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Kingdom Hearts (2002)
One Of The Best Video Games Ever Made
Long before Infinity War brought together all heroes of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the shared universe mania kicked off, Kingdom Hearts did pretty much the same for Disney. In a bizarre yet briljant move, Disney and Square Enix joined forces to create a game that combined the magic of Disney with the dark anime storytelling of Final Fantasy to create Kingdom Hearts. While many may raise an eyebrow at a game that features Goofy and Donald Duck going toe to toe with Cloud Strife and Squall Leonhart, the brilliance lies in the execution.
Kingdom Hearts is known for its dense, indecipherable story. While this is definitely true for later installments, the original game's plot is still fairly comprehensible. Sora, a young boy who is the perfect cross between a Disney and a Square anime character, loses his home world in an attack by dark beings known as the Heartless, and teams up with Donald Duck and Goofy to save various Disney worlds from said beasties, with the help of a band of Disney and Final Fantasy characters and a strange weapon called the Keyblade (which literally looks what it sounds like). Looking for Sora's friends and King Mickey Mouse respectively (the latter of whom, despite being Disney's best-known player, is mostly an unseen and enigmatic presence over the course of the story), Sora, Donald and Goofy go up against a conspiracy of Disney villains led by Sleeping Beauty's Maleficent, who have kidnapped seven Princesses of Hearts (most of which are actual Disney Princesses) that apparently have the power to open the door to the heart of all worlds.
KH's gameplay is fairly straightforward hack and slash, but includes a lot of RPG elements (customizeable weapons, items, equipment and magic spells) and, depending on the boss, some strategy elements. Although most battles do come down to mashing X, there is still strategy required - the three-headed hell hound Cereberus (from Disney's Hercules), for instance, has various attacks which all require a different response. One attack is best avoided by staying behind him, another by jumping on his back, and yet another by simply avoiding those all-consuming jaws. Whereas Sephiroth has a devastating attack that will surely kill you unless you use a very well-timed item. Still, the quick pace of the fights and the different powers and weaknesses of the many Heartless and Disney villains you encounter make for a thrilling spectacle. The boss battles especially - when you're fighting Jafar, Hades or Ursula, they really live up to the menace they are portrayed as in their source movies. The one drawback gameplay-wise is the much maligned Gummi Ship sections, which are required to reach each world. How the hell does a game with gorgeously rendered Disney worlds and action-packed battles also include on-rails space battles that look like rubber StarFox missions where you shoot at random polygonal objects? It's amazing that, even after ten games, Nomura still hasn't realized people actually really hate these segments. Fortunately, you eventually acquire a warp that allows you to jump to places you've been before. Frankly, I've never flown a Gummi Ship mission other than those required for the story. Apparently there's a ship editor feature, but I've never bothered to even look at it.
Chances are you'll enjoy watching Kingdom Hearts as much as playing it. There's hours of voiced cutscenes, and even after 16 years the graphics - since gorgeously re-rendered in HD for the ReMixes - still hold up, perfectly emulating the look and feel of every Disney movie covered in the game. No small feat, considering how good Disney's animators are. Even the stop-motion Tim Burton film The Nightmare Before Christmas (not released under the Walt Disney banner, but owned by Touchstone which is a sudsidiary of Disney) is included, with graphics that are appropriately darker and more realistic in appearance, to accomodate the stop-motion look of the film. Also, Disney and Square went out of their way to find the original voice actors for all the Disney characters in the game. In addition to Donald, Goofy, Mickey and more, characters such as Hades, Jafar, Ursula, Tarzan and Jack Skellington are voiced by the same actors as the original film. When the original character is not used, the official voice actor from the DTV sequels or adjacent TV series is used, as is the case for Genie, Philoctetes and others. Two actors deserve special mention: Kathryn Beaumont, who reprised her roles as Alice from Alice in Wonderland and Wendy from Peter Pan half a century after the original films premiered (you can sorta tell it's an old lady pretending to be a young girl, but who cares), and Corey Burton, the verbal chameleon who effortlessly mimics the original voice actors of Captain Hook, Flotsam & Jetsam, the White Rabbit and more, and who would go on to do the same in future games for characters such as Shan-Yu and Commander Sark. Characters original to the game, or Final Fantasy characters that lacked voices in their original games, are played by A-listers such as Hayden Panettiere, Mandy Moore and David Boreanaz (you know, Angel from Buffy). Special mention goes to Billy Zane, who plays the evil Ansem and, despite having only a dozen lines or so, steals the show whenever he pops up. Hayley 'I see dead people' Joel Osment is perfect as Sora, the main playable protagonist who is a perfect stand-in for the audience as he traverses one Disney world after another with wide-eyed wonder.
One small gripe in the graphics - not all cutscenes use fully animated character models. While important scenes have full facial animation, others use in-game animations which is just the mouth and eyes opening and closing. In the latter case, the movements don't match up with the English dialogue (the game is originally from Japan).
Musically, Kingdom Hearts is another standout. While each world has a standard looped field and battle theme (which can be a bit generalistic, but pretty good nonetheless), the boss battle themes are truly epic, giving a sense of dread and urgency when you're fighting the enraged Clayton or the terrifying Dragon Maleficent (one of the hardest Disney bosses in the series). Also, various emotional themes made specifically for the cutscenes showcase the extent of composer Yoko Shimomura's talent, especially Kairi's poignant theme and the orchestral version of the theme song, Simple and Clean. Ah, Simple and Clean. While I've tried getting into J-pop singer Utada Hikaru's other work and found it boring (I'm more of a metal guy anyway), her Kingdom Hearts songs are among my absolute favorite musical pieces. To this day, after finishing the game dozens of times, the ending cinematic where the song kicks in still sends chills down my spine.
Although it is now part of a franchise with its own ever-extending lore, Kingdom Hearts still works on its own as well. While very different from any other Disney or Square game, it finds its own voice - quite a feat for a game relying mainly on characters not original to its story - and manages to emulate the magic of a Disney film all on its own, and allowing us to hop from one childhood favorite to the next. While many scenes echoe famous Disney moments (such as Jafar becoming a genie, Clayton going after the gorillas, the Crocodile chasing after Captain Hook), every Disney world still feels part of a bigger whole story-wise, and the game deftly balances a dozen worlds and over a hundred characters into a grand narrative on a scale that wasn't seen again until the Marvel Cinematic Universe kicked off six years later.
Alien: Covenant (2017)
Batman At The Beach
The history of the new Alien prequel series is a weird one. Prometheus, the first one, was originally conceived as a full-on Alien prequel, and later reworked to a semi-spinoff set before the 1979 original, with no actual Aliens in it. Alien: Covenant, on the other hand, was initially conceived as a sequel to Prometheus that would 'even further tangentialize from the Alien series', and focus on the Engineers. After all, Prometheus ends with Shaw and David traveling to the Engineer homeworld. However, fan demand prompted Ridley Scott to turn Prometheus 2 into a full-on Alien movie, the creature's first solo outing since 1997's Alien: Resurrection and its first cinematic appearance since 2007's Aliens vs Predator: Requiem.
The result is a mixed bag. First off, the film looks great. Prometheus's cinematography, a delightfully otherworldly mix of gorgeous and sinister, carries over well into this film. Again, Scott takes it slow, allowing for tension to build as the characters gradually uncover what has transpired on the new world that is the setting for this film (fan sites call it 'Planet 4', since it remains unnamed in the film). The SFX look marvelous, and the CGI Alien looks worlds apart from the shoddy computer-generated beasts in earlier films. Still, it remains a bit questionable to see the Alien in full view (and broad daylight, no less). The earlier films showed very little of the Aliens, which amped up the horror element - less is more, and the one thing scarier than seeing an Alien is not seeing one (but knowing it's there anyway). Honest Trailers aptly compared it to seeing 'Batman on the beach'. That being said, the film is once again chock-full of 80s style body horror, now aided by high end CGI that allows for even more grotesque things to happen (the baby 'Neomorph' looked a bit iffy though). While the film amps up the violence with stuff like creatures bursting from backs and monsters biting people's heads off, it never becomes as over-the-top as in, say, Resurrection.
