tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1569448564075553362024-02-02T05:05:35.922+00:00alienlanesFilm and TV Reviewsalienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.comBlogger438125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-65309332127672705372010-11-21T21:33:00.003+00:002010-11-21T21:36:55.726+00:00Latest Reviews<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br /><a href="http://alfilmandtvreviews.blogspot.com/2010/11/case-39.html"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >Case 39</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> <span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">2 Stars</span></span><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >So-so horror film that follows a well-worn path about a child possessed by the Devil.</span><br /><br /><a href="http://alfilmandtvreviews.blogspot.com/2010/11/creature.html"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >Creature</span></a> <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">2¼ Stars</span></span><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Cheap and cheerful 1985 b-movie rip-off of ‘Alien’.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><a href="http://alfilmandtvreviews.blogspot.com/2010/11/management.html"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >Management</span></a></span> <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);font-size:100%;" >2¾ Stars</span></span><br /><span style="font-family:Trebuchet MS;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Likeable indie rom-com starring Jennifer Aniston.</span> </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><a href="http://alfilmandtvreviews.blogspot.com/2010/11/quatermass-and-pit-1958.html"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >Quatermass and the Pit</span></a></span> <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);font-size:100%;" >*5* Stars</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-size:100%;" >1958-9 BBC serial of the final part of the famous Nigel Kneale trilogy. Possibly the single greatest example of British science fiction.</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Latest review posted on 21 November 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-24140521833415371562010-11-21T21:19:00.005+00:002010-11-22T08:10:03.374+00:00Management<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:trebuchet ms;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written and directed by Steve Belber<br /><br />Starring Jennifer Aniston <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sue Claussen</em>)</span>, Steve Zahn <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mike Flux</em>)</span>, Wood Harrelson <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Jango</em>)</span>, Fred Ward <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Jerry Flux</em>)</span>, Margo Martindale <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Trish Flux</em>)</span> and James Hiroyuki Liao <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Al</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjosK81c0p7N57HYJE_cwW0yWC3e6aQ4AQbSom8VBxI6AZ8YR5SZEdxISRP_1wFd6q4WHCeprw9KheF4BiGA_lX1-6Em3cooc5lC6CbI_HJzzquXQQMzLqU1UnrvGXymfabs-r36_AgFQGm/s1600/Management%25231.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 134px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542118031537909090" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjosK81c0p7N57HYJE_cwW0yWC3e6aQ4AQbSom8VBxI6AZ8YR5SZEdxISRP_1wFd6q4WHCeprw9KheF4BiGA_lX1-6Em3cooc5lC6CbI_HJzzquXQQMzLqU1UnrvGXymfabs-r36_AgFQGm/s200/Management%25231.JPG" border="0" /></a>Mike Flux, the night manager of his parents’ motel in Arizona, develops a crush on Sue Claussen, a passing visitor from Baltimore. He follows her back there and their relationship develops, but the road to true love is a rocky one and she leaves Baltimore for Washington State to get back together with an old boyfriend.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 204, 204);">...</span><br /><br /><br />‘Management’ is a low-key indie rom-com. It contains all the expected quirks of its genre, but despite a decidedly peculiar opening fifteen minutes or so, it gradually becomes a rather heartfelt story, thanks in no small part to a decent screenplay and some good performances. Certainly, Steve Zahn’s character Mike is initially rather creepy, almost a kind of comic Norman Bates, but it is possible to start to warm to him as the film progresses. Equally, the seemingly odd behaviour of Jennifer Aniston’s character Sue begins to make a little more sense as we learn that she is, like Mike, lonely and, in her own way, directionless.<br /><br />The film received mixed reviews and has a 46% rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 94 reviews. It received a limited theatrical release and grossed $2.2 million. It probably deserves to be compared to Aniston’s excellent 2002 indie film ‘The Good Girl’.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted on 21 November 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-64563894431210250912010-11-21T15:11:00.011+00:002010-11-21T15:21:49.236+00:00Quatermass and the Pit (1958)<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;color:#333333;"><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span><br /><br />Rating <span style="color:#990000;"><strong>*5*</strong></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#333399;">Created and written by Nigel Kneale<br /><br />Starring André Morell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Professor Bernard Quatermass</em>)</span>, Cec Linder <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Dr Matthew Roney</em>)</span>, Antony Bushell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Colonel James Breen</em>)</span>, John Stratton <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Captain Potter</em>)</span>, Christine Finn <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Barbara Judd</em>)</span>, Harold Goodwin <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Corporal Gibson</em>)</span>, Brian Worth <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>James Fullalove</em>)</span>, Richard Shaw <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sladden</em>)</span>, Hilda Barry <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mrs Anne Chilcot</em>)</span>, Howell Davies <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mr Chilcot</em>)</span>, Victor Platt <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>PC Ellis</em>)</span>, Richard Dare <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Private Secretary</em>)</span> and Michael Ripper <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sergeant</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhmyW9Elj4-FXFLakNWUihVNm2_V7fL79xrEOFdFvNfpxBCcsvCCDCglm0iELYxmSjHhTSB7QDWSGkhBPdXp5JwQUZd7EdxeRPAus1qrLa9pmVvsMttv2LpJLufnBoy3qWE8BE6r3bOBR_/s1600/QuatermassAndThePit%25232.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 164px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542022039599435042" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhmyW9Elj4-FXFLakNWUihVNm2_V7fL79xrEOFdFvNfpxBCcsvCCDCglm0iELYxmSjHhTSB7QDWSGkhBPdXp5JwQUZd7EdxeRPAus1qrLa9pmVvsMttv2LpJLufnBoy3qWE8BE6r3bOBR_/s200/QuatermassAndThePit%25232.jpg" /></a>A pre-human skull is discovered on building works in Hobbs Lane in Knightsbridge. Palaeontologist Dr Matthew Roney identifies it as a missing link, many thousands of years old, and obtains permission to carry out archaeological excavation of the site. However, when what appears to be a previously-unidentified unexploded World War II German missile is discovered, the site is closed off by an Army bomb disposal team. Roney asks his friend Professor Bernard Quatermass of the British Experimental Rocket Group to intercede on his behalf and they begin to piece together the terrible truth about the origins of the human species.<br /><br /><span style="color:#cccccc;">...</span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc7SjOeipLsYTcKHyiyiFNm5W9UETQg0nNd_5sYmoQXWT2e0rq5B-mvuRqdw8x_v0rLD0Vbdltv-8XQinCx7U9J5wsOexP0wXnX9I9cGoVC_qKxwQhGOw0jcXCaKhyphenhyphenZaO_3zezoVYUWlgv/s1600/QuatermassAndThePit%25231.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 160px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542022193803326594" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc7SjOeipLsYTcKHyiyiFNm5W9UETQg0nNd_5sYmoQXWT2e0rq5B-mvuRqdw8x_v0rLD0Vbdltv-8XQinCx7U9J5wsOexP0wXnX9I9cGoVC_qKxwQhGOw0jcXCaKhyphenhyphenZaO_3zezoVYUWlgv/s200/QuatermassAndThePit%25231.jpg" /></a>When I was growing up, the 1967 Hammer Films version of ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ was one of my favourite films. I guess I would first have watched it as a teenager sometime in the early to mid-1970s. I remain very fond of it. Like the two earlier Quatermass films made by Hammer, it was a remake of a 1950s BBC serial. ‘Quatermass and the Pit’ was the final one in the trilogy, broadcast in six 30-minute segments between 22 December 1958 and 26 January 1959, most of it performed live.<br /><br />‘Quatermass and the Pit’ is a wildly acknowledged classic, possibly the single greatest example of British science fiction. It was hugely influential, both in style and theme. Doctor Who is a very obvious example of the influence of the Quatermass trilogy, but it extends much wider than just that.<br /><br />It might be a little bit dated and stagey now, but science fiction does not get any better or more intelligent than this. The quality of the surviving print is also superior to the first two instalments in the trilogy, ‘The Quatermass Experiment’ (1953) and ‘Quatermass II’ (1955).</span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;color:#333333;"><br /><span style="font-size:78%;color:#cc6600;">Review posted on 21 November 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-46838658646931810752010-11-21T14:25:00.003+00:002010-11-21T14:30:37.044+00:00Creature<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;color:#333333;"><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2¼<br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#333399;">Directed by William Malone<br /><br />Written by William Malone and Alan Reed<br /><br />Starring Stan Ivar <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mike Davison</em>)</span>, Wendy Schaal <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Beth Sladen</em>)</span>, Lyman Ward <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>David Parkins</em>)</span>, Robert Jaffe <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Jon Fennel</em>)</span>, Diane Salinger <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Melanie Bryce</em>)</span>, Annette McCarthy <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Dr Wendy Oliver</em>)</span> and Klaus Kinski <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Hans Rudy Hofner</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglQ-BAqcwVrV0xQDAJT6B9xEMUanTAUy86b4rIibJU4JudjjyQg-XdXyU3D7QW_8jgHBF6U6iXnYm-5-bEic6DtvFW4-NM-_B3DfcchyphenhyphenND8gw2H39yNzRWxhN_kdDW-wGELcvPc2ZvsmCg/s1600/Creature.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 146px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542009867596163282" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglQ-BAqcwVrV0xQDAJT6B9xEMUanTAUy86b4rIibJU4JudjjyQg-XdXyU3D7QW_8jgHBF6U6iXnYm-5-bEic6DtvFW4-NM-_B3DfcchyphenhyphenND8gw2H39yNzRWxhN_kdDW-wGELcvPc2ZvsmCg/s200/Creature.jpg" /></a>During exploration of the Saturn moon Titan, two American astronauts uncover the remains of an ancient civilisation and unwittingly release a terrifying alien creature. When a subsequent space mission to Titan discovers that a German space expedition beat them to it and then finds horribly mutilated bodies in the German spacecraft, they are plunged into a desperate fight for survival.<br /><br /><span style="color:#cccccc;">...</span><br /><br /><br />‘Creature’ is a cheap and cheerful 1985 b-movie rip-off of ‘Alien’, directed and co-written by William Malone, who seems to specialise in such things. The acting is at best adequate, the direction stolid and mundane and the special effects primitive. However, it races along at a jaunty pace and doesn’t take itself too seriously. It also boasts a suitably inexplicable appearance by Klaus Kinski.<br /><br />This is not a film to remember, but there is no reason why fans of slightly crummy sci-fi monster movies should not find something to enjoy here.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;color:#cc6600;">Review posted on 21 November 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-2831830833913346162010-11-21T11:54:00.018+00:002010-11-21T15:45:14.081+00:00Case 39<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:trebuchet ms;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Directed by Christian Alvert<br /><br />Written by Ray Wright<br /><br />Starring Renée Zellweger <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Emily Jenkins</em>)</span>, Jodelle Ferland <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lillith Sullivan</em>)</span>, Ian McShane <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Detective Mike Barren</em>)</span>, Bradley Cooper <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Douglas J Ames</em>)</span>, Adrian Lester <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Wayne</em>)</span>, Cynthia Stevenson <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Nancy</em>)</span>, Alexander Conti <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Diego Ramirez</em>)</span>, Kerry O’Malley <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Margaret Sullivan</em>)</span> and Callum Keith Rennie <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Edward Sullivan</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhazcRaA4p4NhUgxdyDMm8EAeWb5f1_8mNqVSLnNERAXyXkD4iqD2q39ppHIVJDQKpGyHYxNr4lIFlg9dr4gkgflhkXKVnSbWRwM_fgIxAYvHRTUDLVy_43YBUvjYolHuBGNUmX9ohXCnmD/s1600/Case39.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 141px; float: right; height: 200px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542000857728711010" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhazcRaA4p4NhUgxdyDMm8EAeWb5f1_8mNqVSLnNERAXyXkD4iqD2q39ppHIVJDQKpGyHYxNr4lIFlg9dr4gkgflhkXKVnSbWRwM_fgIxAYvHRTUDLVy_43YBUvjYolHuBGNUmX9ohXCnmD/s200/Case39.jpg" border="0" /></a>Emily Jenkins is a social worker who already has 38 active cases, but is given two more to add to her impossible workload. She wearily picks up the first one and is fascinated by the case of 10-year-old Lillith Sullivan. After visiting the parents, she becomes convinced that Lillith is in real danger, but there is no evidence to allow her to act. However, she gives Lillith her cell phone number and after a terrified late night call she rushes to the Sullivan house, putting a call into her friend, the police detective Mike Barren. They break down the door and discover that the parents are attempting to roast their daughter alive in the oven. Emily is given temporary custody of Lillith while a suitable foster family is found for her, but she soon begins to realise that Lillith is not all that she seems.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 204, 204);">...</span><br /><br /><br />The German film director Christian Alvert came to the attention of Hollywood following his 2005 film ‘Antikörper’ (Antibodies). The science-fiction film ‘Pandorum’ was his first American venture to be released and that was followed by the horror film ‘Case 39’, which was filmed in late 2006 and originally due for release in February 2008. It was eventually released into New Zealand cinemas in August 2009, followed by numerous other markets around the world, but it was not until October 2010 that it limped out in America. Reaction to the film was generally negative and it has a 22% rotten rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 63 collected reviews. It had a production budget of $26 million and grossed a little over $28 million at the box office.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjty8WTyjU4Yic2HL26J4LcfklXfKFeTHfMQKIx6sKPRGxVHUY6ZmXmJqF8zywO6Mwxm6iNof6Plv0jj6CWugGKzTr7xHnSZG7YMOh4ahW0fYXuNhSzIc4bbZJoFaBpmsXMU0L7_V3L7PJ0/s1600/Case39%25234.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 134px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542001061195920802" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjty8WTyjU4Yic2HL26J4LcfklXfKFeTHfMQKIx6sKPRGxVHUY6ZmXmJqF8zywO6Mwxm6iNof6Plv0jj6CWugGKzTr7xHnSZG7YMOh4ahW0fYXuNhSzIc4bbZJoFaBpmsXMU0L7_V3L7PJ0/s200/Case39%25234.jpg" border="0" /></a>The film deals with a tried and tested horror theme that children are evil and often possessed by the Devil. The obvious influences here do not take too much guessing – ‘The Exorcist’ and ‘The Omen’. The film does need to be taken with a pinch of salt and does require a willing suspension of disbelief; not, oddly, because of the supernatural or horror element, but in response to more mundane moments in the plot. It beggars belief that Emily, the children’s social worker, would be permitted to become Lillith’s temporary carer and guardian. Perhaps even harder to believe is the manner in which Mike Barren, who had previously been seriously skeptical and concerned for Emily’s psychological health, so easily changes his mind and comes to believe her story, based on just one very indistinct and ambiguous phone call. This particular moment in the film and the scenes immediately after it seem rushed and yet the film generally rather drags and is a good 20 minutes too long. It runs out of steam long before the end. Having said this, there are some very effective individual scenes along the way and the film is not a complete dud.<br /><br />I am not fond of Renée Zelleweger’s acting style and find her quite difficult to watch, but she is okay here as far as it goes. Jodelle Ferland is suitably creepy and unpleasant in the role of Lillith. It’s always nice to see Cynthia Stevenson in a film, although she has a small and a relatively inconsequential role.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 21 November 2010</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-10262754099164563292010-06-17T08:38:00.005+01:002010-06-17T08:54:22.209+01:00Doctor Who: Planet of Evil<span style="font-family:georgia;color:#333333;"><span style="color:#ffffff;">…</span><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#333399;">Written by Louis Marks<br /><br />Directed by David Maloney<br /><br />Starring Tom Baker <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Elisabeth Sladen <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sarah Jane Smith</em>)</span>, Frederick Jaeger <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sorenson</em>)</span>, Ewen Solon <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Vishinsky</em>)</span>, Prentis Hancock <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Salamar</em>)</span>, Michael Wisher <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Morelli</em>)</span>, Graham Weston <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>De Haan</em>)</span>, Louis Mahoney <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Ponti</em>)</span>, Terence Brook <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Braun</em>)</span>, Tony McEwan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Baldwin</em>)</span>, Haydn Wood <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>O’Hara</em>)</span> and Melvyn Bedford <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Reig</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYqalvpefWE_3zjrNHTrUGcy7oljf5orbNSZ2FTU6Y3pFXZ3ejHrT5e4XGeK8aP625WGJhCndQwHQ-xc_tO3MGdYArXFoCuP0SwmvIepgzCa6oBEMYPDZ9J8SD_BzYO8YUoj8GsW2q9TFc/s1600/FourthDoctor.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 165px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483644875795008866" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYqalvpefWE_3zjrNHTrUGcy7oljf5orbNSZ2FTU6Y3pFXZ3ejHrT5e4XGeK8aP625WGJhCndQwHQ-xc_tO3MGdYArXFoCuP0SwmvIepgzCa6oBEMYPDZ9J8SD_BzYO8YUoj8GsW2q9TFc/s200/FourthDoctor.jpg" /></a>The TARDIS responds to a distress call from Zeta Minor, the most distant planet in the known universe, where the Doctor and his companion Sarah Jane discover the apparently abandoned base of a geological expedition. A military ship has also answered the distress call and the Doctor and Sarah Jane become suspects for the unexplained deaths of several of the expedition crew. Only Professor Sorenson remains alive and the Doctor realises he has been tampering with antimatter in his bid to discover alternative sources of energy to save his people, whose Sun is dying.<br /><br /><span style="color:#c0c0c0;">…</span><br /><br /><br />‘Planet of Evil’, a serial broadcast in four 25-minute episodes between 27 September and 18 October 1975, has always stuck in my memory. I am not sure why. Perhaps because it is clearly based on the classic 1956 film ‘Forbidden Planet’, a real favourite of mine, with a bit of ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ thrown into the mix. Maybe because this was one of the classic periods of Doctor Who, with the most popular and successful Doctor, Tom Baker, and one of the most popular companions, Sarah Jane Smith, played by Elisabeth Sladen.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHMG-j9VXf0Yl0RsVXujtM9WLlI61LehNSt7MGqMwirbYVzCWkM4mXP9e-VhdTQ29JcjI-5v30AGhM9TNO5Pabqn_IUDJc1nkicDPj7sRLYpMijKGjlq8__-gE8UYeglb_T9AxC4w18hXd/s1600/PlanetOfEvil2.jpg"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwoHwW9EmWgz7Fx4l0CRcL_JQ95l_FJKZCQY9djj98D-tvP4pRJ2bkaXwv_1JlAFRY4O9_d5iuO1g0Fv5sH0yxPDnf5u6ramhqUviyYRg5-QsTQK6Odr2XmEnRtYO3r90gQEvJKHP2FowS/s1600/PlanetOfEvil3.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 100px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483645218595482194" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwoHwW9EmWgz7Fx4l0CRcL_JQ95l_FJKZCQY9djj98D-tvP4pRJ2bkaXwv_1JlAFRY4O9_d5iuO1g0Fv5sH0yxPDnf5u6ramhqUviyYRg5-QsTQK6Odr2XmEnRtYO3r90gQEvJKHP2FowS/s200/PlanetOfEvil3.jpg" /></a>Elisabeth Sladen played this role from ‘The Time Warrior’ at the start of the final season featuring the third Doctor, played by Jon Pertwee, in December 1973, until ‘The Hand of Fear’ in October 1976, the second serial in Tom Baker’s third season. She made a subsequent appearance in ‘The Five Doctors’ in 1983 and in the aborted 1981 spin-off ‘K9 and Company’, before returning in 2006 for a guest appearance in ‘School Reunion’ in the revived series. This led to the successful spin-off ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’, which has so far run for three seasons, with two more confirmed by the BBC.<br /><br />Is ‘Planet of Evil’ memorable? Well, I don’t think it ranks amongst the very best Doctor Who serials from the classic series, but I love nearly all Doctor Who and this is a minor gem, even if it does rather fizzle out in the final episode. It is not original by any stretch of the imagination, but it is constructed with some degree of flair. The message can perhaps best be summed up by something the Doctor says to Professor Sorenson: “You and I are scientists, Professor. We buy our privilege to experiment at the cost of total responsibility.” It is a theme that has been explored over the course of the series time and time again.