Didn't they do well?

I am shocked, SHOCKED to discover that not only is Marketa Irglova dating Glen Hansard, but she is only nineteen! (Well, twenty in three days, but still...) She's only a few months older than I am! I'm not saying she looks old or anything but I would never have said she was that young. I am utterly besotted with her now, though, after the look she gave at being cut off (stupid orchestra!) and how gracious she was when Jon Stewart brought her back on for a chance to speak. I didn't love Once but I loved the music, and the performance of "Falling Slowly" last night was just heavenly. I actually beamed when it was announced as the winner.

For some reason, though, my heart sank a little when No Country for Old Men was given the final, biggest prize... not because I don't like it (I do: it's either my second or third favourite out of a superb roster), or even because it meant I got my prediction wrong- but just because it was so. bloody. predictable. About the only surprising wins last night were The Bourne Ultimatum getting both sound prizes and The Golden Compass besting Transformers for effects. (And on that note: what the hell? I'm sorry but The Golden Compass had rubbish effects.) How I longed for something truly surprising... like, say, The Lovely Laura Linney (who, by the way, seemed to be beaming all night- the camera loved her!) winning, or something that wasn't No Country snagging BP. I can't really complain too much about the winners, who were on the whole a good bunch (well, I could moan about Marion Cotillard- who seemed rather complacent while still sitting down, if you ask me- but I won't), but it was just so... dull.

That said, I did love both Tilda Swinton's win and her acceptance speech ("Really truly the same shape head, and, it has to be said, the buttocks..."), the aforementioned Once win, the gorgeousity of Jennifer Garner, Javier Bardem transferring to Spanish for his mother, how hilariously nervous Katharine Heigl was, Helen Mirren (rowr), and those excited women who won for Freeheld. Best dressed? I'm hardly an authority on these things, but I loved Garner, Diane Lane, Cameron Diaz, and Mirren. (I didn't love, however, Hilary Swank, who, I'm sorry, has the biggest teeth and chin of anyone I've ever seen. Alarming in the extreme.)

Oh, and my predictions? 15 out of 24. (So what have we learnt? Never trust anyone Never take risks. They don't pay off.) That's one up on last year. If that trend continues, I'll get them all right in 2017. Maybe Kate will finally have won by then...

They're zombies! Oh, and those others like to take a bite out of your necks...

Dawn of the Dead is, like, terrifying. Seriously. I don't think I've been this scared by a film since I saw Blue Velvet years ago and was constantly shivering from utter terror. There's one particular bit in Dawn of the Dead to do with a pregnancy that was so obviously going to be horrifying but it made me so uncomfortable that I almost fainted. And this was from watching on DVD! The film itself- which is, as I'm sure you're aware, a remake of George A. Romero 1978 sequel (which I haven't seen- I tried once, when it was on tv, but I just wasn't in the mood for gore then) to the terrific Night of the Living Dead- isn't overloaded with gore (though it's still pretty violent), but is more concerned with sustaining an atmosphere, as a group of survivors of the sudden zombie epidemic hide out in a well-protected shopping mall and try to plot a way to escape. The film is remarkably well-cast when you consider what it is- no big names so to speak, but indie-regular Sarah Polley (who directs the soon-to-be-released Away From Her with Julie Christie) headlines, with solid background names including Ving Rhames and Mekhi Phifer astutely playing their purposely surface roles- these aren't people we ever have time or need to get to know, as they don't with each other for the most part. To its credit, Dawn of the Dead never divides itself into set-pieces, never repeats itself, and feels remarkably fresh and modern. Grade: B+

The Holiday, meanwhile, clearly wants to be fresh and modern, what with all its gleaming, expensive and expansive L.A. mod-cons and its cosy, extraordinarily remote English cottages, but all in all it feels rather backward, not just because of its squishy romantic sensibility but because of its antiquated ideas of what British life is like (Cameron Diaz is disturbed by how small Kate Winslet's lovely cottage is- bitch should try living in my house) and how freakin' manipulative it is. Also there's an enormous subplot- I say subplot, but the supposed romance between Kate and Jack Black is hijacked by her friendship with Diaz's elderly screenwriter neighbour Eli Wallach, while Diaz spends all her time snogging the face off Jude Law, because, eww, if the girl isn't a stick and the guy is a tiny bit portly no-one wants to see more than a peck! Anyway, said subplot is all about how Wallach (and thus Winslet) bemoan the kind of movies we have today (the kind Diaz, as a maker of movie trailers, is all about making "look like a hit"), yet all the while director/writer Nancy Meyers is indulging in exactly that! I don't think The Holiday is totally bad, because there are some nice touches in there (Diaz can't stop that familiar trailer voice from overlaying her own predicaments) and the cast are a capable bunch who do their best to paper over the creaky, sentimental gaps, but The Holiday is never truly heart-warming, even in the corny sense, and even though its all so bloody long (2 hours and ten minutes!) I doubt it'll leave much of an impression on anyone at all. Oh, and it hasn't snowed like that in England at Christmas for ages. Grade: C

