Wednesday 3 March 2010

The Incredible Suit's 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge #7: Twelve Monkeys

The 30-Minute Freeze-Frame Challenge is a futile, inane experiment which judges a film's merits entirely on how good it looks at 30-minute intervals according to arbitrary and indistinct criteria applied by The Incredible Suit. For previous challenges, click the links on the right.

This week's 30MFFC came to be in a roundabout kind of way: The Doctor wanted to see something from Terry Gilliam, but as he's already had a go at this game by suggesting A Clockwork Orange, I wanted to let some other suggestions in first. Then Andrew Nelson suggested La Jetée, which was also pretty inappropriate because it's only 28 minutes long. A worse candidate for an experiment that requires a film to be at least half an hour in length I struggle to imagine. Furthermore Andrew has also had his bite of the cherry, suggesting last week's North By Northwest.
 
Anyway to fail to cut a long story short I decided to combine the two suggestions and do Twelve Monkeys, Gilliam's re-imagining of the French short stretched out to feature-length and with added Bonkers Brad Pitt waving his hands about in an over-exaggerated fashion.
 
Christ that was a tedious introduction. Better put some pictures up sharpish.
 
0:30:00 Here's Bruce Willis, locked up in a loony bin for crimes against music, ho ho. As if that wasn't annoying enough, Bonkers Brad Pitt is waving his hands about in an over-exaggerated fashion and there's a massive out-of-focus ear blocking his view of the telly.

1:00:00 Here's Madeleine Stowe checking the recently-decommissioned body of her would-be rapist, although in this gloom she could just be sorting through her washing.

1:30:00 Here's Bonkers Brad Pitt waving his hands about in an over-exaggerated fashion for a change. If you haven't seen Twelve Monkeys, a) you should, and b) he does this quite a bit and you really just have to go along with it. He had a lot to prove in those days. Oh and excuse me sir, you're blocking the shot with your big fat back.

 2:00:00 Aah look, it's young James, being all cute while watching something so mind-bogglingly terrible that by the time he becomes Bruce Willis his eyes have turned green.

Result:

Really only one of these shots is good enough for the 30MFFC; the rest are either obscured by foreground irritations or feature scruffy women in a dodgy back alley. So soz and all Terry Gilliam, you join fellow shamed losers Ridley Scott, Michael Curtiz and Francis Ford Coppola in the Fail bucket. Also I haven't forgiven you for The Brothers Grimm.

Keep those 30MFFC suggestions coming, I've had loads but I can't get access to them all. Try suggesting something I'm likely to have on my shelf will you, and remember they don't have to be classics - any old cackapoopoo could pass the 30MFFC; it's just a matter of luck. That's what makes it so phenomenally pointless.

Worthy mini-documentary to balance out inanity of post:


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12 comments :

  1. Forget the Brothers Grimm, Tideland was so bad it could almost be classified as a crime against humanity. Although you are right, Grimm was pretty bad too.

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  2. I never saw Tideland, but if it can out-grim Grimm, I'll pass.

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  3. I'll add it to the list Mark, and I haven't forgotten your Kane suggestion from ages ago either. Sadly I sold both my Kane and Exorcist DVDs a few years ago when I came to the conclusion they were both overrated.

    I'm sure I can lay my grubbies on a copy somehow though.

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  4. Andrew's quite right of course, I omitted to include his retraction for comedy value. It wasn't worth it and I formally apologise.

    As for The 1 Second Film, what a load of pretentious old tittypiffle.

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  5. Hello! Long time reader, first time commentator.

    Please do The Breakfast Club.

    Thank you. Love the blog x

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  6. How could I refuse? Flattery will get you everywhere.

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  7. Here is a video where every frame is a work of art. www.vimeo.com/612081
    First created in 1968 for TV.

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  8. Yay I got a mention! Nicely done, but once again the fickle nature of the challenge has undone one of cinemas greats.
    Also The Brothers Grimm is indeed his worst moment - for two main reasons. Damon and Ledger should have swapped roles, and apparently the Weinsteins interfered massively in the production... something that has happened many times in Gilliam's esteemed career. It's a credit to his brilliance that he manages to make so many great films in the face of adversity. But Grimm ain't one of 'em.
    Also also wik, I almost choked on my McMuffin at your comment that The Exorcist and Citizen Kane are "over-rated". Really? Really? Gone With The Wind and The Sound Of Music, now that's what I call over-rated. But not The Exorcist and Citizen Kane. Surely.
    (cue "and don't call me Shirley" reply.)

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  9. It's just attention-seeking contrarianism.

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  10. Hello Mr. Suit,

    Firstly, congratulations on your amazing Oscar predictions, I bet you're the only person on the planet that got it spot on.

    Secondly, I suggest you do Grease for your 30 minute thingy as I watched it for the millionth time the other day and I realised that I was entirely happy all the way through, especially the bit with Danny Zucco singing about his pussy wagon.

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  11. Can do. You know that he ain't braggin'.

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