DVD Roundup (Tim)

A while back, Tim leant me more DVD's than I can shake a stick at, and since I hadn't seen any of them before, I figured that I'd talk about them here. Because apparently I have nothing more to say in life than how many movies I watch?

CARNIVALE (season 1)
Ooooh, it took a long time to watch through this show. Beautifully made, jawdroppingly sumptuous to look at, it didn't half drag through barely imagined mysticsm about the death of magic in the American Dust Bowl of the 1930's.

CARNIVALE (season 2)
Cut short just when they were trying to get somewhere, this season flowed better than the first. True to form, the background characters were actually far more fun than the leads, although hats off to Clancy Brown for keeping a striaght face.

THE FALL
While this film is intensely beautiful to look at, I still can't see why it's worth watching, really. The story isn't up to much, but there are a few amusing moments.

HUMAN TRAFFIC
While supposedly not serious at all, I feel that this jaded view at the 90's actually took itself far too seriously, going full circle as it were. Not convinced by its merits.

THE FISHER KING
I'm not a Terry Gilliam fan, I find his work too off the wall for me, but this particular film seemed to acknowledge that and be less whacked. Also, Jeff Bridges, so good times.

MAD MEN (season 1)
Yeah.... I can see why so many people love this show, but I found it particularly difficult to give a crap about all these cynical, unfaithful, constantly smoking arseholes. It's slick, sure, and Christina Hendricks looks particularly amazing while wearing that decade, but unless someone develops a soul in that foetid quagmire of social depravity, I'll pass.

I think he actually lent me more than what I've listed there, but it was a short while back and I can't really recall... never mind, on with the film review.


IRON SKY

Now I talked about this film the other week, about how it was made by fan money and so on. Basically, about 10% of the funding was fan contributions, who clubbed together to make a trailer. This trailer was then shipped around film festivals until about twenty or so small film companies clubbed together to produce the movie. And produce it they did.

In 2018, to aid her failing publicity, the President of the United States (not named as such, but a blatant parody of Sarah Palin), sends a black model to the moon as a stunt. While up there, they're also searching for Helium-3, an element used in fusion that's had a few sci-fi outings in the past. But you know what they did find while up there?

MOON NAZIS.

Oh yes, for back in 1945, seeing defeat, a contingent of Nazis fled the Earth and set up camp on the Moon, building a garishly huge Swastika fortress and a war machine called The Gotterdammerung. There should be some umlauts on that. Anyway, the model dude, Jack Washington, is captured and sent back to Earth in order to aid his captors in harvesting incredible computer power. In the form of Apple devices. Oh yes, an iphone can end the world. The sense of satisfaction is overwhelming.

This movie is far from perfect, the story is farcical and over the top, the acting is questionable at times and there's a character played by Peta Sergeant that I'd happily murder, but any film that can include the American's first deep space exploration vehicle; The USS George W Bush, gets my frickin' vote. With all the space combat and steampunk Nazi tech and ridiculous plot turns, this is a very silly, but very awesome film.

Also, we left before the end of the credits, but apparnetly do stay for that, as we missed something. Yes, this is a recommendation, it's just hilarious.

Next review: Lip Service
(another BBC tv series)