<br /><br />The sets are what they are and anyone with any knowledge of Doctor Who knows not to expect state-of-the-art special effects. The spacecraft is rather threadbare, to say the least, but the alien jungle landscape of the planet Zeta Minor is not entirely bereft of charm.<br /><br />Tom Baker had an odd lazy approach to his acting, almost disinterested, which somehow seemed to work perfectly. It gave his Doctor a slightly disengaged air, often one of amused and slightly superior intellectual curiosity. I recall that he was sometimes compared to Harpo Marx and there is occasionally a degree of uninhibited anarchy about him.<br /><br />‘Planet of Evil’ perhaps has not quite lived up to my memory of it all these years later, but I still enjoyed it very much.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;color:#cc6600;">Review posted 17 June 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#ffffff;">…</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-47504687746072209602010-06-13T14:03:00.011+01:002010-06-26T14:52:23.705+01:00Doctor Who: The Lodger<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Gareth Roberts<br /><br />Directed by Catherine Morshead<br /><br />Starring Matt Smith <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Karen Gillan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Amy Pond</em>)</span>, James Corden <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Craig Owens</em>)</span>, Daisy Haggard <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sophie</em>)</span>, Owen Donovan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Steven</em>)</span>, Babatunde Aleshe <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sean</em>)</span>, Jem Wall <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Michael</em>)</span> and Karen Seacombe <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sandra</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><strong><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxSW6oRdFeyYE1nN_kEDURgq9xyEPzeobVajYea7f8B1gocco9hCbTb_6lDKMdVVwB71fIxc_TPKEpMl9c5m6JqFrpBUXaCbkOEloPIqpsZWk5lb2ywy7dTOiCzTyiYARfrofRaXGE0win/s1600/DrWhoLodger1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5482245669740627666" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxSW6oRdFeyYE1nN_kEDURgq9xyEPzeobVajYea7f8B1gocco9hCbTb_6lDKMdVVwB71fIxc_TPKEpMl9c5m6JqFrpBUXaCbkOEloPIqpsZWk5lb2ywy7dTOiCzTyiYARfrofRaXGE0win/s200/DrWhoLodger1.jpg" border="0" /></a>“All I have to do is pass myself off as an ordinary human being. Simple. What could possibly go wrong?”</strong><br /><br />The TARDIS arrives unplanned in Colchester, but when the Doctor steps out it immediately dematerialises, leaving him separated from his companion Amy. The Doctor turns up on the doorstep of Craig Owens, announcing that he is the new lodger and producing a small brown paper carrier bag full of money. Something very strange is happening upstairs that is preventing the TARDIS from materialising and the Doctor needs to find out what it is, but he is also not blind to Craig and his friend Sophie and the obvious unspoken feelings they have for one another.<br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);"><br />...<br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoPOn9BHNVsEvpICKnvZZiHGHpELC63KoMUfUSXJJfLii-qx6sLyLlj-Orye7YZ4qYRfE0jpi-vE-2Mn-6D6Y43W61zZYrAYgTCOO4dxZv0rVDvjoYx2egBniwmr7qMe1EFb0IJT7FtPob/s1600/DrWhoLodger2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5482245795702406850" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoPOn9BHNVsEvpICKnvZZiHGHpELC63KoMUfUSXJJfLii-qx6sLyLlj-Orye7YZ4qYRfE0jpi-vE-2Mn-6D6Y43W61zZYrAYgTCOO4dxZv0rVDvjoYx2egBniwmr7qMe1EFb0IJT7FtPob/s200/DrWhoLodger2.jpg" border="0" /></a>We arrive at episode eleven. The next two episodes will see the latest season reach its climax and be brought to a close, so ‘The Lodger’ might be described as the calm before the storm. This is an episode that perhaps could be equated to ‘Love and Monsters’ in season two of the revived series or ‘Blink’ in season three. From comments I have read, some fans are critical of ‘The Lodger’ because they say it is not Doctor Who. When the Doctor should be concentrating on the mysterious and disturbing events taking place upstairs, the disappearance and we assume death of innocent people, he is out playing football or fooling around at the office where Craig works. This I feel completely misses the point and assumes that Doctor Who is a soulless sci-fi series with no humour and no interest in people and the minutiae of human drama. ‘The Lodger’s is a comic diversion, the story of two people who are in love with one another but find it impossible to openly express their true feelings. The science fiction element, the strange events at the top of the stairs, is not entirely without relevance, but it is to some degree incidental.<br /><br />‘The Lodger’ is an episode that, after one viewing, I think starts brightly, has countless funny and memorable moments, but perhaps does not quite add up to the sum of its parts. However, it’s affectionate and warm-hearted and benefits from a pitch-perfect performance by Matt Smith, who has proved himself to have exquisite comic timing. There are several references back to the “classic series”, a now familiar refrain in this fifth season of the revived show. When asked if he plays football, the Doctor says, “Football? Is that the one with the sticks?” It’s a funny line in itself, coming in an episode that coincides with the start of the 2010 World Cup, but also a clever reference back to the fifth Doctor, who is incidentally the favourite of executive producer and head writer Steven Moffitt.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB-4y66OY5tSCWMsgOE_LH-3xC2A1BrCD44xE6QLFai75NoXrXryM2XAvOgYsCqAZs3ooy1TRKvZHkkP8kOJXP6rnY35ofSUWlI4SFw8feJmuL7KFZ7URk0ya01gJ-vWiPI8r2f94SLcVx/s1600/DrWhoLodger3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5482245957374713666" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB-4y66OY5tSCWMsgOE_LH-3xC2A1BrCD44xE6QLFai75NoXrXryM2XAvOgYsCqAZs3ooy1TRKvZHkkP8kOJXP6rnY35ofSUWlI4SFw8feJmuL7KFZ7URk0ya01gJ-vWiPI8r2f94SLcVx/s200/DrWhoLodger3.jpg" border="0" /></a>From many of the comments I have read about this episode it does seem that I was not alone in being dubious of the involvement of James Corden, who would clearly seem to be a love or hate figure, perhaps more so after his recent childish spat with the actor Patrick Stewart. And like many others, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that he gives a restrained and likeable performance as the sweet natured and lovelorn Craig.<br /><br />I enjoyed ‘The Lodger’ very much and it might just become more of a favourite in the fullness of time. For now it was a pleasant diversion that does not count amongst the best episodes of this season.<br /><br />‘The Lodger’ was written Gareth Roberts, who has written several other episodes of the series and many episodes of its spin-off show ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’. His previous work includes the soap operas ‘Emmerdale’ and ‘Brookside’, as well as the Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer revival of ‘Randall & Hopkirk Deceased’, which starred the longest serving and most successful Doctor of them all, Tom Baker, in a supporting role.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 13 June 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-28314492030390753022010-06-08T16:12:00.009+01:002010-06-08T19:44:12.496+01:00Doctor Who: Vincent and the Doctor<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 3¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Richard Curtis<br /><br />Directed by Jonny Cambell<br /><br />Starring Matt Smith <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Karen Gillan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Amy Pond</em>)</span>, Tony Curran <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Vincent Van Gogh</em>)</span>, Bill Nighy <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Dr Black</em>)</span>, Nik Howden <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Maurice</em>)</span>, Sarah Counsell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Waitress</em>)</span> and Nik Howden <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mother</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE91n0r16dkXyh2hNOMO-6J_BHSNE3c7p7itXvffSyyQkR887dUEDnD_BpTAT7C909zkLzVQF5AzBeQYZZM_eZPsSo3ZEXo5ytGRszYFk2PXHkHL0jvm3_Ay13NRVgscNO5qpOUuUmvvo2/s1600/ChurchAtAuvers.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 159px; float: right; height: 200px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480424067662933586" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE91n0r16dkXyh2hNOMO-6J_BHSNE3c7p7itXvffSyyQkR887dUEDnD_BpTAT7C909zkLzVQF5AzBeQYZZM_eZPsSo3ZEXo5ytGRszYFk2PXHkHL0jvm3_Ay13NRVgscNO5qpOUuUmvvo2/s200/ChurchAtAuvers.jpg" border="0" /></a>The Doctor takes Amy to the Musée d’Orsay in Paris to visit the Vincent Van Gogh collection. She mentions that he has taken her to many fabulous places recently and asks why he is treating her to such special attention, but he brushes aside her suspicious questioning. When the Doctor notices a malevolent face in Van Gogh’s painting of <em>The Church at Auvers</em>, he and Amy travel backwards in time in the TARDIS to find out what it was that Van Gogh had painted and discover that he is battling a giant invisible alien creature known as the Krafayis.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br />I have been deliberately keeping myself as uninformed as possible about each new episode of Doctor Who, wanting to be surprised by developments in the continuing storyline. Sometimes I have failed, such as the last episode, when I inadvertently discovered in advance that something terrible was going to happen and guessed what it would be. All I knew about ‘Vincent and the Doctor’ in advance of watching it was what I had seen in the trailer at the end of the previous week’s episode and, subsequently, the knowledge that it was written by Richard Curtis, whose work, generally speaking, I am not a fan of. I assumed it would be a jokey throwaway, perhaps along the lines of ‘The Shakespeare Code’ in the third season of the revived series. I was not expecting what we actually got.<br /><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSAEvSvRgIS71JVsn_MVWqN3laYx_D6EVkWCpuQQhCVvAFtX0YMLasrIA5t9xNbYG2MsFzzf30dGxDkk_Y5ZrgWBClDVFuU6NVmZC0HwNvdQo7qREozsaYaqI7wUISGPB6R85yi3mJwuqf/s1600/VincentAndTheDoctor4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480422276981380946" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSAEvSvRgIS71JVsn_MVWqN3laYx_D6EVkWCpuQQhCVvAFtX0YMLasrIA5t9xNbYG2MsFzzf30dGxDkk_Y5ZrgWBClDVFuU6NVmZC0HwNvdQo7qREozsaYaqI7wUISGPB6R85yi3mJwuqf/s200/VincentAndTheDoctor4.jpg" border="0" /></a></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >On the face of it, ‘Vincent and the Doctor’ is a typical Doctor Who episode. There are several self-referential allusions to the past. Not for the first time in this latest season, there is a visual reference to the first Doctor (William Hartnall). The character played by Bill Nighy, an art expert conducting a tour of the Van Gogh collection, can be related back to John Cleese and Eleanor Bron,</span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" > the art snobs seen in the Louvre in the famous 1979 Doctor Who serial ‘City of Death’, which was co-written by Douglas Adams.<br /><br />The invisible creature, a kind of giant rooster, is nothing to get excited about and is, in itself, the least interesting aspect of the episode. However, it serves a purpose, one that I suppose draws on the influence of the classic 1956 science fiction film ‘Forbidden Planet’. In that f</span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >ilm, the character Dr Morbius inadvertently creates a gigantic invisible monster with the power of his id. The Krafayis is not created by Van Gogh, but it can be viewed as a kind of manifestation of his illness, not least because ultimately, when it is too late, it is realised that the creature was fearful and disorientated and lashed out for that reason. The action here takes places just months before Van Gogh would commit suicide, a v</span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >ictim of severe depression that had haunted him for much of his life. In the episode we see his extreme mood swings, from great elation to soul-destroying melancholia.<br /><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTTP_k9rRJ917NuUPhFkVehZ9aGly3veSgz_XJKVQZQa1Fm-LzCOnLoOnVfTqvl7LiVCv3lmnlc81sTOEFuIw-pef9NiI0UVR52RVtu2mxj0B_ztc_WeM62ZQ8WS3mvYPy1kdMU5dJplco/s1600/VincentAndTheDoctor1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480421800385156018" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTTP_k9rRJ917NuUPhFkVehZ9aGly3veSgz_XJKVQZQa1Fm-LzCOnLoOnVfTqvl7LiVCv3lmnlc81sTOEFuIw-pef9NiI0UVR52RVtu2mxj0B_ztc_WeM62ZQ8WS3mvYPy1kdMU5dJplco/s200/VincentAndTheDoctor1.jpg" border="0" /></a></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >Van Gogh is initially hostile towards the Doctor, although less so towards Amy. However, he craves companionship and people he can talk to who understand him. He soon begins to respond to them and a change can be seen in his manner, until in one tremendous scene we discover how desperately lonely he is. When he realises that the Doctor and Amy will soon leave him he immediately becomes angry and sinks into deep despair. It’s beautifully done, dealt with in a subtle and responsible way.<br /><br />The episode contains many clever and nicely observed touches. Van Gogh, a native of the Netherlands, speaks in a broad Scottish accent. When the Doctor and Amy first encounter him he observes that Amy has a Dutch accent, because that is how he hears her. We, the audience, are likewise hearing Van Gogh the way that Amy, who is Scottish, does. Van Gogh, because of his acute awareness of the fragility of the mind, is able to recognise Amy’s inner sadness, something she herself is unaware of. Her conscious memory of Rory, her dead fiancé, has been erased, but not it seems her sub-conscious memory.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgupDC85iX10i9_g1Q2pkoCRvnRoXepmHi7ZxOgPCGD0Gro8xhA4FF2m8_nBoWX9NVgKnu5I16FixM6sfhy_s1K6AG42OUc2M8BxASQAUw68GUkmAdNhDTSijaLwetEE5CTyVaBwsP-fDLr/s1600/VincentAndTheDoctor2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480421915657455186" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgupDC85iX10i9_g1Q2pkoCRvnRoXepmHi7ZxOgPCGD0Gro8xhA4FF2m8_nBoWX9NVgKnu5I16FixM6sfhy_s1K6AG42OUc2M8BxASQAUw68GUkmAdNhDTSijaLwetEE5CTyVaBwsP-fDLr/s200/VincentAndTheDoctor2.jpg" border="0" /></a>The episode possibly bludgeons us a little unnecessarily with the fact that Van Gogh was a genius whose paintings were unheralded and unsuccessful in his lifetime and that he was increasingly frustrated that he was unable to reproduce on canvas what he saw in the world around him and in his own head. However, this is leading up to the scene in which the Doctor and Amy bring Van Gogh forward in time so that he can see his work on display in the Musée d’Orsay and hear for himself the enormous admiration and wonder it inspires in people. This scene, complete with cheesy musical accompaniment, courtesy of a song by the dreadful Athlete, could so easily have been mawkish over-sentimental drivel, but against all the odds it works beautifully, in no small part due to the terrific performance by Tony Curran.<br /><br />The closing scene, also, in which Amy insists that she and the Doctor return to the Musée d’Orsay after taking Van Gogh back to his own time, is effective and cleverly conceived. She expects to find new paintings, even greater works that Van Gogh would have created had he not killed himself when he did. Instead, she discovers that nothing has changed. Those few days of happiness and the renewal of spirit that Van Gogh experienced in the company of the Doctor and Amy were just that, a fleeting respite from his spiralling despair and mental illness.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia07s7I1ajv5VZG5maeDyj0QbEHyo0R4DjCVD7F9ZMaza-QoWy_O_nHq09g1DDR4zf2UelAb_1Tl90JKHPFkdFB1J9DPSFXMPe4G_QgEPYLMYds79PTtNbYGmA6OhIXyMsItSqvrUKCSim/s1600/VincentAndTheDoctor3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480422097220150290" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia07s7I1ajv5VZG5maeDyj0QbEHyo0R4DjCVD7F9ZMaza-QoWy_O_nHq09g1DDR4zf2UelAb_1Tl90JKHPFkdFB1J9DPSFXMPe4G_QgEPYLMYds79PTtNbYGmA6OhIXyMsItSqvrUKCSim/s200/VincentAndTheDoctor3.jpg" border="0" /></a>The only jarring note for me was the “To Amy” message now appended to the painting of <em>Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers</em>. It was enough for us to suppose that Amy had inspired Van Gogh to create this celebrated painting, but this unnecessary addition made it became too artificial and pulled me away from the narrative.<br /><br />This fifth season of the revived series is increasingly proving to be one of the best yet. It is certainly, for me, a return to the brilliance of the first two seasons back in 2005 and 2006. My rating for each episode has been deliberately on the low side. I do not want to fall into the trap of awarding a “5” based on my initial reaction after watching an episode once or twice at most. However, ‘Vincent and the Doctor’ is an episode that quite possibly will, in the fullness of time, prove to be just that.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 8 June 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-38925129338111197712010-06-07T14:16:00.008+01:002010-06-07T14:33:39.746+01:00Batman Begins<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Directed by Christopher Nolan<br /><br />Written by Christopher Nolan and David S Goyer, based on the comic books by Bob Kane and Bill Finger<br /><br />Starring Christian Bale <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Bruce Wayne / Batman</em>)</span>, Michael Caine <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Alfred Pennyworth</em>)</span>, Liam Neeson <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Henri Ducard</em>)</span>, Katie Holmes <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Rachel Dawes</em>)</span>, Rutger Hauer <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>William Earle</em>)</span>, Gary Oldman <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sgt James Gordon</em>)</span>, Cillian Murphy <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Dr Jonathan Crane / The Scarecrow</em>)</span>, Tom Wilkinson <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Carmine Falcone</em>)</span>, Mark Boone <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Detective Arnold Flass</em>)</span>, Linus Roache <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Thomas Wayne</em>)</span>, Sara Stewart <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Martha Wayne</em>)</span>, Ken Watanabe <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Ra’s al Ghul</em>)</span> and Morgan Freeman <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lucius Fox</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiELPt2zMaaeNlVZb2xDdZ9SxH4uFa9s1CRQOEgYFMgHYB0YY_TKIbDCJqzg3IS7oDe_TtD2N0R4TBf09OCrx388wGl0uwjn4TMIH5MNgXqc3Tx1Vbe6Bo5ME6b949barsiiHplZ7CxpbuE/s1600/BatmanBegins1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 84px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480021166835828850" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiELPt2zMaaeNlVZb2xDdZ9SxH4uFa9s1CRQOEgYFMgHYB0YY_TKIbDCJqzg3IS7oDe_TtD2N0R4TBf09OCrx388wGl0uwjn4TMIH5MNgXqc3Tx1Vbe6Bo5ME6b949barsiiHplZ7CxpbuE/s200/BatmanBegins1.jpg" border="0" /></a>Young Bruce Wayne witnesses the murder of his parents. He returns to Gotham City as an adult, intent on revenge against the killer, who is then assassinated before he can do so. He decides to immerse himself in the criminal underworld to try to understand the motivation to do evil and ends up in a hellish prison. He escapes and encounters Henri Ducard, who leads him to Ra’s al Ghul and the League of Shadows, where he undergoes rigorous training, intended to rid him of his fear and turn him into a fearless fighter. He is told of a plan to purge Gotham of evil by destroying the city, but he refuses to have anything to do with it. He returns to Gotham and with the help of Alfred Pennyworth, the loyal Wayne family butler, he sets about creating an alter-ego, Batman, to help rid the city of corruption.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /></span><br /><br /><div><div><div><div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFy_AMdLDzX174GJ68U2GJ8MFdpVM6Mg6LesTtok7C_gslPlfYGPh2ybLwtYoJ2O_T6JFdaVcq9WqE7SmLNPQatCox75XMtmGs4L66ZHQ99uQEuGEGsY2gu_QUnIHinpeDnAHzOwXH6IG9/s1600/BatmanBegins2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 134px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480021295235310530" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFy_AMdLDzX174GJ68U2GJ8MFdpVM6Mg6LesTtok7C_gslPlfYGPh2ybLwtYoJ2O_T6JFdaVcq9WqE7SmLNPQatCox75XMtmGs4L66ZHQ99uQEuGEGsY2gu_QUnIHinpeDnAHzOwXH6IG9/s200/BatmanBegins2.jpg" border="0" /></a>I should start by mentioning that ‘Batman Begins’ has an 85% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 254 reviews, 215 of those reviews judged to have been favourable.<br /><br />It took me three attempts to watch the whole of the film. I all but gave up after the first 45 minutes or so, having become increasingly irritated by the relentless ninja nonsense. I later returned to the film for a second try, picking it up where I had stopped watching. Once the action moved back to Gotham and Batman made a first appearance, things improved marginally, but still I grew restless within the hour. I came back to the film the next day to finish watching it, but I had largely lost interest before the end came.<br /><br />So, what is wrong with the film? Probably nothing very much, but I just didn’t like it. Much was made of the fact that the film and directed and co-written by Christopher Nolan and clearly it has been made with some skill. It was, we were repeatedly told, a much darker interpretation of Batman, which I guess is true if by dark they mean silly. I found the comic-book fight scenes excruciatingly boring, but that is something I knew to expect, because it has increasingly become a problem in these types of blockbuster films.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieKNj65sXwhfnEOy9TKYf_CTg7HtN6okuLpo10AGokWYQzR3PD7maiwWvf1HwSa7bA8SX3qNJMMp38tmmD5JsXaakx4KkbXyud3wWgO4qoKJ2WdjV2gG9_lQiahy4yg7XjnKe402GnK-rv/s1600/BatmanBegins3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 85px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480021447347514770" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieKNj65sXwhfnEOy9TKYf_CTg7HtN6okuLpo10AGokWYQzR3PD7maiwWvf1HwSa7bA8SX3qNJMMp38tmmD5JsXaakx4KkbXyud3wWgO4qoKJ2WdjV2gG9_lQiahy4yg7XjnKe402GnK-rv/s200/BatmanBegins3.jpg" border="0" /></a>Most troublesome, though, was my dislike of Christian Bale’s performance in the lead role. I had not previously seen a Christian Bale film and I was undoubtedly guilty of some bias because of the spectacularly appalling rant he was responsible for on the set of ‘Terminator Salvation’. Irrespective of the excuses that have been made for his behaviour, and his own subsequent apology, he is quite clearly an arsehole. However, it is tempting to suspect that this kind of behaviour is commonplace and Bale is only really guilty of having his outburst made public. It should not necessarily affect judgement of his acting. I was just left cold by his take on Batman. I didn’t like Katie Holmes either, although I have seen performances in other films and not come away with any negative opinions. She was replaced by Maggie Gyllenhaal in the sequel, ‘The Dark Knight’. Cillian Murphy seemed to be channelling the spirit of Christian Slater, which I found rather off-putting, because it was all I could focus on whenever he was on the screen. Having said that, the concept of the Scarecrow was quite effective.