www.list.co.uk/film WAR/DRAMA THE THIN RED LINE (12) 95min (Optimum) ●●●●●
The central message of James Jones’ source novel – war is insane and it turns soldiers into mad men – was somewhat lost amid the seemingly endless scenes of marines wading through long grass in Terrence Malick’s quasi-mystical 1998 take on the story of the American invasion of the island of Guadalcanal in the Pacific theatre of WWII. This first version, made in 1964, does the opposite by bludgeoning home the madness of war through personal and professional disagreements between officers and the grunts sent on a series of suicide missions culminating in the securing of the island’s natural fortress, Elephant Hill. Keir Dullea maintains a single note of hysteria, as a cowardly private who finds strength through sadism as he learns from Jack Warden’s sergeant that being mean is the only way to survive. Jones’ vivid first-hand insights and overacting melodramatics aside, director Andrew Marton (who shot exteriors for The Longest Day) turns in a workmanlike war movie. No extras. (Miles Fielder) THRILLER DEEP RED (PROFONDO ROSSO) (18) 121/100min (Arrow) ●●●●●
Deep Red stands beside such work as The Bird with the Crystal Plumage and Suspiria as the most interesting of Dario Argento’s mid-career peak films. Its captivating visuals, all clean lines, whites and chromes contrasting with dark mahogany
interiors and the bloodstains of the title emblematise the wild paranoiac disjunction between interior lives and the clinical contemporary exteriors of the contemporary world.
In it, David Hemmings’ composer is, like so many Argento protagonists, an artist using the idea of perspective and its various distorting effects to uncover a serial killer whose work he has witnessed. The search for the killer is rendered more urgent when Hemmings realises that he is a suspect – like Argento’s dancers, painters and writers placed in similar situations, understanding history and deviance is part of the task. As ever the piece teems with ideas, this time about art, gender roles and sexuality, and is splendidly offset by a strong central performance and engaging support from Daria Nicolodi as an eccentric feminist journo. Available on both Blu-ray and DVD formats with a ton of extras, the biggest of which is that there are two versions of the film, both by turns visually seductive and disturbing. (Steve Cramer)
TV COMEDY GARY TANK COMMANDER (15) 180min (2entertain) ●●●●●
The idea of a slightly dim, highly camp Edinburgher in the armed services sounds like it has the potential to
be either massively offensive or a spot-on critique of military politics. The ultimately affectionate Gary Tank Commander falls between as many stools imaginable but thankfully has enough moments of sheer daftness to make it worth persevering with.
Asides from the YouTube-style footage of Gary McLintoch (played by the show’s creator, Greg McHugh) and his cohorts larking about in Iraq (actually Kirkintilloch, as revealed in a DVD extra) and standard sitcom fare such as a birthday being ignored, an American with a funny name (General Randy Badger) and an unopened envelope with potentially serious news, we see Gary responding to questions from an unseen interviewer. There, he offers his Brent-like ‘opinions’ such as a cure for terrorism: ‘Just take that rucksack aff and let’s have a beer; let’s get wrecked and talk shite.’ Never mind the barracks, here’s Gary McLintoch. (Brian Donaldson)
ACTION/ADVENTURE K-20: THE LEGEND OF THE BLACK MASK (12) 137min (Manga Entertainment) ●●●●●
DVD REVIEWS Film
Playlist
If your 2011 diet of cinema has thus far been confined to dumpster-bound turkeys and stale awards ceremony regurgitations masquerading as fresh product, get ready for some healthier fare. What you really want is some tasty, cutting-edge, local filmmaking and PlayList is here with a groaning buffet table of sweetmeats. So lets blast off with Modern Times (tinyurl.com/2cvf4ah), pictured, in
which Edinburgh-based ‘motionographer’ BC2010 has created a retro-tinged sci-fi epic that deliciously picks up where Stanley Kubrick’s 2001 left off. In a beautifully rendered lunar landscape, a visionary work is piped down to an enthralled audience of moon dwellers. The twist, of course, is what these interstellar pioneers are watching, but you’ll have to check it out for yourself to see.
The beauty of such new technology is that it allows the creation of new vistas, stories and styles, none more so than Fife’s very own Lawrie Brewster, whose creation with Irish screenwriter Sarah Daly – Morgan M. Morgansen’s Date With Destiny – wowed audiences at Sundance last year. They collaborated with Inception star Joe Gordon Levitt to forge an inspired mixture of live-action and visual opulence, screening for your delectation here (tinyurl.com/5ukdhsv).
And there’s more down-to-earth Scottish filmmaking in the charming,
romantic short Swedish For Hello, in which a cappuccino vendor struggles to communicate with his increasingly eccentric customers (tinyurl.com/6ab5txj). Working from inside the confined space a police box, or a TARDIS as most of us know it, the vendor’s experience proves that life, like Dr Who’s spacecraft, has more to offer than it appears at first glance. Alessio Avezzano’s distinctively Glasgow-set confection may not have such a huge production, but it’s quirky, funny and worth ten minutes of anyone’s time. The point is that long after most short film schemes have dried up and government funding for filmmakers seems a thing of the past, committed Scottish creatives are still getting their work out there. So pick up your camera, or even your phone and see how your work measures up to the fresh filmmakers mentioned above. (Eddie Harrison)
line with Hollywood comic book adaptations and action sequences on a par with the best Asian martial arthouse films. No extras. (Miles Fielder) SPORT/BIOPIC PHANTOM PUNCH (15) 100min (Metrodome) ●●●●●
Perhaps the most duplicitous aspect of Robert Townsend’s account of the life of heavyweight champ Sonny Liston is the title itself. Liston’s rematch with Mohammed Ali ended early with a punch that simply didn’t look like a knockout. Liston’s rather theatrical slump to the canvas has
been variously explained as a mafia fix, a genuine punch or a psychological collapse by Liston. Whatever the enduring mystery, it remains an enigma at the end of this film.
Meantime, we follow Ving Rhames’ as-much- brutalised-as-brutal champ from his discovery in prison, through his early engagement with gangsters to his notorious affair with his mob handler’s wife, and finally to his death by probable mafia hit. There’s a nice sense of the 1950s and 60s setting to the film, and Rhames gives a compelling central performance, capturing
Forget about the duff Green Hornet, this Japanese take on vintage crime-fighter serials – The Shadow, The Rocketeer, The Phantom et al – is far more entertaining. The year is 1949, but it’s an alternate reality in which WWII never happened and Japan is still imperial, and capital city Teito is being terrorised by the titular thief and master of disguise. K-20 might not be
particularly original, but it boasts a richly evocative steampunk setting, special effects in
the causalities that made Liston, by turns, monstrous, frail and childlike, but much of the rest is gangster movie by numbers, and poor performances by Stacey Dash and Bridgette Wilson as respective wife and mistress don’t help. Pedestrian extras. (Steve Cramer) 3–17 Feb 2011 THE LIST 53