Thursday 17 May 2012

2285 Eight films May 2012 (1)

Resisting Leveson and as tension built over sporting interests I watched Super Eight by mistake having intended to download another film from Sky Anytime. The film has echoes of ET and the Giant spider hoarding humans as food in Lord of the Rings rather than Close Encounters. A group of talented adolescents (ET style) are into making Super Eight Horror movies back in 1979 before the digital era when school breaks up for the summer, and they enlist the help of a girl for the movie to be shot at the town’s railway station after midnight.

When they see a train coming they include the train in the filming only to witness a lorry confront the train head on. The train is derailed with dramatic effect and they narrowly escape. They approach the lorry and find the driver not only alive but their science teacher who advises them to say nothing or they and their parents will be killed. The military then move onto the town in a big way and a number of extraordinary things happen, an exceptional magnetic field which appears to destroy automotive engines as well as throwing metal all over the place, and a number of individuals disappear, while electrical power and instrumentation goes haywire.

The film is fast moving with lots of dramatic action and a crescendo of an ending, this is the basic plot. In the later 1950‘s two decades earlier a space ship crash landed from another planet with a being akin to a giant spider/bat creature captured alive although how this happened is never explained or why the authorities decided to contain in the way they did. There was a special episode of the X Files where a creature was moved by train. The space ship breaks up or down into small plastic white interlocking pieces which are carefully stored by military in containers.

The science teacher worked on the project and at one moment established a psychic connection during which he learned that the entire creature wanted to do was to gather the materials to create a tower to reassemble his space craft to return home.  Instead of cooperating the authorities imprison in order to try and learn about the creature and his space craft technology without success over the following two decades. It is not explained why the creature and his craft was being moved or how the science teacher came to know of the plan in advance and prepare for the event in order to free the alien and provide a base for it to create the tower and ship craft via an assortment of any metal coming into its orbit as well as having the power to affect electricity. The basic power appears to be that of moving objects at a distance, telepathy with humans and connecting with available energy.

There is a relevant sub plot in which the young daughter the local always getting into troubled man whose wife left home years before is in conflict with the deputy sheriff and father of the boy who did the makeup and created the models used in the film making. They have also the mother/wife who at first I thought had been the former wife of the other man and then that he had been involved in the situation at work when she had died accidentally. I failed to work out/understand this aspect. The two young people form an attachment which continues despite both parents ordering the young people not to have contact with each other.

With the creature lose and the local community terrorised without knowing what is happening, the deputy has to take over when the Sheriff “disappears” and he is the one who suspects there is more going on than the military are advising and discovers that the fire which caused the town to be evacuated was caused by them. The scientist teacher was captured alive but dying and refuses to reveal that it was young people who were on the scene. The military have the evidence from a packet of empty film and tyre tracks that others were present filming the event.

When the young heroes see the creature on the processed film and learn of the girl is taken after having a row with her father they go back into town to search for her appreciating that the starting point must be with the school office and home of the scientist. The deputy sheriff is taken into custody when he voices his suspicions but manages to break out and enlists the help the girl’s father to search for their children. The gang discover the hideout of the creature and his food store of human’s similar to that of the giant spider in Lord of the Rings but in this instance the young hero establishes a connection with the creature who lets them go and ET like he completes the creation of a his space craft with the white pieces; A fantastic Lego which transforms magically at the top of the town of metal junk for launching before disappearing into the heavens.

While this is happening the military has sent in their tanks and rocket launchers which have gone haywire and destroyed half the town. Unlike Close Encounters the authorities are portrayed has frighten incompetent and fascist without curiosity caution and care. Parents and children are reunited among the final mayhem.

A very different kind of science fiction thriller adventure is Mercury Rising. The USA has an unbreakable code which a nine year old autistic child is able to break after two of those who helped devise the code for some reason not clear to me but on which the whole film hangs decide to test it out in a puzzle magazine giving a telephone number to ring which the boy does, This results in a senior within the National Security Agency ordering the section of the boy and his parents and the two young men who tested the code via the puzzle magazine.