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiD6mOckSGUOVlGDl8Le1kPmzZeRN7lWzKhFsxdj1vDpoViHQtSznzw6EVxH90JlUYfpxQSIMYip9KGjlSa0_31f8ZHXGBrmJ_7f9fgsvLqQkXMplGHFWDt2FZ2df5Qkro_eRSEpD32B2E/s1600/BatmanBegins4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 148px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5480021686951439362" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiD6mOckSGUOVlGDl8Le1kPmzZeRN7lWzKhFsxdj1vDpoViHQtSznzw6EVxH90JlUYfpxQSIMYip9KGjlSa0_31f8ZHXGBrmJ_7f9fgsvLqQkXMplGHFWDt2FZ2df5Qkro_eRSEpD32B2E/s200/BatmanBegins4.jpg" border="0" /></a>The remainder of the lead cast did exactly what you would expect from them and this was probably the saving grace for me. I was happy enough to watch Michael Caine and Rutger Hauer and rather impressed by Liam Neeson, although the true identity of his character was blatantly obvious to me right from the start, without any knowledge of the comic book source material. The revelation, so I have subsequently read, was supposed to come as a shock. I find this very hard to believe, so glaringly obvious was it. The Ming the Merciless facial hair did rather give it away.<br /><br />‘Batman Begins’ had a production budget of $150 million and grossed a not entirely overwhelming $323 million at the box office. It was ranked eighth in the annual domestic box office list for 2005, but its gross was dwarfed by that of its sequel ‘The Dark Knight’ three years later, a film that garnered considerable additional publicity because of the untimely death of Heath Ledger, who won a posthumous best supporting actor Academy Award for his performance as the Joker.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 7 June 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span></div></div></div></div>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-3479849098934452642010-06-05T21:57:00.004+01:002010-06-05T22:03:53.188+01:00Cloverfield<span style="font-family:georgia;color:#333333;"><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#333399;">Directed by Matt Reeves<br /><br />Written by Drew Goddard<br /><br />Starring Michael Stahl-David <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Rob Hawkins</em>)</span>, Mike Vogel <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Jason Hawkins</em>)</span>, T J Miller <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Hudson Platt</em>)</span>, Odette Yustman <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Beth McIntyre</em>)</span>, Lizzy Caplan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Marlena Diamond</em>)</span>, Jessica Lucas <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lily Ford</em>)</span> and Ben Feldman <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Travis</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB7A-uKXLrEUJ3Rrs1j3wT_2Lf-2QbNjUY2j94iA1s6GSdzH24yjutCDxJQ-Vb2ghHNgHjPuNRLCK-H3eOIcT65IrL-Mgpn2rCMqruXVALw9XmMzRnymG18wgpps9TG-vTndqJ6azl1_a2/s1600/Cloverfield4.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 134px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5479397380546337634" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB7A-uKXLrEUJ3Rrs1j3wT_2Lf-2QbNjUY2j94iA1s6GSdzH24yjutCDxJQ-Vb2ghHNgHjPuNRLCK-H3eOIcT65IrL-Mgpn2rCMqruXVALw9XmMzRnymG18wgpps9TG-vTndqJ6azl1_a2/s200/Cloverfield4.jpg" /></a>A surprise going away party is arranged for Rob Hawkins, who is about to leave Manhattan to take up a new job in Japan. His brother Jason persuades their friend Hud Platt to use a camera to film testimonials to Rob given by party guests. The party begins to sour when Beth McIntyre, who Rob has recently slept with, arrives with a new boyfriend, and it is then disrupted by what appears to have been an earthquake. When the guests go up onto the roof they discover that vast areas of Manhattan are ablaze and when they go out onto the street below they are nearly killed when the decapitated head of the Statue of Liberty comes crashing down just metres from them. Manhattan is under attack from a monstrous alien creature.<br /><br /><span style="color:#c0c0c0;">...</span><br /><br /><br />I missed out on most of the early hype that surrounded ‘Cloverfield’ before its theatrical release at the beginning of 2008. I don’t recall exactly when I became aware of it, but what caught my attention initially was that it had been written by Drew Goddard, who had contributed episodes to the seventh and final season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Even so, by the time the film arrived in Britain I had been put off by the hype and although I remained interested to see it, I was not convinced that I could sit through a film made to look like everything had been shot through a shaky hand-held camera. It has taken me more than two years to finally get around to watching it.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxNRBjnXBmjkIuEeYNYdMSVAuwUH18geqC5nDev6WHzAuInzx9UMLLot2PaQ7EhGTkPTQXhG2AeoYIM7v7D4f3wdI_EM9i3mDCjQ61_YhUwKPAgv-xjA_SHT1LRezXMlulo2ckOXCXJB-h/s1600/Cloverfield1.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 112px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5479397793472334930" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxNRBjnXBmjkIuEeYNYdMSVAuwUH18geqC5nDev6WHzAuInzx9UMLLot2PaQ7EhGTkPTQXhG2AeoYIM7v7D4f3wdI_EM9i3mDCjQ61_YhUwKPAgv-xjA_SHT1LRezXMlulo2ckOXCXJB-h/s200/Cloverfield1.jpg" /></a>The lengthy opening, in which we learn but don’t care that Rob has slept with his friend Beth and now a month later a party is being thrown in his honour before he departs for Japan, is not interesting enough to be diverting. It merely served to make me impatient and question whether or not I wanted to sit through this film. It doesn’t help that the characters struggle to leave any lasting impression. Because the film did not hold my attention enough in the opening scenes I kept confusing Rob and his brother Jason. Hud was only distinguishable because he was the one behind the camera – and because he was rather annoying. At least I recognised the actress Lizzy Caplan, who I had seen before in ‘Mean Girls’ and ‘Tru Blood’.<br /><br />The concept is an interesting one and it is achieved with some skill and success. Some people consider it to be a brilliant and adventurous work at a time when the industry, Hollywood specifically, is in a state of dire creative doldrums. I would not go that far. The film is clearly drawing on ‘The Blair Witch Project’ and cinéma vérité is hardly a new approach to film making. The shaky hand-held camera proved not to be as annoying as I feared it might be, but there were times when I wished we could have another view and perhaps a bit more characterisation. Having said that, the plight of these nondescript people caught in an entirely inexplicable situation and doing something that defies logic, which they themselves capture on film more of less accidently, is quite effective and could have been quite affecting.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggEseYkrv6TZl6rYxDFYOGzTETUA-Nb7NSfAVXGhYgF8upc4g8c8aOdU59xK8dUMtqiJjClka0BxKYWZJoExCKPjKPzI5VAH5I-9prRna6mzQYGI1mLt7bQkLi5THFQmS3DsEvwn2It2Y9/s1600/Cloverfield2.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 112px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5479398013549954738" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggEseYkrv6TZl6rYxDFYOGzTETUA-Nb7NSfAVXGhYgF8upc4g8c8aOdU59xK8dUMtqiJjClka0BxKYWZJoExCKPjKPzI5VAH5I-9prRna6mzQYGI1mLt7bQkLi5THFQmS3DsEvwn2It2Y9/s200/Cloverfield2.jpg" /></a>A question I repeatedly asked myself was why Hud kept on filming, when clearly he would have a greater chance of escaping the clutches of the monster if he wasn’t hindered by having a camera on his shoulder. This was explained to some degree at one point in the film, but not in a way that I felt was altogether convincing. I found the monster disappointing. It was a lot more “Aliens” than I was expecting, having read review after review that made reference to ‘Godzilla’. As Xander said about the 1998 ‘Godzilla’ remake in the Buffy episode ‘Dirty Girls’, which was, incidentally, written by Drew Goddard, “Matthew Broderick did not kill Godzilla. He killed a big, dumb lizard. That was not the real Godzilla.”<br /><br />I like the fact that no explanation is ever offered for what is happening, but I was quite glad to see the end arrive. The film, at least, has a relatively short running time and does not outstay its welcome. It’s a good film, no doubt, but one that will probably be enjoyed a lot more by some people than others.<br /><br />‘Cloverfield’ has a 76% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 190 reviews. It grossed a little under $171 million at the box office against a production budget of $25 million. There has been some talk about a sequel.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;color:#cc6600;">Review posted 5 June 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-31530407552060709412010-06-03T11:22:00.002+01:002010-06-03T11:27:19.589+01:00Doctor Who: The Happiness Patrol<span style="font-family:georgia;color:#333333;"><span style="color:#ffffff;">…</span><br /><br />Rating: 2¼<br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#333399;">Written by Graeme Curry<br /><br />Directed by Chris Clough<br /><br />Starring Sylvester McCoy <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Sophie Aldred <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Ace</em>)</span>, Sheila Hancock <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Helen A</em>)</span>, Ronald Fraser <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Joseph C</em>)</span>, Harold Innocent <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Gilbert M</em>)</span>, Lesley Dunlop <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Susan Q</em>)</span>, Georgina Hale <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Daisy K</em>)</span>, Rachel Bell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Priscilla P</em>)</span>, Jonathan Burn <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Silas P</em>)</span>, Tim Baker <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Harold V</em>)</span>, Richard D Sharp <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Earl Sigma</em>)</span>, John Normington <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Trevor Sigma</em>)</span>, Tim Scott <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Forum Doorman</em>)</span> and David John Pope <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Kandy Man</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-CQCDtcplgvycEe1ntHr55Lm4jyxN1FilA-m7LbAR0dWft0fpK-70u8fBHgY7vkrT3mAMhGWcm7PRJfwN1h9xmEhfO8g304lnvMZ5S-LacRSwtV2sMQeJ7qjE5fJuUpv7LiKX0F9c7spy/s1600/HappinessPatrol1.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 133px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5478491995191519058" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-CQCDtcplgvycEe1ntHr55Lm4jyxN1FilA-m7LbAR0dWft0fpK-70u8fBHgY7vkrT3mAMhGWcm7PRJfwN1h9xmEhfO8g304lnvMZ5S-LacRSwtV2sMQeJ7qjE5fJuUpv7LiKX0F9c7spy/s200/HappinessPatrol1.jpg" /></a>The TARDIS materialises on the planet Terra Alpha. The Doctor has heard rumours of unrest amongst the human colony there and tells his companion Ace that they have a busy night ahead of them. They soon discover that unhappiness has been outlawed and large numbers of the population, those designated as “killjoys”, have disappeared. They also hear tales of a grotesque and frightening executioner known as the Kandy Man.<br /><br /><span style="color:#c0c0c0;">…</span><br /><br /><br />This is a very interesting one. At the time of first broadcast, Margaret Thatcher had been the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom for nine and a half years, with a another two years in office still remaining. For many of us living in Britain at that time it was a very dark period. Moving forward two decades, the new coalition government, led by Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, talks meaningless nonsense about the “Big Society”, but Thatcher said “there is no such thing as society” and set about proving her contention by destroying it, a goal she more than succeeded in achieving. That quote, from an interview she gave in 1987, two years before coming to power, is rather taken out of context, but Thatcher was a malignant and destructive force, whose terrible impact is still being felt today, some twenty years after her own party prised her out of Downing Street.<br /><br />The purpose of this rant? Although somewhat watered down by the time production was complete, ‘The Happiness Patrol’ was a less-than-complementary commentary about Margaret Thatcher and the Conservative government of the time. It is not hard to interpret the intended meaning behind a storyline in which freedom of expression is forcibly suppressed and demonstrations are crushed.<br /><br />‘The Happiness Patrol’ was told across three 25-minutes episodes between 2 and 16 November 1988, during the second season to feature Sylvester McCoy in the role of the Doctor. This was the twenty-fifth season, all told, and McCoy was the seventh actor to play the lead role. The first thing one notices is how threadbare it looks. All three episodes are studio-bound and much of the action takes place on an obviously tiny and very fake set. It looks more like the set of an amateur play than a prime-time television series. The story itself is quite peculiar and although there are some very good actors here the whole thing is so odd and inexplicable that they are faced with overwhelming obstacles to overcome.<br /><br />The next thing that most immediately stands out in these episodes is the Kandy Man, a sadistic psychotic killer robot that looks like a liquorice allsort and is thwarted by the Doctor not once but twice using lemonade. Bassett’s, the makers of liquorice allsorts, lodged an official complaint with the BBC, claiming, not unreasonably, that the Kandy Man was nothing more than a copy of “Bertie Bassett”, the company’s mascot. The BBC agreed not to use the Kandy Man again, which is actually a pity. The first instinct might be to laugh, but he is certainly memorable.<br /><br />It did strike me how plodding and careless the direction seemed to be. It needed to make a virtue of the limitations, but failed to do so, although oddly the very fact that it was so derisory seems somehow appropriate. Perhaps that was the intention. Chris Clough directed six Doctor Who serials in total and has had a long career on British television as a director and producer.<br /><br />This was the dog-end of the original series, as it wound down towards its inevitable cancellation, but strangely it was also a genuinely creative period. These final three seasons were not always successful, but they always strived to be inventive. ‘The Happiness Patrol’, which, apart from its commentary on Margaret Thatcher, also contains a very obvious gay subtext, runs out of steam before the end of the third episode, but for all of its very obvious faults it does remain quite fascinating as an allegorical tale of the time.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;color:#cc6600;">Review posted 3 June 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#ffffff;">…</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-84717409077183177772010-05-31T20:01:00.014+01:002010-06-01T10:00:27.943+01:00Doctor Who: The Hungry Earth and Cold Blood<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br /><strong><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">WARNING: major spoiler if you have not already watched these two episodes</span></strong><br /><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Chris Chibnall<br /><br />Directed by Ashley Way<br /><br />Starring Matt Smith <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Karen Gillan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Amy Pond</em>)</span>, Arthur Darvill <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Rory</em>)</span>, Meera Syal <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Nasreen Chaudhry</em>)</span>, Robert Pugh <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Tony Mack</em>)</span>, Nina Roberts <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Ambrose Northover</em>)</span>, Alun Raglan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mo Northover</em>)</span>, Samuel Davies <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Elliot Northover</em>)</span>, Neve McIntosh <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Alaya / Restac</em>)</span>, Richard Hope <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Malohkeh</em>)</span> and Stephen Moore <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Eldane</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxc50uUtSVlZfl9VFBMkmTo_aUShgtp3lrUPudlSO1bsHhKtSYmHIi8erylJoK6R0eFG5Z7cEbB7O5GzAkIwaMjI_R6ZeiZSY-jKYtoRqMTl3vQuUwIgUIfFg3Kc5BXP-zfHOSYeT5-ZXT/s1600/Hungry+Earth+3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5477512843019406978" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxc50uUtSVlZfl9VFBMkmTo_aUShgtp3lrUPudlSO1bsHhKtSYmHIi8erylJoK6R0eFG5Z7cEbB7O5GzAkIwaMjI_R6ZeiZSY-jKYtoRqMTl3vQuUwIgUIfFg3Kc5BXP-zfHOSYeT5-ZXT/s200/Hungry+Earth+3.jpg" border="0" /></a>The TARDIS materialises in what the Doctor thinks is going to be Rio de Janeiro, but actually turns out to be the small Welsh village of Cwntaff, the centre of an ambitious drilling project going deeper into the core of the planet than has ever previously been achieved. When Amy is sucked into the ground, the Doctor realises that something deep inside the earth is coming up and soon he is faced with an old adversary, the Silurians.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgogJbnT-CI6qXYJXj16zR_Z-ifEPQ1PQ3mK-_Ez5g0rvmEsrv7pTAf5tDt3lPF5zTG8ACLekCcul2H1wi0pPwufASTgLGzxjF2Gum1VZ-DBWKMeeEg8FCiUOFYS23AbUaYyd45gaCkW-vC/s1600/Cold+Blood+1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5477513001027147874" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgogJbnT-CI6qXYJXj16zR_Z-ifEPQ1PQ3mK-_Ez5g0rvmEsrv7pTAf5tDt3lPF5zTG8ACLekCcul2H1wi0pPwufASTgLGzxjF2Gum1VZ-DBWKMeeEg8FCiUOFYS23AbUaYyd45gaCkW-vC/s200/Cold+Blood+1.jpg" border="0" /></a>The second two-part story of the fifth season, ‘The Hungry Earth’ and ‘Cold Blood’ pays homage to the old “classic series” and in particular the first season that starred Jon Pertwee in the lead role, originally broadcast in the first six months of 1970. That season, the seventh of the old series, introduced the Silurians in a tremendous story called ‘Doctor Who and the Silurians’ that followed a storyline very similar to this new one. The Silurians, who are also referred to as the Eocenes and “Homo reptilia”, made a second appearance in 1984 in the story ‘Warriors of the Deep’.<br /><br />Watching ‘The Hungry Earth’, the first of these two new episodes, for the first time I came away feeling a little disappointed, but when I watched it a second time that changed completely. Not only did I thoroughly enjoy it, I also started to pick up on many little subtleties in the writing. I suspect my initial reaction was simply a subconscious expectation that it wouldn’t live up to my memories of the old series from what remains my favourite era of the show. ‘The Hungry Earth’, in fact, proved on second viewing to be a very tightly written and well structured episode with a real emotional resonance to it.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7y0tqmmiUrQd9HSN5yZnkCv6coB7cPeTUXd0QW8pUyBpi0x4sgj-yP1tmFVW5T-ob8a9r4puqIPfyLpk0G_4b0kAikuozLNnKxUX-v-9ZNtABq-n_W8XbKCLFr8Dhr01aTe0YP-Uwp-sU/s1600/Hungry+Earth+2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5477513147159977154" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7y0tqmmiUrQd9HSN5yZnkCv6coB7cPeTUXd0QW8pUyBpi0x4sgj-yP1tmFVW5T-ob8a9r4puqIPfyLpk0G_4b0kAikuozLNnKxUX-v-9ZNtABq-n_W8XbKCLFr8Dhr01aTe0YP-Uwp-sU/s200/Hungry+Earth+2.jpg" border="0" /></a>‘Cold Blood’ had a lot to live up to and, ultimately, probably did not quite manage to pull it off, despite a powerful ending. That ending, which should have come as a rather shocking surprise, was slightly dampened for me because of something I read in <span style="font-style: italic;">The</span> Guardian newspaper that morning that alerted me to what was coming – and the television critic responsible should be ashamed of himself.<br /><br />I felt that in the middle of the episode ‘Cold Blood’ seemed to veer off into ‘Star Trek’ territory, with the Doctor acting as a kind of slightly high-handed diplomatic envoy, creating, by using almost bullying tactics, an atmosphere in which negotiations could take place between two opposing factions, a la Captain Picard. These scenes were effective enough, without injecting much drama into the proceedings, but more than that they were never very believable, even within a context that is already, if we think about it, fairly far-fetched to start with.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbZvTt5OFuOdxjrJbSLNlU5odO85o6sb8FALHlTiCDB5FCn0bFmRlPesYPuRFEFzGOQVfetck9mFpm8SvFTeoeGxTz56mC5ORV9cE4ySU8xX0EW74Srf-DuFe95wTdwuMXbjDMkjBe8QS6/s1600/Hungry+Earth+1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5477512481975991554" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbZvTt5OFuOdxjrJbSLNlU5odO85o6sb8FALHlTiCDB5FCn0bFmRlPesYPuRFEFzGOQVfetck9mFpm8SvFTeoeGxTz56mC5ORV9cE4ySU8xX0EW74Srf-DuFe95wTdwuMXbjDMkjBe8QS6/s200/Hungry+Earth+1.jpg" border="0" /></a>The storyline dabbled in some moral issues. The Silurians, although aggressive, were not the aggressors per se and the humans failed to, as the Doctor put it, “be the best of humanity.” Whether or not, however, this ultimately amounted to very much is somewhat debatable. It worked well enough, without really giving pause for thought. Having said this, it was more than made up for by the simple fact that the two episodes had a good feel to them. For an old-timer like me it did feel like “old Doctor Who”, without stripping away all the things that have made the revived series so successful.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKYIXglJoDAQBAJZCQWl0AororFoFTJKKyyEcMNU00o-UVNr74Qs3tPqphG8PBNs3BDaNnhOj2WtcX6DyrX_CGPSiv4CLOWRTb3bUw2gO18GytGAoG8gC7-IVZSTkEbs6HDOWxIDEYnqty/s1600/Cold+Blood+2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5477512631999695810" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKYIXglJoDAQBAJZCQWl0AororFoFTJKKyyEcMNU00o-UVNr74Qs3tPqphG8PBNs3BDaNnhOj2WtcX6DyrX_CGPSiv4CLOWRTb3bUw2gO18GytGAoG8gC7-IVZSTkEbs6HDOWxIDEYnqty/s200/Cold+Blood+2.jpg" border="0" /></a>There was a nice little nod in ‘Cold Blood’ to the Peter Davison era, with the Doctor’s comical reference to celery and all in all it was not too much of a letdown after the tremendous opening episode. The closing scenes, however, made it a whole lot more important, with the death of Rory. A central character dying in Doctor Who is still something of a rarity, enough so that it does come as a shock when it is not expected. Joss Whedon made killing off main characters into an art form, but he has done it so often now that it has become very tired and boring, simply too predictable. Rory’s death in Doctor Who didn’t fall into this trap, although I am very sorry to see him go so soon. However, many fans doubt this is the last we will see of him and suspect he will be back in some guise or other before the season is done.