The big iron daddy of the semi-modern era of giganto-blockbusters. Titanic was a cultural phenomenon that I was alive to witness and absorbed a fair clutter of it just through breathing. What really shocked me about watching it in 2024 was how solid it actually is as a film and how much it still stands up technically. The entire sinkening is brutally paced and the scale of the sets is extraordinary but what the whole thing hangs on, the lost love of an old woman, genuinely is deftly done and makes it quite compelling despite the runtime. Fair play to it for that and it's certainly a great deal more compelling as a story than anything in Cameron's latter blue-bloato-megabusters. That being said, the music is extremely dated, our two leads say eachother's names more than any other thing and the whole endeavour is all a bit Julian Fellowes. Despite all this, it sincerely doesn't feel like the big iron daddy without reason.
Reviews
670 Reviews
Rabbit
(I) (2005)
Fun With Ink and Pen
10 May 2024
This dark little British short by the late lamented Run Wrake is a fascinating little bit of twisted morality surrealness entirely composed of 1950s educational stickers. It bagged Wrake a bafta but is still relatively obscure as a project. The use of a chillout score and the nature of computer animation do date it somewhat and it has a distinct "you'd stumble on this at two am on channel 4" vibe. That being said, Rabbit is extremely smart with the core design quirk and months after watching it I still recall it's nasty little twists and turns. Worth hunting down and capturing for yourself, regardless of the consequences.
Sky Blue Pink
(1968)
The Pink Baron
10 May 2024
Pink Panther Odyssey Part XXXVII
There's no throughline here. Our guy is flying his kites, then the whole thing becomes totally sidetracked by the little man and his business. Vengeance being the principle nature of that business. I dig these panther shorts, I really do, but would it have killed them to practice a bit of circuitous storytelling? That being said, the biplane end tangent is rather inspired.
A bi-plane fact to get us up to the required character length:
The concept of "stacking wings" on an aircraft was suggested by a Sir George Cayley way back in the 1840s who correctly identified the core four forces which dictate flight. He died decades before powered flight was ever achieved.
There's no throughline here. Our guy is flying his kites, then the whole thing becomes totally sidetracked by the little man and his business. Vengeance being the principle nature of that business. I dig these panther shorts, I really do, but would it have killed them to practice a bit of circuitous storytelling? That being said, the biplane end tangent is rather inspired.
A bi-plane fact to get us up to the required character length:
The concept of "stacking wings" on an aircraft was suggested by a Sir George Cayley way back in the 1840s who correctly identified the core four forces which dictate flight. He died decades before powered flight was ever achieved.
Follyfoot
(1971–1973)
Lighting Steeeeve
3 May 2024
When my partner first proposed we watch Follyfoot years ago I was convinced it was a bit of flimsy 70s second-hand nostalgia from our parent's generation. A children's TV show? About ponies??? No thanks. What I wasn't expecting at all was almost Kes-like contemporary social commentary built around some seriously complex and very well-observed character work. Follyfoot is genuinely something of a revelation. It was enormous in its day but seems now only the preserve of "it-was-better-in-them-dayers" on Facebook. Truthfully it can be rather dated and the combination of cheap 1950's film stock music and chaste preteen yearnings can get a bit much but the tough bits feel dark and this little old telly relic can occasionally be genuinely shocking. From the literary lineage of Dickens and with names like Stephen Frears and Michael Apted in the mix, it's wild that this has become so obscure. Don't be the fool that I was all those eons ago, give this a go.
The Lorax
(1972 TV Movie)
Thneeded less songs
3 May 2024
The legendary Lorax short, from the distant past of '72, is a strange little artefact. My partner and I yearly absorb "The Cat in the Hat" around Christmas time so that was solidly lodged in my brain - the two compare poorly I think, the songs in this feel egregiously tacked-on and the central theme is worthy but now rather unintentionally melancholic given all that was to happen (or rather, not at all happen) in the decades between then and now. Not it's fault, but it does rather taint the vibe. Still, the fussy animation is one of the most strikingly clear conversions of original cartoon style to motion there is, and that's something.
The Regime
(2024)
A little wobble.