A Life Less Ordinary

A Life Less Ordinary (Danny Boyle, 1997)


In essence, I suppose Danny Boyle's follow-up to his breakthrough hit Trainspotting is no different to the many other romantic thrillers we've seen through the years, but, unlike them, A Life Less Ordinary doesn't even retain the pretence of trying to hide it's inevitability: of course, we always know that the lead pairing will fall in love, whatever obstacles have been haphazardly placed in their way,but somehow screenwriter John Hodge's decision to advertise this fact from before we've even met these characters loses the magic that can, occasionally, be present in this type of film. No, Hodge makes his main supporting pair of characters two angels, O'Reilly (Holly Hunter) and Jackson (Delroy Lindo), who are charged by their boss Gabriel (Dan Hedaya) of making two people fall in love, or else: if they fail, they'll be stranded on earth. So, of course, in the rather wacky, slightly heightened reality of A Life Less Ordinary, the central pairing must fall in love, because now the price is doubled: not only will they be unhappy, but these two angels will be too.

So who are this central pairing, this inevitably lovelorn couple, and how, exactly, are they thrust together? Well, Robert (Ewan McGregor, in his third straight film for Boyle) is a lowly cleaner with aspirations to write a trashy novel (he repeatedly spins a lame yarn about the lovechild of Marilyn Monroe and Bobby Kennedy growing up and solving a great mystery), but when he's fired from his job and replaced with a robot, he charges in and points a gun at his rich boss Naville (Ian Holm), and the whole thing transpires so he ends up kidnapping the man's beautiful daughter Celine (Cameron Diaz). Of course, Robert proves a rather inept kidnapper, but no worries: Celine is so smooth and confident, and I suppose rebellious, that she ends up taking charge of her own kidnapping... for a share of the profits, of course.

Strangely, for a film both written and directed by men, A Life Less Ordinary proves itself to be an oddly feminist film. Of course, this came when it was fashionable for the world to participate in reverse-sexism, a world where women are notably more intelligent and confident than the men, no matter what. (I have no problem with equality, but the current sexism towards men simply seems driven by revenge, which can hardly be what the suffragettes were aiming for.) Celine is so balanced, so relaxed, so coolly manipulative that she rapidly takes charge of everything, showing Robert what to do, easily escaping from her ropes and even offering a rather silly but convincing excuse to a curious neighbour who comes calling on their hideout. And so it is in the angels' pairing: O'Reilly constantly shushes a rather foolish Jackson when they visit Neville under the guise of bounty hunters. If Hodge's script had been more crafty, more elegantly written, and more sensibly compiled, it might have progressed beyond the simplistic exteriors of it's characters and created a more original film. But everything in A Life Less Ordinary seems pointless. Why draft in capable (and, in Hunter's case, consistently brilliant) actors if you're not going to give them anything to work with? The angel subplot certainly adds a fantastical interest to the film, but it never gels with the film, and Lindo and Hunter are reduced to mugging shots and soulless characterizations because there's nothing there for them to enhance. The script ambles along aimlessly, taking needless divertions into bitty scenes like Celine's forceful bank robbery and their visit to Stanley Tucci's rather unbalanced dentist. When, eventually, the film drops the kidnapping guise altogether, it totally falls apart, reducing itself to cliched romantic melodramatics and flat scenes of Diaz sobbing in her car.

I'm not sure if A Life Less Ordinary wants us to believe that it's actually spiritual or not. The ridiculous climax certainly points towards it, but it's almost so unbelievable that it might all be a joke. I can't exactly say that A life Less Ordinary is predictable, but it's plot turns are so stupid that I'd almost rather it had been. The cast, all a perfectly capable lot, are by no means awful, but they just dart around, aimlessly and rather half-heartedly trying to bring anything to their parts. Looking at the film's IMDB page, the current comment of choice describes the film favorably as "whimiscal and wacky"- if only the whimsy were charming enough to get excited about. Grade: D