<br /><br />‘The Hungry Earth’ and ‘Cold Blood’ were watched by what might be the lowest audience numbers since the series was revived back in 2005. That is a pity because this new season is proving to be very good indeed, although the low viewing figures are probably not quite the cause for alarm that some fans have been suggesting. Somehow, I do not think the series is in danger of being cancelled just yet.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 31 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-49561417935122223452010-05-25T20:10:00.009+01:002010-05-25T20:32:16.054+01:00Doctor Who: Amy’s Choice<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 3¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Simon Nye<br /><br />Directed by Catherine Morshead<br /><br />Starring Matt Smith <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Karen Gillan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Amy Pond</em>)</span>, Arthur Darvill <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Rory</em>)</span>, Toby Jones <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Dream Lord</em>)</span>, Nick Hobbs <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mr Nainby</em>)</span>, Joan Linder <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mrs Hamill</em>)</span> and Audrey Ardington <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mrs Poggit</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><strong><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSHSUEFNEr7c8WmQhCynK4YjbVRcIYMCu9N09-M6jzO5PlhbosT8_Dy8W2oIYuwVSpgIzotxiEMyYk-lC6TRYqMtM0wWTJVQWNgOHWsBqg5_oIlFomQoVai5JrOoBWX4GSgqI1tfOYmyG8/s1600/DoctorWhoAmysChoice1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5475288331131540610" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSHSUEFNEr7c8WmQhCynK4YjbVRcIYMCu9N09-M6jzO5PlhbosT8_Dy8W2oIYuwVSpgIzotxiEMyYk-lC6TRYqMtM0wWTJVQWNgOHWsBqg5_oIlFomQoVai5JrOoBWX4GSgqI1tfOYmyG8/s200/DoctorWhoAmysChoice1.jpg" border="0" /></a>“If you can’t save him, then what is the point of you?”</strong><br /><br />The Doctor unexpectedly arrives in the small village of Upper Leadworth to visit Amy, who is heavily pregnant, and Rory, five years after they last travelled with him. All three fall asleep while sitting on a bench and wake up back in the TARDIS. It has, or so it seems, been a shared dream. They encounter a mysterious figure who has somehow managed to infiltrate the TARDIS. He calls himself the Dream Lord and tells them they must decide which reality is real. Death awaits them if they make the wrong choice.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_cW8l4zazLGaraLrAwCnkx1Vws1Lkgm0sCgFpqAntedBwDS1_to2JI1Fvk9b4t_31YcasApKxKRv1Tw1IQIDTB656xVYn9h3jT-CswYUr3alC8tnSOP9H3ayx0iY24ZykChHYxcJjrKad/s1600/DoctorWhoAmysChoice4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5475288698600888498" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_cW8l4zazLGaraLrAwCnkx1Vws1Lkgm0sCgFpqAntedBwDS1_to2JI1Fvk9b4t_31YcasApKxKRv1Tw1IQIDTB656xVYn9h3jT-CswYUr3alC8tnSOP9H3ayx0iY24ZykChHYxcJjrKad/s200/DoctorWhoAmysChoice4.jpg" border="0" /></a>‘Amy’s Choice’ is the seventh episode of the fifth season of the revived series. With the exception of the somewhat under-par ‘Victory of the Daleks’, the standard has been very high so far, closer to that of the first two seasons than the slightly tired latter stages of David Tennant’s time in the role, when the episodes, especially the “specials” broadcast in 2009, were becoming a little brash, if still just about the best thing on television.<br /><br />Matt Smith settled into the lead role immediately. As has been commented elsewhere, he seems to have an uncanny ability to project the fact that although the Doctor now has the appearance of a young man and outwardly behaves as such, he is, in fact, extremely old and carries the weight of often painful and traumatic experience. Karen Gillan, also in her first season, has proved to be excellent and should be given extra points for getting the Daily Mail worked up into a froth of moral outrage. I like the character Rory and the performance of Arthur Darvill, but this character does seem to have been greeted with scepticism by many fans.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjSfv3hzc3y2eCU5vLf-fCarK2c6bIWGKPWLYoX9Ppp2idiOq5poNK338MC7jT1JdWEWUkSyEZC95oeHINgOtw7cJd8TiwyQ-XFvfiOGa8szfOynk-XBuH4EOzYDAZxsLaHGXgvbmdz-cW/s1600/DoctorWhoAmysChoice2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5475288434521312066" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjSfv3hzc3y2eCU5vLf-fCarK2c6bIWGKPWLYoX9Ppp2idiOq5poNK338MC7jT1JdWEWUkSyEZC95oeHINgOtw7cJd8TiwyQ-XFvfiOGa8szfOynk-XBuH4EOzYDAZxsLaHGXgvbmdz-cW/s200/DoctorWhoAmysChoice2.jpg" border="0" /></a>‘Amy’s Choice’ instantly became a favourite episode on first viewing and that didn’t change when I watched it for a second time. It put me in mind of episodes of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’, in particular ‘Nightmares’ from the first season of that show, ‘Restless’, the inspired season four closer, and, to some degree, ‘Dead Things’, a dark and controversial episode from the sixth season. Although there is no reason to assume that ‘Amy’s Choice’ drew any direct inspiration from these episodes, it would not be the first time the revived series has been influenced by Buffy. Former executive producer and head writer Russell T Davies never hid his love of that show or his admiration for Joss Whedon.<br /><br />The episode is very cleverly pieced together, as the Doctor and his two companions move between two possible realities – one inside a dead TARDIS, where they are rapidly freezing to death, and the other in what initially appears to by an idyllic rural setting, one that the Doctor thinks is “boring” and then very quickly realises is not as it seems on the surface. It also manages to incorporate some very well judged and genuinely laugh-out-loud humour into what otherwise proves to be an ultimately rather dark episode with a real sting in its tail.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIQc9vRHCU2PeH0F-2jEDfnPGu-NxZIJQmG6QqMStUNYmrJU0IXbOUxU8gAh2uATrK5BM9yqLNNYvUuZmHR7YKQx8AmIAIYdt7w-mUR8O7IPUhvpjyxQLh01dfpRoqhwBLAPSESFhswsr2/s1600/DoctorWhoAmysChoice3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5475288540365893090" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIQc9vRHCU2PeH0F-2jEDfnPGu-NxZIJQmG6QqMStUNYmrJU0IXbOUxU8gAh2uATrK5BM9yqLNNYvUuZmHR7YKQx8AmIAIYdt7w-mUR8O7IPUhvpjyxQLh01dfpRoqhwBLAPSESFhswsr2/s200/DoctorWhoAmysChoice3.jpg" border="0" /></a>Added to this, the Doctor is left with the riddle of the true identity of the Dream Lord (brilliantly played by Toby Jones), which proves to be a particularly compelling component of the episode and one that promises to provide some more twists in the future.<br /><br />‘Amy’s Choice’ was written by Simon Nye, creator of the 1990s sitcom ‘Men Behaving Badly’ and more recently the co-writer of the misfiring ‘Reggie Perrin’ update.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 25 April 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-13475737113139292752010-05-24T13:57:00.013+01:002010-05-24T20:39:03.624+01:00The Prisoner<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Directed by Nick Hurran<br /><br />Written by Bill Gallagher<br /><br />Episodes: <span style="font-size:85%;">(1)</span> Arrival; <span style="font-size:85%;">(2)</span> Harmony; <span style="font-size:85%;">(3)</span> Anvil; <span style="font-size:85%;">(4)</span> Darling; <span style="font-size:85%;">(5)</span> Schizoid; <span style="font-size:85%;">(6)</span> Checkmate<br /><br />Starring James Caviezel <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>6</em>)</span>, Ian McKellen <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>2</em>)</span>, Ruth Wilson <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>313</em>)</span>, Hayley Atwell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>4-15</em>)</span>, Lennie James <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>147</em>)</span>, Jamie Campbell Bower <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>11-12</em>)</span> and Rachael Blake <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>M2</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfOp3TAkQr1BUGa2eLn32lgj3z4TfwuYTYdLa5qHwvK-JRc8ULclNM1lW256o95DCqVta92hRIl0zs8iBWsrR1RDGN9r-51R9Yo3383DdNyvH8mMwztjsRWx8tYqQmKrewABe3pQMPxxQp/s1600/Prisoner6.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 141px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474820698625950578" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfOp3TAkQr1BUGa2eLn32lgj3z4TfwuYTYdLa5qHwvK-JRc8ULclNM1lW256o95DCqVta92hRIl0zs8iBWsrR1RDGN9r-51R9Yo3383DdNyvH8mMwztjsRWx8tYqQmKrewABe3pQMPxxQp/s200/Prisoner6.jpg" border="0" /></a>A man wakes up in the desert, not knowing how he got there. He is caught in the middle of a chase, as an old man is pursued. The old man dies and the stranger buries the body before wandering into a strange isolated village where all the inhabitants are known by numbers. He is 6 and the outwardly benign leader is 2. The other inhabitants act as though nothing exists outside the village, although some dream of other places. 6 is now trapped in a surreal nightmare, intent on escaping the village, showing that there is a world outside and proving that he is a free man.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br />The original television series ‘The Prisoner’ was co-created and produced by Patrick McGoohan, an American-born actor who had become a star in Britain during the 1960s in ‘Danger Man’ (renamed ‘Secret Agent’ in the US). McGoohan, who starred in ‘The Prisoner’ as Number 6, also wrote and directed some of the seventeen episodes, which were broadcast by ITV between 29 September 1967 and 1 February 1968. Although the series mystified many when it was first shown, it quickly established a cult following that remains as strong as ever some forty-plus years later and it ultimately had a sizeable impact on other television series and popular culture in general.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitK2I-e1i6F4gfeWaVvozFFecxajfz0OzSL3KxxD5F7Nurp7PFUrgOI3oJFu1R9IUof576MW4MWcaL0XSQSECCk3E5SrkOYK9A27WOe9ecB2fUO6SV8BDWjGAE5oFdWDwldvzAp-BCVCZv/s1600/Prisoner3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 141px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474820813444884066" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitK2I-e1i6F4gfeWaVvozFFecxajfz0OzSL3KxxD5F7Nurp7PFUrgOI3oJFu1R9IUof576MW4MWcaL0XSQSECCk3E5SrkOYK9A27WOe9ecB2fUO6SV8BDWjGAE5oFdWDwldvzAp-BCVCZv/s200/Prisoner3.jpg" border="0" /></a>Fans of the series continue to make the pilgrimage to Portmeirion, the small resort village in Wales where the location filming took place. They continue to discuss and debate the meaning behind the seventeen episodes and even debate the correct order in which those seventeen episodes should be watched.<br /><br />The 2009 remake, co-produced by ITV with the American cable network AMC, was always destined to be contentious and face angry criticism. Writing about it in <span style="font-style: italic;">The</span> Guardian newspaper, James Donaghy suggested that, “It struggles from the outset to get past its own futility and never gets close to making it. Too timid to take risks with the story and with nothing substantial to add to the Prisoner canon it feels like a cheap knockoff.” He goes on to write, “Still, in a turbulent world it’s comforting to know that some things remain constant. ITV retains its uncanny knack of doing the dumb thing whenever it counts.”<br /><br />I was vaguely aware that a remake of ‘The Prisoner’ was on the cards. What I didn’t know was it had actually been made and already broadcast some several months earlier on the AMC network in America. When a friend mentioned to me that it was about to be shown on ITV my initial reaction was negative. I very much doubted that a remake would compare at all favourably to the original, a peculiar and unique aberration that at one time I might have called my favourite television series ever. I had no plans to watch it, but curiosity got the better of me.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirJyKFK8OnYqYDlG6Tb14FxM7h-E8NWosDni5M9tuySsTgofU9XNQcHv4Cy3MeyRzt2j-jij8YGCLnDVOciTzyVt4mXEurbMSyrXReXkUxzZEPu-3KTkirl5QZ1Kc5cPUDzAN6KbR10F78/s1600/Prisoner1.jpg"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4ZlQ5DCFXvkMVLrUcIvkkfzJQ05fwor2GYw_pX6gGqRwKUykaWHthl0aVqzCPWFTjgMP8HGX_ZnPR5DNd6nvqKUvbej3LQje3RnqANqVkZ28lXnvTClz_S7bdn7znVuNxdGzrtjNO-hGh/s1600/Prisoner1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 141px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474821896868933970" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4ZlQ5DCFXvkMVLrUcIvkkfzJQ05fwor2GYw_pX6gGqRwKUykaWHthl0aVqzCPWFTjgMP8HGX_ZnPR5DNd6nvqKUvbej3LQje3RnqANqVkZ28lXnvTClz_S7bdn7znVuNxdGzrtjNO-hGh/s200/Prisoner1.jpg" border="0" /></a>The opening episode, entitled ‘Arrival’, as was the opening episode of the original series, did not bode well. I wasn’t convinced by the change from a rocky coastal setting to the desert. I didn’t like the look of the village. I thought the use of old vehicles, all of which I remembered from my childhood, was too much a quaint artifice, although I was rather taken by the Renault Dauphine used as a taxi by the character 147 – and the presence of Lennie James, the actor who plays 147, bucked me up a little because I liked him in ‘Jericho’. I was a little worried that Ian McKellen was going to give a rather hammy performance, one that seemed to be pitched somewhere between ‘Brideshead Revisited’, ‘Gods and Monsters’ (a film in which McKellen starred) and a Merchant-Ivory production. My main gripe, though, was James Caviezel in the lead role. I didn’t like his performance at all. However, this opening episode did enough to persuade me to carry on watching.<br /><br />There are six episodes in total (a clue in itself, I guess) and I think this is just about right. It allows the story to be told, but it doesn’t outstay its welcome. I got used to Caviezel in subsequent episodes and Ian McKellen proved to be fabulous. I also got used to the setting, even if it is no match for the original.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAAv5fLeYu-X7gMxHDLHxT1V0-nqDPyEHMmaZ7bLjnNed_ny24wSWeQORZTTN3yZmjeYoAr9hyUQRDe1Apm78jXxeGvB5AIiobR-DjI4wrYQP9CR18XAPxdhNk_15c8GwdZyY7TMtHCAX5/s1600/Prisoner2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 134px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474820987481822658" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAAv5fLeYu-X7gMxHDLHxT1V0-nqDPyEHMmaZ7bLjnNed_ny24wSWeQORZTTN3yZmjeYoAr9hyUQRDe1Apm78jXxeGvB5AIiobR-DjI4wrYQP9CR18XAPxdhNk_15c8GwdZyY7TMtHCAX5/s200/Prisoner2.jpg" border="0" /></a>Although I did find some episodes slightly tedious in places, I was always quite intrigued to find out where the story was leading and what the conclusion would be. The fact I knew I would only have to wait for six episodes helped enormously. In the end, the explanation of the strange events that had unfolded was surprisingly satisfactory and retained the flavour of the original – the idea that we are all prisoners of our own minds. I ended up liking it, even if to all intents and purposes this remake has been rather made redundant by the recently concluded ‘Lost’.<br /><br />The iconic theme music from the original, composed by Ron Grainger of ‘Doctor Who’ fame, is gone. The penny-farthing crops up a couple of times. The catchphrase “Be seeing you!” is changed here to “I’ll be seeing you,” which doesn’t particularly work for me. Noticeably missing is “I am not a number, I am a free man!” and the question “Who is Number 1?” with it ambiguous answer, “You are Number 6,” (or “You are, Number 6.”). Instead, we get the altogether less intriguing mantra, “Number 6 is the one.”<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_q09Glfhv0Ds1bdtYXKDm6DmUKJ3yUlhpmWEbpJSttBMf9uW37Mm95h9IYcZYzGG07sj3lxOzHqikW02069mZeZSAcLfXGOjGMFie49KfCyOibaqEiP9D4gWw_IHdHzFW_1UgqwTluAUl/s1600/Prisoner4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 141px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474821203454315954" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_q09Glfhv0Ds1bdtYXKDm6DmUKJ3yUlhpmWEbpJSttBMf9uW37Mm95h9IYcZYzGG07sj3lxOzHqikW02069mZeZSAcLfXGOjGMFie49KfCyOibaqEiP9D4gWw_IHdHzFW_1UgqwTluAUl/s200/Prisoner4.jpg" border="0" /></a>The new series does not slavishly follow the storyline of the original, but instead takes the basic theme and creates something that is very similar, but not quite the same. It perhaps suffers because it comes at a time when we seem to be apathetic bystanders, disinterestedly watching as our civil liberties are gradually eroded, whereas the original was the product of a time when more and more people were standing up their rights and demanding more freedom. The difference, of course, is that for many of us those freedoms were granted, to some degree or other, and we don’t have much to fight against any longer, the very thing that has allowed the erosion of human rights to take place. I live in a country that shouts loudly about its adherence to and defence of democracy, but whose security services have routinely participated in torture, with, it surely appears, the knowledge and hidden authority of the government of the day. I feel tremendous anger about it, but I still sit back, my own freedom not obviously affected, but still insidiously chipped away by the appalling times I live in.<br /><br />‘The Prisoner’ received a mixed reaction from television critics. Metacritic gives it a rating of 46/100, based on 21 collected reviews.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 24 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-39954593654748396462010-05-23T21:20:00.008+01:002010-05-23T23:18:18.891+01:00Malice in Wonderland<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Directed by Simon Fellows<br /><br />Written by Jayson Rothwell, loosely based on ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ by Lewis Carroll<br /><br />Starring Maggie Grace <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Alice</em>)</span>, Danny Dyer <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Whitey</em>)</span>, Nathaniel Parker <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Harry Hunt</em>)</span>, Pam Ferris <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Duchess</em>)</span>, Matt King <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Gonzo</em>)</span>, Antony Higgins <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Rex</em>)</span>, Paul Kaye <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Caterpillar</em>)</span>, Gary Beadle <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Felix Chester</em>)</span>, Steve Haze <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Midge</span>)</span>, Amanda Boxer <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Bag Lady</em>)</span> and Bronagh Gallagher <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Hattie</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYfhJMbiN5Jxv2LLLToTY_l5ixEH3mMI9lFKHknv_0Dy-9oYjPHQ7Lz3oXiUkRw1FI3eDwgtG_2ow_DB5BNLEAEzwMhnxFYJdUV3MYWPoPfatlrXy3LtqT3sDZ0q35xMyv_22GMVu7JpUr/s1600/MaliceInWonderland1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 133px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474564491177337666" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYfhJMbiN5Jxv2LLLToTY_l5ixEH3mMI9lFKHknv_0Dy-9oYjPHQ7Lz3oXiUkRw1FI3eDwgtG_2ow_DB5BNLEAEzwMhnxFYJdUV3MYWPoPfatlrXy3LtqT3sDZ0q35xMyv_22GMVu7JpUr/s200/MaliceInWonderland1.jpg" border="0" /></a>An American student is knocked over by a black cab while being chased by a couple of goons. Although she is not seriously hurt, the collision leaves her suffering from amnesia. Whitey, the taxi driver, puts her in the back of his vehicle and says he will help her, but first he has to collect a gift for a notorious underworld boss and he is already late. Alice is thrown into a surreal after-dark world of crime and bizarre characters as she tries to remember who she is and get home.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrc-aMubYwXu1vQDKlunGd9jl9UxmaYmcuuSHBXPYl9ejdy6X-D56zrJBGvludTMQhtWjH7SZhxej35LhTjUWuLENvzOGcZulPB_lb7nE1Izgad-GnvgZhC42mJumADm4PJcrUY-WdD0Ju/s1600/MaliceInWonderland3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 134px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474564665380560194" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrc-aMubYwXu1vQDKlunGd9jl9UxmaYmcuuSHBXPYl9ejdy6X-D56zrJBGvludTMQhtWjH7SZhxej35LhTjUWuLENvzOGcZulPB_lb7nE1Izgad-GnvgZhC42mJumADm4PJcrUY-WdD0Ju/s200/MaliceInWonderland3.jpg" border="0" /></a>‘Malice in Wonderland’ is an unusual take on the Lewis Carroll story, played out as a kind of comic version of a Guy Ritchie gangster flick. The film critic Kim Newman, writing in Empire magazine, called it a “genuinely original interpretation”, but in general it was received with far less welcoming words. Ten reviews collected at Rotten Tomatoes result in a 10% rotten rating.<br /><br />I really wanted to like the film and I was certainly looking forward to watching it. In the event, I cannot pretend that it wasn’t a slight disappointment. The look of the film, all tacky neon and suffused lighting, is effective, but the performances are relentlessly quirky, which can become become rather irritating.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPRYO711vC5S3CI2xu8hoz9Fxq63qXXrY9f9M8b8p8fDIxnkdc3-4fU292QLnPtqCtoR1eEQlRfmaz1trJpeSVDH2NdVfMR78NpQ7Uwzm6uVmHDu126JJmhHrZUfgMyu43TXA6ZRxbzkfO/s1600/MaliceInWonderland4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 134px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5474564879838530706" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPRYO711vC5S3CI2xu8hoz9Fxq63qXXrY9f9M8b8p8fDIxnkdc3-4fU292QLnPtqCtoR1eEQlRfmaz1trJpeSVDH2NdVfMR78NpQ7Uwzm6uVmHDu126JJmhHrZUfgMyu43TXA6ZRxbzkfO/s200/MaliceInWonderland4.jpg" border="0" /></a>Danny Dyer, who has recently attracted much bad publicity as a result of an ill-informed and badly thought-out ghost-written item in the utterly appalling and reprehensible lads mag ‘Zoo’, plays to type as a small-time crook. He has so far failed to build on the early promise he showed as an actor. Maggie Grace, in the central role, phones in an uninvolved and uninvolving performance. She has been effective in the past, but here she simply seems miscast, all at sea and uninterested. She signed up as a last-minute replacement for Mischa Barton, but she seems to have no great passion for the part. However, in the original story Alice is a largely uninvolved and bemused bystander to the surreal events taking place around her, so perhaps Grace has not approached her performance without giving it at least some thought.