Enter Bruce Willis of the FBI who detects that all is not as it should be and rescues (kidnaps) the boy from the clutches of the NSA and gores on the run with him declared outlaw but has the help of a friend within the FBI. Because the boy is autistic he cannot communicate directly with Willis who enlists the help of a young woman he encounters at a coffee shop to help look after the boy while he makes some further enquiries. He remains in the dark without knowing the whys and there wherefores until the young woman friend of one of the two young men creative finds him murdered but also finds a crumpled note of a letter being sent to Willis explaining what has happened.

She fortunately is seen by Willis’s friend at the FBI when she contacts and he takes her to see Willis where he is hiding. Whereas Willis appears   willing to endanger the life of the young woman he counsels his trained FBI friend to put the welfare of his family first in limiting his involvement. However he asks the man to secret the boy in the witness protection programme.

Understandably the FBI agent is portrayed as stupid enough to arrange this for Willis and to communicate what he is doing with Willis and the girl without taking the basic counter surveillance measures. One suspect there is in a reality such rival between the official National security agency and the FBI as there has always been between the FBI and State and County police forces, endangering national security as a consequence.

Willis has gone to visit the NSA controller behind the murders who rightly accuses Willis of naivety in that what is life of one autistic boy worth against that of the national security for 200 million. How many civilians have been treated in this way in Iraq and Afghanistan you may well ask and don’t tell me one  white American child is worth  more than the hundreds possibly thousands died in friendly fire as part of the USA led operations?

When Willis goes to confront the NSA man at his home in finds the man is holding a birthday party and agreed to see Willis in his wine cellar which provides Willis with the opportunity to destroy some of his best vintages as part of making a point of forcing   the man to call of his dogs and go on National TV to admit the code can be broken, Why he should want to do this is also not clear? Why the NSA would want to kill the parents, the creative and the boy is also not justified or appears rational other than for he purposes of the film. In the finale the FBI agent friend is able to persuade his boss that the it is the NSA man who is the rogue and turns the table in top of tall building helicopter finale in which the boy walks fearlessly along the edge of the building roof to get a gun to go give to Willis which enable him to take control of the situation and the NSA man who falls to his death below.

The film ends with Willis going to see the boy who is at a special day centre and who is also fostered to see how he is doing. He brings some puzzle magazines and the kindly assistant encourages Willis to make direct contact although accepting the boy may not know who Willis now is. The boy makes eye contact and gives Willis a hug. The only redeeming feature of the film is that it successfully communicates about the nature of autism and many of the young people if they also have high intelligence and make important contributions to society and can be helped to fit in better with the rest of us. However the basic premises are fundamentally wrong. OK democratic states should have principles and standards, but the main responsibility of governments is to govern in the interests of all the people with national security its core. Any constitution has to be subservient to this consideration.



Another different form of science fiction is the Mel Gibson romantic film Forever Young.  He is a USAAF test pilot who is approached by his long time scientific experimenter friend to participate in a cryogenic chamber project; Gibsen has a girl friend who he hopes to marry but cannot bring himself to ask her. He is distressed beyond measure when she has a vehicle accident and goes into a coma from which she is not expected to recover.

It is at this point that the story is given the twist upon which everything else follows in that he takes the unlikely decision given what we know of him and his relationship to asks to go into the cryogenic chamber for a year so that he does not have to witness her deterioration and death, This is such a preposterous proposition as to render the rest of the film absurd. What follows is even more ludicrous as for reasons which I did not understand, the year passes and Gibsen was not reactivated. In  fact five decades pass by before two boys are temporarily  left in a vehicle on a military storage base and they enter and find the machine which they are able to restart to the extent that the frozen body of Gibsen is revealed and he is able to come to after they depart. The idea that he could have survived without the machine having energy to maintain the constant temperature is one of the many moments of incredulity.

I contrast to the two previous films there are no official records and official cover ups and Gibsen has no means of proving his identity and experience and appears to be destined to find himself in a medical establishment for the mentally and emotionally delusional. His one link with what happened is the name and address tag in the jacket of one of the two boys brothers who discovered and released him. Their mother is Jamie Lee Curtiss an excellent actress although as she aged has lost the sexual magnetism by the parts she sometimes has performed. In the film after their initial panic at seeing Gibsen the brothers agree to hide him in their tree house while he tries to locate someone who might be able to confirm his story. Jamie is involved in several relationships including nice medical doctor at the same hospital where she also works as a doctor, and an abusive man who when Gibsen from the tree house sees her being physically attacked intervenes, drives him off  and establishes a more open relationship with the family.

