Alien anthology

The Alien anthology consists of four Sci-fi suspense thrillers made over the course of almost twenty years and directed by four of the most visionary and visually influential film makers working today; 

Ridley Scott - Alien (1979), James Cameron - Aliens (1986), David Fincher - Alien 3 (1992) and Jean-Pierre Jeunet - Alien: Resurrection (1997).

The first Alien film, and still considered the best, was directed by Ridley Scott early in his career and set the bar extremely high for later sequels to follow. It’s a movie you can’t take your eyes off for several reasons. The visually striking set design and grimy dark lived-in environments are so realistic that you're pulled into its claustrophobic world of futuristic high-tech industrial machinery, which has become a hallmark of the series.

The suspenseful storyline of a group of interstellar miners traveling back to earth from a work assignment on a massive space vessel carrying crude oil, are awoken from their hyper-sleep prematurely to investigate an alien distress signal coming from a nearby uninhabited moon. Contractually obligated to investigate, they do a quick search of the area where the signal originated only to find a lifeless alien ship abandoned in a hostile environment. Finding what seems to be a primordial life form, a curious member of the scouting party unknowingly becomes the host for an alien species with some very unique and hostile qualities.

Essentially, Alien is a Sci-fi/horror thriller, the first of its kind. Ridley Scott was very much influenced by the success and unique used retro look of Star Wars (1977), which was released three years prior and openly admits to wanting to go in a similar direction with his next film. But where Star Wars was a mix of fairy tale and Science Fiction, Alien was a much darker and grimmer tale in a more realistic Sci-fi setting. It was the Edgar Allen Poe of Science Fiction. 

The theme that runs through all the Alien films is that all is not what it appears from the outside. The alien at first appears to be very small and vulnerable but we soon discover that the alien is not what it seems at all and quickly metamorphosis into a frightening indestructible and cunning monster. The unsuspecting crew is also not what they appear to be. The seemingly strongest and smartest members of the mining party quickly fall victim to the alien and the weakest or unlikeliest ones become the most resilient, surviving under the most difficult of circumstances. To add even further suspense and confusion, one of the crew members who appear to be human is not human at all and may actually be aiding the alien due to the sinister motives of an unseen corporation.

Enhancing the mystery even further by tying it into the visuals is the alien’s ability to blend in with its surroundings and camouflage itself, making it more difficult to detect. As the crew is hunting the alien, they quickly become the hunted and it becomes unnervingly suspenseful as we cannot distinguish between parts of the interior of the ship and the alien. The surrealist Swiss artist H.R. Giger was brought in to design the eerie and otherworldly look of the alien creature and was consulted on all the sequels.

The subsequent sequels are all variations on these themes. The first and second are considered the best in the series but all four movies are unique films in their own right with their own visual style and they all add something new to this popular franchise.

Ridley Scott, the original director on the series, who would later be known for such iconic films as Blade Runner (1982), Legend (1985), Thelma & Louise (1991), Gladiator (2000), Black Hawk Down (2001), Kingdom of Heaven (2005) and Robin Hood (2010), has now returned to the franchise he started and made a prequel called Prometheus (2012), which is the first in a new trilogy of films that will lead up to the Alien anthology. Watch for it coming to cinemas June 8, 2012.

JP

Lawrence of Arabia

To celebrate the 50^th Anniversary of David Lean’s legendary magnum-opus Lawrence of Arabia (1962), one of the all-time most sweeping historical epic adventures ever filmed, the Cannes film festival is screening a newly restored print of the film which includes an extra 21 minutes of footage that was added to the Director’s cut back in 1989. This spectacular film can only be fully appreciated on a large screen and is often exhibited in big theaters on special occasions.  

Lawrence of Arabia was the Avatar (2009) of the 1960s, so grand and exotic in its vision of a faraway tribal desert culture.  It follows the adventures of a young officer in the British army stationed in Cairo during the First World War, who becomes infatuated with the proud Bedouin tribes living a nomadic life in the Arabian Desert and helps unite them to fight against the Ottoman Turks while adopting their ways.

What makes this astonishingly beautiful film so unique is the breathtaking cinematic way in which it was filmed in vast shimmering desert landscapes of Jordan and Morocco, which gives it a grand epic quality unlike any other film I’ve seen. Much of the film takes place in the visual splendor of sand swept dunes with flowing robes fluttering in the harsh conditions of swirling desert sands. The only other thing I can compare the stunning cinematography to is some of the recent BBC Life and Planet Earth series. 