2 May 2024
A sort of flabbily misjudged Armando approximation that does everything Death of Stalin did but less well. Winslet is both a magnetic central presence and the reason the whole thing doesn't really work. There needed to be more of a focus on the "lower deckers" like Andrea Riseborough's Agnes or the David Bamber's fantastically greasy Victor Schiff. Instead as the plot rolls along everyone but the central duo as discarded. I'm a fan of these political satirical allegories generally but the Regime lacked tonal cohesion overall despite a genuinely fantastic cast. Also Alexandre Desplat's theme was far too silly.
Avengers: Age of Ultron
(2015)
Chekov's Hammer
2 May 2024
After nearly ten years away from consuming the MCU (a mixture of self-denial and not knowing where to start) my partner and I plunged back in with the sequel to 2012's Avengers. It's still got Whedon's giddy setpieces, the core ensemble hold together remarkably well with the exception of the undercooked romance between Widow and Hulk. They never knew what to do with ScarJo, and that this ends up being her biggest slab of screentime until the solo film is a shame. That being said, the central narrative thread is fairly strong and there are some really great moments here (Ultron's first ghoulish appearance, Hulkbuster battle). The foreshadowing holds up well and Ultron ends up looking like a solid road map for all that was to come.
Nadiya's Fast Flavours
(2021)
Colour Supplement Cooking
2 May 2024
I'd literally watch Nadiya descale a teapot. I'd happily watch her just mooching about looking at wildebeest. Bake Off's charismatic winner of yore has had a few of these book tie-in glossy limited formats on the Beeb and they never quite suit her. Alone in an Observer Sunday supplement fake kitchen bedecked with whacky utensils and unctuous close-ups of glugging and mixing and so on. She cooks up a random assortment of things and her own endearing touch is to add an unexpected ingredient like... what if rice crispies were put in a roast? But on her own (here, likely for pandemic reasons) she loses a little something and you long to see her interacting with folk. The spots with guest chefs break up the format a little, but not enough really. But still - I'd watch her board a ship. I'd watch her catching butterflies and so on. She's TV gold.
Nighty Night
(2004–2005)
"Oh, Jill..."
2 May 2024
Upon re-watching Julia Davis's mid-noughties dark comedy I found myself almost totally overwhelmed by how tremendously disturbing it is. It makes Jam look like marmalade. All these years later it is still thoroughly unpleasant. There's also an underlying satirical wackiness present in all Davis projects that's really irresistible, pushing the extremity at times into a kind of self-aware melodrama more like a soap or a telenovela than a sitcom. What really makes both series worth plunging into beyond the hypnotically deluded Jill is a who's-who of British comedy talent. Rebecca Front's career-best performance as the painfully passive Cathy, or Kev Eldon's hapless Terry. The cartoonish caricatures of Ruth Jones, Mark Gatiss and the brilliant Felicity Montagu. Yes it's awful in some rather irredeemable ways, but there's something genuinely glorious about it too.
Secrets of Skin
(2019)
Skinny legend
2 May 2024
My father recommended to this with dubious praise: "You know those kind of indulgent single-issue documentary series? Well this is one of those but it's genuinely very interesting." That it is. Led by the charming science communicator Dr. Ben Garrod, we have six episodes entirely about skin, divided into categories of function and it's by-and-large utterly fascinating. There's a sort of winningly dated "you're being forced to watch this in science class at school" vibe about the presentation but it rattles along at a great pace and I genuinely learned tonnes that I didn't previously know. Fair play dad, good choice.
The Bear Who Slept Through Christmas
(1973 TV Movie)
"This could only happen to a Pisces"
27 April 2024
This strange piece of 70s ephemera from a long-lost 70s Christmas is really fascinating. It's a beautifully designed little animation crammed with strange rococo props and fussy backgrounds but it's a shame that narratively it's a tale of two fairly illogical halves that don't seem to match up. You've got this whole... almost proto-Pixar "world of bears" which is fascinatingly high concept and full of bear airports and honey factories and the like. It's all very weird but as it spills over into our reality it loses momentum and becomes a rather atypical Christmas heartstring-tugger that seems at odds with what came before. A big fan of the beautifully dated pink-eyed delivery of the Smothers brother.
