Film Review: The Jacket

Sometimes you'll see a movie that makes you scratch your head and wonder what the hell's going on (in the same way the lead actor is in the picture!). Before I went to see this film, I had read about it, and got the sense that this would be one of them. I was thus pleasantly surprised and pleased by the Jacket, directed by the British filmmaker John Maybury.

It is about a man (Adrien Brody) who serves as a soldier in the Gulf, and following a headshot wound, 'dies' momentarily on the battlefield. Sent home to recuperate, he gets involved in a bizarre set of incidents, about which he remembers little, and subsequently gets accused of murder. He is sent to a mental hospital where his unorthodox treatment involves being strapped into a straight-jacket and placed into a morgue drawer under the influence of some heavy hallucinogens.

It is inside the drawer that the director gets to show off his style - here we have some disturbing cutting and random noises that add to the disjointed nature of his confined hell. Another strange thing happens; he starts getting visibility of the things that happened to him, and also a view of the future that helps him to piece together the years between his imprisonment and the future.

The experiences he has in the future are intriguing and guide him to the truth of what happens to him. In this respect, the film has a thriller feel about it; some sleuthing amidst all the disjointedness. In the future, he also has a relationship with Jackie (Keira Knightly), a girl he met years before, and she helps him unravel all the timelines. Their inevitable sex scene didn't work particularly well - the nudity was unnecessary, and it all felt a bit clumsy and awkward. Despite the obvious lack of chemistry between them, there are bigger questions about why Jackie would bother helping him in the first place.

That aside, the performances are strong throughout. Adrien Brody is excellent as the patient; he convincingly carries the driven haunted look of a man who discovers his fate in installments. His subtle quirkiness works best in the hospital, where he twitches and sweats his way through all the medication and the drawer episodes. His doctor, played by Kris Kristofferson, is creepily understated, and deserves merit for appearing misguided rather than unhinged (as we'd prefer to believe).

If you can avoid picking holes in the plot, or focussing too much on fathoming it out, the spectacle is a very enjoyable one. It is classily underwritten by a very atmospheric Brian Eno score. As a psychological thriller, it is different to most others, and it has a level of weirdness that keeps your attention throughout. 7.5/10

Drama Review: equaldoubt - Suffocation

Yesterday I went to see Suffocation at South Hill Park, as part of a drama festival called Fresh, largely to promote emerging talent in both drama and dance.

Suffocation itself was hosted in the Studio Theatre, which was appropriately compact for a performance thus named. The audience itself made up the fourth wall around the action, and as such couldn't have felt more involved in the piece. Equaldoubt's own description is:

"To cause discomfort to by or as if by cutting off the supply of fresh air."

Two people, who fall in love, decide to share life with each other, to live together, slowly start to lose each other, but don't have to face it - until one day... Two people, two cultures, two languages, two paths, under one roof... Suffocation.

I thoroughly enjoyed this performance, but would not want to lessen the impact by describing what happens; it really is best experienced live; the delivery is powerful, physical, challenging and totally mesmerising. Equaldoubt (made up of Sean Palmer and Agnieska Blonska) are ones to watch out for: you can catch them next at the Chapter Arts Centre in Cardiff on the following days:

28th Jun, 2005 @8pm
29th Jun, 2005 @8pm
30th Jun, 2005 @8pm

Film Review: Kingdom of Heaven

Kingdom of Heaven is the new movie directed by Ridley Scott, and starring Orlando Bloom. He plays Balian, a blacksmith during the 12th Century in England. At those times the Christian forces travelled as part of the crusades to defend Jerusalem from the Muslim invaders. In so doing, Balian undergoes the journey, proving to be both physical and spiritual for him, and in so doing challenges all he understands to be true.

At the present, there is a sensitivity both in society and the media about the Muslim faith. The film, perhaps surprisingly, takes an even-handed view of both the Christians and the Muslims, highlighting the good and bad shown on both sides. In fact the characters in the film who are the most weak are either those who use their religion to exercise their own ends, or those who are the most religious: priests throughout are fickle and two-faced, and the cowardly bishop at the end is prepared to deny his religion to save himself ("convert to Islam, repent later").