Based on the life of T.E. Lawrence, a real historical figure, Lawrence of Arabia is considered one of the most influential films in cinema, alongside such classics as Citizen Kane (1941), Casablanca (1942) and The Godfather (1972), inspiring many of today’s greatest filmmakers including Steven Spielberg. Winner of 7 Oscars, including best picture and cinematography, the movie opens, like other epic British productions such as The Man Who Would Be King (1975) and Gandhi (1982), with a scene that explains the legacy left behind by our hero and then goes back in time to where it all began.

Considered a bit of a strange chap with unusual skills, Lawrence is chosen to go on a mission that will take him across the scorching desert to meet with an Arab Sheik. His outspoken moral convictions, and knowledge of history mixed with his respect for the Bedouin people impresses the Arab Prince and he decides to let him carry out a bold daring military maneuver to attack a strategic Turkish outpost against the advice of his British commanders.

Not enough can be said of the incredibly heartfelt performance of a young Peter O’Toole as T. E. Lawrence in the leading role of a life time that made him an instant star at the age of thirty.  He has since appeared in such epic films as The Last Emperor (1987) and Troy (2004). 

Everything about this film exudes epic film-making at its finest by a director who was already revered for his unrivaled body of work which included such classics as Great Expectations (1946), Oliver Twist (1948) and The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), and would go on to make more classics such as Doctor Zhivago (1965) and A Passage to India (1984).

This is an ideal film to watch on today’s large screen High Definition televisions to really appreciate its epic scale and I’m looking forward to its release on the Blu-ray format  November 13, 2012. 

JP

Crumb

Crumb (1995) is an unusually candid and intimate portrait of an underground adult comic book artist from the 60s, who loves to draw strong shapely women in perverse satirical situations. 

Robert Crumb is much less known than his popular surreal comic artwork and was reluctantly exposed as a major talent to mainstream audiences following the success of this now classic and shocking landmark documentary that goes deep into Crumb’s personal life and explores the dark psychological side of the creative process.

The experience of watching this playful but scathing documentary about the unhappy life of three traumatized siblings who develop their creative ability in order to deal with the dysfunctional relationship between them and their parents is both disturbing and heartbreaking. Many artists who struggled with abuse, pain or sadness, either in their childhoods or during adult life, manage to somehow deal with their misery and desires by channeling it through their creative impulse.

Not without darkly comic moments, this film is also very insightful as director Terry Zwigoff, also known for directing Ghost World (2001) and Bad Santa (2003), takes us into the sad private life of a deeply introverted, insecure and sensitive individual who may not have survived his childhood if not for his talent for drawing and bringing his demons out onto the page. This personal look into the life of a reclusive eccentric artist would never have been possible if not for the friendship that exits between director Terry Zwigoff and his subject.

What strikes you about Crumb is his frank honesty and loner detachment from people and society. Having been teased and tormented by his peers during childhood, he has withdrawn completely into an alternative world that he created and where he can be totally honest with himself and deal with his fears and fantasies. 

Women, the source of much of his anxiety, make up a huge part of his art and psychic make-up. It’s by far his favorite subject and the film focuses much of the time on his shapely female fetish. Throughout the film there are playful and uncomfortable interviews with the many women in his past and present life, both those that hate him and love him, including his present wife who is also an artist.

At the start of the film we find out who Crumb is and that he is fed up with corporate America and resigned to the fact that he must leave the country to live a more genuine life in the south of France, where artists are appreciated and treated with respect and people still value a simple life free of consumerism. Drawing much of his inspiration from Bluegrass music, which makes up much of the film’s soundtrack, he is often seen listening to his extensive collection of old vinyl records in a small corner of his house and lamenting the disappearance of a bygone era in American history. 

Crumb’s unique and provocative artwork can be very controversial and polarizing; both repulsive and attractive, people will either love him or hate him but this documentary treats him with respect and sympathy by including commentary by a variety of art critics, making it a must see for any artist or lover of comic book art.

JP

The Wonderful Weird Worlds of Tim Burton

Tim Burton is having another double feature year in 2012, like he did in 2005 when he released Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Corpse Bride in the same year. This year we will again see him release two new films with Dark Shadows opening this weekend and another animated Halloween themed film, Frankenweenie, being released in October.

