Martin Grace 1942-2010

Martin Grace was a legendary stuntman. If you ever saw Indiana Jones or James Bond doing something eye-poppingly amazing, it was quite possibly Martin Grace you were watching. Indy clinging on to a massive statue as it crashes through a wall in Raiders Of The Lost Ark? Martin Grace. 007 Hanging off the side of a train in Octopussy? Martin Grace.

Sir, for dazzling a small boy with your incredible feats of derring-do, for cultivating a generation's love of the escapism of action films, and for your ability to make Roger Moore look heroic, The Incredible Suit salutes you.



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Pigeon Impossible / Alma

Pixar films are great, I think we can all agree on that. If we can't then it's no wonder there's so much war and violence in the world. CGI animated films by other studios, however, are less good. Dreamworks' Shrek and Shrek 2 are fine, but Madagascar? Happy Feet? Ice Age? They're like Tesco's Frosted Flakes to Pixar's Frosties.

I don't know why this is. There are obscenely skilled animators out there making great short films that could be employed by someone other than Pixar. I don't know, maybe they'll only work for Pixar and would rather live in a hovel eating Tesco Frosted Flakes than work for anyone else.

Man, I'm hungry.

Anyway. To illustrate my point, here's Pigeon: Impossible, a short made by the freakishly talented Lucas Martell. It's so Pixary it could have a cameo by John Ratzenberger, especially with its The Incredibles-esque music. It took Martell five years to make, so you'd better appreciate it.



Whereas Pigeon: Impossible could happily park itself before a feature-length "kids' film" like Toy Story or Up, Alma is a different teapot of turbot altogether. It's brilliant, beautiful and, well, I won't tell you what else it is. Watch it a second time knowing what you know and it's a completely different experience.



Alma was made by Spanish animator Rodrigo Blaas, which is probably the best name of anyone ever.

There are loads more great shorts like this out there being made by people who aren't Pixar or Dreamworks. The Incredible Suit supports them in their efforts (as long as they're good, no timewasters please) and wishes them well in the future. Seek them out why don't you, there's nothing else to do on a miserable Friday afternoon except watch Diagnosis Murder. Amanda's boyfriend Ron did it.

More on Pigeon: Impossible
More on Alma

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Up In The Air

If you're looking for reviews of Up In The Air and have several months in which to read them, you're in luck because every bugger out there has used up petabytes of text writing about this whimsical bit of flim flam. Empire cracked off no less than 1,255 words about it, festooning it with red stars like it was some kind of Communist headquarters, while even the usually blissfully concise Ultra Culture managed to stretch its review out to nearly 500 words.

Up In The Air isn't bad as such, quite enjoyable in fact, but in no way is it exceptional, extraordinary or otherwise notable. The acting is good but that's to be expected rather than applauded. George Clooney's character is interesting but ultimately watered down by the film's cheesy message. It's a solid 6 out of 10 film.

Here are the two most interesting things I could find to say about Up In The Air:

• It features the least sexy phone-text-sex scene ever. I get more erotic text messages from Orange telling me how many free minutes I've got this month than George Clooney does from Vera Farmiga. She should have just texted him anagrams of her name, there must be something saucy there.

• The aforementioned Ms Farmiga has been subjected to the most obvious replacement-by-naked-body-double since Tobey Maguire:

So there you have it. Go and see it by all means, but Jesus, no need to go on about it.

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The Incredible Suit's 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge #2: A Clockwork Orange

Today's 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge comes courtesy of mysteriously-named viewer 'The Doctor', who, I assume, is not the last remaining Time Lord, nor is he spectacularly-bequiffed legend and resolute The Incredible Suit ignorer Mark Kermode, who often goes by that moniker. In fact I'd like to know if he's a doctor at all because I'm sure you can get arrested for that kind of self-misdescription.