Cast-wise, Scott made some weird choices in the film. For instance, a big name like James Franco basically has no more than a cameo, dying in the first scenes of the film (he appears more prominently in the 'Crossing' prologue released on YouTube to promote the film). Also, Noomi Rapace sadly doesn't return as Elizabeth Shaw. She was one of the sympathetic highlights of Prometheus, and is 'replaced' by Katherine Waterston in a decidedly blander role. Fortunately, we are treated to not one but two Michael Fassbenders - he returns as the creepy synthetic David, and also portrays his American-accented counterpart Walter. Some of the film's most interesting scenes feature Fassbender basically talking to himself in Data/Lore fashion. David is more straightforwardly villainous this time around, but Fassbender manages to keep the character ambiguous and unnerving.
One of my main gripes with the film is its decision to give us an Alien origin story of sorts. As it turns out, the Alien was created by David in a genetic experiment with the goal of recreating the various creatures spawned from the X-Files-ish black liquid from Prometheus. This goes against most commonly accepted lore, that the Aliens were either a naturally occurring species or a weapon created by the Engineers. To see them reduced to David's science experiment takes away some of the danger and majesty of the creature. While it's understandable that Scott would want to retcon the 2004 Alien vs Predator film, which shows Aliens being hunted by Predators on Earth thousands of years ago, Covenant's origin story also contradicts the first Alien film, which showed Alien eggs on a derelict spacecraft so old its pilot had fossilized (Covenant takes place in 2101, just twenty years before the original film). It's not much solace that fan sites such as Xenopedia have reasoned that the Covenant Alien is a different strain or a 'recreation' of the original creature, since the direction Scott wants to take the new trilogy in is clear.
All-in all, Alien: Covenant is a pretty good sci-fi/horror flick that is unfortunately brought down a bit by questionable decisions regarding the series lore. But if you're not bothered by that, it's definitely recommenable.
Prometheus (2012)
Cosmic Weirdness In The Alien Universe
Prometheus is something of a unique film. It is set in the Alien universe as a prequel to the 1979 original, but features no actual Aliens (that is, the famous Xenomorph fails to make an appearance, but there are plenty of Xenomorph-ish nasties to be found in here) and instead focuses on the famed 'Space Jockey' found inside the derelict spacecraft on LV-426. As it turns out, these 'Engineers', as they are called, made mankind in their image and seeded Earth with DNA that give rise to all life - an odd blend of panspermia and intelligent design that is made to sound more significant in dialogue than the film actually shows, as the story culminates in familiar Alien-esque running-from-scary-monsters-in-tight-spaceship-hallways.
For this weird experiment to work, it is fortunate that none other than Ridley Scott returned to the Alien universe for this one, as the first director to make more than one Alien(ish) movie. Arguably, the film is somewhat bogged down by its heavy-handed premise and philosophical pondering about the meaning of life, which apparently caused a Ctulhu film to be cancelled for the time being due to the similar plot and subject matter. Until the Engineers wake up, Prometheus lacks a clear antagonist. That isn't bad per se, as Scott's marvelous cinematography and the eye-popping SFX (a good blend of CGI and classic puppetry) succeed in creating an inherent sense of dread and mystery as the characters survey the barren, creepy planet of LV-223 (clearly meant to be a sister world to the original films' LV-426). Throughout the film, we see hints of an Alien - murals, critters with acid blood, egg-like vases - with no real payoff, which actually helps in mythologizing the Alien as some sort of universal avatar of death, so powerful that we're simply not yet worthy of seeing the real thing (again) at this prequel stage. The Alien is suggested but never seen, but we feel that it's out somewhere not too far from the proceedings of this film, like Thanos lurking in the background of half a dozen Marvel movies before he finally appears.
The main story itself is an (albeit slow-paced) roller coaster in sci-fi body horror that we haven't seen on this filmic scale since the 80s. People mysteriously fall ill, find alien worms in their eyes and are horribly transmutated into mindless killing machines. If this sounds a bit pulpy, Scott can be credited for making it more genuinely horrific than silly.
The cast do a good enough job, with Michael Fassbender standing head and shoulders above the rest - even outshining Noomi Rapace, whose character feels like a more innocent version of Ellen Ripley, before she became obsessed with eliminating the Alien menace. Fassbender threads the uncanny valley as the android David, an innately creepy, mysterious entity whose true purpose and allegiance remains clouded in darkness - he doesn't become a full-fledged villain until the next installment, Alien: Covenant. Guy Pearce, inexplicably covered in old man makeup due to scenes with a younger version of his character never making it into the final cut, retcons the AvP movies by appearing as the eponymous founder of the Weyland Corporation, in a role that seems like it could and should have been more than the dark side of John Hammond (you know, the guy from Jurassic Park). The rest of the cast are somewhat nondescript, and the film relies too heavily on characters doing unwise things (such as taking off their helmets on an alien planet) to further the plot.
Despite all this, I'm awarding the film a 9/10 for the sheer fun of it. There've been few genre films like this in recent years, especially not on this scale. While it's thankful that big sci-fi has made a return in the last decade, most of it has been glossy PG-13 feel-good fare like Star Trek and Avatar, or run-of-the-mill (if not still good and enjoyable) action fare like Battle: Los Angeles, Edge of Tomorrow and Oblivion. Prometheus deserves to ber lauded for being something different, and for harking back to the days of cosmic weirdness and unnerving body horror in sci-fi.
Predators (2010)
Welcome Back
If there is one good thing that came out of the controversial Alien vs Predator movies, it's renewed interest both titular creatures. Whereas Alien has dabbed in odd semi-prequels, the Predator's second wind quickly resulted in a full-on new installment, two decades after its last solo outing.
Predators, its pluralized title a wink at the second film of the Alien series the Predator is now intractably connected with, is a fresh start in many ways. None of the principals from the previous two films return, and the events of the moody 1987 original are only mentioned in passing (thank goodness it isn't a reboot - I'm a continuity freak and love long-running timelines). An assorted bunch of mercenaries, gang members and soldiers finds itself abducted by aliens and brought to a surprisingly Earth-like alien planet that acts as a game preserve. There, they quickly find themselves hunted by the Predators we all know and love. Since each Predator installment has an all-new cast, we know more about the creatures than the protagonists do, and observe them discovering things we already know in the first act.
This isn't to say Predators has nothing new to offer. First off, these Predators use alien bloodhounds to corral their prey, a nice addition to the Predator creature being an analogy of a big game hunter. Also, we're on an alien planet, so we get to see some of their other quarry - not Xenomorphs, but mysterious eyeless creatures whose design will be instantly recognized by die-hard Predator nerds as the rejected design from the original film. A nice easter egg, indeed.
Finally, there is an addition where the film went a little off the reservation in my opinion: the 'Predators hunting Predators'. While this is a nice nod to the 'blood feuds' of the expanded universe comics, the Predators fighting amongst themselves makes them seem less threatening to the protagonists. Especially when they decide to aid one of the two Predator factions in a move that will surely bring back memories of the much-maligned 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' from the first AVP. The fact that the main Predator antagonists, so-called 'Super Predators', look wholly over the top once their face masks are removed, doesn't help this. It's a small consolation that the Predator helped by the humans is a fantastic recreation of the original 1987 design, whose presence tells us that the film isn't completely revamping the titular creature's look but simply introducing different Predator races. Still, it feels as something of an insult that the 'classic Predator' is reduced to being the prey of bigger, badder Predators. Is this the same creature that gave Arnold such a hard time?