On the Muslim side, the leader Saladin is excellently played by Ghassan Massoud - he comes over as wise, and honourable; not looking to fight for the sake of it; instead prepared to use diplomacy and trust to preserve the rights of his people. Of course both sides have their war-mongers, and it is the king of Jerusalem, played with sensitivity and style by Edward Norton, who has to restrain the Christian military zealots.

The man who convinces Balian to join the Crusades is his father (Liam Neeson). He was typically excellent, in a role where he gets to exhibit an understated quiet strength (as he does in Kings of New York). He leads Balian to Jerusalem, and the journey is interesting from a visual viewpoint: the colours are very muted on the journey there, then the warm oranges of Israel are very much in abundance. His eventual triumphal return home treats us to England's lush and green landscape, indicating a journey's end, a place of comfort and rest.

The battle for religious discovery involves Balian visiting key landmarks, such as the place of Christ's crucifixion, in order to clarify his own beliefs. He learns that one's goodness is judged by what happens in your heart, by the way you behave, and not who your God is. He bears this out later, when he cites his reasons for defending Jerusalem against the Muslim hordes: it is important that whoever wants to pray within the walls of Jerusalem should be free to do so, not matter what their divine preference. In this, Bloom is convincing. As a man struggling to redeem himself for his earlier misdeeds, he handles 'perplexed' quite well, as well as his gradual awakening, and his increasing prominence in the eyes of the king. He's certainly not without merit, it's the warrior bravado I question. Russell Crowe, he's not.

The inevitable final battle scenes are where he just doesn't quite cut it. His beard in the movie helps him not to look like an adolescent, but I thought his tinny little voice trying to inspire an army of citizens at the end just didn't really wash. He has a romantic dalliance with Sybilla the future queen of Jerusalem, but this part of the film is badly misjudged. She is neither a good actress, nor particularly sultry, and the bond between them is all a bit awkward, and a bit of an irritating addition. The film doesn't explore their relationship enough, and Orlando, instead of behaving heroically silent (as indeed Liam Neeson would have done), just behaves a bit cold with her, and the script doesn't help either of them in this regard.

The direction though is classic Ridley Scott - few can shoot action like he does. The final battle scenes are all inimitable, and he puts his mark on them in the same way as he does in Gladiator and Black Hawk Down - they feel sufficiently claustrophobic and gory as to make believe you are in the midst of them. The locations throughout are stunning - you really sense the hot climate, boiling over with religious zeal, and the costumes are spot on for both the Crusaders and Saladin's army.

All in all, worth watching. Despite a bit of a wimp as a hero character, a one-dimensional love-affair, and a script that stunts character development for all the main protagonists, the religious moments are handled in a balanced way, there's some cracking direction, and a large amount of swashbuckling action to ensure a largely satisfied audience. 6.5/10

Chinese IQ game

This one's a teaser, alright. We've all seen the river crossing puzzle, with the fox, the chicken and the grain, and you have to get them across the river. well, this is a variant, and is an IQ test applied as a prerequisite to working in China.

The game can be found here, but because it's in Chinese, the rules are shown here:

• Only 2 persons on the raft at a time
• The father can not stay with any of the daughters without their mother's presence
• The mother can not stay with any of the sons without their father's presence
• The thief (striped shirt) can not stay with any family member if the Policeman is not there
• Only the Father, the Mother and the Policeman know how to operate the raft
• To start click on the big blue circle on the right.
• To move the people click on them.
• To move the raft click on the pole on the opposite side of the river.

(thanks to Karen)

Guess the Google

This is a great idea. At this site, the author has created a flash application.

This is similar to Google Montage, in that for a search keyword, Google assembles a set of images related to that search string. However, what makes this one different is that you are given the images, similar to the picture left, and you have to guess the Google search word.