Anyway The Doctor suggested that Stanley Kubrick's 1971 bonkersfest A Clockwork Orange should be submitted to the rigorous testing of the 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge (I've got to come up with a snappier name), and who am I to argue?

Before we examine the evidence, if you've got absolutely no idea what I'm wittering on about, go and read Challenge #1: The Shining before carrying on with this drivel. I'm not laying any pipe here, people.

So, still lacking a fanfare but occasionally speaking French nevertheless, let's crack on.

0:30:00 Here's Alex quelling dissent in the ranks of his droogs. As usual for Kubrick, even a shot of three spotty oiks in long johns and ludicrous codpieces looks perfect.

1:00:00 Here's the Minister of the Interior inspecting a prison cell at random. Turns out it's Alex's cell, which is convenient as he's about to unwittingly volunteer himself for the Minister's new rehabilitation wheeze. Quelle coincidence! Oh yeah, lovely shot. Perspective and that.

1:30:00 Here's Alex being booted out of his own house by his dear old Pee and Em. Kubrick does like to throw his backgrounds out of focus when his characters are feeling isolated, which is pretty much all the time. cf The Shining at 1:00:00.

2:00:00 Here's Alex chatting to his psychiatrist in hospital. I'm tempted to think that Kubrick cast his films entirely based on interesting faces - Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Malcolm McDowell, Keir Dullea etc - although Tom Cruise buggers that rule up a bit.

Result:

Stanley Kubrick is making a mockery of the 30MFFC, as they're all now calling it. With his insistence on perfect composition, lighting and choice of lens, focal length and actors who look a bit weird, it appears you can indeed pause his films at any random point and get what looks like a production still. It's also because he uses very long, static takes without crazy whip pans or abstract cutaways that he succeeds at the Challenge.

Despite this whole idea looking and smelling like a complete waste of time, I can assure you that it's not that easy to pass the 30MFFC. I've tried it with loads of films and almost all of them fail. I can only conclude, therefore, that Stanley Kubrick is cheating and should immediately be banned from competing again.

So let's have some more suggestions. This blog is an interactive experience, you know (i.e. I can't be arsed coming up with all the ideas).

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Two Legends Of The Movie World Finally Meet

Just so there's no confusion, that's Mrs James Bond. As you can imagine, she was delighted to meet The Incredible Suit and, as a 71-year-old Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, had no problem with me thrusting a 40-year-old photo of her in her skimpies under her nose.

God bless you your Dameness!

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Dear Hollywood, Don't Even Think About It

***Vaguely relevant YouTube clip designed
to distract from text-heavy post***

Looks like "the word" on "the street" is that the long-rumoured Gremlins 3 is on the way, although as rumours go, this one comes round about every twenty minutes and can therefore be treated with all the seriosity it deserves.

My concern is not that it will or won't get made, but that if it does, I do not want to see a poster advertising

GR3MLINS

at any point. Right? If you're overpaid enough to be in marketing then come up with something original instead of making this stuff up in your sleep you irritating bumwarts.

And while I'm at it, can we also have a ban on any of the following:

AVA2AR

STAR 2REK
KILL 3ILL

IV-MEN (it's Roman numerals, work it out)

CHARLIE'S ANG3LS

JURASSIC P4RK

SPIDER-M4N

MEN IN 3LACK
2013

CL3RKS
GHOSTBUST3RS*

ALIEN5
THE GODF4THER

TRANSFORM3RS

TRANS4MERS

TRAN5FORMERS

IRON 2 MAN... oh dear, too late

...and so on.

Actually, now I come to think of it, I can't think of that many films that have done this, except maybe Se7en, and that wasn't even a sequel... does 2 Fast 2 Furious count? The TRON sequel was going to be called TR2N, but was mercifully changed to Tron Legacy... hmm. I think I may have just rendered my own argument pointless.