Bad Sisters
(2022– )
Catch the JP-idgeon
27 April 2024
This characterful remake of a Flemish series sees a likeable gang of Irish sisters set about to do a murder. For ages. It didn't help that I ended up watching this over a seriously long period of time but it felt like seventy years. A lot of the surrounding plots that pad this up to 10 long episodes feel extraneous at best and downright deceptive at worst. Crack this down to six or less episodes and with a cast this good you'd easily have one of the finest Irish dramas ever made. A real shame but with some unforgettable moments. What a great mini.... wait, there's going to be even more?? Why? We didn't even need this much!
Captain Marvel
(2019)
Deus ex cattina
27 April 2024
Slogging merrily through a massive MCU backlog, I finally hit Captain Marvel and it's a real drag. A cautiously built and extremely muddled sort of a project that feels weighted down, messy and confused. The structure feels off - and Danvers Terminator-esque excursion to 90's Earth tells me starting it there would have been smarter. It never settles into what Danvers character actually is and the spotlight gets swiftly stolen by a convincingly de-aged Samuel L and even Clark Gregg. Even the baddy. Even a cat. It's irritating as Larsen has chops for days and deserved far better than this strangely 2D whisp of flimsy top-gunny air-force foolishness.
Wreck-It Ralph
(2012)
Game Over Man, Game Over
27 April 2024
It didn't know what to expect retroactively clambering into affectionate arcade film Wreck-it Ralph. I knew it had been a bit of a cultural phenomenon a decade or so ago but suspected it would be rammed with Disney animation schmaltz. For me though, it ends up being their strongest non-Pixar effort. There are a lot of smart angles crammed into this dusty games cabinet and you can feel the decades that went into hammering out the characters and the plot. Ralph is an unconventional sort of a thing, and I genuinely was taken by surprise by it. It's only tainted for me at all really by seeing it through the shadow of the misjudged sequel, but more on that later.
Kubo and the Two Strings
(2016)
Monkey With a Thousand Faces
27 April 2024
I was really surprised by Kubo - and not necessarily in a good way - Laika's breathtakingly beautiful bit of clay confection essentially amounts to a flimsily allegorical bit of culturally awkward fluff. Aside from the bafflingly intricate construction of a few set pieces within I have a terrible feeling it's not going to lodge in my mind with as much tenacity as previous Laika projects. As the credits rolled I was stunned that this much-hyped film that really had all the makings of my exact cup of tea ended up being the little more than "What if Joseph Campbell, but a weaboo?". A serious shame.
Miriam's Fair Go
22 April 2024
The utterly brilliant Margolyes sets out across just pre-pandemic Australia to discover what the "fair go" means there and bumps into the great, the good and the real. It's a testament to the structure of the series that it always feels a bit impulsive. Yes, clearly they would have got permissions and done scouting beforehand but Miriam seems to just wander around meeting real people. Her humanity is peerless, her self-awareness unmatched, and watching her just going around taking things in is beautiful. Much like the "planned/unplanned" vibe, where the trip ends is both accidental and somehow completely perfect. She gave it a fair go.
Jaws
(1975)
"Let the bodies pile high"
22 April 2024
Jaws is the quintessential summer blockbuster and one of those "you know what, fair play this is actually really good" sort of classic films that still functions really well. The core being a really tight narrative focus, some smartly layered symbolism, a host of fantastic characters and some genuinely shocking sequences. It's sad that the now fairly talked-about mayor plot isn't really resolved and it does feel like a film split firmly in two but it bristles with fantastic moments and is an absolute blast to watch. Gradually becoming that rare thing of a historical noteworthy work that also still really communicates something.
Sherwood
(II) (2022– )
*Suspicious David Morrissey Noises*
22 April 2024
British drama tends to either be either too cartoonish or too grimdark and a precious few manage to straddle that line. I think Sherwood just about manages it with the help of some seriously strong character performances and a few chunky narrative twists. As is usually the case, Adeel Akhtar is about thirty times better than everyone else and his arc is sincerely heart-breaking. The strike-breaking undercover cops stuff which is the wider plot is a bit less convincing and a quick glance at the local view tells you that they missed the mark in terms of authenticity. Still, I found myself drawn in every episode, and ultimately that means something.
It's Bruno!
(2019)
Fido of the Conchords
18 April 2024
Solvan Naim's breezy little series about a man and his dog is like a breath of fresh air. Propelled by fine tunes, low stakes and portions of perfect pups I was totally taken by it. There's a lovely lowkey vibe running through It's Bruno that feels super underrated. I mean, there is also no denying that it's fairly cheap looking and features a few unjustifiable lurches towards "a bigger plot" toward the end. The core concept, the wide cast of silly characters and call-backs are really solid and there feels like bags more sincerity in this than some other, much more expensive, comedies on the platform and indeed off it.