<br /><br />I liked ‘Malice in Wonderland’ enough to watch it twice, but I cannot imagine it is a film I would recommend to anyone else. The film it most reminds me of is Martin Scorsese’s 1985 black comedy ‘After Hours’.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posed 23 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-36308757936642633082010-05-09T16:25:00.015+01:002010-05-09T17:07:57.249+01:00Doctor Who: The Vampires of Venice<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);"><strong>WARNING: spoilers if you have not watched this episode</strong></span></span><br /><br /><br /><div><div><div><div><div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >Rating 3<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Toby Whithouse<br /><br />Directed by Jonny Campbell<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhibLBmpgPJRIwQQSeXcuZYpeYuvJ7j6kdqgfJwg_Z4ADtRuGFZ0fyWp6Luf_sTUNBOEShPIlMuIlEzro4rAdoeXAxz1_UQ4inXSEltDTUyUN-F2AokJrx_ulzjDNowhWiCbuiSc_4OZRaU/s1600/DoctorWhoVampires1.jpg"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimXiX961MrIQ1g_23wAguhIuYa44no2WprtvHE1EPP8C_OGBelqlisxFBKq38a9IYp72QIR0spwetpl872Hafki9J6mSyuyKejiKjh5pETjfIusHbSqK4bf-Q7qIah25yEMYHERCG__Ra4/s1600/DoctorWhoVampires1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5469294415268927490" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimXiX961MrIQ1g_23wAguhIuYa44no2WprtvHE1EPP8C_OGBelqlisxFBKq38a9IYp72QIR0spwetpl872Hafki9J6mSyuyKejiKjh5pETjfIusHbSqK4bf-Q7qIah25yEMYHERCG__Ra4/s200/DoctorWhoVampires1.jpg" border="0" /></a>Starring Matt Smith <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Karen Gillan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Amy Pond</em>)</span>, Arthur Darvill <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Rory Williams</em>)</span>, Helen McCrory <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Rosanna Calvierri</em>)</span>, Alex Price <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Francesco Calvierri</em>)</span>, Lucian Msarnati <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Guido</em>)</span>, Alisha Bailey <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Isabella</em>)</span> and Simon Gregor <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Steward</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br />Following “the kiss”<span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">*</span>, the Doctor reunites Amy with her fiancé Rory and takes them in the TARDIS to Venice in 1580 for a romantic weekend to get their relationship back on track. Once there, the Doctor immediately realises that something is wrong and when he investigates a mysterious school for girls run by the city’s patron Rosanna Calvierri it seems that he has uncovered a nest of vampires.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">(*See the episode ‘Flesh and Stone’.)</span><br /></span></div><br /><div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);"></span></span></div><div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja03U_jTjsvhXyMwOqbuEW31aiCa_NMYfbios9hHhffsK4U0mc97f2j_N7B26LTPu6V5hmS4cBk_AJuPa5DtZrwfwpRaZbjS4hMkZpwddYdbQDRN69_ejTJYIdtTBtYd5J2AKBeap3TEHO/s1600/DoctorWhoVampires2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5469293534787054386" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja03U_jTjsvhXyMwOqbuEW31aiCa_NMYfbios9hHhffsK4U0mc97f2j_N7B26LTPu6V5hmS4cBk_AJuPa5DtZrwfwpRaZbjS4hMkZpwddYdbQDRN69_ejTJYIdtTBtYd5J2AKBeap3TEHO/s200/DoctorWhoVampires2.jpg" border="0" /></a>Toby Whithouse, who wrote ‘The Vampires of Venice’, is the creator and main writer of the BBC3 series ‘Being Human’, an inspired mix of comedy, drama, thriller and horror that tells the story of a vampire, a werewolf and a ghost who share a house. He previously wrote the season two Doctor Who episode ‘School Reunion’, which saw the return of Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, and was responsible for my favourite ‘Torchwood’ episode ‘Greeks Bearing Gifts’.<br /><br />Before I realised that ‘The Vampires of Venice’ was written by Toby Whithouse I had been slightly wary of it. Vampires have started to become rather tired and clichéd recently due to over-exposure, what with the ‘Twilight’ film franchise and the television series ‘True Blood’, amongst others. In the event, it proved to be a very enjoyable episode, with plenty of humour typical of Whithouse, although not without its faults.<br /><br />Bringing back Rory, who we first encountered in ‘The Eleventh Hour’ (the first episode of this latest season), worked very well. In a clever twist, he was not overwhelmed that the TARDIS is bigger on the inside than outside, immediately guessing that the inside exists within a different dimension. His anger at the Doctor when he tells him “you have no idea how dangerous you make people to themselves” was powerful and palpable, although we might wonder how he has been able to form such an incisive impression of the Doctor so quickly. Perhaps there is more to Rory than meets the eye and we are in for some surprises later on. The prospect is intriguing.<br /><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHmD5K9aGEz5dlqLL0VbeYMsHBRlASy7uY_vRMcCucqmmvwUMdmAFNjI61F_2PdwfBzW1PUNHt1GJ7TZ_Ads9gp4nRilVMRVWctqakqu3M8j6-H2nG5g2i2Ie_MW0mKFNFVSGx8k9O29W4/s1600/DoctorWhoVampires3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5469293774349556258" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHmD5K9aGEz5dlqLL0VbeYMsHBRlASy7uY_vRMcCucqmmvwUMdmAFNjI61F_2PdwfBzW1PUNHt1GJ7TZ_Ads9gp4nRilVMRVWctqakqu3M8j6-H2nG5g2i2Ie_MW0mKFNFVSGx8k9O29W4/s200/DoctorWhoVampires3.jpg" border="0" /></a></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >The vampire storyline works well for the first twenty minutes or so, with its echoes of the 1989 story ‘The Curse of Fenric’, but it seems as if one minute they are not affected by light and the next minute they are, something that occurs time and time again. Having watched the episode twice and taken care the second time to look for clues to explain this, it still seems like an inconsistency in the story, unless I am missing a subtle explanation for it. Once we discover that the vampires are, in fact, no such thing the episode does begin to unravel a little bit, but this is always going to be a problem when trying to tell a story in 45 minutes. Everything starts to become rather rushed and frenetic as the action builds up towards its climax.<br /><br />Signora Calvierri (played by Helen McCrory, who I recently saw in the now cancelled American crime-drama series ‘Life’) clearly knows exactly who the Doctor is once she has discovered that he comes from Gallifrey, although this is not particularly well explained to us. She knows of the fate of the Time Lords and of the part the Doctor played in the Time War, suggesting to him that he is now responsible for the extinction of two races, hers as well as his own. This new season is clearly harking back to the first season of the revived series, both in theme and content.<br /><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghXWnRFXmdDPn9gFHJ4ybfCuVznq0174o1fmQBn8vPK802LUDZuVHGDJjYbM08THGrcvnrlE6m7WEa1oZS-DmI5-ty8g1fjWoDM8kNmd3n18dsaHGb5eKxg1TocNtNI-375LrO7ykx6Wfd/s1600/DoctorWhoVampires4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5469293987392307234" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghXWnRFXmdDPn9gFHJ4ybfCuVznq0174o1fmQBn8vPK802LUDZuVHGDJjYbM08THGrcvnrlE6m7WEa1oZS-DmI5-ty8g1fjWoDM8kNmd3n18dsaHGb5eKxg1TocNtNI-375LrO7ykx6Wfd/s200/DoctorWhoVampires4.jpg" border="0" /></a></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >It does seem a little odd that knowing the creatures are still in the water beneath Venice, the Doctor just leaves them there to die, but I suppose there is nothing he can do to save them. Once again, though, it does seem like an inconsistency in the story. After all, they will presumably continue to devour anyone unfortunate enough to fall into the water. Equally, it seems inconceivable that earlier in the story Signori Calvierri would just allow the Doctor to walk away once she has discovered who he is and that he intends to stop her plans. Surely she would have had him killed immediately or at least hold him captive.<br /><br />I don’t think this is ultimately destined to be remembered as a classic Doctor Who episode, but it is a very good one and there seems to be a lot here that will become much more relevant as we see future episodes in this season.<br /><br />‘The Vampires of Venice’ was filmed in Trogir, Croatia, on the Adriatic coast, and at St Donat’s Castle in Glamorgan. It looks fantastic, a very realistic depiction of Venice.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 9 May 2010</span><br /></span></div><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><div><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"></span> </div><div><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span> </div></span></div></div></div></div>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-8697771613315619472010-05-08T21:05:00.016+01:002010-05-09T17:14:24.890+01:00Doctor Who: Planet of Fire<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2½<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Peter Grimwade<br /><br />Directed by Fiona Cumming<br /><br />Starring Peter Davison <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Nicola Bryant <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Peri Brown</em>)</span>, Mark Strickson <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Turlough</em>)</span>, Anthony Ainley <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Master</em>)</span>, Peter Wyngarde <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Timanov</em>)</span>, Barbara Shelley <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sorasta</em>)</span>, James Bate <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Amyand</em>)</span>, Michael Bangerter <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Curt</em>)</span>, John Alkin <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lomand</em>)</span>, Edward Highmore <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Malkon</em>)</span>, Jonathan Caplan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Roskal</em>)</span>, Dallas Adams <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Professor Howard Foster</em>)</span> and Gerald Flood <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Voice of Kamelion</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjn1n2Yvkmgwhbi-aQqP7bb5NNszen1M-fkJqS2uOcklT73OSNYVuE8Cn71zRivB85k1Pf2-HItO_GIpNwwta4HqstkCXe2JT-eA8gtQaUfOi544DoSGeSEuJU3oKhYAxKLavJUvD_S0719/s1600/DoctorWhoPlanetOfFire1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 150px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5468994960519485026" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjn1n2Yvkmgwhbi-aQqP7bb5NNszen1M-fkJqS2uOcklT73OSNYVuE8Cn71zRivB85k1Pf2-HItO_GIpNwwta4HqstkCXe2JT-eA8gtQaUfOi544DoSGeSEuJU3oKhYAxKLavJUvD_S0719/s200/DoctorWhoPlanetOfFire1.jpg" border="0" /></a>The Doctor and Turlough are drawn to the planet Sarn, which holds secrets about Turlough’s identity and past that he is reluctant to share. Once on Sarn they encounter the Doctor’s old adversary the Master. They also pick-up an accidental hitch-hiker along the way, American botany student Perpugilliam ‘Peri’ Brown.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br />Peter Davison had the unenviable task of taking over from Tom Baker, who had played the Doctor for seven seasons between December 1974 and March 1981, by far the longest tenure of any of the actors who have played the role to date. More so than that, Doctor Who was enormously popular during Baker’s tenure, averaging eight or nine million viewers an episode. The final episode of the story ‘The City of Death’, co-written by Douglas Adams and broadcast on 20 October 1979, was watched by over 16 million viewers. It remains a record for the show, one that is extremely unlikely to be broken.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3wMu3eQvOfK24zq7smYiXt8IEbHkbqnFTNvp1VRH-3hyioco1mYo0Cb8fIi3AbE4jscAWqpwblmMgt0CXWXcY58ca5xdDqoYxeFd3ItPeGZRTJy-SppGhqpJlePQTxiWomy25Qk8OF4lJ/s1600/DoctorWhoPeterDavison4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 150px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5468994774136408354" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3wMu3eQvOfK24zq7smYiXt8IEbHkbqnFTNvp1VRH-3hyioco1mYo0Cb8fIi3AbE4jscAWqpwblmMgt0CXWXcY58ca5xdDqoYxeFd3ItPeGZRTJy-SppGhqpJlePQTxiWomy25Qk8OF4lJ/s200/DoctorWhoPeterDavison4.jpg" border="0" /></a>Davison proved to be a clever choice because not only was he quite different to Tom Baker, his Doctor was quite different to any of his predecessors. This Doctor was less arrogant than had been seen in the past, a much more reserved and diffident character. Rather than wanting to always be at the very centre of the action, he was frequently content to remain on the sidelines, observing events as they unfolded from a distance. His relationship with his companions was also quite different in many ways and much more collaborative.<br /><br />‘Planet of Fire’, the penultimate story to feature Peter Davison, is not the best of his time in the role. In many respects it is hampered by the fact that it needs to help to bring one era to an end and set the scene for the new era that was soon to come, preparing the way for the change from the fifth to the sixth Doctor. Turlough leaves the story here and Peri is introduced, complete with numerous gratuitous bikini scenes. There was also what appeared at the time to be a somewhat unsatisfactory final appearance of the Master, at least as played by Anthony Ainley, although in fact it would not be long before his return.<br /><br />The story is not an altogether uninteresting one, with its themes of religious belief and intolerance, even if perhaps it is a little flat. There is even some genuine location filming in Lanzarote. It is enlivened by the presence of Peter Wyngarde, who is great value. Wyngarde had been a big star on British television and a larger-than-life one in the late 1960s and early 1970s in ‘Department S’ and its spin-off ‘Jason King’. Barbara Shelley, a familiar face from many British horror films of the 1950s and 1960s, is also featured, although she is underused in a rather inconsequential role.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">At the time of Nicola Bryant’s arrival as Peri the producers of the show played down the fact that she is actually British, although she was playing an American character. They were also reluctant to make it known that she was married – oddly enough, to an American, which gave her dual British-American citizenship.<br /></span><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 8 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-4143354413520362562010-05-08T20:52:00.007+01:002010-05-09T13:58:41.884+01:00Doctor Who: The Twin Dilemma<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2½<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Anthony Steven (completed by Eric Saward)<br /><br />Directed by Peter Moffatt<br /><br />Starring Colin Baker <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Nicola Bryant <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Peri Brown</em>)</span>, Maurice Denham <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Professor Edgeworth / Azmael</em>)</span>, Edwin Richfield <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mester</em>)</span>, Kevin McNally <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Hugo Lang</em>)</span>, Barry Stanton <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Noma</em>)</span>, Oliver Smith <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Drak</em>)</span>, Dennis Chinnery <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sylvest</em>)</span>, Gavin Conrad <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Romulus</em>)</span>, Andrew Conrad <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Remus</em>)</span>, Seymour Green <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Chamberlain</em>)</span>, Dione Inman <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Elena</em>)</span> and Helen Blatch <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Fabian</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisxrEBPX1byp5CL1IkLMsaDnWH6N8EBO1dcwKJOPshC6xOCRj7QV6LKMAPkBpNqtITQ65G5s79J9QHhL5tYp8Xv4USXtsXZKs0pkCVPaADLzsLWmggCETqIUMXbuPxx9c6i9e6SUoF78Xa/s1600/DoctorWhoTwinDilemma3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 194px; float: right; height: 200px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5468991681814419538" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisxrEBPX1byp5CL1IkLMsaDnWH6N8EBO1dcwKJOPshC6xOCRj7QV6LKMAPkBpNqtITQ65G5s79J9QHhL5tYp8Xv4USXtsXZKs0pkCVPaADLzsLWmggCETqIUMXbuPxx9c6i9e6SUoF78Xa/s200/DoctorWhoTwinDilemma3.jpg" border="0" /></a>Following his regeneration, the Doctor’s behaviour becomes increasingly erratic and borders on psychotic. He attempts to strangle his companion Peri, but apparently remembers nothing of the incident immediately afterwards. He sets the controls of the TARDIS to take them to Titan 3 where, he says, he intends to spend a thousand years of solitude, but once there they encounter Commander Hugo Lang and become tangled up in a mystery involving Azmael, another Time Lord and an old friend of the Doctor.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br />There were two things more than anything else that contributed to the success of Doctor Who when it first began back in 1963. One was the iconic electronic theme music and the other was the creation of the Daleks. However, one thing more than anything else ensured its longevity and that was the regeneration of the Doctor. Initially, it was an expedient forced upon the producers of the show when William Hartnell, the first Doctor, departed in 1966, partly as a result of increasing ill health. The series had been a huge success and they were looking for a novel way of persuading the audience to accept another actor in the lead role. It worked beautifully and it meant that the show could now effectively continue for as long as there was an audience to watch it.<br /><br />Colin Baker was the sixth Doctor, taking over the role from Peter Davison at the end of the twenty-first season. The regeneration itself took place at the end of the story ‘The Caves of Androzani’, which was voted by fans as the greatest Doctor Who story of all-time in the official magazine in 2009. ‘The Twin Dilemma’ was the final story in that season, told across four episodes between the 22 and 30 March 1984.<br /><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiXNpJYvP8OdRQRqZkHTEhAhIrf5p3P3Tt4kv1hRsUUh1k6IWOLhxGmXX-il8mdl6IeKBj58kmAWKd9C2Ham4GoxN24w8W8g7Cak8ie1xHz65bRaFwIvoPasonaR66NveVORwRh9aUf567/s1600/DoctorWhoTwinDilemma2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 144px; float: right; height: 200px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5468991524130875922" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiXNpJYvP8OdRQRqZkHTEhAhIrf5p3P3Tt4kv1hRsUUh1k6IWOLhxGmXX-il8mdl6IeKBj58kmAWKd9C2Ham4GoxN24w8W8g7Cak8ie1xHz65bRaFwIvoPasonaR66NveVORwRh9aUf567/s200/DoctorWhoTwinDilemma2.jpg" border="0" /></a></span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" >Unlike the previous story, ‘The Twin Dilemma’ is not universally well-regarded and it marked the start of a very troubled time for the show. In fact, many fans would claim it is the worst story in the history of the series. Through no fault of Colin Baker, several factors meant that his time in the lead role was not a happy one. In retrospect, however, it is clear that Baker was a good choice for the role and there were some interesting ideas played with during his brief tenure as the Doctor.<br /><br />Baker’s performance in ‘The Twin Dilemma’ is perhaps rather hammy at times, but this was his first story in the role and the writers were attempting to show a new and much less likeable side of the Doctor. The moment when he attempts to strangle Peri still has enough of an impact to shock. The story itself fizzles, never quite catching fire, and doesn’t make a great deal of sense, but it is enjoyable enough and I rather like Mester, the telepathic giant slug creature.<br /><br />There was, as I recall it, some unhappiness at the suggestion that this was a Doctor who was deeply flawed, one who bordered on megalomania. It brings to mind the reaction of some fans to Buffy’s flawed and complex character in ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ – and later on when dislike of both the lead character and the actress who played her had become deeply entrenched in those same fans (irrationally so, in my opinion), their negative reaction to the flaws explored in supporting characters like Willow.<br /><br />I don’t know if I watched all four episodes of ‘The Twin Dilemma’ the first time around, but I did watch the opening episode and it has always been one that has remained in my memory. I came to it again all these years later not expecting too much, but I was pleasantly surprised. Doctor Who has been much better than this many times, both before and since, but even below its best it remains compulsive viewing.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 8 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-27668028554252733332010-05-04T11:29:00.008+01:002010-05-04T11:47:00.366+01:00The Box<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Directed by Richard Kelly<br /><br />Written by Richard Kelly, based on the short story ‘Button, Button’ by Richard Matheson<br /><br />Starring Cameron Diaz <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Norma Lewis</em>)</span>, James Marsden <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Arthur Lewis</em>)</span>, Frank Langella <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Arlington Stewart</em>)</span>, Sam Oz Stone <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Walter Lewis</em>)</span>, Holmes Osborne <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Dick Burns</em>)</span>, Gillian Jacobs <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Dana / Sarah Matthews</em>)</span>, Deborah Rush <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Clymene Steward</em>)</span>, Ryan Woodle <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lucas Carnes</em>)</span>, James Rebhorn <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Norm Cahill</em>)</span>, Celia Weston <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lana Burns</em>)</span> and Allyssa Maurice <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Suzanne Weller</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAtu-fOuud7Lvv_bBtZnrnOD0oLg-Ykyb9_iHikgVIK9mxj1nAi4YY2czcpRzIYDDBAzLa8Q2aFgZVskTm-7t926ck7PoHyeej3EO7Dxb0Pixyjn2xjdKArXTukxXiyildkBgIhXJN3dl5/s1600/TheBox2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 83px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5467361181692915314" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAtu-fOuud7Lvv_bBtZnrnOD0oLg-Ykyb9_iHikgVIK9mxj1nAi4YY2czcpRzIYDDBAzLa8Q2aFgZVskTm-7t926ck7PoHyeej3EO7Dxb0Pixyjn2xjdKArXTukxXiyildkBgIhXJN3dl5/s200/TheBox2.jpg" border="0" /></a>A package containing a strange box with a button locked inside a clear Perspex dome is left on the doorstep of the home of Norma Lewis, a teacher, and her husband Arthur, a NASA engineer. Norma then receives a visit from a mysterious stranger who is missing a large chunk of the left side of his face. He introduces himself as Arlington Stewart and tells Norma if she and her husband unlock the box and press the button someone they do not know will die, but they will receive one million dollars. Arthur is sure it must be a hoax, but when Norma presses the button Arlington Stewart once again calls to hand over a briefcase full of money. However, Norma and Arthur are filled with guilt and their lives begin to spiral out of control as they are overtaken by increasingly surreal events that have tragic consequences.