While characterization has never been the series' strength, we are treated to a varied bunch of characters this time around, among them a Mexican cartel member, a Russian Spetsnaz fighter and a Yakuza member. Given the Predators' penchant for sport, it's no surprise why they cherry picked some of the nastiest, most brutal inhabitants of Earth and threw them all together into a genocidal version of the Expendables. The plural 'Predators' refers as much to the human cast as their alien hunters. Everyone is given their own little backstory, which fairly easily sets them apart from their wildly different compadres. Adrien Brody, not the most logical actor to follow after Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny Glover, surprises as a merciless mercenary with the meanest growl since Clint Eastwood told those gang members to get off his lawn. Walton Goggins plays a deliciously creepy death row inmate, Alice Braga shines as a toughened-up version of the Anna character from the original and Danny Trejo is, well, Danny Trejo. There's also a fun role for Laurence Fishburne as an Air Force soldier who's been trapped on the planet for years, has learned to hide from the Predators using their own technology and has become a little, well, 'weird'.
While not terribly original - another jungle, another bunch of souped-up humans being picked off one by one - Predators feels very sure of itself and, despite going off the rails with some unneeded Predator-on-Predator violence, seems to understand what made the original tick. It shamelessly recycles much of Alan Silvestri's score (which is just fine by me) and doesn't lose itself in CGI - yes, there's CGI in the film (the hounds, some Predator weaponry), but much of the Predator action features old-fashioned men in suits. We are even treated to the return of Long Tall Sally. All in all, it's a welcome return for one of cinema's most iconic monsters.
AVPR: Aliens vs Predator - Requiem (2007)
Garbage
While I don't agree with detractors of the first AVP movie from 2004, this one definitely deserves all the flak it gets. In just over 90 minutes, the Strause brothers manage to degrade some of cinema's most iconic sci-fi monsters to cheap fodder from a Syfy original film. Where did it all go wrong?
First off, the Strauses have a background that is chiefy in SFX work, having worked on various high profile blockbusters such as Terminator 3, The Day After Tomorrow and Titanic. And it shows - SFX-wise, AVP:R, like its predecessor, looks about thrice as expensive a it actually cost. The CGI and animatronics are top notch, the Predators look much more manacing than in the first AVP and we are even treated to a glimpse of their home planet. But while Alien and Predator definitely had good SFX, their strength was in their tense atmosphere, moody cinematography and the relatable characters. This made you really feel the terror of being hunted by a hostile extraterrestrial lifeform. In interviews, and on the Alien Experience forum that I was a member of at the time, the Strauses seemed to get this. For instance, they talked of the brother dynamic between Dallas and Ricky Howard, and Kelly O'Brien's experiences as a soldier in Iraq being important in shaping their character over the course of the film. Molly, Kelly's daughter, was an obvious attempt to emulate the Ripley/Newt dynamic from Aliens. However, all these promising words never made it into the actual product. The Strauses seem to think that talking in depth about their characters in interviews is the same as having well rounded characters in their film. But when nothing of this is actually seen or heard in the film, it becomes empty rhetoric. We see none of the brother dynamic between Dallas and Ricky, who are just stilted one-note characters distinguished only by their names and looks. Kelly and Molly are empty clones of Ripley and Newt, with none of their emotional resonance or determination. Hell, Kelly isn't even a badass like Ripley was in Aliens - you'd think that would have been the easiest to copy. The other character are equally one dimensional - the well-meaning sheriff, the weasel ('screw the woman and children first shit!'), the high school bully (who gets killed, of course).
Then there are the creatures themselves. If the first AVP seemed biased towards the Aliens, with one Alien killing two of the three lead Predators within the space of several minutes, AVP:R goes to the opposite extreme: its lead Predator is the ultimate badass, mowing through hordes of Aliens like they're mere annoyances. Granted, Ripley dispatched quite some Aliens in the 1986 sequel, but there they still felt intimidating. Here, they're just B-grade screechy movie monsters. The human deaths are over-the-top and unimaginitive - it's as if the Strauses saw the criticism of AVP's PG-13 rating as that film's chief mistake, and set out to make AVP:R the polar opposite. As a result, AVP:R turns the Aliens and Predators into Freddy and Jason, brutally killing humans in cheesy slasher flick fashion.
While the Predators definitely look great, the Aliens suffer by comparison. This is mainly due to the introduction of the Predalien. While the Alien/Predator hybrid (or rather, an Alien with Predator characteristics due to having a Predator host) is a staple of AVP lore and should definitely be included in any film adaptation, AVP:R's Predalien just looks silly with its overdone pecs (seriously, pecs on an Alien? What is this, a cartoon?) and oddly draped dreadlocks.
Also, AVP:R tries to 'expand' the Alien mythos by introducing yet another form of reproduction, after the classic life cycle, the 'eggmorphing' from the Alien Director's Cut and the live birth from Alien: Resurrection - the Predalien, supposedly a young Queen, vomits embryos into victims' throats as it cannot yet lay eggs, and these then burst from the victim's belly. Yes, you read this correctly. If the Facehugger is meant to symbolize oral rape, I don't want to know what the Strauses were thinking of when designing this. Anyway, this 'let's make it as disgusting as possible' mentality is clearly played only for shock value and ends up turning the Alien's life cycle into a parody of itself.
The film tops it off with the introduction of the Yutani Corporation, the other half of Alien's Weyland-Yutani after the first AVP gave us Weyland Industries, vaguely linked to Predator 2's 'OWLF' group. While this is interesying, it goes nowhere, vaguely hinting at a sequel that never materialized, and just comes off as C-grade 'there's a bigger ploy' evil company diatribe that we've all seen before a thousand times.
In sum, AVP:R is a definite low point for both franchises, which were thankfully elevated by Predators, Prometheus and Alien: Covenant in recent years. The Strauses have displayed a fundamental lack of knowledge and skill in crafting a good Alien/Predator film, or a good film in general, and show little skill in filmmaking beyond SFX work. Besides the nonexistent pace, one-dimensional characters, lack of any kind of plot beats (once the action starts, it's basically a one-way street to the conclusion - running from warring extraterrestrials, not much else) and B-grade treatment of its titular monsters, the film is also poorly lit, making much of the action hard to see. All it deserves credits for is the SFX work and the design of the Predator. The Strauses seem to have realized their limits, or at least Hollywood has, seeing as they returned to SFX work after making one more movie post-AVP:R (the interesting but ultimately underwhelming Skyline). Meanwhile, the fanbase awaits an AVP film that actually lives up to the original Alien and Predator. Will it ever happen?
AVP: Alien vs. Predator (2004)
Better Than You Think
Call it lowering standards or blind fanboyism, but I place myself in the 'AVP is sort of good' camp. While the film definitely has its issues and doesn't live up to the potential of, say, the 1991 Peter Briggs script or certain fan fiction, it is not the train wreck people make it out to be.
15 years in the making, after a 1989 comic book followed by an easter egg in 1990's Predator 2, AVP was finally there in summer 2004. Fans were concerned about the choice to let Paul W.S. Anderson write and direct. While he's definitely made some mistakes along the way, it actually seems like a pretty logical choice in retrospect. He made a pretty entertaining Alien knock-off with 1997's Event Horizon, and his 1995 Mortal Kombat adaptation is generally considered to be one of the better video game movies out there. The same can be said for the original Resident Evil, his last film before directing AVP, which, unlike some of the sequels, wasn't half bad.
