry with fear, punishes them by shooting one in the foot and ordering a new young recruit to kill the other.

Rocket’s life follows a different path. Having seen his brother gunned down by the police, he avoids violence and, wherever possible, L’il Zé. Even in his one attempt at ‘flirting with crime’, he fails to hold up a store because the girl behind the counter is ‘foxy’ and cannot rob a bus conductor, Knockout Ned, because he is too cool. Rocket aspires instead to be a photographer – and to get laid. His failed attempts to pull the beautiful Angelica are among a number of smaller stories that make Cidade de Deus such a great film. It is not just about the relentless violence of the slum, even as it progresses from a poor district into a war zone with children running around with guns. The film is also about growing up, with wonderfully colourful characters and many moments of humour, such as the transformation of Benny, L’il Zé’s best friend, into the man ‘too cool to be a hood‘. Violence is never far from the surface, however, and Rocket’s own opportunity to fulfil his dream comes when his photos of L’il Zé’s gang are accidentally printed in a city newspaper. In the midst of a war for revenge and the control of the drugs business where the old rules have been abandoned, shooting hoodlums with a camera offers Rocket a way out.

Cidade de Deus is undoubtedly shocking, although the violence is never glamorised. Indeed, the film has in the story of Knockout Ned, a man opposed to violence against 'innocent citizens' who in seeking vengeance for the murder of two familiy members by L’il Zé becomes the catalyst for a bloody gang war, an important message about the way that the path of violence inevitably corrupts those who choose to follow it. Most shocking perhaps is the sight of young children wielding guns as if they were toys, which has an even greater impact when you realise, as the film says at the end, that it is based on a true story. But Cidade de Deus is also very moving and brilliantly constructed with wonderful storytelling that binds together the links between people and events. Anyone put off by subtitles (and I usually am) should put aside their concerns. This film is simply too good to miss.

Unquestionably destined to be one of the films of the year.

GANGS OF NEW YORK
Saturday 11th January 2003
Stratford Picture House, London E15 VISIT

In spite of all the hype, I really wanted to like Martin Scorsese's long awaited film about the gang violence, squalor and corruption of 19th century New York. And it wasn't bad. The sets and the costumes look fantastic and the set-piece gang battle between Protestant 'Nativists' and Catholic immigrants at the beginning of the film is shocking and bloody. There are some great quirky moments too, such as the comedian John Sessions dressed as Abraham Lincoln, suspended like an angel above a theatre stage, or the gangfight interrupted by an escaped elephant from PT Barnum's American Museum.

The problem is the terrible miscasting of Leonard DiCaprio as a street tough. Cameron Diaz is also miscast in the love-interest role as the inevitable tart-with-a-heart (she looks like someone dressed up 'Oirish' for the tourists in a modern St Patricks Day Parade) but I could watch a miscast Cameron Diaz all day! Not Leo though. He's as convincing a vicious gang member as John Wayne was as a Roman centurion, or Euan MacGregor is at Alec Guinness impersonations. He's even less convincing than Dick Van Dyke's "Cockney" accent. My neighbour's daughter could kick Leo's arse. And she's only five.

Worse still for DiCaprio, Daniel Day-Lewis, an actor who has until recently been in semi-retirement, manages to steal every scene he is in. He does so partly by hamming madly but also by showing that, even after spending the last few years mending shoes in Italy, he can act better than any load of old cobblers Leo can offer.

The other problem is the plot. The central story is about Amsterdam Vallon (DiCaprio) seeking to avenge the killing of his father by William 'Bill the Butcher' Cutting (Day-Lewis). Waiting for the obvious showdown between the two protagonists, I thought the middle of the film was way too slow and then the last third tried to pack too much in - there were too many distractions. It seemed that Scorsese had these ideas for set-pieces (the competitive amateur firemen, the brothel scene, the boxing match, the election rally) that didn't advance the story but looked great so they stayed in. Some might have been OK to give a flavour of the times but there were just too many.

The one part of the plot that was just annoying was the attempt at the end of the film to portray the Draft Riots, the worst civil disturbance in US history sparked by the introduction of the compulsory drafting of troops for the Civil War, as in some way 'noble'. Whilst it is true that the rich were able to buy their way out of the draft and so had their homes attacked by the poor, the main target of the mainly Irish mob's fury were black Americans, hundreds of whom were lynched. Scorsese hints at this but prefers the more 'romantic' version of the story. For a film that claims to show the 'true' story of an America born in the streets, that aims to debunk the myth of the great American 'melting pot,' this sanitising of history seems somewhat hypocritical

Still, I guess I'm glad I've seen it, because it looks fabulous. But I'd recommend anyone else to wait until it comes out on DVD.

DONNIE DARKO
Saturday 4th January 2003
Odeon Covent Garden, London WC1

At the end of Donnie Darko, the titles rolled and the lights came on and almost no-one got up and left. Ten minutes after the end of the screening, there were still groups of people in their seats, talking, trying to make sense of a brilliant but strange, intense and confusing film. Donnie Darko is definitely a film to be seen more than once, so when I got home, the first thing I did was order a Region 1 copy from the internet. And yes, it DOES make more sense the second time!

The plot: October 1988. Donnie Darko (Jake Gyllenhaal), on medication and in therapy as a result of mental health problems, sleepwalks and thus avoids death when an aircraft engine falls on his house. But no plane with a missing engine can be found. Donnie is then told - by a 'daylight hallucination' in the form of a malevolent giant rabbit called Frank - that the world will soon end. As the clock ticks down and plagued by nightmares, Donnie becomes fascinated by the possibilities of time travel after being given a book written by Grandma Death, a reclusive who was formerly a teacher at his school. All this is set against the backdrop of suburban, New Age obsessed, hypocritical middle America in the late Eighties. And the aircraft engine may or may not be from the future.

Sorry, it's no good. You'll have to go and see it for yourself.

The soundtrack is great too, although I guess I'm biased as I think I bought most of the tracks as an Eighties teenager. But any film that starts with Echo & the Bunnymen's brilliant "Killing Moon" and by the end can make a sappy version of Tears for Fears' "Mad World" sound deeply moving is obviously destined for cult status.

Brilliant film. Watch it at least twice.