Naked
(1993)
"Thanks for the mammaries"
17 April 2024
Very rarely do films clamber into your mind and lodge there but this one has successfully done that. In the sense that I watched it a few months ago but it keeps queasily lurching back into my mind. Underpinned by the dark aimless wanderings of nasty narcissitic Johnny, here played with onanistic intensity by David Thewlis. The film is a grotty voyage through early nineties London and feels unendingly cruel. You get Leigh's cartoonish caricatures but drenched in a kind of sweaty 3am glaze of lost wrongs. The worst thing is you definitely know a Johnny, or you worry people think that you are a Johnny. That's why it's still in there. It all got a bit real.
Blue Collar
(1978)
Harvey Keitel's Psychosomatic Crab Trio
17 April 2024
Some films you find, some films find you. This is definitely the latter - and on the strength of seeing the hefty rock soundtrack alone in a discount vinyl bin I decided to watch it. The music is good but it's the bitter viewpoints and dark twists, as well as a totemic central trio in Prior Keitel and Kotto, that really made this a fascinating watch. It doesn't pull many punches and there's some deep brutality in here amidst the occasional comedy sequences. Prior's core performance is genuinely spellbinding and honestly as a directorial debut for Schrader it's pretty solid if a little tonally uneven. Sometimes it's really worth following up on a strange whim in a record bin.
Neverwhere
(1996)
"It's very cold, my friend. And very dark. And very cold."
17 April 2024
Neil Gaiman's insanely ambitious 90's TV series is a wild ride into a strangely progressive dark pocket of forgotten Brit TV. Filmed on strange cameras and ending up with this odd unvarnished presentation that looks much better in retrospect than it did at the time, bristling with oddments and weirdnesses and absolutely great British character actors. Trevor Peacock? A super young Paterson Joseph and Tamsin Greig? Peter Capaldi as the ominous Angel Islington?? A thousand times yes. It's extraordinarily gawky but strangely endearing, like a lot of Gaiman's work, but is also very recognisably his which is quite an impressive feat in a lot of ways.
Red Dwarf
(1988– )
Boys from the Dwarf
17 April 2024
Red Dwarf was a show that I was so obsessed with as a child that my teacher wrote to my parents to ask that I be "made to watch" something else. Funny jokes, hard sci fi concepts, solid characters, cool ships, relatable naffness, great guest actors. From the battleship grey days at the Beeb through to the Funchal promised land of Dave. From youthful Alien-inspired eighties exuberance, that weird awkward mid-life crisis period of which we rarely speak to a mostly tasteful old age. The boys from the Dwarf are fabulous, flawed and ever-smeggin-green. To that teacher of a byegone era I say: "swivel on it, punk!"
Life in the Snow
(2016 TV Movie)
"You'd be a fool to mess with this impenetrable wall of musk ox"
17 April 2024
The great Gordon Buchanan gads about in various cold climes prodding polar bears and the like. It has a compilation quality but Buchanan is always a charismatic draw and footage of him gamely scrabbling about on snowy hillsides is worth the price of admission alone really. Not a lot of it has stuck into my brain, certainly not enough to fill the required characters count here. I was going to write about the etymology of snow but that is dense and not particularly interesting, so I instead thought I'd puncture the idea that that Eskaluet languages have more words for snow than English but actually that turns out to also be quite a dense topic. Better to just make like Gordon and gad about in it.
Echo
(2023–2024)
"Keep kicking him, keep kicking him, keep kicking him!"
17 April 2024
Why hire good writers, decent TV writers, if you're just going to bludgeon their experience down into this narrow and flawed little box. It's such a shame that this is yet another uneven and poorly structured Disney+ Marvel endeavour as you've got some serious talent here, behind and in front of the cameras. Nice to see a bundle of Rez Doggers and they can get that cash but they just serve to remind you that there are far greater TV shows of this era you could be watching. There's some decent fight sequences too, but throughout there's this nagging desire that if you're pushing the envelope in terms of representation, tone and violence then you should also push it in terms of collaboration and trust.
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