Granted, Anderson is no Ridley Scott or John McTiernan. While he is a superb cinematographer who really creates a sense of dread and impending doom in AVP's lengthy set-up (aided by glorious set design), when the action finally begins it is somewhat underwhelming. The camera is shaky, the editing is choppy and the amount of actual Alien/Predator fights is quite limited. We get one major showdown with the lead Alien, 'Grid', and one climactic battle with the Alien Queen. Between that, the action is limited to several short skirmishes including the welcome return of the Predator's plasma cannon.
AVP's characters are not as engaging as Alien's or as iconic as Predator's. Still, Sanaa Lathan - who I was unfamiliar with beforehand - manages to fill the huge heroine-shaped void left by Sigourney Weaver in this first Ripley-less Alien film. Lathan's portrayal of Lex is stern and righteous, even if she has little to work with. Lance Henriksen serves to connect the film to the Alien mythos by playing an ancestor to Alien 3's Bishop II (it's obvious Anderson is more of an Alien fanboy). The human/Predator team-up is a bit cheesy, but makes sense strategically - Predators function in a higher manner like humans, and working together against the Aliens was the rational thing to do.
Much has been said of AVP's maligned PG-13 rating. While I think horror in general is brought down by too much emphasis on gore as cheap shock value (I'm looking at you, Alien: Resurrection), the rating does result in a bizarrely bloodless chestburster scene, which is as great an offense as Live Free Or Die Hard's neutered 'yippee-ki-yay' line. Then again, the second AVP demonstrates that more gore does not a better movie make.
But let's focus on the positive things here - even if they could be better, the Alien/Predator confrontations are a thrill to finally see on the big screen. It's great fun to see the two creatures interact and how their abilities play off against each other, given that they were never designed to co-exist. It's amazing happenstance, for instance, that Aliens established that the creatures don't show up on infrared, which just so happens to be the Predator's way of tracking its quarry. Also, the amazing set design and cinematography make the film look like a 100+ million tentpole flick, when in reality it cost about half as much. There is also a plethora of easter eggs and throwbacks to previous films, especially the Alien half, that will please many fans. To top it off, much of the film looks great SFX-wise. The CGI looks a bit dated now, but is used only when necessary. Much of the creature effects are physical, and look better than ever. The poop-brown color and excessive slime from Alien: Resurrection are wisely ditched, and the Predators retain their tribal look (admittedly, AVPR had better looking Predators).
In the end, I think many detractors had been waiting for an AVP film so long they already had a perfect vision of it in their heads, and the film betrayed that vision by being something else. AVP could have been much more and things really hit a snag with the awful sequel. The perfect AVP film is still out there somewhere, waiting to be made.
Predator 2 (1990)
Underrated Sequel
Predator 2 gets a lot of flak, mainly for not featuring Arnold and not living up to its predecessor. While it definitely does not best the 1987 original, I will argue that this is still a sequel worth looking into.
First, the things that are true about the criticism leveled at Predator 2 - yes, it lacks the atmosphere and tension of the original Predator. The inhumanly muscular, quintessentially '80s' mercenaries from the first film are gone, replaced by more conventional cop characters, led by Lethal Weapon's Danny Glover who ironically portrays Mike Harrigan a loose cannon closer to to Riggs than to Murtaugh. The iconic jungle setting is changed to Los Angeles, inexplicably set 7 years into the future without any sort of technological advances or plot elements that make this a different LA than it was in present day 1990. Predator 2 is a somewhat more conventional, pulpy action/horror film, full of explosions and cheesy moments such as an over-the-top closeup of a decapitated voodoo shaman's head, frozen in a scream. The film plays with its titular monster's iconic hunting gear, adding all sorts of new gizmos that have since become a staple of Predator merchandise and memorabilia, almost losing itself in the vast array of weapons and gadgets that the creature now has at its disposal.
What is also true is that the plot does little to avoid cliches, ranging from cop cliches (Harrigan butting heads with his by-the-book, office-bound superiors) to sci-fi horror staples such as the shady government spooks who are trying to capture and weaponize the creature (clearly inspired by that other Fox horror series, Alien).
But what is also true is that Predator is just a very fun film. It realizes its potential cheesiness and just goes with. Less subtly so than the original, which may add up to people's dislike of it. While the Predator is somewhat demystified by appearing much earlier in the film and spending considerably less time behind its light-bending camouflage, the film teases us with a massive amount of lore that we only get to glimpse (they have a culture, they gather all sorts of extraterrestrial trophy's including the famous Alien's head) and have still only scratched the surface of. While this has been explored to greater lengths in the expanded universe, and not always in a good way (the comic book Predators are basically Klingons at this point), the filmic universe hints at a unique and mysterious society that we're still yet to fully appreciate. Also, the film is full of action and maintains the Predator's aura of an elusive, unstoppable force that treats humans as little more than wild animals to be hunted down and mounted on a wall.
In short, Predator is more than a Schwarzenegger vehicle. The Predator creature is definitely capable of carrying the series beyond a single human lead, and is definitely worth seeing even if it isn't facing the Goverator.
Predator (1987)
Guns, Muscles & Monsters - The Quintessential 80s Film
Along with first two Terminator films, Predator can definitely be considered the pinnacle of Schwarzenegger's carreer. It has everything one needs from a 80s action film - impossibly powerful musclebound heroes, excessive gunfire, lots of explosions, Reagan-era gung-ho interventionism, and a cool villain. What makes Predator good is not just that it has these things, but that it also manages to execute them in a way that elevates the material.
Due to countless crossovers in the expanded universe, culminating in two films, Predator is often compared to Alien (or, more specifically, fellow 80s actioner Aliens). While this is understandable, Predator really is a very different kind of beast. Besides the obvious differences- the Predator creature is no mere animal, but a technologically advanced trophy hunter - it is first and foremost an action film, and not a horror film. It is essentially the template of any action movie from the 80s starring Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Van Damme or Norris, with the big difference of having an alien monster as its villain instead of your usual drug dealer, Soviet assassin or South American warlord. This also means that the Predator is a far more interesting opponent than any Schwarzenegger faced before - whereas Schwarzenegger usually bests his filmic opponents through superior strength or firepower, Predator drives home the point that this won't be business as usual for Arnold. Early action scenes of Schwarzenegger and fellow strongmen Jesse Ventura, Sonny Landham, Bill Weathers and more easily dispatching human guerillas are contrasted by the ease with which these superhuman mercenaries are killed one by one by the Predator, which has tech that makes their weapons look primitive by comparison. They can't see it as it can cloak itself, and it can see them all the better because it sees in infra-red. Ultimately, Schwarzenegger has to use strategy rather than strength to defeat it. And even in defeat, the creature nearly takes him with it.
A very story of muscular mercenaries being targeted by a big game hunter from outer space is elevated by gorgeous location shooting that perfectly captures the thick, inhospitable jungle they are traversing ('badass bush'), steady nuts-and-bolts camera work that lets the actors and environment speak for themselves and a briljant score by the always great Alan Silvestri. While the score is at times delightfully cheesy and oh-so 80s (though not nearly as much as, say, Chuck Norris's Delta Force), it does capture the tension well and helps create the film's giddy cat-and-mouse atmosphere.
Predator was never meant to be its own Alien-esque franchise, starting out as just another Schwarzenegger vehicle (only with an alien twist). In the end, it has managed to escape from Schwarzenegger's Olympian shadow to become a long-running series in its own right. But no installment - either the stand-alone sequels or the Alien crossovers - has managed to recapture the unique spirit of the original.