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLG6-OSJDAqoWIs1gZJNBBsodcOjASvvoKQreu42sXEbC31HP92SNezFanhoHn9ZuRMO_oVedJuN5nVtQrIOgPXpDg-T_lkW4EHuV0rMkl0hgW51hZcp7OxP1DikiIQ2uKyb7ZUl-3AXss/s1600/TheBox4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 83px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5467361492364277234" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLG6-OSJDAqoWIs1gZJNBBsodcOjASvvoKQreu42sXEbC31HP92SNezFanhoHn9ZuRMO_oVedJuN5nVtQrIOgPXpDg-T_lkW4EHuV0rMkl0hgW51hZcp7OxP1DikiIQ2uKyb7ZUl-3AXss/s200/TheBox4.jpg" border="0" /></a>Writer-director Richard Kelly made an immediate impact with his critically acclaimed debut full-length feature ‘Donnie Darko’ in 2001. Its belated follow-up ‘Southland Tales’ was finally released in 2007 after a troubled gestation to a suspiciously gratuitous mauling from some critics. It is certainly an over-ambitious sprawling mess of a film, but I like it. ‘The Box’ is Kelly’s most recent film, based on ‘Button, Button’, a 1970 short story by Richard Matheson that was made into an episode of ‘The Twilight Zone’ in 1986.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF4tQI21O5os2X1h2RteTkpLa5MNqMWjxHwGvnlsMY4DRyO3n_A1_PZGrcZ5fw_DF-90475Vc4lqTa4ErXrrqE81itS_-qzhNiaFWRRP0y-amNjoQlWWn5z8v_APNH3zTL6ny8ut9repB7/s1600/TheBox3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 134px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5467361336402825154" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhF4tQI21O5os2X1h2RteTkpLa5MNqMWjxHwGvnlsMY4DRyO3n_A1_PZGrcZ5fw_DF-90475Vc4lqTa4ErXrrqE81itS_-qzhNiaFWRRP0y-amNjoQlWWn5z8v_APNH3zTL6ny8ut9repB7/s200/TheBox3.jpg" border="0" /></a>‘The Box’ shares many similarities with Richard Kelly’s previous work, ‘Donnie Darko’ in particular, and is certainly typical of his established style, with its themes of science and metaphysics. It is very slow moving and resolutely downbeat. I must admit that for a time I found it bordering on being quite simply boring, but I wanted to know what happened and that kept me watching, until eventually I just seemed to slip into the rhythm of the film. I suspect it is a film that would benefit from repeat viewings and I would like to watch again sometime, but perhaps not in a hurry.</span> <div><div><div><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><br />‘The Box’ was greeted with very mixed reviews, many of them negative. It has a 45% rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 132 reviews. It grossed just over $29 million at the box office against a production budget of $30 million.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 3 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span></div></div></div>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-19561646211527945982010-05-04T10:02:00.013+01:002010-06-03T11:30:59.559+01:00Doctor Who: Battlefield<span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(255,255,255)">...</span><br /><br />Rating 2¾<br /><br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,153)">Written by Ben Aaronovitch<br /><br />Directed by Michael Kerrigan<br /><br />Starring Sylvester McCoy <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Sophie Aldred <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Ace</em>)</span>, Nicholas Courtney <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart</em>)</span>, Jean Marsh <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Morgaine</em>)</span>, James Ellis <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Peter Warmsly</em>)</span>, Angela Bruce <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Brigadier Winifred Bambera</em>)</span>, Marcus Gilbert <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Ancelyn</em>)</span>, Christopher Bowen <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Mordred</em>)</span>, Ling Tai <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Shou Yuing</em>)</span>, Noel Collins <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Pat Rawlinson</em>)</span>, June Bland <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Elizabeth Rawlinson</em>)</span>, Dorota Rae <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Flight Lieutenant Lavel</em>)</span>, Robert Jezek <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sergeant Zbrigniev</em>)</span>, Paul Tormany <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Major Husak</em>)</span>, Marek Anton <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Destroyer</em>)</span> and Angela Douglas <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Doris Lethbridge-Stewart</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7kSDM37Sz-N-2yKXva4CE0C0sBkmVdVYD1HAJ_VF6AR89F5mgHFXZW2vaj-Tf2uo14cv0kbBl69oh8BHy-nei0WRrVVi9ZChgqpGhSG_ZY8T1qVVOYmbPYipa_KNTcCT_8XKa-fo-r8ws/s1600/DoctorWhoBattlefield.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 142px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5467338943729190674" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7kSDM37Sz-N-2yKXva4CE0C0sBkmVdVYD1HAJ_VF6AR89F5mgHFXZW2vaj-Tf2uo14cv0kbBl69oh8BHy-nei0WRrVVi9ZChgqpGhSG_ZY8T1qVVOYmbPYipa_KNTcCT_8XKa-fo-r8ws/s200/DoctorWhoBattlefield.jpg" /></a>The Doctor responds to a distress signal and the TARDIS materialises close by Lake Vortigern in England in the 20th Century, where he encounters a UNIT convoy transporting a nuclear device. When Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, now retired from active service, is informed that the Doctor has returned, he immediately responds to the call and a military helicopter is sent to take him to the site. They all get caught up in an ancient war spilling sideways across time from an alternative dimension involving sorcery and the legend of King Arthur. The Doctor is already known to the combatants, who identify him as Merlin.<br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(192,192,192)">...</span><br /><br /><br />‘Battlefield’, which was broadcast on BBC1 between the 6th and 27th September 1989, was the opening story of the twenty-sixth and final season of the original Doctor Who, the so-called “classic series”. It was the third and final season to feature Sylvester McCoy, the seventh Doctor, although he did return for the “regeneration” scenes in the 1996 film version starring Paul McGann. McCoy is, along with David Tennant, one of two Scottish actors to have played the Doctor.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1TOwZCAuM2aIOh_msjfL_uMSfe2dPYK5gMMCsohNpaH8q_XSKojhsWINltJnWKqexIdN-LLZyWhOgO6I8ZreO9E-XiS4F44t5MilqbLA0ztSN5mvjUwwvPJMJpIM1_9wh0nbv_Mg_wbiP/s1600/JohnNathanTurnerSylvesterMcCoy.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 120px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5467339063773271138" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1TOwZCAuM2aIOh_msjfL_uMSfe2dPYK5gMMCsohNpaH8q_XSKojhsWINltJnWKqexIdN-LLZyWhOgO6I8ZreO9E-XiS4F44t5MilqbLA0ztSN5mvjUwwvPJMJpIM1_9wh0nbv_Mg_wbiP/s200/JohnNathanTurnerSylvesterMcCoy.jpg" /></a>‘Battlefield’ was made during the period when John Nathan-Turner was producing Doctor Who (<em>pictured with Sylvester McCoy</em>). He was the longest-serving producer on the series, having taken over the role in 1980, and presided over 130 episodes. Nathan-Turner cast the fifth, sixth and seventh Doctors (Pater Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy), during what became an increasingly turbulent time after the tremendous popularity and success of the Tom Baker years. He dealt with complaints from campaigners like Mary Whitehouse, who thought the show had a negative influence on children, and opposition from within the BBC. He also faced criticism from some fans of the show as a result of the changes he made, not least because of declining audience ratings.<br /><br />In Sylvester McCoy’s first season the Doctor was portrayed as slightly comical and clownish, not entirely dissimilar to the second Doctor, played by Patrick Troughton. This perhaps was influenced by McCoy’s own acting background and in particular his time as a member of the Ken Campbell Roadshow, where his brand of physical humour included hammering nails up his nose and setting fire to his head. Later on, however, McCoy’s Doctor became a distinctly darker and more ambiguous character.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBl4kKN5Q_ZFSK3A49fELz2XBqeKri2vyIEQ5kqiha-U5_fkYevOA6UXyijPkJWf4ZuzizG20p1Pj9fR6w5jK550B5YZUlKWrN-h2jwtcxEzeUZWihKv0FC1pYOlPxd8E9tL7-fd1ciwFo/s1600/DoctorWhoSylvesterMcCoy.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 150px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5467339760970325970" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBl4kKN5Q_ZFSK3A49fELz2XBqeKri2vyIEQ5kqiha-U5_fkYevOA6UXyijPkJWf4ZuzizG20p1Pj9fR6w5jK550B5YZUlKWrN-h2jwtcxEzeUZWihKv0FC1pYOlPxd8E9tL7-fd1ciwFo/s200/DoctorWhoSylvesterMcCoy.jpg" /></a>I have always been extremely fond of McCoy’s third and final season in the role and consider the four stories, told across fourteen episodes, to be amongst my favourites from any era of the series. However, it had been many years since I last watched ‘Battlefield’. It’s an ambitious attempt to marry the legend of King Arthur and Excalibur to a theme of inter-dimension warfare and although it is a little bit messy and convoluted it is not altogether unsuccessful, despite more than a few faults.<br /><br />The battle scenes do look like the rather peculiar re-enactments that historical societies like to put on and the special effects are a long way short of being realistic. The incidental music is horrible and not remotely fitting, although certainly typical of the late 1980s. These faults, however, are more than made up for by the simple fact that this is a spirited romp, even if it does feel a little rushed at times and perhaps would have benefited from more than its four 25-minute episodes. I would have liked to have seen the Arthurian legend expanded a little more. There is an interesting take on the legend that one day King Arthur will make a messianic return to lead the Britons to freedom and victory. Here, it is ultimately discovered that Arthur turned to dust centuries ago and the continued conflict has been a futile exercise in unnecessary killing and retribution.<br /><br />There is a return for Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart after quite a considerable gap. Courtney made his first appearance in the Doctor Who story ‘The Web of Fear’ in early 1968 and was most recently seen in 2008 in the second season of the spin-off series ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’. There is also an unnecessary but not at all unwelcome appearance by “Bessie”, the car that had been driven by the third Doctor.<br /><br />When Sylvester McCoy first took over the role of the Doctor he inherited the companion of his predecessor Colin Baker. Sophie Aldred joined in the final story of that first season and her character Ace became the Doctor’s companion for the next two seasons. This was a rebellious, forthright and tough character with a troubled home background and in many ways quite a departure from the past, a clear reaction to the slightly simpering companion exemplified by Jo Grant (played by Katy Manning). Ace is an interesting character and even if Aldred is perhaps not the most skilful of actors, I always thought she was a good match for the role and she and McCoy worked very well together.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZE_WgmwKKdeVj4o10Mh1zk95g3tk0mXNV4bIybJYA2FLwjFYZ61OW-BiNKjPhpqjGFyWlVTKRPq7e25HCX7l8TCMGW8vHpQUeFHO4jru5ctM0amPgdIvNZy5YcnfaBTi4BhyBd5APXTQW/s1600/DoctorWhoBattlefield2.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 150px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5467339518012849154" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZE_WgmwKKdeVj4o10Mh1zk95g3tk0mXNV4bIybJYA2FLwjFYZ61OW-BiNKjPhpqjGFyWlVTKRPq7e25HCX7l8TCMGW8vHpQUeFHO4jru5ctM0amPgdIvNZy5YcnfaBTi4BhyBd5APXTQW/s200/DoctorWhoBattlefield2.jpg" /></a>A few seeds of the revived series devised by Russell T Davies can be found here. Ace quickly forms a friendship with the only other young person she encounters, Shou Yuing. The Doctor’s relationship with Lethbridge-Stewart is seen at the end of the story to be very much that of old friends. Instead of making a swift departure in the TARDIS, as he would normally do, he stays as a guest at the brigadier’s house. In fact, more than one friendship has been forged during the events just told. Davies expanded on this theme, something that contributed greatly to the success of the revived series.<br /><br />There are several things in ‘Battlefield’ that alert us to the fact that this story was made in the 1980s and not the 1970s – and that some hard-fought battles had been won in between times. The presence of a female “brigadier” is just one example. In retrospect it may seem rather quaint and for younger viewers the significance of it may be lost entirely now, but it does lend this period of Doctor Who an added importance.<br /><br />If truth be told, ‘Battlefield’ doesn’t stand the test of time. However, for someone like me who remembers it with great fondness its weaknesses are outweighed by the sheer nostalgic joy of watching it again. It was great fun and brought back some good memories.<br /><br />The Northern Irish actor James Ellis, who plays archaeologist Peter Warmsly, is a well-known face on British television. He starred in the long-running crime drama series ‘Z Cars’ between 1962 and 1978, appearing in 625 episodes.<br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(204,102,0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 3 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(255,255,255)">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-13414160725778474862010-05-02T15:26:00.015+01:002010-05-02T15:59:53.179+01:00Doctor Who: ‘The Time of Angels’ and ‘Flesh & Stone’<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);"><strong>WARNING: spoilers if you have not watched these episodes.</strong></span><br /><br /><br />Rating 3½<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Steven Moffat<br /><br />Directed by Adam Smith<br /><br />Starring Matt Smith <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">The Doctor</span>)</span>, Karen Gillan <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Amy Pond</span>)</span>, Alex Kingston <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">River Song</span>)</span>, Ian Glen <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Octavian</span>)</span>, David Atkins <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Bob</span>)</span>, Darren Morfitt <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Marco</span>)</span>, Mark Monero <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Pedro</span>)</span>, George Russo <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Phillip</span>)</span>, Mark Springer <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Christian</span>)</span>, Troy Glasgow <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Angelo</span>)</span>, Simon Dutton <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Alistair</span>)</span> and Mike Skinner <span style="font-size:85%;">(<span style="font-style: italic;">Security Guard</span>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgbHxMZTRfx3zXeU4_-4vajZfhemiTl_vSfBxFsmdo4HMQY-P7TB5mj75nKatIGro9QUjxYmBgRj_ZzJs8IS4j2bpUChfWsKmhYwsWGquZt7zrZb_XsVJONjzlXHj5NMdpbVpY_ey5X3OB/s1600/DoctorWhoFleshAndStone3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466680684258097666" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgbHxMZTRfx3zXeU4_-4vajZfhemiTl_vSfBxFsmdo4HMQY-P7TB5mj75nKatIGro9QUjxYmBgRj_ZzJs8IS4j2bpUChfWsKmhYwsWGquZt7zrZb_XsVJONjzlXHj5NMdpbVpY_ey5X3OB/s200/DoctorWhoFleshAndStone3.jpg" border="0" /></a>The Doctor spots a 12,000 year old “home box” (a starship version of a black box) in a museum, with a message burnt into it written in ancient Gallifreyan text. Recognising that he is the intended recipient of the message, he takes the TARDIS back in time to rescue River Song from the starship Byzantium, which then crashes into an ancient and long deserted monastery on the planet Alfava Metraxis. A group of soldier clerics led by Father Octavian arrive and the Doctor is informed that a Weeping Angel was in the bowels of the ship and they must now go down into a catacomb of tunnels known as the Maze of the Dead in search of it.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br />The fifth season of the revived Doctor Who (the thirty-first season in total, not including “specials”) started promisingly with ‘The Eleventh Hour’. The second episode ‘The Beast Below’ felt slightest flat first time around, but has benefited from repeat viewings. The rather rushed ‘Victory of the Daleks’ was a slight disappointment, but now the season has hit a high with a two-part story that sees the return of River Song and the Weeping Angels.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaRjWflGl9zjQJnY243tNz-dJdBWaiYkJavrbGeIg29q07x9z8jp0KHmhJvAgyovGshQA_Xy97FKWQEK6sr7Fum5xGxvH0CYEguEyG9wJCAg1s4ZZRtAVm5k944PMcL4U1oAxfoAlit1jn/s1600/DoctorWhoTimeOfAngels1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466681023895532050" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaRjWflGl9zjQJnY243tNz-dJdBWaiYkJavrbGeIg29q07x9z8jp0KHmhJvAgyovGshQA_Xy97FKWQEK6sr7Fum5xGxvH0CYEguEyG9wJCAg1s4ZZRtAVm5k944PMcL4U1oAxfoAlit1jn/s200/DoctorWhoTimeOfAngels1.jpg" border="0" /></a>River Song, a role originally written with Kate Winslet in mind, but ultimately played by the actress Alex Kingston, first appeared in ‘Silence in the Library’ and ‘Forest of the Dead’, a two-part story in the fourth season of the revived series in 2008. It was hinted at the time that she might have been the Doctor’s wife and in the first of those episodes she asked the Doctor if he yet knew about the crash of the Byzantium, creating a link to this new story. This time around we have stronger hints that River Song is the Doctor’s wife in the future, although it is never explicitly confirmed and denied.<br /><br />The Weeping Angels made their first appearance in ‘Blink’. That highly-acclaimed episode from 2007 starred Carey Mulligan, who has since received a best actress Academy Award nomination and is tipped for big things in the future, including, so it is claimed, the lead role in a remake of ‘My Fair Lady’. ‘Blink’, ‘Silence in the Library’ and ‘Forest of the Dead’ were all written by Steven Moffat, who has subsequently assumed the role of executive producer and head writer from Russell T Davies. He wrote these two new episodes.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcwwlX3wvQoPRk_fi0Jy4mh5yv-nBG3OpEch_N8igZlDKlW0qQxbkQuCPj4sYHECa9fAnDEzh4C_KNMZ2bAHnRpHOVpQe-BM2XP4Nr0V7nKBrmC3ALMlNze257-GWy6OBbugBBAtix0ax8/s1600/DoctorWhoFleshAndStone2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466681190108735266" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcwwlX3wvQoPRk_fi0Jy4mh5yv-nBG3OpEch_N8igZlDKlW0qQxbkQuCPj4sYHECa9fAnDEzh4C_KNMZ2bAHnRpHOVpQe-BM2XP4Nr0V7nKBrmC3ALMlNze257-GWy6OBbugBBAtix0ax8/s200/DoctorWhoFleshAndStone2.jpg" border="0" /></a>I liked ‘Blink’ very much and thought the Weeping Angels were a fascinating creation. However, because that was such an unusual episode I was not sure about their use again. As it turns out, they work brilliantly here. I didn’t have any strong opinion about River Song following her first appearance, although watching those two episodes again very recently has led me to the conclusion that they are much better than I had remembered, not that I disliked them first time around. I think she works extremely well in these new episodes, but my own preference would be that we don’t meet her again too frequently in the future. The occasional encounter would work best and help to maintain the air of mystery and ambiguity.<br /><br />I think I am right in saying the budget for this new season of Doctor Who has been cut. It certainly doesn’t show here. These episodes look spectacular and there are some superb special effects. As is the style of Doctor Who now, it is very fast paced, but telling the story across two episodes has allowed for it to build up without the rushed and rather under-cooked feel of ‘Victory of the Daleks’. There is a well-judged aura of foreboding and claustrophobia throughout the two episodes, but particularly in part one. This reaches a crescendo when the young soldier-cleric Bob radios Octavian and the Doctor and it is discovered that he is, in fact, already dead.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu_XBg5DQ-bQT6-UhcYK_0Tc2bRgoPJahVK6FtuDqIrilLX82QEW4MfpSYFimwYYffUftRF1MMzZwC3B-xpINF8VKtWiBsmPi82cK01rM3dWmBqBHIVd1pvku47jjcSoY7913Q46J2Yj3e/s1600/DoctorWhoTimeOfAngels2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466681410412843458" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu_XBg5DQ-bQT6-UhcYK_0Tc2bRgoPJahVK6FtuDqIrilLX82QEW4MfpSYFimwYYffUftRF1MMzZwC3B-xpINF8VKtWiBsmPi82cK01rM3dWmBqBHIVd1pvku47jjcSoY7913Q46J2Yj3e/s200/DoctorWhoTimeOfAngels2.jpg" border="0" /></a>There are one or two moments that don’t really work that well and are perhaps best not given too much thought – for example, Amy walking with her eyes shut amongst the Weeping Angels, tricking them into believing that she can see them. I guess this works if we assume the Doctor did not have any better solution to the problem and this was the only thing he could think of in a seemingly hopeless situation. His demeanour and loss of temper with River Song certainly suggests that he was feeling the pressure and I for one am pleased to see this side of him, previously evident in Christopher Eccleston’s Doctor, starting to come to the surface again.<br /><br />I still do have a sense of déjà vu, something that has been with me since ‘The Beast Below’. Apart from the return of River Song and the Weeping Angels, there are many other things here to remind us of previous stories in the revived series. Episodes that immediately came to my mind include ‘The Satan Pit’ and ‘The Waters of Mars’.<br /><br />The closing scene in which Amy passionately kisses the Doctor and tries to entice him into bed has caused some debate and disquiet. I had not read about this before watching ‘Flesh & Stone’ and it did come as a surprise on first viewing. I have subsequently learned that the Daily Mail has rather predictably taken against it. That newspaper has already previously complained about Karen Gillan being too sexy, laughably and implausibly claiming that at no time previously could any of the Doctor’s companions be described as “sexy”. Having watched ‘Flesh & Stone’ again, I think the scene works very well. I am not going to worry unduly about where it might lead to just yet.