A Life Less Ordinary (Danny Boyle, 1998)

Danny Boyle follows the flawless ‘Trainspotting’ with ‘A Life Less Ordinary’. Generally, most people see it as his weakest film and – to some extent - it is. But lets put this in perspective ‘Trainspotting’, ‘Sunshine’, ’28 Days Later’, ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, ‘Millions’ – all of these are at least 9 or 10 out of 10 … ‘The Beach’ may be a 7 or 8. Lets break it down – John Hodge is back writing, but I have to admit, it is his writing that seems to be the problem rather than Boyle’s directing. ‘A Life Less Ordinary’ still shows the events in a way that is anything but generic – shooting McGregor coming home with a CCTV birds-eye-view, the fantastic silhouettes in the opening showing a stunning sunset while Cameron Diaz crosses the view in a swimsuit. The perfectly framed William-Tell, Magritte-reference as Mayhew (Ian McNiece) places an apple on his head for Diaz to shoot off. But, nevertheless, it is the script – or maybe Diaz’s delivery of the script – that seems to fall flat. Trying to juggle the spoilt-brat-rich-girl qualities (I can never relate), with the love-of-McGregors-cleaner-charm is a difficult thing to do. Do we even want McGregor to get with her? Dig deeper into ‘the bosses daughter’ and it seems like a character full of conflicting views. Then again, maybe she is simply a very conflicted person.

The mix of Tarantino and screwball-comedy, road movie doesn’t work very well either, with unnecessary direct references to both. For example, post-bungled-robbery, Robert (McGregor) bleeds in the backseat of a car while Celine (Diaz) drives – “I don’t wanna die…” he says akin to Tim Roth in ‘Reservoir Dogs’. The ‘thumbs-hitchhike’ sequence of ‘It Happened One Night’ is alluded to as both Robert and Celine attempt to slow a car down – but Diaz has not got the presence of Claudette Colbert, while McGregor has not commanded our attention as Clark Gable does. The road of the film is bumpy, whereby as soon as it begins to get comfortable we are shifted towards something else. Whilst our attention is clearly focussed on the couple attempting to fall in love, we are distracted by not-so-interesting Angels (Lindo and Hunter) – and this is not the fault of the actors, they simply do not seem to say anything that helpful. We get it, they are trying to get the couple to fall in love and they can predict some things, but the clumsy-ness of their plots to get the two together do not suit their characters who seem to be professionals. If they were professionals, then I would be interested in what they have to say, if they were bumbling-idiotic characters, then I would laugh, but they are neither, they are just distracting.

Personally, deep down, I love the surreal attitude of it and I cannot help but love the stylish directing of Boyle and cinematography of Tufano … but when the script falls a little flat, the whole film falls down and this happens rather regularly.

On a side note ... Empire Magazine
I just bought the new magazine 20th Anniversary and it is flawless. I am sorry Empire magazine, turns out your not that bad a mag.

Manhattan (Woody Allen, 1979)

Now, I have watched this before and, on the first watch I thought a great film. Now, a second time around I realised that there are not so many jokes as there are in 'Annie Hall' - but this is not so much a bad thing. It has to be taken that little bit more seriously.

Everyone is completely flawed - Yale - the cheating husband, Isaac - the paedo-ish guy, Mary - the indecisive broad. Even Tracy is a little naive. Throwing away London for this silly man who, even she should know, is too old for her.

The Gershwin score is awesome - the big band, semi-marching band mixed with the lovely jazz (probably not Gershwin that one...). The great shots - like this mix of conversations with beautiful NYC images. Obviously, the whole section in the planetarium place simply looks stunning. Silhouettes and small highlights - dare I mention Carvaggio or Helmut Newton ...

The ambiguous ending ... clearly Mary is gone, but does Mary and Yale work out? Did Yale split with the wife? Does Tracy stay ... clearly she shouldn't and I feel that little glance from Woody at the end is trying to say how he is, ultimately, thinking of himself. Take away all the glamour and beauty of NYC, ultimately, he is on his own and alien to the emotions of others - to the point that he is willing to, effectively, destroy someone else's life purely to make his own loneliness not in vain. Whereas poor Mary - as cerebral as she was - maybe she was simply looking for love and followed her heart more so than her NYC head ... then again, she was from Philadelphia. With this in mind, this interesting take on a love story ... you cannot help but give ol' Woody Allen his credit. I mean, screw the old mans life now. Maybe he did get it on with his adopted child or something ... but back in '79, he made a damn good film and it was relevant and interesting so ... there you go!

On a side note ... Empire Magazine and the 'Saw' Franchise
So, I like Kim Newman. But I hate Empire magazine. It is so slim and merely plays on whatever sells in the film world ... rather than whatever people want to know and what is important and what people care about. Does it try to educate .. no. Does it try to inform ... only on the films which pay for the coverage. Anyway, my guilty pleasure on cinema is the 'Saw' franchise. I am not going to lie - I love the films, but I am well aware of how they are kinda of pointlessly violent. My personal link was when I first saw 'Saw' I was so scared I thought to myself that maybe the feeling I got was the closest I would get to feeling the same as people generations before me got when they watched 'The Exorcist'. I'm not saying its better than it, but as a 24year old there is a certain element of 'shock' which I don't get anymore. The barrier has been lowered to a certain extent and so horror is a difficult genre to do - don't get me wrong, the frights and scares are one thing, but gore and seeing things that I've never seen before ... 'Saw' is the first horror film to have done that. Maybe I am giving it too much credit but ... it is what it is and I like it alot.

Anyhoo, the reviews are late and I've already seen 'Saw V' prior to reading the reviews and the two magazines I happened to buy this month - 'Sight and Sound' and 'Empire' obviously reviewed the film. Both by Kim Newman.

Interestingly enough the review in 'Sight and Sound' seemed to give it alot more credit than I thought it deserved - mentioning Edgar Allen Poe references and the 'strength- beyond the sheer fiendish ingenuity - is Tobin Bell as Jigsaw' . Though it was clearly ambiguous as to what KM actually felt himself, overall it seemed to be a solid review of not-as-good-as-it-could-be sequel to a decent horror franchise. Though KM made his view clear in Empire. A short review - finally giving it 'somewhat ho-hum franchise extension' and a nod to a tv spin-off of 'celebrity saw' or something. summarising with a two-star. The simple attitude obviously pandered to the masses and thats my problem - is Empire just keeping the medium of film simple? i think so. This will no doubt come up in the future so I shall holdback until I have more leverage. It n't be long before 'Star Wars' or 'Lord of the Rings' is on the cover...