Fringe Squinting

Did beheading a goblin cause a Zimbabwean house to explode? No. Via Who Forted.

Medvedev taunts alien enthusiasts by telling journos that Russia are forcing the US to come clean about ET ‘contacts’.  Via Anomalist.

Some guy has been staring at Mars pics waaay too long and thinks he’s found statues, fossils blah blah. AboveTopSecret

Odd geologic erratic found in Russia deemed, perhaps unsurprisingly a UFO tooth-wheel what ever that is. Via Reddit

Huffpo have a summary of recent lunar anomalies.

Lengthy, kinda interesting but bonkers article mashing South American prehistory, pyramid grids and UFOS. Via Reddit.

A Bilderberg super-fan has made a pretty picture from their corporate/political interrelationships. Via Reddit.

Featureless Features

I quite enjoyed Andrew Dominik’s snail paced western The Assassination of Jesse James blah blah and even thought Pitt did a decent job but their recent reunion on comedy thriller Killing Them Softly is a surprisingly clumsy and cliched affair. When two idiots rob a mob run poker match Pitt’s fixer is called in to clean up the mess but his employers and employees only lead to frustration. Though nicely filmed It’s a right rambling mess with a unfounded somewhat smug reliance on the ‘characters’ to entertain but is hamstrung by a navel gazing script that allows the assembled talent too much room to overact, underplay and phone it in variously. Shiny bland garbage that even skimps on the violence. 

 

Director Martin McDonagh’s excellent In Bruges was a much needed hit for Colin Farrell but their reteam effort Seven Psychopaths is, like Killing Them, a lazy self satisfied dud that coasts by on ‘quirky’ characters and lacks the poignancy that underpinned their previous comedy thriller. Farrell plays a screenwriter struggling with his next script but finds inspiration, irritation and some jeopardy whilst in the company of his dog-napping, motor mouth friend, Sam Rockwell after he pinches a gangster’s mutt, throw Walken and Woody into the mix and an occasionally amusing, utterly predictable caper ensues. My expectations were probably too high going into this but still there’s little to recommend it. Half hearted hokum.

Doltish Double

Seth Macfarlane peddles his particular brand of shtick onto the big screen with the foul mouthed fable Ted. A young boy's wish comes true when his ursine companion comes to life but 20 years later the bear has some nasty habits, a potty mouth and seems to be dragging his friend down. Wahlberg's acting isn't much better than the CGI bear's and though there's a couple of decent laughs the script consistently aims low and I found it a depressingly tawdry watch. Probably quite enjoyable when drunk.

There's  a few more dull witted chuckles in 321...Frankie Go Boom but it has a meanness of spirit that really shouldn't be encouraged. Chris Dowd stars as an unrepentant bunghole who thrives on humiliating his brother on camera and on his return to the family home post rehab he recommences the torture despite being a fully grown adult. Lurching from jape to jape the script never really picks up momentum and it, like Ted, prefers the low hanging fruit of pratfalls and crudity to crafting any decent character comedy. Instantly forgettable nonsense with sour note.

Drivelling Low Lights

Sometimes even I am surprised by the lazy, craptaculars that get churned out by Hollywood machine these days but Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter was quite astonishing in it’s vacant, soulless idiocy. Retelling the story of an American hero with some fang action thrown in probably seemed a good idea on paper but it’s a pitiful, by the numbers plotted pile of steaming dung that has literally no redeeming merits and will no doubt be an endless source of embarrassment for the director Bekmambetov, producer Burton and the talented cast including Brits Sewell and Cooper. Avoid.

Resident Evil: Retribution is a similarly crummy action flick with Jovovich and Anderson seemingly deluded into thinking that there’s mileage left in this weary franchise. Seguing directly from the 4th the action starts with Alice rescued/kidnapped from the wreckage of aircraft carrier by the Umbrella Corp and her subsequent monster stomping escape. Paper thin characters stumble through predictable set pieces with the usual fan favourite critters making intermittent appearances and though I’ve nothing against the games or some of the earlier film efforts this is a complete waste of celluloid that’s neither scary, thrilling, inventive nor even that grisly

Cockamamie 70's

I was unaware that Bruce Lee had written a script shortly before his death but I'm pretty sure that Circle of Iron wasn't quite what the film he had in mind. The film opens with a martial arts contest with the competitors vying for the opportunity to read a book of wisdom hidden from the rest of the world. The loser of the final bout follows the victor on his travels to the books hiding place and takes on the quest when his chum carks it early on. The script and acting are painfully piss poor especially from the muscle bound lead, Jeff Cooper (who sports a 'do that scuppers any of attempts at profundity) and David Carradine's multiple turns aren't much better but worst of all the plot is a lumpy mish mash of Eastern thought that I'm sure doesn't reflect Lee's intention or ambitions. Only worth watching if you want to see something spectacularly bad.