Alien Resurrection (1997)
Attack of the Clones
Alien 3 seemed like and should have been the natural closure of Ripley's arc, and the series as a whole. Ripley sacrificed herself to defeat her extraterrestrial nemesis, and finally found peace after being torn from her home, loved ones and even her own timeline. Alien: Resurrection resets all that by turning to the age-old sci-fi trope of cloning, allowing the deceased character to simply come back. To its credit, the film does try to add something new by returning Ripley as an alien/human hybrid. It is perverse irony that Ripley would end up, albeit partially, becoming the very thing that she fought for so long. Sigourney Weaver, while realizing the material isn't up to par with previous entries in the series (supposedly, she only signed up to stop Fox from making the long-teased Alien/Predator crossover, which they did anyway seven years later), does her best to make this new Ripley interesting by upping the ambiguity of the character - being part Alien, do we even know what side she is on? Still, it's easy to see why this self-aware, sarcastic and superhuman Ripley doesn't appear to core Alien fans - Ripley's appeal wasn't being badass, it was her everyman nature and her brave moral stance against corporate greed, to the point where she gave her own life in order to save humanity from the Company's ill-advised exploitation of a dangerous alien organism. This new Ripley doesn't really seem to care, and condescendingly recounts how she tried to save 'people' once. The film does seem aware of this to some degree, and deliberately casts Winona Ryder's Call in Ripley's old role as the determined anti-Alien crusader who tries to remind Ripley of what she once stood for (and initially distrusting her for being not human, which is somewhat ironic since she herself is revealed to be an android in a potentially interesting moral sub-plot that should have gotten more attention). The rest of the supporting cast do their best, but the script relegates them to stock characters - the evil scientist (Wren), the cool black dude who sacrifices himself (Christy), the amoral seen-it-all smuggler (Elgyn) and the unhinged brawler who just wants to shoot everything (Johner). Leland Orser's Purvis deserves mention for spending the entire film knowing he's going to die a horrible death, and ultimately redeeming his apparent expendability in a final sacrifice (that is, unfortunately, unintentionally funny in execution).
The Aliens themselves have become your average slimy, roaring sci-fi monster, clumsily rendered through 90s era CGI for the first time, although the animatronics look better than ever save for an unneccessary color shift from blue to brown (thankfully corrected in Alien vs Predator) as well as excessive slime. Despite some changes, H.R. Giger's briljant design manages to keep them interesting. It's a shame, then, that the film decides to throw another human-Alien crossbreed into the mix in the form of the Newborn. Arguably one of the most hated elements of the film, the Newborn's main purpose seems to be present a new chief antagonist in the vein of Aliens' introduction of the Queen, and to serve as the punchline to the film's obsession with mingling human and Alien together, as if to say we're not so different from these terrifying monsters as we like to think we are. Given its quasi-innocent nature (it bonds with Ripley as its mother), its death scene seems unnecessarily cruel. But ultimately, the Newborn doesn't belong in the franchise - the Aliens are supposed to be a lethal force of nature, not something we can relate to. That is the human characters' job.
Alien: Resurrection is by no means a terrible film - it's a fun, gory monster ride. It's just that it doesn't entirely seem to understand what it means to be an Alien movie, and would have worked better as a non-Alien film taking cues from the series than an installment of it. It's also sad that the series has opted for Predator crossovers and prequels/reboots rather than continuing the story, as Alien: Resurrection leaves us in a very interesting place: Earth. The series has never set foot on Earth before, and this leaves the story wide open for any direction. Will the Aliens finally reach Earth? Will Ripley 8 come to terms with her Alien DNA? What about Call's struggle with her non-humanity, analogous to Ripley 8? Sadly, we will never know. There were and still are plenty of opportunities for jumpstarting the series from this point, even fixing many of the mistakes that Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Joss Whedon made with Alien: Resurrection.
Alien³ (1992)
The Most Underrated Threequel Ever
Alien 3 is arguable the most controversial entry in the Alien series. Attitudes towards it have softened with the release of the Assembly Cut in 2003, as well as further installments which many consider to be far worse than however bad Alien 3 was, but it is still generally considered to be the point where the series lost its way and that it's never quite recovered from. I will argue that this is wholly unjustified, even before the release of the Assembly Cut.
Granted, Alien 3 has a lot going against it - a troubled production history, a strong tonal shift from James Cameron's Aliens, and an overall nihilistic atmosphere that is quite unusual from a mainstream Hollywood film. I'll start with the last - yes, Alien 3 is a very dark, depressing film. Whereas Aliens had a very happy ending, with not just Ripley surviving but her (subtly hinted at) love interest, surrogate daughter and redeemed android friend living to tell the tale as well. They were the perfect nuclear family, typical of Cameron sentimentality (which isn't to but Cameron down - he is a great filmmaker and made a fantastic sequel to Alien). People wanted Aliens - Part II, and I can understand why - pretty much the whole of the Alien Expanded Universe, from comic books to novels to video games, is based on Aliens rather than Alien. In my review of Aliens I therefore argued that Aliens was a bigger creative influence on the course and tone of the series than perhaps even the original film.
Still, I think David Fincher did the right thing in making Alien 3 the way he did. Alien 3's dark tone and nihilism are more consistent with the original than Aliens's optimistic, all-American action-adventure. After all, Alien was the dark, gritty antithesis to Star Trek's optimistic vision of our future. It showed that, despite technological advances and the conquering of space, things had stayed relatively the same - working stiffs were still underpaid and exploited by greedy corporations, and profit still triumphed over morality as Weyland-Yutani thought nothing of sacrificing its personnel to acquire a dangerous organism that it had no realistic hope of controlling. Alien 3 returns to this tone, and also makes the struggle more personal again by not just killing off Ripley's friends, but also pitting her against a lone Alien again instead of a whole nest. Having Ripley impregnated with an Alien of her own tops it off. Elliot Goldenthal's haunting score - the best of the series, in my opinion - and the moody, religious undertone of the film further accentuate this. It's sad that, even with the Assembly Cut - which Fincher, who disowned the film, had nothing to do with - we will never see Fincher's true vision for Alien 3. Fox, which also wanted Aliens II, interfered too much to make it work.
Granted, the film has its weaknesses. Due to constant reshoots, some plot threads are just left hanging (prisoner Golic just disappears in the original release, an omission the Assembly Cut fixes), and while most supporting characters in previous films didn't have more depth than the bald-headed prisoners in this film, it is true many are far less distinctive personalities than Alien's space truckers or Aliens's battle-hardened Marines. A few do stand out - Pete Postlethwaithe as David, who is simply a delight in anything he appears in, Paul McGann's tormented, mentally unstable Golic (whose is deservedly elevated to greater prominence in the Assembly Cut) and of course Charles S. Dutton as Dillon, who - likely drawing from his own experience in prison - gives a very underrated, powerful performance as the prisoners' informal leader. Charles Dance and Brian Glover are sadly killed off too soon, robbing Ripley of both a strong human antagonist and her one sympathetic face (which, I suppose, accentuates the film's nihilism)
While the film attempts to return to the original's horror roots by featuring just one Alien, its other attempts at horror fall flat. The cinematography that creates a moody, dark atmosphere is less effective at conveying fear and suspense, and any jump scare is preceded by a rising musical score that immediately gives it away. SFX-wise, the film is an improvement over Aliens, and has stood the test of time better than its 'forever 80s' predecessor. While many will cite the film's poor CGI (which was actually a rod puppet rotoscoped into the scene, a quite rare technique - only one shot actually uses a fully CGI Alien), the animatronics look much more realistic than in Aliens, benefitting from the fact that there is only one Alien in the film. Alien 3 does start the trend of over-sliming its monster - the Alien is literally dripping with K-Y gelly in some scenes, which is a bit too much of a good thing.