*Thanks to prairie_oysters for that one. This blog is, like, so interactive

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12 Angry Men

If you find yourself staring at the tellybox in slack-jawed amazement because there are twelve complete strangers on there stuck in a room arguing for 90 minutes, one of two things has probably happened. Either a) you’re watching an extended episode of Big Brother, in which case you should turn off the TV set and go out and do something less boring instead (I suggest thrusting your head into a bucket of hot toe-jam), or b) you’re watching 12 Angry Men, in which case you should pat yourself on the back and treat yourself to a nice cup of tea or something, because it really is a quite brilliant film.

I vaguely remember watching Sidney Lumet’s courtroom drama about 15 years ago and thinking it was quite good, but after a recent period of upholding justice by serving on a jury at the Old Bailey, I thought I’d give it another go. For those living in shameful ignorance (a small village near Swindon), a brief synopsis: twelve jurors retire to consider their verdict in a murder trial. Eleven of them think the accused is guilty, but the other (Henry Fonda) has convincing arguments otherwise, and tries to talk the majority round.

12 Angry Men is an absolute masterclass in genius writing by Reginald Rose, and a veritable gallery of acting spiffiness by the likes of Fonda, Lee J Cobb, Quincy MD and Detective Arbogast from Psycho. What is essentially a group of cranky old geezers talking for an hour and a half is a genuinely gripping story in which the only action sequences are when someone gets up to go for a wee. Michael Bay has much to learn from it.

I can’t even put my finger on any central message the film has, because on one hand it’s about standing by your beliefs despite being in the minority, but on the other hand it’s about not being a stubborn twit and allowing people to change your mind if they’ve got a good argument. On another hand it’s about respect for other people, on yet another hand it’s about not allowing prejudice to get in the way of common sense, and on another hand still it’s about remaining calm in the face of a blustering idiot hole.

So essentially 12 Angry Men is a film with many hands, which makes sense having read this post but would be an incongruous poster quote. Perhaps this is why I haven’t yet been contacted by the Hollywood Marketing Board. Anyway, go away and watch it now and you’ll come away a better person. The Incredible Suit guarantees it.*

*The Incredible Suit does not guarantee it



Goodness me, how did that get in there?

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Uninformative Film Poster Of The Week

Pop quiz, hotshots:

What’s this film about?

Is it:

a) A long-deceased rugby coach whose ghost returns to help Matt Damon win the Rugby World Cup single-handed
b) The President of the USA decides to start wearing suits with pictures of sporting heroes printed on the back
or c) Nelson Mandela fights apartheid with the aid of a man with too many teeth and funny shaped balls?

To find out, tune into the Oscars on March 7th when it wins the award for Worthiest Film About Worthiest Subject Starring Worthiest Actor Directed By Worthy Hollywood Royalty.

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I'm Assuming It's A Coincidence

The Incredible Suit's post about burlesque Star Wars, Friday 15th January 2010:

Empire Online Newsletter, Friday 22nd January 2010:

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Face Off Francais

A Prophet is released today. It won the Grand Prix at Cannes, Best Actor at the European Film Awards, Best Film at the London Film Festival and was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Golden Globes. The reviews? 93% on Rotten Tomatoes; 8.2 out of 10 on IMDb; "The movie of the year," said The Times; "A complete triumph," said Jonathan Ross, and it's currently UltraCulture's best film Of 2010.

The Incredible Suit's review is here. If you can't be bothered with all that clicking to another page kerfuffle, here's a condensed version:

"A bit rubbish"

Instead of going to see A Prophet, why not save your money, head to Amazon (other online retailers are available) and buy Mesrine Parts 1&2, which is a) released on Monday and b) ace. Proof of aceness is available here.

This has been a The Incredible Suit 'French Film Of The Week' public service announcement.

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Star Wars And Other Galactic Funk

Following last Friday's noodle-frazzling clip of multiple C3P0s and Darth Vaders having some kind of nightmarish eurodisco wig-out, the worlds of Star Wars and Disco have been colliding before my eyes and ears like something from, well, When Worlds Collide, only with more slap-bass and less destruction of Earth.