Dr Black, Mr Hyde is a blaxploitation-era version of RLS's classic tale and despite it's obvious budget constraints manages a half decent job. Our protagonist is developing a cure for liver disease but under pressure for results takes a dose himself and finds the side effects of super strength and (amusingly unconvincing) honkeydom quite exhilarating and predictably chaos reigns as family, friends and colleagues feel the wrath of this changed man. Though the script and plot are decidedly of it's era Bernie Casey is surprisingly good and all in all I quite enjoyed it. Not exactly a classic but if you want something with a little period charm there's worse out there.

Sloppy Seconds

Sequels are always tricky and seldom successful but given my fondness for the original anime I was quite looking forward to the second Gantz film, Perfect Answer. If you haven't seen the first film there's a mysterious black ball that's resurrecting citizens of Toyko to battle aliens in gory, tech assisted, head popping combat, some die and some survive but no-one's really sure what's actually going on. The sequel rejoins the squad as they endeavour to cash in their accumulated points to bring their chums back to life and although it still looks great and the acting is reasonable enough the insane fight scenes have been toned down and most of the (overlong) film is frittered away on exposition and explanation. Maybe if they'd decided on a trilogy of live action films they could've done the source material justice rather than cram the remaining plot into this uneven, fumbled finale.

More glossy action festoons Wrath of the Titans the follow up to the mediocre Clash. The wooden Worthington returns as Perseus who has to rescue Neeson's Zeus from the clutches of his demented brother Hades and his own snotty son Aries. Like before the shiny sfx and monster bashing action are supposed to distract from the papery plot and the by-the-numbers script but it's so crushingly formulaic and just plain dull I had to try hard to get the end. Given the richness of Greek myths it's quite depressing that instead of continuing Perseus' story post Kraken or even adapting the story of another hero like Bellerophon or Cadmus they thought they'd should cobble something together.

Tversity Trinkets

Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol is a startling mediocre slice of big budget quiche. Tom and co are disavowed by the government after Kremlin kerfuffle and have to hoon about on their own, infiltrating & subterfuging in order to clear their names and save to world. Pegg returns along with the Tom Cruise-bot and the bow guy from Avengers and they all burble their way through a simplistic, by the numbers script making weak, ill judged jokes to pass the time between the set pieces. No shortage of budget but a complete lack of imagination - shiny dross.

Sam Shepard stars as an aging Butch Cassidy in the elegiac western Blackthorn. After faking his own death at the height of his career Butch slips into Boliva for a quiet life breeding horses but years later yearns to return to the States to see his remaining family, after being joined by an affable Spaniard however his plans soon fall apart. Though the plot is paper thin it's a beautifully crafted film with a thoughtful, restrained script and some excellent performances from Shepherd, Rea and Noreiga.

Soggy Whitebread

Guy Ritchie returns with another dose of Holmesian antics starring Jude Law & Downey Jnr in the meh-some Sherlock Holmes Game of Shadows. I guess the success of the first film emboldened Ritchie as he really let rips with his trademark guffing about, with a bullet time bonanza, not-as-smart-as-he-thinks-it-is dialogue and lumbering attempts at humour which results in him squeezing out an unabashed action film, largely devoid of intelligence and with a central character that bears little resemblance to Doyle's cerebral sleuth. The two leads are still as ill suited and uneasy in their respective roles as before but, thankfully, their ineptitude is somewhat offset by more admirable performances from Rapace and Harris. It's reasonable multiplex fodder I suppose but insubstantial and entirely forgettable.

Equally as half witted is Man on a Ledge, an almost 80's-dumb thriller about a revenge heist perpetrated by a on the run convict. Sam Worthington mumbles and looks confused throughout his balancing act and as the plot unfurls into mediocrity it drags in Ed Harris and Jamie Bell to the uninspired shenanigans. There's little tension and with a humdrum script that spoon feeds the plot out it's pretty much the epitome of mangled, soul less factory product being churned out in Hollywood these days. Out of the two, and it pains me to say this, I'd recommend Ritchie's film as at least it has some gloss.

Red Planet Blues

TV mini series adaptations of fiction classics should be a sure thing - reasonable production standards twinned with the time to explicate the plot rather than have it scrunched into the usual 90 mins. I've always been a little naive though and it turns out The Martian Chronicles is a cheap and cheesy rendition of a Ray Bradbury novel following over the exploration and colonisation of the Red Planet and the inevitable discovery of it's comically cliched inhabitants. Rock Hudson leads the cast with a empty eyed, hammy performance and over the ensuing 6 hours the script and acting never lifts above the am-dram and the sfx tragic but somehow it kept me watching, It does have a wispy, dreamlike atmosphere and the ghost planet motif is nicely done but I guess that's down to Bradbury's original anyways it's definitely one that's for just the nerds & nostalgists.