These days, an Alien 3 review is incomplete without greater attention to the Assembly Cut. While not made by him or with his consent, the AC is definitely a step closer to what Fincher was trying to make. Supporting characters, especially Golic, are more fleshed out, and a whole new plot twist is introduced when the Alien is actually captured, but later freed. I would definitely consider the AC to be the 'official' version of the scene, although I do much prefer the harrowing 'dog-burster' from the original cut to the AC version where it emerges from a dead ox. Also, the CGI used to create the Alien in new scenes where the SFX had not yet been added in in 1992 really looks awful and really takes you out of the movie. Fortunately, this is only for a few shots in the film. If you want to watch Alien 3, definitely watch this version.
Aliens (1986)
James Cameron's Action Packed Follow-Up To Alien
What makes each Alien film interesting to watch is the series' tradition of going in a completely different direction with each installment. Aliens, arguably, is of greater influence to the series than the original Alien. Whereas Alien provided the foundations - the Alien design and biology, the greedy Weyland-Yutani corporation trying to exploit it - Aliens does a lot of world building and greatly expands the series' lore. Looking at the vast swath of expanded universe comics, books and video games, most are more closely based on Aliens than Alien, featuring Alien Hives, Colonial Marines and of course the vicious Queen, arguably James Cameron's most important contribution to the Alien universe.
In some ways, Aliens's approach as a sequel is somewhat simplistic. Think one Alien is bad? Here's a whole nest of them, along with a bigger, badder leader to sweeten the deal. But as with the original, the brilliance lies not in the concept itself, but in the execution. Where Ridley Scott turned B-list material into an A-list classic, James Cameron turned Aliens from what could have been a run-of-the-mill 80s sci-fi/action romp into an epic action adventure that definitely deserves to be listed as one of the cinematic highlights of the decade.
Having survived Alien, Sigourney Weaver's Ripley is now the relentless Alien slayer she has become known as, although Cameron and Weaver never forget to remind us that she is still human, vulnerable both physically and psychologically as she deals with her trauma from the first film, as well as the loss of her daughter, who passed away while she drifted through space for 57 years. Being 'marooned in time', torn away from her familiar surroundings and essentially an outsider in a hostile new world, would - despite the revolving cast of writers and directors as the series progressed - become a recurring theme in the series. Cameron takes a great risk in introducing a child - Newt - into the fray. Generally, putting a child in danger in an adult story is a cheap way to raise the stakes, liable to bog down the seriousness of the drama. It's also become a bit of a cliche ('Jurassic Park Syndrome'). Fortunately, Weaver's connection with Carrie Henn - who never acted before or after this film, and has since become a schoolteacher, making her one-off performance here all the more impressive - helps raise the Ripley-Newt relationship to something meaningful.
The rest of the cast are fairly one-note, although the cast play that particular note very well. Highlights are the creepy, ambiguous android Bishop (played to perfection by Lance Henriksen, who has become somewhat of a fixture in the Alien expanded universe), the cowardly Hudson (played by the late Bill Paxton), everyman grunt Hicks (played by Cameron mainstay Michael Biehn) and of course the feisty Vasquez (who, in what would be quite controversial now, is played by white actress Jenette Goldstein in makeup). The everyman approach from Alien works less well with soldiers, although this may be by European bias as the military is not as much a part of everyday life here as it is in America (as in, you're far less likely to know someone in the military here).
Being more effects-heavy than the original film, Aliens looks more dated and is firmly entrenched in 80s culture and design. The Aliens themselves look a little less impressive this time around, mainly because a lot more of them had to be created for this film. I'm also not a fan of the 'ribbed' head design, created when Cameron removed the smooth skull dome because it kept cracking. The Queen more than makes up for this however, with a fearsome design that takes the best of the original creature and expands and builds on it to create a truly menacing beast. The final confrontation with Ripley goes down as one of the most memorable showdowns in cinematic history.
Aliens wouldn't be a mainstream 80s action film without that era's distinct militarism. However, unlike jingoistic one-man-army features of the time, often starring Schwarzenegger or Stallone (e.g. Commando, Rocky IV, etc), Aliens has a more critical tone when one reads between the lines. For all the military porn filling the screen in early scenes, these overconfident battle-hardened marines - 'ultimate bad-asses', as Hudson says) - get thoroughly wrecked by what are, for all intents and purposes, mere animals armed not with guns and missiles, but simply claws and teeth (and acid blood). Which serves as a fitting allegory to Vietnam, where Americans - considered, especially by themselves, to be the ultimate military force in the world - were humbled by an enemy considered far beneath them in every way. Which also goes to say that all the military power in the world doesn't hold a candle to Mother Nature.
Alien (1979)
The Ultimate Sci-Fi Horror Classic
The wave of horror films from the 70s and 80s was filled with what many would consider classics. Halloween, Hellraiser, Friday the 13th, A Nightmare On Elm Street and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre are all entrenched in the public consciousness and a must see for any film fanatic. But few of these, even the really good ones, rise above the level of 'cult' classic - they have a dedicated fan following and are certainly good films in their own right, but never really rise above their genre. Needless to say, the *true* horror classics hail from the black and white era of the 30s, 40s and 50s, but I'm specifically referring to the 70s/80s wave here. In my book, three of those rose above the level of cult classic, to become true film classics - The Thing, The Excorcist and Alien. And Alien is the one to rule them all.
In many ways, Alien is the base on which every sci-fi horror film of the past forty years was built. Every film made in this genre, no matter how innovative in other areas, rips off Alien in *some* way at least. From the unique design, courtesy of the late H.R. Giger, to the bleak and pessimistic future set design - even more so than the grimy 'used future' and interstellar warfare of Star Wars, Alien is the true antithesis to the giddy optimism of Star Trek - and the greedy corporation trying to exploit the beast at the expense of the characters, and humanity at large. Watching it now, it may seem like you've seen all this before - but that's only because so many others learned it from Alien.
Story-wise, Alien is not much to look at. Though innovative at the time, it is a very basic 'space-explorers-encounter-a-deadly-organism' tale that we've become familiar with by now. The brilliance lies in the execution - Jerry Goldsmith's creepy score, Ridley Scott's slow, atmospheric direction and the authenticity of the characters. Alien's characters aren't particularly developed, but engaging all the same. We get to know them not through deep backstories or dramatic character arcs, but their interactions - including several improvised scenes - which showcase them as relatable, working class everymen. These aren't the mystic heroes of Star Wars on a quest to save the galaxy, or the elite Starfleet captains commanding a ship exploring the vast reaches of space - these are your everyday working stiffs, sent out to the middle of nowhere on a gig. Space holds no enthralling mystery to them - it's their working environment, much like sailors out at sea. And when they encounter a dilapidated alien vessel on a barren planet, there is none of the exciting mystery of many space exploration tales - rather, there is a sense of impending doom. And we see their very human reactions when they encounter this fearsome extraterrestrial predator - fear, anger and desperation. This is not the childlike wonder of first contact, but the terror of being trapped in a tin can with an animal trying to eat you. As icing to the cake, there is no real 'hero' to the story. Ellen Ripley, played brilliantly by Sigourney Weaver - by now synonymous with the Alien franchise - does not emerge as a 'natural leader' among the group. In fact, she doesn't really lead at all - she becomes the story's sole survivor mainly through happenstance, because she is fortunate enough to not be in the wrong place when the Alien comes out, and spends enough time studying it to figure out a way to outsmart it. Later films elevated Ripley to a more mythical status as the woman who kept surviving the Alien incursions, taking away from her human vulnerability in this film.