Now many of you probably know exactly where the music came from and, seeing exactly where this post is heading, are right now popping off to read real movie blogs like UltraCulture or SlashFilm, and frankly I don't blame you. But for the uninitiated idiots, in which I include The Incredible Suit, the music you heard (assuming you bothered to play the clip) was from this album:

I don't know what those two are up to on the cover but one of them is certainly feeling a presence in the force.

Anyway this chap Meco was also responsible for this, which is well worth turning your speakers up for:



He also did the funky disco business with Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, Star Trek and Superman, but they're not very good I'm afraid. Look for them on YouTube if you want but you'll only be disappointed. Better to leave The Empire Strikes Back tune in your head and not spoil it.

If anyone has a vinyl copy of 'Star Wars And Other Galactic Funk' lying about the house that they don't listen to any more, please wrap it up carefully and pop it in the post addressed to:

The Incredible Suit

c/o The Interwebs

Thanks!

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Nobody Gives A Winnet

The BAFTA nominations have been announced, how exciting! Also, The Evening Standard Film Awards nominations have been announced, but nobody gives a winnet about those. So let's have a lengthy, exhaustively comprehensive analysis of who should win what, shall we?

Reasons Why The Incredible Suit Hates Movie Awards Ceremonies #2:

Acceptance speeches make me very, very cross indeed

There are so many examples of indescribably, unutterably, unbelievably ghastly award acceptance speeches that it was difficult to choose just one to demonstrate the point. But if you can watch this clip without puking your face off then you’re watching with your eyes shut and cucumbers in your ears.



Incidentally, Halle Berry won this Oscar for Best Actress in March 2002. Let’s examine her career in the few years immediately after this triumphant celebration of her considerable skills as a thespian:

2002 Die Another Day: Ms Berry played one of the worst ever Bond girls in the film that left the franchise in a coma for four years.
2003 X2: Ms Berry played Storm, the most useless of the X-Men in an otherwise excellent film. Wolverine is near-indestructible. Cyclops can blast entire buildings to bits with his eyes. Storm can make drizzle.
2003 Gothika: Ms Berry starred in a film that NOBODY watched. She was so good in it that Robert Downey Jr actually broke her arm during filming.
2004 Catwoman: CATWOMAN. 3.2 out of 10 at the Internet Movie Database.
2005 Robots: Ms Berry voiced a character called ‘Cappy’. It’s an open goal really.
2006 X-Men: The Last Stand: You get the idea by now.

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The Incredible Suit's 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge #1: The Shining

I watched The Shining again the other day, one of just 15 completely perfect, ten out of ten, entirely flawless films ever made according to The Incredible Suit, and therefore pretty much enshrined in law as an inarguable fact unless I change my mind.

You could fill a black hole with all that’s been written about The Shining already so there’s little point in me repeating it all, but watching it again made me realise that there are some films that are so meticulously crafted that I reckon you could pause them at any random point and you would have a beautiful, perfectly composed and lit image that wouldn’t look out of place hanging in an art gallery.

So I decided to start an experiment. It’s called (a fanfare here would be nice) The Incredible Suit’s 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge and it goes something like this: Pick a film, any film. Stick it in your DVD player, spin forward to precisely the 30 minute mark, hit pause and see what you get. Then do the same at one hour, one hour 30 minutes and so on. If you end up with three or four amazing images your film has passed and you should immediately consume a bottle of the finest champagne known to man. If not it has failed and you should hang your head in shame while standing in your front garden for 24 hours inviting passing strangers to wee on you.

I realise this experiment completely ignores many achievements in scriptwriting, acting, music and so on, but I’ll just have to think of another experiment for them. In the meantime, The Shining: does it pass (fanfare) The Incredible Suit’s 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge? (Warning: it gets a bit arty so I may have to speak French occasionally)

0:30:00: Here's Jack being right browned off at being interrupted by his irritating missus. It's a perfectly composed shot, with his body language and the fact that she's almost being pushed out of the frame showing his utter disdain for her. Not sure what that big roll of wallpaper is doing in the foreground though.