Edgar Rice Burrough's aging Martian adventure, John Carter, got a polish from Disney but a kicking by the critics and sure, it's big budget fluff. but it's not nearly as bad as some of the guff I've sat through. It doesn't make much sense, is stuffed to the gills with cheese and the main actor, Taylor Kitsch, can't act for toffee but that hardly distinguishes it from the majority of Hollywood's offerings. The titular hero gets zapped from the South into the middle of a Martian civil war and discovers his new found abilities might hold the key to ending the conflict and finding his way home blah blah blah. Given the amount of cash they spent on the snazzy sfx it's just a shame they never though of making something more than the average dumb blockbuster better film.

Signage

Blacks n Whites

Blair, English bigots & Tory Woes

Hahaha massive bawbag Tony Blair is cancelling his next signing event, nothing at all to do with the shoes, bottles and eggs that were thrown at him in Dublin of course. I'm liking the reshelving protest too - nice and childish.

Fat faced goon Rod Liddle writes about Scotland like well the English prick he is. Seems he's not alone in his anti-Scottish sentiments - independence, whether good or bad, looms closer I think. Mind you Salmond has retreated on his referendum pledge presumably thinking a wait will allow the coalition stink to ferment a little longer.

Amusing troubles for our Tory masters these days, the NOTW/Coulson phone hacking shenanigans have resurfaced again after the detailed NYT piece and Willy Hague found himself on the receiving end of Guido's particular brand of shitraking. Not that Fawkes has been put off by the tut-tutting with a sneering post today and a pic of the twin bedroom Hague supposedly shared with his driver.

Troublesome Tories

While the rest of the 24hr news monster is chewing over Julian "I Enjoy Crushing Bastards" Assange's mega release it appears our newly revived Tory Overlords are coming a little unstuck.

First up is army toff Rory Stewart who referred to his constituents as yokels who hold their trousers up with string - how charming - he's now recanted somewhat.

Another former army idiot is Patrick Mercer, who according to Guido, is having a little problem with the wife probably due to his dalliance with another MP's secretary. Tsk Tsk

Boris Johnson seems to have problems with his zipper too.

David Davis indiscreetly referred to the marriage of the two parties as as a "Brokeback Coalition"
- apparently there's chatter about starting a Brokeback Club for those skeptical of the wedding but bad mimer John Redwood won't be joining.

And finally the Charity Comission has released it's unsurprising finding that stupid neo-con organisation Atlantic Bridge has been shown to be little more than a front for the usual tedious right-wing wrong thinking. I sure hope members Willy Hague and Liam Fox are upset.

Oily grubby fingers & the usual 'tard politicians

Funny how I keep coming across this BP/Megrahi release story on US blogs but haven't heard much over here. So BP were angling for a good deal in Libya and might have asked for a favour from Gordo via Alex probably in exchange for actually paying a bit more tax or something else as tawdry. Yet another indicator that the Markets influence over western governments has become troublesome and needs some heavy pruning.

Mandy sure is whipping up some nice headlines with his newly published memoirs but none of it's particularly shocking, ohh Tony and Gordo hated each other duh. Moronic stuff from a egotist that's best ignored.

Tony might well be in a huff that Mandy beat him to publication, going so far to plead to King Fuckface himself Rupe Murdoch and actually being rebuffed hahaha twat, but he really should be concerned about the latest investigations into our complicity in torture, mmm Blair on trial at the Hague that'd be a refreshing sight but never gonna happen. Flaming Torch and Pitchfork have never been so tempting.

Some chump from the Institute of Community Cohesion is stating the obvious, that MP's live in a cosseted little bubble of demonic ambition twinned with inflated egos and a pack mentality. Well he phrases it differently.

The Rise of the Idiots

There's a funny/tragic/infuriating article on the Guradina site about two utter morons being appointed to Health Select Committee by our ConLib overlords. One is proud ignoramus Nadine Dorries, her of Humanzee fame and frequent spouter of abortion nonscience, the other is some guy called David Tredinnick who seems - astonishingly - to be just as thick as Dorries: his particular flavour of stupid involving asking taxpayers to pay £700 in expenses for software examining correlations between astrology and complimentary medicine citing as evidence the Moon's effect on the tides and from Hansard, Tredinnit during the alternative medicine debate

"In 2001 I raised in the House the influence of the moon, on the basis of the evidence then that at certain phases of the moon there are more accidents. Surgeons will not operate because blood clotting is not effective and the police have to put more people on the street."

So much for evidence based policy making then. Thanks Claggmeron.