None of this would be as effective without the film's briljant creature design and special effects. Making the most of its modest budget (reportedly, Ridley Scott built the Space Jockey set without full permission from the studio) and using SFX both sparingly and effectively, Alien has managed to stand the test of time much better than its 1986 sequel Aliens. H.R. Giger's creepy, sexually charged design - inspired both by outlandish fetishes and deep phobias of rape - has not been matched in the decades after, though many have tried. This isn't a cheesy green space invader with a laser gun, but an *animal* - a fierce creature, trying to feed, survive and procreate. The humans it encounters are no mortal enemies or puny natives to be conquered, but either prey or merely in the way. In fact, it isn't really an evil monster - it's just doing what it does to survive. This, in fact, makes it a more effective antagonist rather than if it were just your average creepy space man. Later films respected this core foundation, but unfortunately moved away from the ilusive, deceptive nature of the Alien and turned into insectoid cannon fodder, dangerous mainly because of its large numbers. It's easy to forget that, at its core, Alien is supposed to be about suspense instead of action.
No film, both within the series and outside it, has ever matched the briljant effectiveness of Alien. It is a film that was never meant to be A-list, but became so anyway because it was just executed so well. This is truly one for the ages, and a must-watch even if sci-fi and horror don't appeal to you.
Van Speijk (2006)
Excellent Dutch television
Van Speijk is definitely the best Dutch police series right now, surpassing Baantjer and Grijpstra & De Gier as my personal favorite Dutch series. With its fast pace, good scripts, multiple plot lines and wide range of stories it has accomplished more in terms of character development than Baantjer did in more than 10 years, and each episode has more content than a whole season of Baantjer.
Van Speijk is radically different from Baantjer and G&DG; while these series have virtually no multi-episode plots and always feature a new, unrelated story with each episode, some of Van Speijk's plots stretch over the entire season. This creates even more anticipation for each new episode, because you'll want to know how things continue with the characters. Also, each episode features a set of several shorter story lines, mostly concerning guest characters. These vary greatly; in one episode you have a Chinese immigrant searching for her missing daughter, then there's a Muslim teenager who wants to commit suicide because he is gay. With plots like these Van Speijk also refers to contemporary political issues in the Netherlands.
What is also great is that the characters are far more developed- they all have different personalities and backgrounds. The series is very diverse and doesn't seem biased towards any particular group- there's a deeply religious character who constantly refers to God, an atheist character who swears a lot, a racist character, a gay character, a troubled Turkish character with a family crisis, etc. This combination of politically correct and incorrect characters makes the series refreshing to watch- it is an objective reflection of society as it is, not a subjective image of how some people would like it to be. Van Speijk does have a flaw here, though- the huge ensemble cast of 11 actors causes characters to shift in and out of the background depending on who the writers decide to give a plot line in an episode. ER, an American hospital series in a style not unlike Van Speijk, did a better job at giving all main characters equal attention thanks to its smaller cast (in the beginning, at least). Then again, I can't think of a Van Speijk character I'd like to see dropped as they're all interesting and full of potential.
Another minor annoyance is the fact that the Talpa website (Talpa is the channel that airs Van Speijk) features extensive background info on the characters. I'd rather see them develop over time, with the writers thinking of new things while the series progresses, instead of having everything already pre-determined and knowing what to expect. It just seems like a lazy thing to do.
Technically, the series is also very good- the camera work is good, and the production values are very high for Dutch television. In the past falling pianos, gunfights, cars crashing through stalls and other stunts were much too expensive for Dutch TV, but Van Speijk raises the bar considerably in that respect. Some find scenes like these to reek of sensationalism. I won't deny that, but this doesn't take away from the quality of the story lines and just makes things even more fun to watch, like icing on a cake makes the cake taste even better.
Aside from the flaws mentioned above, I think 13 episodes is too short for a series with multi-episode plots. I'm afraid this is going to cause some plots to move too fast and start too early in the season in the future. What Van Speijk needs is 22 episodes per season, like ER, which allows more time for plots to be enveloped.
Another thing that somewhat annoys me are the forced 'standard elements' put in episodes. All episodes except for the series premiere begin with a briefing in the café near the police station (yes, I know this is not possible in real life) where the foul-mouthed garbageman Jules 'de la Tourette' barges in, and end with a compilation of scenes with music on the background followed by a final scene where character Altan Uslu's story progresses (he's definitely the best and most developed character in the series). The music scenes always start with a scene where someone turns on a radio or whatever, giving a reason for the background music to be in the subsequent scene. This is forced and unnecessary- you can just begin with the music right away, it doesn't need to originate from something in the episode. Imagine if every scene with background music in Star Wars started out with an alien orchestra playing it for no discernible reason at all. These 'standard elements' feel out of place in an otherwise very variable series and would be better suited in Baantjer or Grijpstra & De Gier.
Despite its flaws, Van Speijk is a great series to watch; I'm definitely looking forward to the new season in 2007.
Grijpstra & De Gier (2004)
Worthy follow-up to Baantjer
Admittedly, this series has nothing to do with Baantjer, but it's obvious it is supposed to be a 'spiritual successor'. It is written by the same team, is also based on popular books, also takes place in Amsterdam (What Dutch crime series doesn't? Oh, that's right: Spangen) and is also aired on RTL4's Friday evening. Hell, every episode so far featured at least one guest star who also played in Baantjer!
Grijpstra & De Gier sports a nice cast who portray their characters well. Jack Wouterse, my favorite Dutch actor at the moment (partially because of Grijpstra & De Gier), plays Grijpstra as an ill-tempered guy who can be an asshole at times, but still has his heart in the right place. Roef Ragas nails De Gier as the friendlier, sometimes wiser sidekick who occasionally keeps Grijpstra in line (basically the opposite of De Cock and Vledder from Baantjer, where the oldest one is also always the wisest). Jasper van Overbrugge is good in his role of Cardozo although he doesn't really do much besides coming across as the nerdy underdog, except for one impressive episode where he is shot and almost dies. The lovely Anniek Pfeifer is also good in her role as Hetty, but, like Cardozo, is a secondary character and has less to do. My least favorite is Lex van Delden, whose character is a bit overly philosophical and a bit unbelievable as a commissioner. He just comes across as weird and absent-minded, even though he is also wise, much smarter than Baantjer's often comically dumb Buitendam.
The dialog in the series is well-written; the conversations between Grijpstra and De Gier are always interesting to listen to (Janwillem van de Wetering, who wrote the books, also did the dialog for the series) Overall, the series is like Baantjer- most episodes form single entities with no continuity between them, except for recurring guest stars playing coroners (and the stray dog which befriends Grijpstra) and an interesting story arc in late Season 1, where we learn a lot about Hetty's past. Too bad they didn't do that in the following seasons, although there is more character development than in Baantjer. In three seasons we've learned more about G&DG's characters than about most of Baantjer's characters during that series entire run, which is about four times as long.
Some episodes deviate from the typical format. This was also not unheard of in Baantjer, but Grijpstra & De Gier tends to be a little wilder when doing so. While Baantjer, even when departing from its format, still has a corpse at the start of each episode, G&DG has also featured different cases- in Season 1 there was a teacher who was being beaten up, and in S3 there was a woman who suddenly remembered her father molested her as a child. This would be unthinkable in Baantjer.
G&DG is also more modern than Baantjer, taking place in a newer Amsterdam area, away from the old buildings and classic Red Light District. This rawer look, and the hand-held camera (as opposed to Baantjer's Steadycam), really give the series a modernized look. The nature of the cases treated in each episode doesn't differ much, though. G&DG is also a bit more sensational than Baantjer; short 'action moments' featuring guns being shot, suspects retaliating and short chases on foot are far more common, and a format-departing episode from the first season even featured a full-fledged shootout in a parking garage. It's far from being an action series (which is good), but these moments show that G&DG is a little rougher and sharp-edged than Baantjer.