1:00:00: OK, it might not be pretty, but that is a woman with some serious issues concerning her possessed husband and psychic son. A bit too much blue backlight perhaps, but nicely framed with the picture in the background, non?

1:30:00: Here's Jack trying to convince Captain Blumburtt from Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom, who may or may not be a ghostly pre-incarnation of himself, to let him out of the pantry. Unspectacular but still an interesting composition, n'est-ce pas?

Result:

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It's 'Obvious Visual Gag' Tuesday

Just to reinforce my earlier post about the ridiculosity of the Golden Globes, I notice they've even started giving awards out to fictional animated characters now.

Ahahaha.

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The Golden Globes 2010

So at some point over the weekend everyone in Hollywood simultaneously suffered spinal fractures as the annual backslapping season – sorry, awards season – began with the explasm of self-congratulatory fawnication that is the Golden Globes. For those of you unfamiliar with the Golden Globes, here they are:

Sweet zombie Jesus I detest movie awards ceremonies. If you came here hoping for informed analysis on the winners and losers, outrage that some cackfest won or that something AMAZING didn’t win or a detailed deconstruction of Drew Barrymore’s sodding dress (sadly not a literal deconstruction, this is a family blog) then oh deary me are you in the wrong place.

There are many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many reasons why I hate awards ceremonies, but rather than bring you down with one long rant I thought I’d bring you down with lots of little rantettes.

So between now and whenever the hell it is that this season of agonising despair downs the last dregs of repulsively expensive champagne at the final revolting after-show party, The Incredible Suit will bring you just some of the reasons why it hates movie awards ceremonies with a passion similar to that with which Hollywood loves itself.

Reasons Why The Incredible Suit Hates Movie Awards Ceremonies #1:

Actresses on the red carpet never, ever look where they’re going

I hope you walk into a wall you conceited, vacuous bints!

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The Box

I finally got round to seeing The Box the other day, at the Odeon Mezzanine in Leicester Square, where the screens are approximately the size of a sock drawer. If I’d waited a couple of months longer I could have rented it and watched it in my own sock drawer, but it’s nice to get out every now and again isn’t it?

So you know when you get up, eat breakfast, go to work, do the same old routine that you do day in, day out, but then at lunchtime everyone explodes and the office launches itself to a distant galaxy and the photocopier becomes the supreme being? Well that’s what The Box is like. It starts off as an unassuming 1970s-set drama, and trundles along like that for about 20 minutes, then it gets a little bit weird, then with very little warning it goes so absolutely crazy mental bonkers that you could give it a job at the RAC, stick it on BBC News and call it Crackers Patel.

Now I quite like it when a film pulls the rug from under your feet like that, and my interest levels peaked when I realised I was going to see something I most certainly wasn’t expecting. I won’t tell you what it is but if you look hard enough I'm sure you could find out.
THE GUY WHO GAVE THEM THE BOX IS BEING CONTROLLED BY MARTIANS! YOU DIDN'T SEE THAT COMING DID YOU?
However I also quite like my weirdness to make some vague kind of sense, and for events to connect with each other in a way my tiny brain can follow, which is a) why I can’t be doing with David Lynch and b) why I ended up not liking The Box.

Director Richard Kelly cooked up a devilishly delicious dinner with Donnie Darko, but shat in the custard with Southland Tales. Now, with The Box, he’s filled the apple pie with pencils, and that’s just stupid. Marks for originality I suppose, and I look forward to the next serving, but I’ll be taking a packet of biscuits with me just in case.

In retrospect that was an ill-advised extended metaphor, but I’ve written it now and I can’t just delete it can I?