His attempt to find the scientist leads to the discovery of his notebooks kept by the man’s daughter. The problem is that Gibsen begin the process of rapid aging which he scientist has recorded in the notebooks and this requires urgent medical help. This happens after the daughter of the scientist reveals that his fiancĂ©e did not die, recovered and has become a widow after her husband died. The two women have kept in touch and provide Gibsen with the address. By this time the military has established the authenticity of the Gibsen story and the current cryogenics expert arrives with the authorities in an effort to try and help Gibsen to survive but with the help of Curtiss unknowing they have come to help him, he breaks out of the hospital and steals a plane from the local airport to reach his former girl friend before it is too late. Fortunately there is an airshow and a restored flying B 52 of the type he previously tested.

In a second piece of good fortunate one of the lads he lads who he has shown the rudiments of flying back in the tree house  also stores away on the plane ( how he does this is also not explained, and is able to help him land the craft a few yards from the cliff top door of the girlfriend.  They are able to meet up and we are left to resume that the experts are able to help him become stable at his true age so the could can send the rest of their days together. He is able to pass on the research notes to the present day researchers.  True love triumphs but little else.
 
A very different kind of science fiction tale is Avalon Beyond the Abyss.  An island blows up leaving a poison and a team is sent to investigate and clear up the threat to marine life. They discover a deep chasm and a large underwater cave with painted figures. A battle develops between the expedition leader and one of the team over the extent to which there is time and resources to investigate what can be seen in the cave.

Just when the leader orders the team to leave an expert arrives with the authority to investigate further and her findings appear to indicate a prehistory and the existence of either extra terrestrial to super beings. The man who presses for the work to continue dies in an attempt to explore further. The leader of the team elects to descend to the depths of the Abyss as seismic activity indicates the opening is closing.  He provides maker for the body of the tam member so it can be raised to the surface. However on reaching the depths he has an experience which changes his understanding of the balance between science and the paranormal. He encounters someone who appears to be himself and also an alive comrade whose body has been raised to the surface.

I remained confused if this made for TV film was suggesting a form of heave or a parallel universe or something else. He returns to the surface against the odds a change man. The gap in the oceans closes and with it proof of his experience. The poison stops and the marine earth is saved.

At least this film has a subject matter of some interest which cannot be said for another film whose title presently escapes me. This concerned the exploration of a very deep cave in the midst of the jungle. The basic story is one of survival against he odds when part of the large team is trapped underground because of a major change in weather conditions and have to find a way of reaching the sea through small channels in a part of the world never explored before.

The positive aspect of the film is some amazing photograph of the natural underworld. In order to stretch out what proved at times to be a boring film stock relationship issues are introduced notable that between the expedition leader and his son who is contemptuous of his father’s obsession and its impact on the family and who is required to articulate in expeditions from time to time. When push comes to proverbial shove the son elects to remain below ground to help his father escape the situation rather than get to the surface himself. The problem that arose is a dramatic change in weather conditions which swells the river which falls into the chasm and then gets to the sea by channels as yet undiscovered.

Conflict arises within the surviving group because of the steel determination of the father and expedition leader. The girl friend of his number, a mountaineer refuses to obey his commands on three separate instances which led to her eventual death. His number distressed by the situation and simmering resentment loses it and at one point abandons father and son who remain survivors. A fight between the man the father leads to the death of both although the son help his father to die more quickly than he is destined in part in order for him to survive which he does the only one of those trapped to do so.

I now come to Frantic which has an opening which then had me engaged for the rest. A woman takes the wrong luggage at the airport in Paris which she is visiting with her husband Harrison Ford who is to deliver an academic paper. It will be remembered that at the end of my recent trip to London I took the wrong case on leaving the train at Newcastle Station. Fortunately the train ended in the city rather than continue north to the City of Aberdeen. I was also fortunate as the owner of the case lived in Newcastle and waited at the station with his friends until I returned. When the mistake was realised in the film on reaching the hotel the airline was contacted and arrangements made to return the case as well as file a lost form in relation to that of the wife. The couple are tired from their overnight journey and Harrison has a shower after ordering breakfast and then finds that his wife is not in the room after receiving a phone call.  He goes downstairs to see if she is in the lobby, restaurant, and hotel shop and then out to the neighbouring street after a search of the hotel with the help of the management fails to find her. He goes into a nearby flower shop and a local bar when he meets a local drunk who claims to have seen his wife bundled into a car by two men. Ford goes to the police who treat it as a missing person and he gets no help from the USA Embassy after waiting his turn in a long line.