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidFju2G3GEk9gaJofUJ_23zUVW-ZLYqLZhBWuwZ2skftsU-qFzioXUq7SvrHZ8_Ub_gnKgnJGM_PZXlLL2FAaFw17XfUu_Qb_JHOUVSsoRJadFHfoE6_DaIAplTgTXwbv08UxyHC9BoODL/s1600/DoctorWhoFleshAndStone1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 112px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466681652822950738" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidFju2G3GEk9gaJofUJ_23zUVW-ZLYqLZhBWuwZ2skftsU-qFzioXUq7SvrHZ8_Ub_gnKgnJGM_PZXlLL2FAaFw17XfUu_Qb_JHOUVSsoRJadFHfoE6_DaIAplTgTXwbv08UxyHC9BoODL/s200/DoctorWhoFleshAndStone1.jpg" border="0" /></a>Reaction to the new Doctor and to this new season has been generally very positive, but there have been some dissenting voices. One particularly angry fan comment I have read in response to ‘The Time of Angels’ and ‘Flesh & Stone’ suggests that it is now so bad on every level that it should be cancelled immediately. The only reason I am not more taken aback by such opinions, apparently coming from fans of the show, is that I encountered exactly the same thing in the days of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’. At that time I was quite shocked that a large minority of fans seemed so angry and critical and so quick to voice their disapproval, but now I realise it is just a symptom of such loyal and fanatical fandoms.<br /><br />The cameo appearance by Mike Skinner in the opening scene of ‘The Time of Angels’ passed me by completely because, up to that moment, I did not actually know what he looked like.<br /><br />My expectations of this new season are probably still too high just now, but this was very good. I don’t think there is a better show on television at the moment.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 2 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-21401939867769603312010-05-01T23:56:00.013+01:002010-05-02T15:48:18.445+01:00Doctor Who: The War Games<span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(255,255,255)">...</span><br /><br />Rating 3½<br /><br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,153)">Written by Terrance Dicks and Malcolm Hulke<br /><br />Directed by David Maloney<br /><br />Starring Patrick Troughton <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>; Frazer Hines <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Jamie</em>)</span>; Wendy Padbury <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Zoe</em>)</span>; David Savile <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lieutenant Carstairs</em>)</span>; Philip Madoc <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>War Lord</em>)</span>; Edward Brayshaw <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>War Chief</em>)</span>; James Brae <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Security Chief</em>)</span>; Vernon Dobtcheff <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Scientist</em>)</span>; Jane Sherwin <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Lady Jennifer Buckingham</em>)</span>; Noel Coleman <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>General Smythe</em>)</span>; Hubert Rees <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Captain Ransom</em>)</span>; Richard Steele <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Commandant Gorton</em>)</span>; Graham Weston <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Russell</em>)</span>; David Troughton <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Moor</em>)</span>; Rudolph Walker <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Harper</em>)</span>; Bermard Horsfell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>First Time Lord</em>)</span>; Trevor Martin <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Second Time Lord</em>)</span> and Clyde Pollitt <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Third Time Lord</em>)</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIoxHLObUWzmDhYUhFEngLlhjMszQwYLQBKhn4x1HkxAseZGMe2VjeIFL22U9DsUhOHuPStb4ydtKLZzz8HBuailg33p7q5ufmdA6LAYaemg-UVoiFfzE0XEnS3wxi7-g83VecJPmdebJe/s1600/WarGames3.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 182px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466441295293673138" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIoxHLObUWzmDhYUhFEngLlhjMszQwYLQBKhn4x1HkxAseZGMe2VjeIFL22U9DsUhOHuPStb4ydtKLZzz8HBuailg33p7q5ufmdA6LAYaemg-UVoiFfzE0XEnS3wxi7-g83VecJPmdebJe/s200/WarGames3.jpg" /></a>The TARDIS materialises in no-man’s land in what appears to be a trench war zone in the Great War. The Doctor and his two companions, Jamie and Zoe, end up in the field headquarters of the British Army, where they are accused of being spies and court-martialled and the Doctor is sentenced to be executed by firing squad. However, when they escape and find themselves chased by Roman foot soldiers it quickly becomes apparent that all is not as it seems. They are at the epicentre of a complex Alien plot to become absolute rulers of the Galaxy.<br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(192,192,192)">...</span><br /><br /><br />‘The War Games’ was the final regular story to feature the second Doctor, played by Patrick Troughton, although he did turn up again on three more occasions in the company of subsequent Doctors. It was told across ten episodes and a total running time a little over four hours between 19 April and 21 June 1969. As far as I know, only ‘The Daleks Master Plan’, told across twelve episodes in late 1965 and early 1966, is longer, unless one counts ‘The Trial of a Time Lord’ in 1986. 63 episodes from the Patrick Troughton era are lost, so we should be grateful that all ten episodes of ‘The War Games’ still exist and in good condition. This was the last time Doctor Who was filmed in black and white.<br /><br />Despite its lengthy running time, ‘The War Games’ has surprising few real dead spots, although it does have a tendency to repeat itself a little too often and undoubtedly would have benefited from some trimming. The concept is a very interesting one and the subtext about the horror and futility of war is admirable. The recreation of the horrific reality of trench warfare is surprisingly effective, if perhaps the other war zones are not quite so successfully realised. Some extremely dodgy attempts at German, American and Mexican accents do not help, but somehow the variable acting doesn’t really seem to matter. Some of the acting is truly awful, but that is part of the period charm of it all.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpIvcTZyzVK30jtbkzVYNRVblvb8Y-XSSrdWF-EP-kewTBJnEo4yejOpyLVTQLnGE-c3AcOEEPDy3FYSM6EDHhAt2BnOag0Ah1xI7zUKhMdOt3XaWKVnjD5mJD1C18CdwBzSZxZLD57jNw/s1600/WarGames2.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 150px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466441445565632898" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpIvcTZyzVK30jtbkzVYNRVblvb8Y-XSSrdWF-EP-kewTBJnEo4yejOpyLVTQLnGE-c3AcOEEPDy3FYSM6EDHhAt2BnOag0Ah1xI7zUKhMdOt3XaWKVnjD5mJD1C18CdwBzSZxZLD57jNw/s200/WarGames2.jpg" /></a>Special mention must be given to Philip Madoc for a great performance as the War Lord. Madoc had already made an appearance in the 1966 film ‘Daleks Invasion Earth 2150AD’, which is not considered to be part of canon, and in another Patrick Troughton story ‘The Krotons’ in 1968. He appeared in Doctor Who again in 1976 in one of my favourite stories, ‘The Brain of Morbius’, which was written by Terrance Dicks, one of the two co-writers of ‘The War Games’. I loved the hammy performance of James Brae as the Security Chief. The strange over-emphasised monotone voice patterns he employed are almost identical to Dan Aykroyd in the Saturday Night Live sketches and 1993 film ‘Coneheads’. It made me smile, but at the same time it was strangely chilling.<br /><br />There is an appearance by Rudolph Walker, who went on to star in the contentious 1970s sit-com ‘Love Thy Neighbour’ and later on in ‘The Thin Blue Line’ with Rowan Atkinson, before joining the cast of the soap opera ‘EastEnders’. There is also an early role for David Troughton, the son of Patrick Troughton and an acclaimed stage and television actor in his own right. He has appeared in Doctor Who again, most recently in the 2008 episode ‘Midnight’ with David Tennant.<br /><br />The few Patrick Troughton stories that I can still recall are very stylised. That is particularly true here when the action moves from the war zones to the Alien centre of operations, complete with control panels that are actually nothing more than metal shapes on a magnetic board. This is, I think, the first time we visit the home planet of the Time Lords, although the name Gallifrey is not actually mentioned. I also think it is the first time they are called the “Time Lords”.<br /><br />Troughton’s Doctor is often referred to as the “Cosmic Hobo”. He was quite different to the first Doctor, portrayed by William Hartnell, and indeed to his successor Jon Pertwee. He often appeared befuddled, but was something of a trickster, meaning that his adversaries would underestimate his quicksilver mind. He had a number of catch-phrases, of which the one I recall best is, “When I say run... RUN!”<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqfYsGooeh-7r1gzdbfuMIKQq410K94Mf824ajt9YdGg6sLH0wV-1J026ofEWyD3dAFUs8zA5-zpA-yTsi8GEm_sGUkPPcz5Sn5KOhjEqOY7b414yZLsQRl7t36SKbQDcXENRhZR0Ixw-l/s1600/WarGames1.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 150px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5466441690112996690" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqfYsGooeh-7r1gzdbfuMIKQq410K94Mf824ajt9YdGg6sLH0wV-1J026ofEWyD3dAFUs8zA5-zpA-yTsi8GEm_sGUkPPcz5Sn5KOhjEqOY7b414yZLsQRl7t36SKbQDcXENRhZR0Ixw-l/s200/WarGames1.jpg" /></a>As well as being Patrick Troughton’s final story, ‘The War Games’ also marks the departure of Fraser Hines, who played Jamie Robert McCrimmon from ‘The Highlander’ in December 1966, the second story with Troughton, onwards. Hines returned, alongside Patrick Troughton, to appear in the ‘The Five Doctors’ in 1983 and ‘The Two Doctors’ in 1985. Wendy Padbury also departed at the end of ‘The War Games’. Her character Zoe Heriot had first appeared in ‘The Wheel in Space’ in April 1968. She made one subsequent appearance, a cameo in ‘The Five Doctors’. Padbury went on to star in a now largely-forgotten series called ‘Freewheelers’, while Hines was among the regular cast of the long-running soap opera ‘Emmerdale Farm’ (later shortened to ‘Emmerdale’) between 1972 and 1994.<br /><br />I don’t know where ‘The War Games’ sits in the pantheon of classic Doctor Who stories, but while it certainly isn’t without its faults, I enjoyed it immensely.<br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(204,102,0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 2 May 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(255,255,255)">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-75579277530334995102010-04-28T19:39:00.018+01:002010-05-04T10:19:04.903+01:00Doctor Who: Jon Pertwee’s first season (classic series)<span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(255,255,255)">...</span><br /><br />Rating 5<br /></span><br /><br /><div><div><div><div><div><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,153)">1) Spearhead from Space <span style="font-size:85%;">(4 episodes: written by Robert Holmes, directed by Derek Martinus)</span> </span></span><br /></div><div><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,153)">2) Doctor Who and the Silurians <span style="font-size:85%;">(7 episodes: written by Malcolm Hulke, directed by Timothy Combe)</span></span></span></div><div><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,153)">3) The Ambassadors of Death <span style="font-size:85%;">(7 episodes: written by David Whitaker, with Trevor Ray and Malcolm Hulke, directed by Michael Ferguson)</span></span></span></div><div><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,153)">4) Inferno <span style="font-size:85%;">(7 episodes: written by Don Houghton, directed by Douglas Camfield and Barry Letts)</span><br /><br />Starring Jon Pertwee <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Caroline John <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Liz Shaw</em>)</span>, Nicholas Courtney <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart</em>)</span> and John Levene <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sergeant Benton</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEig3x_1Aec_56litSYTdeMxAO_m7rQYSCIDzY_jn7Bq9OJb7Ky6np5C_bcwDY3NpWouKNH1VXicVgdGtsDQoV_eMckSPUZ93ewJXIEIInCrQlURsurVPn93__EAgLSKEOirdWIrhEM4eqzG/s1600/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra1.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 150px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465261104611770034" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEig3x_1Aec_56litSYTdeMxAO_m7rQYSCIDzY_jn7Bq9OJb7Ky6np5C_bcwDY3NpWouKNH1VXicVgdGtsDQoV_eMckSPUZ93ewJXIEIInCrQlURsurVPn93__EAgLSKEOirdWIrhEM4eqzG/s200/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra1.jpg" /></a>The TARDIS materialises on the planet Earth in the 20th Century, where the Doctor, who has just gone through a new regeneration, has been exiled by the Time Lords. He reluctantly agrees to work in an unofficial capacity for Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart of UNIT (United Nations Intelligence Taskforce), who had previously encountered and worked with him, in an earlier incarnation, on two other occasions. The Doctor works closely with Liz Shaw, a young graduate from the University of Cambridge who is seconded to UNIT as a scientific advisor. He spends much of his time using UNIT facilities to try to repair the TARDIS, which has been disabled by the Time Lords, but is also called on to deal with alien invasions, intergalactic kidnapping, military sabotage and mad scientists whose actions threaten to destroy the planet.<br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(192,192,192)">...</span><br /><br /><br />I don’t have any clear recollection of watching Doctor Who in its original incarnation when William Hartnell played the lead role, although I undoubtedly would have done. I do have memories of various stories from the period when the Doctor was played by Patrick Troughton and I was certainly watching it week on week long before Troughton gave up the role in the summer of 1969. However, it was the arrival of Jon Pertwee that probably coincided with the start of the period when I became an avid fan of the series and he remains my favourite Doctor. Budget constraints placed on the show dictated that the Doctor would now be exiled on Earth; something I think has been greeted down the years with a mixed reaction. It did, however, give the stories a consistent running theme and it always worked well for me. My fondest memories are reserved for stories from the second, third and fourth seasons of Pertwee’s Doctor, those that feature his companion Jo Grant, played by Katy Manning, but having recently watched his first season again I was struck by the unexpected high quality I found and the constantly fascinating and thought-provoking themes that still resonate strongly today.<br /><br /></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisdQvg9LMfCO4Dpnxpzl6eNJ-WC6k_PbENAF5UmXT1U7AgtukNHLpNiwmlUKPg199ySQ1Zs_ci7tUS2yWDfEpTAcdRD-FN2a941g4MwaUw0xgA8z4DJHih5wMMDAR136Rwy7nuEdtM-qCn/s1600/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra2.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 150px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465261212580764738" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisdQvg9LMfCO4Dpnxpzl6eNJ-WC6k_PbENAF5UmXT1U7AgtukNHLpNiwmlUKPg199ySQ1Zs_ci7tUS2yWDfEpTAcdRD-FN2a941g4MwaUw0xgA8z4DJHih5wMMDAR136Rwy7nuEdtM-qCn/s200/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra2.jpg" /></a></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >It is at least fifteen years since I last watched ‘Inferno’, the final story in the season reviewed here, and probably longer for the preceding three stories. In fact, in the case of ‘The Ambassadors of Death’ I suspect this might be the first time I have seen it again since it was broadcast in late March through to the beginning of May 1970.<br /><br />In a later story, ‘The Three Doctors’, which included the return and final appearance of William Hartnell, the first Doctor, he describes Pertwee and Troughton as the “dandy and the clown”. Just as Patrick Troughton had done before him, Jon Pertwee drew on some aspects of earlier interpretations of the Doctor and incorporated his own take on the character. Pertwee’s Doctor is a mixture of arrogance and compassion. His attitude towards his companions (Liz Shaw in this first season, Jo Grant later on and finally Sarah Jane Smith) is sometimes that of a stern father, sometimes a mentor and sometimes condescending, but no matter how sorely his patience is tried, he feels a great deal of affe</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >ction for them all. He is, first and foremost, a scientist, but he also sees himself as something of an action man. When he is not talking about “reversing the polarity” he is often to be found playing with various gadgets of his own invention or taking a very active role in the pursuit of villains.<br /><br />Pertwee, who was also widely known for the television series ‘Worzel Gummidge’ and the long-running radio show ‘The Navy Lark’, seemed to have good screen chemistry with the other regular actors, notably Roger Delgado who played the Master from the beginning of his second season onwards. Delgado’s tragic death in June 1973 is said to have been a major factor in his decision to leave the series. He also worked very well with Nicholas Courtney, a great favourite amongst Doctor Who fans, who surely must make an appearance in the revived series at some point, although age may be a factor since he is now in his eighties.<br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >The first season with Jon Pertwee, the seventh season of the so-called “classic series”, comprised twenty-five episodes between 3 January and 20 June 1970, each one 25 minutes in length, telling four stories. It opens with ‘Spearhead from Space’, which cleverly introduces the new Doctor in a satisfying manner and sets the scene for the direction the series would take over the next few years. It also introduces the Autons, who </span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >would appear again in ‘Terror of the Autons’, the o</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >pening story of Pertwee’s second season. They made a third appearance in 2005 in ‘Rose’, the very first episode of the revived series. ‘Spearhead from Space’ is told across four episodes (the remaining three stories each got seven episodes). It is also the first Doctor Who story to be filmed in colour.<br /></span><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVlAzkvMl9xakZKEPKpkHZrJ97IuSLpDEp32sRo9GJLFZx_LHaEZvDhQFqn852v3riJiFoHOlXmxVSkC1wsczQN026aegrjJLTr2nYPefV33S8xLCraCExPRX9Bn0rydrO1sojv5whcp3n/s1600/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra5.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 105px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465267334794469170" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVlAzkvMl9xakZKEPKpkHZrJ97IuSLpDEp32sRo9GJLFZx_LHaEZvDhQFqn852v3riJiFoHOlXmxVSkC1wsczQN026aegrjJLTr2nYPefV33S8xLCraCExPRX9Bn0rydrO1sojv5whcp3n/s200/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra5.jpg" /></a>‘Doctor Who and the Silurians’ marks the first appearance of the Silurians, reptilian creatures (clearly modelled on the 1954 film ‘The Creature from the Black Lagoon’) who, we discover, ruled the planet Earth 200 million years earlier. There is interesting moral ambiguity in the story about exactly who the aggressor is. We also have the theme of the dangers of nuclear power misused and science gone</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" > mad, something that is returned to again in ‘Inferno’. The Silurians are classic Doctor Who monsters, actors in rubber suits who largely seem to have been given only the very basic of stage directions. The labyrinth of caves in which the Silurians have been hibernating for all these millions of years are, of course, entirely artificial and unrealistic, but that’s all part </span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >of the charm of it. It is, in fact, a fast moving and enjoyable story. Paul Darrow, who is probably best remembered as Avon in ‘Blake’s 7’, is featured here, as is Geoffrey Palmer, who has starred in various popular sitcoms over the years. Palmer appeared in Doctor Who again, playing different roles, in ‘The Mutants’ in 1972 and ‘Voyage of the Damned’ in 2007.<br /></span><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >‘The Ambassadors of Death’ is the story that surprised me most, probably because it is the one I remembered least. Even the opening credits sequence is slightly modified from the norm, coming in tw</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >o parts with a brief recap teaser in between. The story was clearly inspired by ‘The Quatermass Experiment’, the classic 1953 BBC serial that was remade as a film by Hammer Film Productions in 1955. As is often the case with Doctor Who, it is best not to look for holes in the plot or dwell on the implausibility of some of the scenarios, but it just works really well as a story. I also noticed the use of some rather unusual and not always entirely appropriate original incidental music, which I found both odd and strangely compelling. ‘The Ambassadors of Death’ marks the first appearance of Sergeant Benton, a regular for the next few years to come, having previously appeared in the 1968 story ‘Invasion’ as Corporal Benton.<br /><br /></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnP12jnh3R6Ly4ozBNIFcr2kolJYeKyRrot4_8EyyKul2_OmoaxdpXvsui9XHYqRrgRtz44d555NOLZzVPwhFDy3-HvlUIbzMPiuoZEOgSRTLTODPBuFBZhPHRTS_dJJVKOI-NxpXaMj-z/s1600/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra4.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 128px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 200px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465267133580979122" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnP12jnh3R6Ly4ozBNIFcr2kolJYeKyRrot4_8EyyKul2_OmoaxdpXvsui9XHYqRrgRtz44d555NOLZzVPwhFDy3-HvlUIbzMPiuoZEOgSRTLTODPBuFBZhPHRTS_dJJVKOI-NxpXaMj-z/s200/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra4.jpg" /></a></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >‘Inferno’ is widely regarded to be one of the classic Doctor Who stories. It has very obviously parallels with a 1967 Star Trek episode called ‘Mirror, Mirror’ and would seem to have been influenced by that earlier work. Once again, the theme of science gone mad</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" > is at the h</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >eart of the story. This time around the Doctor taps into some of the available nuclear power to conduct his continuing experiments on the TARDIS console and is shifted sideways into a parallel dimension in which he finds himself in a totalitarian version of Britain with a decidedly less than friendly version of Lethbridge-Stewart and UNIT. It’s an intense and rather downbeat story with some interesting themes and an unusual one insomuch that the Doctor fails to save the planet from destruction, in one reality at least. The “primords”, humans mutated into savage beasts</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" > who look uncannily like Oddbod in ‘Carry On Screaming’, need to be taken with tongue in cheek, but otherwise ‘Inferno’ maintains th</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >e very high standard of the previous three stories and the inter-related themes.