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I Prefer My C3P0 With Tassles

Just when I thought global weirdery had peaked with the inexplicable Robocop Unicorns, these pictures appeared in front of me and I had to ask the nearest stranger which dimension I was in.

These were taken in a place called 'Los Angeles', which is apparently like Norwich but odder. As if.

WRONG

WRONG

SO VERY, VERY WRONG

HMM... NOT ACTUALLY ALL THAT WRONG

THERE ARE NO WORDS

I'm not sure if that last one is supposed to be Jabba The Hutt or the Bigbagoballoon creature from Episode VII.

Oh yeah, and then this happened:

Thanks to Popbitch for the video!

Personally I think I prefer my C3P0 with tassles.

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It's 'Trailers For Inevitably Bad Films' Thursday

Here’s a turnup for the books: Obi Wan Kenobi writing James Bond’s autobiography!

Warning: contains French subtitles, one F-bomb and

FOREIGNERS DOING ENGLISH ACCENTS!!!

I hope (but seriously doubt) the film is better than the book, which was both ridiculously awful and awfully ridiculous.

Also, the book was just called ‘The Ghost’. Presumably we’re too stupid to realise it’s not about actual ghosts so Hollywood has kindly renamed it for us, thereby obliterating its only redeeming crumb of subtlety.

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The A Team: Some Kind Of Trailer

This shy, retiring chap, you might realise by now, is Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson. He’s here for two reasons: 1) He plays BA Baracus in The A-Team, which is what it is that this post is about it is, and 2) so many people came to The Incredible Suit searching for him last time I mentioned him that I should probably talk about him every day.

I can’t believe how often I find myself writing about The A-Team. Every fibre of my suit knows that it’s going to be like a third Charlie’s Angels movie with dangly bits. But somehow I find myself poring over photos, watching the new trailer and waiting eagerly for a poster like some pathetic deskbound geek with no friends or life to speak of… oh.

Anyway as it happens I’d be happy if it follows the tone of the first Charlie’s Angels, which I actually like actually, and I’m actually not ashamed to say it either actually. If The A-Team goes for the same sense of fun that is enhanced by having half a bottle of wine inside you (by which I mean half the contents of a bottle of wine, not, y'know…) then I’ll be there with nobs on and a mohican.

Anyway here’s the new trailer, which I smiled all the way through until the last bit with the tank, at which I actually burst out laughing and woke up Mrs The Incredible Suit, who had fallen asleep from the sheer boredom of being near me. Liam Neeson fluffs the iconic line though; must try harder come July 30th.



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The Fabled Katana Of Twaddle

Despite all evidence indicating the contrary, it turns out that I have the bare minimum of redeeming features required to convince another human to spend a significant portion of their life with me, and luckily for me it’s Mrs The Incredible Suit, a woman with infinite patience, the will to tolerate all manner of unbridled geekery and an almost complete absence of cooking skills.

What she lacks in culinary proficiency, however, she has this week more than made up for in pointless blog subject provision, having visited the Marvel website wherein you can, without any interference from diabolical villainous masterminds, create a visual representation of your own superhero.

So if any of you were wondering exactly what The Incredible Suit looks like while typing these words (or indeed watching movies, eating a sandwich or sitting on the toilet), the answer is:

To answer the most obvious immediate questions:

• I don't know how the cape is attached
• Yes it is bloody cold in wellies, a cape and titanium pants
• That thing in my hand is the fabled Katana of Twaddle, with which I defend the interwebs from the evil forces of common sense, worthwhile conversation and Shia LaBeouf.

All I need now is my own theme tune; if anybody out there would care to provide me with one that would be marvellous.

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The Spider-Man Reboot: The Incredible Suit Exclusive

Like Quantum, The Incredible Suit has people everywhere. News reaches me today from my Hollywood spies of this conversation, which took place at the headquarters of Sony Pictures yesterday between Sam Raimi, director of two great Spider-Man movies (and Spider-Man 3) and the head of Sony, a retarded monkey:

Sam Raimi: "Well, I’ve confirmed Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst for Spider-Man 4, and I’ve secured John Malkovich to play The Vulture, so it looks like I might be able to atone for the last one and make another great movie!"