Back at the hotel he breaks into the case and finds nothing except a book of matches with the telephone number and Christian name. He visits the club where he learns that the name has not been seen for a couple of days  and that the man is a drug dealer according to another drug dealer who thinks Ford is talking about wanting to find white power rather than a white lady! He bribes the individual to find the address of the other man and when he visits he find the man dead. He takes the answering machine tape where there are several messages by a woman in French. He is able to have these translate and learns that the female caller plans to visit so he arrives beforehand and takes her to the airport to reclaim the case.

The young woman had agreed to got to California to bring back the case without knowing its contents except it was not drugs  and without know who she was working for as the trip had been arranged by her now dead boyfriend. The action takes place at the airport and then at the flat of the young woman where for some reason he takes case with him using the roof to get into a sky light at the flat. This results in the cause of the action, a small replica of the Statue of Liberty ending in a precarious position as the case opens. They eventually find it contains a device crucial to the detonation of nuclear devices and worth several million dollars.

Ford negotiates a trade with the kidnapper for his wife where the exchange takes place on the banks of the River Seine. During the films the police, the US Embassy and the security forces show great interest and their intervention prevents Ford being killed although not the girl. He and his wife are reunited on the day he is due to deliver his paper although it is not disclosed if he goes ahead with this as planned. Frantic was aptly named and the acting of a high order so that one experienced the reality of his emotions had such a situation happened. For once the basic premises was easily appreciated. Easily done.

I did not like or enjoy Everything Must Go whose message is one alcoholic in the family is bad enough but two is a major problem but it is also a well made film. I also believe had the film been the back story of the couple it would have been more interesting how the couple met, the life they had together and how they became alcoholics and then went sober via AA. although the wife only features through the words of others. Will Ferrel plays the sales husband who gets fired one day because of the false accusations of another employee and his record with the firm despite being a good salesman. On his way home he collects some beers to console himself against the injustice of the decision rather than contact his AA sponsor who is a Detective on the local police force.

He finds all his clothes and personal possession strewn on the lawn. The cause is the discovery by his wife that her husband had got drink and spent the night with another woman. Fearing she would slide the slide herself she had turned to the detective who had given her a place to stay while she hoped her husband would sort himself out.  The husband sleeps out on the lawn, gets caught out with the lawn care sprinkler system twice, drinks a lot of beer, is told he and the belongings have to be moved with five days and he engages the help if a local teenage boy to convert the possession into an Everything must go sale.

He tries to make friends with a woman who has moved in to a house from New York following the break up separation of her relationship.  The woman’s partner visits and makes up and she returns to New York. Before then Ferrell takes her for a genuine Mexican meal and there meets the man who fired him who says that the female complainant has been exposed as someone who has made a livelihood of joining firms and then suing them because of the actions of existing staff members who she has compromised and then accused. His final comment is that he would have been able to have got Ferrel’s back had the man not stuck his Swiss army presentation leaving present knife into the tyre of his gar. The knife had Ferrel’s name and could not be taken out.

The film with Ferrel signing the divorce papers, having got sober again when his money ran out, the credit cards stopped and the joint bank account held. He is able to stay in the house until that his sold. He is ready to move on.

I also did not enjoy Stolen Lives the story of a detective who had the care of his son one day leaving him in a diner while going to the toilet only to find the boy disappeared with no trace. The event destroyed him and the relationship with his wife.

He is called out to the finding of the remains of a boy and at first the hope is that these are remains of his child. The remains are those of someone who was murdered 50 years before. The film is the story of how the investigation leads to finding that the man who murdered this boy is also the killer of his son. The remains are found and he child is buried and the parents are able to move on.

I have decided to leave to a separate writing Cinema Verity. The story of the Loud Family who agreed to be filmed over the course of several months to make the first TV showing of real life in a a ten week  one hour episode series.

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