<br /></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><br />Jo Grant was and will probably always remain my favourite companion, undoubtedly because of nostalgia and the fact that as a twelve-year-old I had a huge crush on Katy Manning. However, there is no doubt in retrospect that she was a rather simpering character and, from this distant perspective, a distinctly sexist creation. This is given greater credence by the decision of producer Barry Letts to dispense with the actress Car</span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >oline John after just one season because he felt Liz Shaw was an unsuitable companion for the Doctor (John was pregnant at the time, which undoubtedly would also have been a factor in the decision). Shaw was portrayed as a strong and independent character who respected the Doctor but was not intellectually threatened by him. Watching these first season episodes again, I realise how good this character who I previously had given very little thought to could have been had she stayed around longer.</span><br /><br /></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" ><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7duPSOg26tEFA7bU9BSvnPUvil2zZn1Nmu62ZnsKcusatq8mQVc10BL_qBSKCI6F_EEkw6EacdiJF-ZMdANo60MZqipnNWmlt312RdpIYKN98_gApaA3jIe2qFjeehzxnLdimDZ2q7oFB/s1600/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra3.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 141px" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465266965482215282" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7duPSOg26tEFA7bU9BSvnPUvil2zZn1Nmu62ZnsKcusatq8mQVc10BL_qBSKCI6F_EEkw6EacdiJF-ZMdANo60MZqipnNWmlt312RdpIYKN98_gApaA3jIe2qFjeehzxnLdimDZ2q7oFB/s200/DoctorWhoJonPertweeEra3.jpg" /></a></span></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >I don’t know what younger viewers of the revived Doctor Who would make of this earlier incarnation. The very limited special effects of old Doctor Who have always been a point of discussion and good-natured humour and would undoubtedly be a big problem for some viewers used to the kind of special effects that are now the norm. The length and the slower pacing of the stories would also, I imagine, come as a surprise, as perhaps would the rather downbeat themes. For me, though, watching these episodes again has not just confirmed my memories of them, but actually surpassed my expectations.<br /><br /></span><span style="COLOR: rgb(51,51,51);font-family:georgia;" >When Doctor Who was revived in 2005 it was no longer permitted to refer to UNIT as United Nations Intelligence Taskforce and so it became Unified Intelligence Taskforce.<br /><br />Numerous episodes of Doctor Who were wiped or otherwise destroyed by the BBC in the 1960s and 1970s. Considerable effort has been made to locate missing episodes from a number of different sources, primarily overseas broadcasters, although 108 episodes from the first six years of the show remain missing. The Jon Pertwee episodes were badly affected by the BBC’s policy of reusing or destroying old videotapes and although mostly now restored, several parts of ‘The Ambassadors of Death’ exist only in black and white.<br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(204,102,0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 28 April 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="COLOR: rgb(255,255,255)">...</span></span></div></div></div></div></div>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-8333284094430938612010-04-26T22:16:00.003+01:002010-04-26T22:33:38.688+01:00Doctor Who: An Unearthly Child (classic series)<span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51);font-family:georgia;" ><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">... </span><br /><br />Rating 2½ (5 for the pilot episode)<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 153);">Written by Anthony Coburn (and C E Webber, uncredited)<br /><br />Directed by Waris Hussein (and Douglas Camfield – film inserts, uncredited)<br /><br />Starring William Hartnell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>The Doctor</em>)</span>, Carole Ann Ford <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Susan Foreman</em>)</span>, Jacqueline Hill <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Barbara Wright</em>)</span>, William Russell <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Ian Chesterton</em>)</span>, Derek Newark <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Za</em>)</span>, Jeremy Young <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Kal</em>)</span>, Alethea Charlton <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Hur</em>)</span>, Howard Lang <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Horg</em>)</span> and Eileen Way <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Old Mother</em>)</span></span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidf2663l0KEPauicVIoZM92I2ULoHDFNZiibPG1dfndBfD7LbwR0-SmYrvd67BEL6bPAAGxx46iIHirwKKDSHu2HEdfwHWbCSBhpc16zopzjsBjJaorPn2LRxWvQN9qXRnQ-xYL_R1RlRC/s1600/AnUnearthlyChild4.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 150px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5464556681567836562" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidf2663l0KEPauicVIoZM92I2ULoHDFNZiibPG1dfndBfD7LbwR0-SmYrvd67BEL6bPAAGxx46iIHirwKKDSHu2HEdfwHWbCSBhpc16zopzjsBjJaorPn2LRxWvQN9qXRnQ-xYL_R1RlRC/s200/AnUnearthlyChild4.jpg" border="0" /></a>Schoolteacher Barbara Wright is concerned about her pupil Susan Foreman and shares these concerns with her colleague Ian Chesterton. Susan is unusually bright in many respects, but strangely uninformed in others. She is also secretive about her home life, other than to say she lives with her grandfather, who doesn’t like strangers. Barbara and Ian decide to confront Susan’s grandfather and go to the scrap yard Susan has given as her address. When they go inside the gates they discover a blue Police box and are then confronted by the elderly man, who is both evasive and angry at their interference. When they hear Susan’s voice from inside the box they force their way past the old man, only to discover that it is considerably bigger on the inside than out. Susan tells her teachers they are in a machine that can travel in time and space, which they do not believe. The Doctor angrily tells them they can now not leave and uses the controls to take them away from London in 1963 back in time to the Stone Age, where they all find themselves in deadly danger.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(192, 192, 192);">...</span><br /><br /><br />The very first episode of ‘Doctor Who’, entitled ‘An Unearthly Child’, was broadcast on BBC (there was only one BBC channel at the time) on 23 November 1963. It was part of a story told across four episodes. During the early years of the series, up to the latter stages of the third season in the Spring of 1966, each episode was given a separate title. So it was that ‘An Unearthly Child’ was followed by the episodes ‘The Cave of Skulls’, ‘The Forest of Fear’ and ‘The Firemaker’. However, it is the opening episode that is of particular interest and especially an earlier version, filmed a month or so before the one that was broadcast. Referred to these days as the “pilot” episode, it was not intended as such, but there were several technical problems identified with it and the depiction of the Doctor was considered to be too sinister and too frightening for younger viewers. It is this pilot that is most interesting to me.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuRAo9V0hNR3TyvdiqgOO_FVpzqKH5eo8dJ1devAIKiGj0TS9ZXtJmvp3yLKSpYXKL4FeB2VN7xLp7SBHbLcidQHFzmiMOuqC0I6Q2x97xWaAaTQmZ4NrqJPnIke392gKOyelk66oiBscE/s1600/AnUnearthlyChild5.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 150px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5464556783789489986" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuRAo9V0hNR3TyvdiqgOO_FVpzqKH5eo8dJ1devAIKiGj0TS9ZXtJmvp3yLKSpYXKL4FeB2VN7xLp7SBHbLcidQHFzmiMOuqC0I6Q2x97xWaAaTQmZ4NrqJPnIke392gKOyelk66oiBscE/s200/AnUnearthlyChild5.jpg" border="0" /></a>I think it is superior to the later version, although how long the series could have progressed with such a cruel and unsympathetic version of the Doctor is a moot point. Even with the character softened somewhat through re-writes, William Hartnell continued to play him as an irascible and autocratic figure, emphasising his alien nature. This is something, to a lesser extent, that subsequent actors who assumed the role later on have continued to do from time to time, right through to the revived series, starting with Christopher Eccleston’s war-scarred Doctor in 2005.<br /><br />The pilot is certainly rough around the edges, but even after nearly 47 years it still packs a punch, as does the later broadcast version. A big part of this, of course, is thanks to the opening credit visuals and the extraordinary theme music, composed by Ron Grainer and created by Delia Derbyshire at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, using electronic oscillators and various pioneering tape loop and reverse tape effects. The other most significant contribution to the early and ongoing success of the series is the TARDIS, the time machine shaped like a Police box. Although an anachronism now that many younger viewers would not be familiar with outside of the series, they were still a common sight throughout the 1960s and, in fact, there are apparently one of two still in use in rural areas.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpWo5YmvDDAZGAGFGQVsYSPGOyEinvGYgZrwbTsbtookPKDA4eVumE3Wjv8SNilbAZTALGbd1rMzE5IAlU4iNv2oyz0-ICZZtowKhvkthHWfqLgmiqx_9vZIUqGbHXz_g2spjZbgaqJ_Ch/s1600/AnUnearthlyChild6.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 200px; float: right; height: 150px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5464556928381160130" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpWo5YmvDDAZGAGFGQVsYSPGOyEinvGYgZrwbTsbtookPKDA4eVumE3Wjv8SNilbAZTALGbd1rMzE5IAlU4iNv2oyz0-ICZZtowKhvkthHWfqLgmiqx_9vZIUqGbHXz_g2spjZbgaqJ_Ch/s200/AnUnearthlyChild6.jpg" border="0" /></a>The BBC already had an established reputation for innovative and popular sci-fi drama, first in the 1950s with the ‘Quatermass’ trilogy (the three serials were broadcast live) and then in 1961 with ‘A for Andromeda’, which starred Julie Christie in one of her earliest roles. Tragically, only one of the seven episodes has survived. Much like these earlier productions, the episode ‘An Unearthly Child’, whether the pilot or the broadcast version, remains a significant moment in the history of British television and film science-fiction.<br /><br />The following three episodes that make up the first story are not of as much interest and seen through our eyes now are borderline offensive, with their depiction of unintelligent “savages”, and entirely historically unauthentic and unrealistic. However, they do need to be considered within the context of the time in which they were made. What is interesting is that it is the character Ian Chesterton who is most proactive in getting them out of the predicament they find themselves in, while the Doctor often sulks and behaves in an almost childish manner, his pride easily hurt. He is a long way removed from the humanitarian Doctor of later years.<br /><br />The Foreman scrap yard visited by Barbara and Ian in the opening episode, where they first encounter the Doctor and enter the TARDIS, is seen again in two subsequent stories much later on – ‘Attack of the Cybermen’ in 1985 and ‘Remembrance of the Daleks’ in 1989.<br /><br />William Hartnell, the first Doctor, was an experienced theatre and film actor whose career dated back to the 1920s. He was 55 years old when he assumed the role, but he looked older. He was, by some accounts, not always easy to work with during his time on Doctor Who and ill health meant he had problems memorising his lines. He played the role in the first three seasons and the first two stories of season four. His final episode was broadcast on 29 October 1966. He returned briefly to appear in ‘The Three Doctors’ in December 1972 through into January 1973, although his appearance was limited by health problems. He died in 1975 at the age of 67.<br /><br />Derek Newark, who appears in episodes two to four of this initial story, appeared in Doctor Who again in 1970 at the time of the third Doctor in a story called ‘Inferno’. It was primarily directed by Douglas Camfield, who was assistant director to Waris Hussein on ‘An Unearthly Child’ and directed some of the second unit film inserts.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 102, 0);font-size:78%;" >Review posted 26 April 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">...</span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-156944856407555336.post-5793232769485162262010-04-20T16:34:00.018+01:002010-04-20T17:05:25.260+01:00Star Trek (2009 film)<span style="font-family:georgia;color:#333333;"><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span><br /><br />Rating 3¼<br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#333399;">Directed by J J Abrams<br /><br />Written by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, based on characters created by Gene Roddenberry </span></span><span style="color:#333399;"><br /><br />Starring Chris Pine <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>James T Kirk</em>)</span>, Zachary Quinto <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Spock</em>)</span>, Karl Urban <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy</em>)</span>, Zoe Saldana <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Nyota Uhura</em>)</span>, John Cho <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Hikaru Sulu</em>)</span>, Anton Yelchin <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Pavel Chekov</em>)</span>, Simon Pegg <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Montgomery ‘Scotty’ Scott</em>)</span>, Eric Bana <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Captain Nero</em>)</span>, Chris Greenwood <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Christopher Pike</em>)</span>, Ben Cross <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Sarek</em>)</span>, Wynona Ryder <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Amanda Grayson</em>)</span>, Chris Hemsworth <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>George Samuel Kirk</em>)</span> and Leonard Nimoy <span style="font-size:85%;">(<em>Spock</em>)</span><br /></span><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHT8mTQUHXmHp9tYZEejLr96qBAVPtBSh__PxVqiWhiFY0uNZFRX93LHPXst7-HW34FaBJitIGI_I8smLgUWO9imj6UoxS7tMZJPq-31QQ9qG38fDDLtXSwsB9pa1k_c6lvqzrBx0V-Mvb/s1600/StarTrek4.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 84px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5462244956368960674" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHT8mTQUHXmHp9tYZEejLr96qBAVPtBSh__PxVqiWhiFY0uNZFRX93LHPXst7-HW34FaBJitIGI_I8smLgUWO9imj6UoxS7tMZJPq-31QQ9qG38fDDLtXSwsB9pa1k_c6lvqzrBx0V-Mvb/s200/StarTrek4.jpg" /></a>When Starfleet receives a distress signal from the planet Vulcan, cadets are mobilised for active service on awaiting starships. Commander Spock is assigned to the starship USS Enterprise, which is captained by Christopher Pike. A junior Starfleet physician, Dr Leonard ‘Bones’ McCoy, smuggles aboard his friend James T Kirk, a rebellious cadet who has been suspended from active duty following a charge brought against him by Spook. As the Enterprise travels at warp speed towards the stricken planet, Kirk realises that something is seriously wrong and it is somehow connected to the death of his father many years earlier.<br /><br /><span style="color:#c0c0c0;">...</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:georgia;color:#333333;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyfmlFu_RxeX0rht-stNwKzn0251eLEIk0xg2YgHzu4hiLVrdunCL5wlI-moMQld75gZoPOEXQPcYSFp2HWXBJ5uXTVbOkX3ao_5hUpLTQQ5AAtw_eIg3HPflttqQfb4L-p2OCv-Excbi_/s1600/StarTrek1.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 84px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5462245112641681154" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyfmlFu_RxeX0rht-stNwKzn0251eLEIk0xg2YgHzu4hiLVrdunCL5wlI-moMQld75gZoPOEXQPcYSFp2HWXBJ5uXTVbOkX3ao_5hUpLTQQ5AAtw_eIg3HPflttqQfb4L-p2OCv-Excbi_/s200/StarTrek1.jpg" /></a>Development on ‘Star Trek’ began in early 2005. The last Star Trek film, ‘Nemesis’, had been released in December 2002 to generally unenthusiastic reviews and grossed a little over $67 million at the box office against a production budget of $60 million. The last (to date) television series, ‘Star Trek: Enterprise’, ran for four seasons, but suffered from sharply declining audience figures before coming to an end in May 2005. ‘Star Trek’ was intended to “re-boot” the franchise, going right back to the beginning to tell the story of how the original characters first met and became the crew of the starship USS Enterprise.<br /><br />The “re-boot” was placed in the hands of ‘Lost’ co-creators and producers J J Abrams (who directed the film) and Damon Lindelof. The screenplay was written by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, who, alongside Abrams, are the co-creators of the television series ‘Fringe’. The film utilised extensive state of the art special effects and had a production budget of $150 million. It grossed a little over $385 million at the box office. Its domestic gross a little under £258 million placed it at No.7 in the yearly list for 2009.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh92Ta44YWZv599Pm2kHHXtRUQVgwPN4bq3tZfwGugeHYPpEllJ6Bzi0WR36JYtMy6RPb3aQTy1HCRedhaz41DuMBIwBNeuS5_590QmbLlkS5SwzBQR7dwKF3k-8kXbrc2xTZx4LuCE_fxw/s1600/StarTrek2.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 85px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5462245364011744082" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh92Ta44YWZv599Pm2kHHXtRUQVgwPN4bq3tZfwGugeHYPpEllJ6Bzi0WR36JYtMy6RPb3aQTy1HCRedhaz41DuMBIwBNeuS5_590QmbLlkS5SwzBQR7dwKF3k-8kXbrc2xTZx4LuCE_fxw/s200/StarTrek2.jpg" /></a>I am not a devoted fan of Star Trek. I watched the original iconic late-1960s television series as a child and teenager and loved it. There was a time when I watched ‘Next Generation’ regularly, but that is many years ago and I am perhaps not as keen on it in retrospective. I can take or leave ‘Deep Space Nine’; I don’t mind watching the occasional episode, but it is not something I would wish to watch regularly. I didn’t like ‘Voyager’ very much and missed out on ‘Enterprise’ altogether. I have seen most, but not necessarily all of the various feature films and oddly the one that probably stands out most for me is ‘Nemesis’, which was not universally well received.<br /><br />There are all manner of ways in which ‘Star Trek’ could have been a monumental disaster, but it proved to be anything but; not only performing well (if not spectacularly) at the box office, but also garnering good reviews from critics. 279 reviews collected at Rotten Tomatoes result in a 94% fresh rating. I don’t know what reaction was like amongst “Trekkers” (or “Trekkies”), but while the nature of fandom dictates that there was probably plenty of criticism, I am not aware of any widespread backlash against the film.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimoh81fUwWCnonH6k_qWe4r8KLaGQyekLeZakPv9a9fFJrQgzd18J3itjsCHNujdWW428_r6LLZyXurELf9Gksh9n8JZQtSdlsXzNI2XJEzDWe8TEGZyI6KE1Tk_-J0UXztun56IXhLkpW/s1600/StarTrek3.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 85px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5462245553429974530" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimoh81fUwWCnonH6k_qWe4r8KLaGQyekLeZakPv9a9fFJrQgzd18J3itjsCHNujdWW428_r6LLZyXurELf9Gksh9n8JZQtSdlsXzNI2XJEzDWe8TEGZyI6KE1Tk_-J0UXztun56IXhLkpW/s200/StarTrek3.jpg" /></a>It’s not perfect. The special effects are extremely impressive, but an over-abundance of effects and constant in-your-face frenetic action sequences are not to all tastes. It can become exhausting and the depiction of Kirk as almost super-human, apparently able to withstand any amount of punishment, does wear out its welcome after a while. The film tumbles into extreme schmaltz on several occasions, but this is actually quite affecting, more so than nauseating, which it so easily could have been. I wasn’t sure what to make of the relationship of Spock and Uhura. I don’t know where that came from, but I guess I must have forgotten something from the original television series.<br /><br />What most struck me was the near-perfect casting of the main characters, with one notable exception. Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto, in particular, give performances that, while they are not impersonations, are scarily accurate. Pine, without attempting to duplicate William Shatner’s inimitable acting style, is sensational, although ultimately it is perhaps Quinto who steals the film. Each actor, it seems, was free to take elements from the performances of the original actors and incorporate these into their own interpretation of the role. It works superbly well. The one exception, I thought, was Simon Pegg as Scotty, which is a pity because I like Simon Pegg a lot.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg2UM6UKDt65EzMeU048CREOtYCIJmaP0Gi_jaNFuijPkoT5t-05mBb69UZgeYKhajPX7gG-Ap5VB2zKzblx78Lyhj88Qtz2uRtMboJMJl2QQS4vn5d9dizXRLy9ZThycMqizk48s-cCuW/s1600/StarTrek5.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 200px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 85px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5462245818972208850" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg2UM6UKDt65EzMeU048CREOtYCIJmaP0Gi_jaNFuijPkoT5t-05mBb69UZgeYKhajPX7gG-Ap5VB2zKzblx78Lyhj88Qtz2uRtMboJMJl2QQS4vn5d9dizXRLy9ZThycMqizk48s-cCuW/s200/StarTrek5.jpg" /></a>I must admit I did struggle with the film during the first twenty or thirty minutes. It was slipping into boredom for me and the two-dimensional portrayal of Kirk as a troubled and rebellious child/teenager/young man almost had me reaching for the off button. However, things improved as soon as they were on the Enterprise. Leonard Nimoy’s appearance as Spock is beautifully incorporated into the story, although as the film closes and we hear those famous words, “Space... the Final Frontier,” I just think they should have been spoken by William Shatner, not Nimoy.<br /><br />I wasn’t sure what to expect and I was very pleasantly surprised.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:78%;color:#cc6600;">Review posted 20 April 2010</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="color:#ffffff;">...</span></span>alienlaneshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11529693317658875964noreply@blogger.com0