Tim Burton’s body of work consists almost exclusively of darkly comic but sensitive children’s tales of eccentric awkward characters who discover an alternate world where everyone is weird; The Nightmare before Christmas (1993), Corpse Bride (2005), Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005), Alice in Wonderland (2010), Sleepy Hollow (1999), Mars Attacks! (1996), Edward Scissorhands (1990), and Beetlejuice (1988). These whimsical tales explore and exploit our fears and prejudices with humor and playfulness but never lose their poignant significance. Even his more adult films cannot escape Burton’s sense of dark comedy and youthful exuberance; Ed Wood (1994), Planet of the Apes (2001), Big Fish (2003) and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007).

As fantastical and quirky as these visually striking films are, they also contain a melancholy that’s grounded in relevant human emotions. What makes a Tim Burton film so special is the familiar themes of a sensitive, withdrawn, misunderstood and teased loner, (usually played by Johnny Depp, Tim Burton’s alter ego), whose unusual appearance or ideas doesn’t quite fit in with those of mainstream society and must overcome his or her fears, doubts and bullies. The well-meaning, good-hearted outsider, through determination, conviction and a lot of humor, eventually gains self-confidence and the admiration of his or her peers while finding love. 

The surreal visual style and set design of his films are so outrageous and eye-popping that the audience feels completely immersed in a dream like world of childlike wonder. What’s so funny about all of Burton’s characters is how they all start out as being strangely out of place, completely at odds with their environment, and by winning the hearts of the locals with charm and vulnerability, they slowly manage to inspire acceptance and transform that environment into something new and wonderful.

The squeamish detective who must solve a murder mystery using unorthodox new techniques in the spooky town of Sleepy Hollow, a shy melancholic groom forced into an arranged marriage, finds himself trapped in the lively underworld of the dead and revives the lifeless world of the living by inviting ghostly guests to his wedding in Corpse Bride, and the Pumpkin King Jack Skellington accidentally finds himself in the snowy world of Christmas town and decides to bring a little of his Halloween town into the world of Santa Clause in The Nightmare before Christmas. These are just a few examples of the strange alternate worlds and displaced characters that transform their environments in Tim Burton’s films.

Dark Shadows is no exception, based on the 1960s TV soap opera of the same name, a wealthy 18^th century English immigrant in New England, America is cursed and buried alive only to be unearthed and woken 200 years later as a Vampire in the disco era of 1972.

You can currently see a Tim Burton art exhibition showcasing artwork, props, costumes and sculptures from many of his films in Paris, France from March 7th, 2012 until August 5th, 2012.

JP

The Avengers

Summer has officially started with this super cool, super fun, super-hero movie that brings together for the first time the heroes from several movie franchises including Thor (2011), The Incredible Hulk (2008), Captain America (2011), and Iron Man (2008, 2010), plus a couple of new characters. This one lives up to the hype and will satisfy comic book fans as well as fans of the movie adaptations and feels very much like the successful Iron Man movies.

The Avenger initiative is S.H.I.E.L.D.’s weapon against invasions from alien worlds. A collection of super humans with unique powers, but it only works if they work together as a team, and that is the big problem. Like any team of highly skilled and competitive individuals they all want the spot light for themselves. Similar to the World Cup soccer teams where some of the biggest egos in sports come together only once every four years and are asked to play alongside their lesser team mates, these over achieving egos with personal issues don’t play well with others.

Tony Stark is the George Lucas of the super-hero universe; he has all the coolest and most advanced gadgets. Even S.H.I.E.L.D.’s technology is not quite up to his standards and no one can agree on what course of action to take when the villain Loki from Thor shows up with a clever scheme to enslave mankind.

Iron Man and the Hulk are probably the coolest characters in the movie in my opinion, supplying much of the humor, and they have the best on-screen chemistry between them as they are both scientists, but all the characters get their equal share of fun moments in this film.

Our squabbling heroes easily fall prey to a surprise attack during their first trial working as a unit when Samuel Jackson’s character Nick Fury finally intervenes and appeals to their less selfish natures and they decide to put their differences aside to focus on fighting their common enemy. It’s a great set-up story that introduces us to a new franchise that has unlimited sequel and spin-off potential.

Make sure to stay until the end of the credits as there is a very funny scene after the credits finish.

It’s going to be a great year for super-hero movies with a new Batman movie and a new Spider-man film coming to cinemas in July. Also look for Battleship and Men in Black 3 coming this May.

JP