Retarded Monkey: "OO! OO! OO!"

Sam Raimi: "Quite. The only thing is, I won’t have it ready for next summer like you wanted. It’ll take another year to do it properly because these things take time."

Retarded Monkey: "AA! AA!"

Sam Raimi: "Indeed. Well we rushed Spider-Man 3, and you made me cram too many villains in, and look what happened there."

Retarded Monkey squeezes out a huge poo on the desk.

Sam Raimi: "I’m sorry you feel that way, but what with my excellent track record as an innovative director capable of handling massive action sequences and nuanced emotional drama who’s made 2.5 billion dollars for this studio, I think you’ll agree I know what I’m doing."

Retarded Monkey flings some of the poo at the wall.

Retarded Monkey: "EEK! EEK! OO! OO! AA!"

Sam Raimi: "What? You want to get rid of me and all the actors and start the franchise again with a completely different bunch of people and call it a reboot and put it out only five years after the last film and the script’s already written and it’s 'gritty' even though the comic was all about fun and bright colours and people don’t want a 'gritty' Spider-Man when they’ve got Batman, Bond and Potter all mooching about in huge piles of grit and could I close the door on the way out? Are you some kind of retarded monkey?"

Retarded Monkey eats the rest of the poo.

Sam Raimi: "Right you are. Good luck with that. I’m sure the audience can’t wait to see Zac Efron as Peter Parker and sit through another origin story."

Retarded Monkey: "OO! OO! Do you have McG’s phone number?"

Sam Raimi leaves to make billions of dollars for another studio.



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Jonathan Ross Does Something Useful

It looks like all that time I spent praying, self-flagellating and offering human sacrifices to the gods of justice and common sense has finally paid off, as Jonathan Ross has at last decided to leave the BBC, leaving behind a gargantuan vacuum where his colossal ego and titanic self-importance used to be.

As this is a film blog (not that you can tell thanks to the vast tracts of cabbage you have to wade through to locate any coherent discussion on the nature of cinema as an art form), I won’t go on about Ross’ awful Friday night chat show onto which he invites major celebrities to talk about himself, except to say that it is one of the biggest reasons why I haven’t watched the BBC’s weekly 'Film' programme since the peerless legend that is Barry Norman left in a puff of knitted sweaters.

I realise that Jonathan ‘Friday Night With Jonathan Ross’ Ross is a different beast to Jonathan ‘Film whatever year it is’ Ross, but the former drove me so far up the wall and over the other side that I only watched the latter if there was a new Bond film, and even then through gritted eyes and with a steady stream of antipsychotic medication coursing through my veins. I’m not alone; a survey of everyone in the world, commissioned exclusively by The Incredible Suit, resulted in this graph, which clearly demonstrates the fluctuation in quality of the programme since it began in 1971. It should be noted that Ross took over from Barry Norman in 1999.

So the big question, apparently, is who will replace Ross in his weekly digest of movie mutterings. A cursory riffle through the internets throws up several names - husky saucecake Mariella Frostrup, annoyingly-hairstyled James King, godlike genius Charlie Brooker and staggeringly-bequiffed legend Mark Kermode being just the most tediously obvious. Personally I will only be happy if one of the following three suggestions are taken up by the BBC:

• Barry Norman
• The chap who tried to sell me double glazing who spent more time talking about films than windows and has excellent taste in Bond movies
• The Incredible Suit

Now when I say The Incredible Suit, obviously I have no intention of coming out from underneath my blog blanket and appearing in person. That would be horrifying for everyone. But I do believe that televising this website for an hour each week would not just be a massive leap in broadcasting innovation, but a triumph for education, information and entertainment, the very principles on which the Beeb was founded.