It is quite challenging, and very addictive. Best score so far 253. Post yours in the comments.

Graph Paper

Ok, so I accept this one is of limited appeal, but it's a set of free downloadable pdfs in the form of graph paper. you can get most types, metric, imperial, in grey, blue, black or red, or there's the old-fashioned one that I remember from school (pictured).

Omnipelagos

This is a great idea. Using the Wikepedia database, the clever guys at Omnipelagos have devised an engine that looks for the chains of relationships between things.

"Each chain is displayed along with a short text fragment which provides context. It can be used for fact-finding, brainstorming, or just plain fun."

Of course, when you try it, you find that you will end up trying out quite a few more links, and suddenly all your time has gone. One might think that in light of recent falsehoods told over the Iraq war, that Tony Blair and Judas Iscariot may have an obvious link. However, the link I like ties Judas to Bertrand Russell, to the Fabian Society, then onto Tony Blair.

Of course, time-consuming relationship engines aren't new. There is of course, the legendary Oracle of Bacon at Virginia University. This permits you to look for the links between movie stars and Kevin himself. The number of links in the chain is presented as a "Bacon Number". It is actually incredibly difficult to find a high Bacon Number, on account of the fact thet Kevin Bacon has appeared in loads of movies, with loads of different people. (But of course, it's fun trying)

If you want to open up the search a little, there's always Star Links, which allows you to link any star to another, whether through movies or TV.

Paper Starships

I've featured quite a few links on here before to cool things you can do with paper folding. This site has a whole load of starship templates to print and fold. The results are pretty impressive, as you can see from the photo. The site says:

"This site was created to host all good paper starship models on one place. Paper starships are foldable models of sci-fi starships. You can download them, print them, cut them out, and assemble them. When you finish a paper model, you'll get a full 3 dimensional physical model of the selected starship"

(via Kuklas).

Cave Flyer

Here's a cool game, that involves steering a craft around some caves, collecting the red dots (see picture), and amassing points - nothing too clever, but simple to play, if not simple to master.

(Via Ursi's).

Bishop's Tipple

How about this for a game of chess? Each of the pieces is a different shaped shot glass, which you can fill with your favourite poison. Each time a piece is taken, the owner has to take a shot! The makers suggest it has it's own natural handicapping system:

"Perfectly combining two of the world’s oldest and greatest pastimes, shot glass chess is also a game that can be played by two people of vastly differing skill levels, thanks to an 'ability leveller' inherent in every match. Imagine forcing all 11 members of an opposing football team to wolf down a meat and potato pie every time they win a corner!"

(Via Kuklas).

I wanna be elected!

With less than a week till the UK General Election, are you (as I am) anxious not to waste your vote? At the moment, all the parties are in the rounds of baby-kissing, and visiting industry around the country (better late than never, eh?), and dry-cleaning their suits daily for maximum appeal.

Tony Blair's smile seems to have broadened, Charles Kennedy has had a proper army short-back-and-sides, and Michael Howard is now sporting new glasses. But what about the policies? Well, in the UK, we laugh at the US, because even though Bush has an awful record on the economy, he managed to divert the whole issue by talking about the (largely illegal) 'war on terror', and if he could whoop up enough fear in the southern states, they would surely elect him.

Well, now it's happening here. Michael Howard isn't focussing on waiting lists in hospitals, he's largely jumping on the back of MRSA, and also immigration. Not that these issues aren't unimportant, but they're largely what I call 'pub issues', you know, subjects that the common man can have a rant about, because you don't need too much understanding of what goes on in Westminster to discuss them. If ever there was a section of society that can lead the armchair revolution, it's the Middle England that reads the Daily Fascist (Mail) and the Daily Apathy (Express).

Of course, their vote carries every bit as much weight as yours, so use it wisely. To help out, I found this fantastic page on the BBC to assist all those (myself included) that need a broader overview of the key policies (i.e real national issues) that the major parties support.