Since the budget it's looking more and more likely that this magic coalition will collapse and personally I can't wait, the acrimonious blood letting will be marvellous to behold. If Clegg thinks his VAT u-turn stands well with Libdem voters he's delusional and it looks like the polls are beginning to show the result of their twisted little marriage. The usual excuses will be thrown out I'm sure but it'll lead catastrophe sooner than he thinks. The in-it-together budget itself is coming under increasing criticism too - Simon Hughes kicked off with some murmurings about tinkering with it, the IFS called it regressive and now we've got a Nobel prize winning economist calling it a crock of shit, my words not his. Oh happy days

Black and LaBute's Death

Lewis Black is one of the funnier Daily Show contributors so I was looking forward to his latest live dvd, Stark Raving Black, and it didn't disappoint he's still a righteously angry political commentator and fantastic at cutting through the insane levels of bullshit in American society. My only criticism could be that halfway through he drifts away from his political stuff & the performance softens a bit and the laughs less frequent but it's only for 20 mins or so out of 80 mins of shouty fun

After seeing Rock & Jordan bigging up their version of the 2007 farce Death at a Funeral on TV last week I thought I'd give the remake a go. I have watched the original and thought it was funny but slow to start and over-reliant on cheap gags. The remake, as far as I can remember, sticks almost exactly to the original plot and suffers from most of the same faults with the addition of some terrible performances from Martin Lawrence, whose always rubbish anyways and a tired occasionally incomprehensible one from Tracy Jordan. LaBute should hang his head in shame - if you're remaking a movie within 3 years of the original surely you have some ideas on how to improve it & if not why bother ? Mind you maybe he's got previous...

Cacophony of Cliches

Brooklyn's Finest is the latest by Training Day director Antoine Fuqua and it's was a little disappointing as it treads much the same ground as that enjoyable thriller but with added cliches and less focus. 3 cops played by Gere, Hawke & Cheadle are struggling with their jobs for one reason or another and are slowly drawn together for a ridiculous, plot holey denouement. The acting is solid from all three and it's well shot but ffsake the script and plot are so stereotypical, so over used that once the film starts you could pretty much guess the final third straight away.

Cold Prey is a Norwegian horror film that manages to squeeze in even more cliches than Brooklyn's Finest which really must have been quite an effort. A gang of chirpy snowboarders head into the wilderness looking for some tourist free slopes and after a leg snapping accident they decide to hole up in an abandoned ski-lodge hotel thing with the usual deranged killer stalking the corridors. Events take an even more predictable turn as the body count builds with neither the acting/script or scares lifting this above a painting-by-numbers exercise. Must have done quite well in Norway as there's a sequel I won't be watching.

General Meh Lection

Questioning my own sanity is one of my favourite pastimes so I was delighted to see I hadn't imagined Michael Caine's verbal mistakes during his endorsement of the Tory National Service policy shebang.

“I’ve actually seen a government who is interested. This government, I think, is doing a wonderful thing with the National Citizen service, so let’s give them a second chance.”

Well he's getting on a bit and these actors are hardly renowned for their brains are they?. Doesn't say much about the rich old thesp that he's prepared to emigrate if we tax him a single percentile point more on his millions. Quote taken from The Mirror's website.

Some dim wannabe Scottish Labour mp dude Mclennan has got the boot today for failing to understand Twitter. His expletive laden rants didn't go unread and after a quick think Labour HQ has decided he should go. Guido has some choice examples and points out he's a Rangers fan which frankly explains everything.

Gordo has been interviewed by Politics.co.uk and has repeated Mandy's appeal that peeps should vote Lib Dem wherever Labour can't win - he doesn't have much confidence in a Lab win then? Good advice though as I've love to see the Eton boys faces if they lost.

The brilliant B3TA has an interesting link in this weeks mailout - VoterPower shows exactly how much your vote counts by postcode - stupid old Labour should have done Electoral reform in their second term rather than try and chuck AV in at the last minute.

Further Chartage

Another great chart, courtesy of Io9, this time a handy guide for first contact with alien intelligence. BoingBoing has a rather amusing bingo game about those pernicious evo-psychologists

Shite in 3 flavours

Renowned moron Dubya returns to the world stage and not so subtly wipes his hand on Bill Clinton's shirt after shaking hands with a Haitian. Classy guy. Ta Metzger

As we're on the subject of shit here's a terrifying article via Gawker & WSJ about some poor farmer in the States who has a problem with 20ft bubbles of shit emerging from his dung pond. Poor sod is going to have to puncture them at some point I wish him luck. I once got a quad bike stuck in the edge of shitpile - not happy day.

More shit this time from the "brain" of Sarah Palin - ignoring the worrying signs of violence and abuse directed at pro-healthcare politicians she's put out a charming poster with gun sights over some of their districts. It appears that, bizarrely, Palin has secured herself a documentary series on Discovery - presumably it's going to be filled with slow motion animal killings and the bespoiling of the Alaskan environment. hat tip to the Dish.