Obviously, the series also has bad points. Due to the characters' bigger roles, the episode stories suffer a bit and aren't always as interesting or original as Baantjer's. There are notable exceptions of course, such as a creepy episode featuring a mysterious Native American, or an episode where Grijpstra's aunt is murdered. Other things I don't like are the annoying split-screen scenes which are luckily rarely used in newer seasons, and the completely pointless scenes where Grijpstra and De Gier are playing on musical instruments in the lost & found storage (these scenes are only there because they are in the books). Also, the scenes taking place at Fred's cafeteria are an obvious rip-off from Baantjer's café scenes, although Grijpstra never gets clever ideas here, like De Cock does. The same counts for the ferry scenes at the end (in Baantjer they're at De Cock's house), but luckily the dialog here is more interesting and funnier than in Baantjer's episode endings.
Overall, Grijpstra & De Gier is a good series with the same flaws as Baantjer, and both very similar to and very different from this older series. The cast do a great job, especially Jack Wouterse. I hope it'll go on for plenty of seasons.
Baantjer (1995)
Good series, but stop commercializing everything, dammit!
This is the first Dutch TV series I ever saw, and it's still one of my favorites. The cast is great (newcomer Kirsten van Dissel is a good replacement for Marian Mudder) and so are the scripts. Of course, not all plots are as good, but every episode has interesting solutions, motives and suspects to offer. What I also like about the series is the different themes throughout the episodes. For instance, one episode features a murder in Amsterdam's Red Light District, another focuses on a murder case surrounding a monastery and yet another features Elvis fans, or Wiccas. These things help to make each episode interesting to watch. In some cases the stories rise above the series usual level of 'good', most notably two-parters such as one in which a main characters' sister commits suicide after being suspected of murder. Episodes like these showcase excellent writing and acting, showing that the cast are capable of far more than their usual performances, which are good but routine. This last thing is caused by the fact that, two-parters aside, each episode is a separate entity and the writers must follow a strict format in order to stay true to the books the series is based on. While this format sometimes hinders the series (for instance, when a confession is made before the last commercial break you can bet your bottom euro it's a lie and the real murderer has yet to reveal him/herself), it also helps in making it a very familiar sight on RTL4's Friday evening, something it has been for over a decade now.
Of course, over the years the show has also developed some less-than-favorable characteristics. The commercialism surrounding the show is horrendous- during most episodes (even reruns!) the viewer can play an SMS game and win something by guessing the murderer before the last commercial break. Of course, there have been episodes which rendered this system useless; 2003's ''De Cock en de moord op het water'' (featuring American actor Jack Luceno as a visiting NYPD cop) had the murderer revealed ***before*** the last commercial block. I wonder how they fit the SMS game around that........
But the worst part is blatantly obvious product placement in recent seasons. Believe me, you've never seen anything like this. It peaked during the 9th (2003) season, which featured giant close-ups of coffee vending machines by the brand Nescafe, one of the series' sponsors, when the characters went to get themselves a hot cup.
Also, one thing I really hate about the series nowadays is the criminally reduced number of episodes per season. They went from the original 13 to 10 in 1999, and after 2002 it's been declining each season, leaving us with just six in the 11th (2005) season. SIX EPISODES!!! This is part of a cheapo behind-the-screens ploy to reduce costs: episodes filmed for the 9th season were aired in the 10th and so on. If this continues we'll be left with nothing.
Quality-wise the series has lost very little in steam; in fact some of the best episodes are found in later seasons. However, one element in the show that has shown decline in quality are the two-parters. The first two were some of the best I've ever seen from Baantjer, but the third was not as good. It started out just as good as the others, but had a solution which was too easy and simple in comparison to the excellent closures for the previous ones. The most recent one, written by one cast member and directed by the other, featuring a murder in a famous Amsterdam soccer arena, was the most disappointing. While it was definitely not a bad episode, the solution was too predictable and overall it felt useless as a two-parter; they could have just as easily made it a single episode.
Overall, Baantjer is an excellent series- always has been and still is-, but has suffered from commercialism and cost-cutting. Hopefully we'll get a few more seasons with a respectable number of episodes.
Jurassic Park III (2001)
Misses Spielberg.
Now, I don't think JPIII is a bad movie, but it's certainly not a good one either, unlike its predecessors (many will disagree with me on The Lost World).
The CG dinosaurs looked good, very good actually, but for some reason were a slight step down from the previous incarnations. The animatronics were also a little less than the ones in the predecessors. I didn't really like the revamped designs either. Sure, it's nice to keep your dinosaurs up-to-date to new scientific discoveries, but not when it contradicts the previous movies! The plot wasn't really as interesting either, overall the movie felt too small-scaled in comparison to its predecessors. I felt that the running time was too short, too.
Now, there are also plenty of good things about JPIII. I liked to see Grant and Ellie again. The Spinosaurus, though unnecessary- they mistakenly thought the audience had grown tired of the good ol' T.rex- was an interesting and refreshing new addition, and the Spino/T.rex battle was nice. It wasn't overdone or stylized, which was good. Although in the end it was a bit unrealistic that the Rex's bone-crushing bite didn't kill the Spino. The aviary scene was definitely the height-point of the movie, it was well-directed and exciting.
Aside from a not-so-great script, I think some of the bad things can be attributed to Steven Spielberg not directing. I know he doesn't always make good movies (never really cared for Hook), but I think JPIII would have been better than it is with Stevie in the director's chair rather than the producer's. Not that Joe Johnson is bad, though. I loved Jumanji.
I liked JPIII enough to *buy* it on video, so I don't dislike it or consider it to be trash, but it could- and should- have been better. I'm still looking forward to IV, though.
The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
Great sequel!
It surprises me that so many people hate this movie. For me, the magic of the first is still present in this one (probably due to Spielberg directing again), albeit not as much, mainly due to the fact that the tone of this one is darker. You'll notice that there are less scenes taking place in daylight, too.
The movie has lots of likable characters, one of the greatest being big game hunter Roland Tembo (Pete Postlethwaite), and is an enjoyable ride from beginning to end. The plot is not very strong, but made up for with thrilling dinosaur scenes (such as the raptor attack at the worker village) and great cinematography. Also, the jungle setting gives everything a nice exotic and 'prehistoric' look (as in Jurassic Park).
Adding to the cast of dinosaurs from the first movie are the classic Stegosaurus, the head-butting Pachycephalosaurus and of course the Compsognathus, vicious little critters not to be taken lightly! These especially are a great addition, showing that even the small dinosaurs can be lethal predators.
And the movie ends with an almighty finale where a T-rex wreaks havoc in San Diego. This scene, denounced by some as 'silly' or 'a Godzilla rip-off', is not to be taken just as seriously as the rest of the movie, as indicated by the many small jokes in it. It is meant to be a fun closure for a thrilling movie.
The plot does not follow the book very much, but some of the best scenes (such as the trailer-cliff sequence) are lifted straight from there. The overall story is not dissimilar, but mostly with different characters or multiple characters fused into one. I do wonder why they left Levine out and didn't even create someone similar to him. All in all, I think that book purists will hate this movie. But if the changed plot and characters don't bother you (or if you haven't read the book at all, like me when I first saw it), you're in for a treat.
Jurassic Park (1993)
A dinosaur lover's dream
This is still one of the best dinosaur movies to date. It portrays the dinosaurs realistically; they are not movie villains, but simply animals looking for something to eat. Spielberg takes some liberty regarding the looks of the dinosaurs (Raptors were only half the size of the ones in this movie), but overall delivers a masterpiece. The relatively simple plot is overshadowed by a great script, ground-breaking effects and a good cinematography.
Adding up to this is a great cast of likable actors. I really felt sorry for Hammond in the end. The children are nice, too, and well-acted.
However, every movie has its flaws. Jurassic Park's flaws come in the form of some grotesque goofs. Goofs are usually fun to search for, but some of the errors in JP are gut-wreching and impossible to overlook (such as a cliff suddenly appearing where several minutes ago there was a 5-tonne T-rex walking).
A real gem, it deserves a higher rating than a 7.4.