Fortunately somebody of excellent judgement* has already set up a Facebook group to campaign for The Incredible Suit as Ross’ replacement. If you too believe it’s the only way forward, please join the cause and tell all your friends. Together we can restore balance to the force.

CLICK HERE TO SAVE THE WORLD!
(if that doesn't work just search Facebook Groups for The Incredible Suit)

*Obviously it was me

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Where The Wild Things Are + The Road

Faced with a day off work and a house so cold you could stick the Rebel Alliance in it and call it Hoth, I decided to spend the day in the warmth of ye olde picture house, catching up on last year’s Where The Wild Things Are, which I thought might have a chance of sneaking into my Top 10 of 2009, and The Road, the new bleakfest of miserosity starring Viggo Mortensen, an actor so brilliant he must have been the result of a genetic experiment to create the perfect thespborg.

Before I babble on about that though, spare a thought for the poor lady in front of me in the ticket queue. “Can I have two tickets for Aviator 3D”, she asked the cinedroid at the counter. I can only imagine her distress when she got into the auditorium to see a bunch of blue-skinned aliens wazzing about instead of an overlong Scorsese-directed biopic of Howard Hughes.

If Where The Wild Things Are was a fish, it would be an odd fish. But it’s not, it’s a film. An odd film. Odd because, despite having some very believable Wild Things and an excellent child actor, as well as encompassing everything that is staggeringly complex yet entirely simple about being a) a kid and b) a grown-up, it just didn’t connect with me. I think it was because the characters Bob and Terry seemed so different to how I remember them from '70s sitcom ‘Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads?’

The Road is worth seeing to watch a true legend at the peak of his mighty powers. Viggo Mortensen is so convincing in all his roles that I genuinely believe he has, during his life, actually been chief weapons officer on a submarine, an American hitman, a Russian hitman, a German literature professor, a mythological warrior king and a post-apocalyptic survivor with a soft spot for shopping trolleys and an aversion to razors.

However the rest of The Road is mostly two hours of unswervingly bleak grimness and desperation, which isn’t what I was after on my day off. If I’d wanted unswervingly bleak grimness and desperation I’d have gone into work. Boom boom!



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The Greatest Films Of 2009. FACT.

So here it is. I'm well aware it's a bit late for this kind of thing thank you very much so stop going on about it. The thing is, right, there's no point doing it in the middle of December before I'd seen everything, so I've left it till now in the hope that I'd been able to catch up. As it turns out I've failed miserably on that front, and many other fronts in fact, so you'll have to make do. Like we did in The Blitz, remember?

TEN

Anvil! The Story Of Anvil

NINE

Moon

EIGHT

Watchmen

SEVEN

Mesrine: Public Enemy No. 1

SIX

Timecrimes

FIVE

Review here

FOUR

Review here

THREE

Review here

TWO

Review here

ONE

If you know your movie onions (or, in this case, Swedes), you don’t need me to tell you how great Let The Right One In is. But if your onion and/or swede knowledge is deficient, let me tell you how great Let The Right One In is.

I hope that's clear enough.

Let The Right One In’s crowning achievement is to take two genres that I have pretty much no time for – Movies About Kids That Aren’t The Goonies or The School Of Rock, and Movies About Vampires – and glue them together with some achingly beautiful cinematography and skilful economy of storytelling to make a downright draculaspectacular film.

I won’t bang on about it too much because in all honesty I’m a bit embarrassed that I’m writing about it so long after it came out, and you’re all like, “er, HELLO, we KNOW, this is why we prefer PROPER film websites to The Incredible Suit you LOSER”, but I would just like to point out one last thing that makes Let The Right One In so very, very great, and it is that the swimming pool scene at the end is probably the finest five minutes of cinema I saw this year. And that includes the Owl Ship saucytime scene in Watchmen, although I may have to go and re-watch that to be certain.

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