Fathers And Justice

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The Empire Strikes Back continues the story of Luke, Leia, and Han as their importance in the universe continues to grow and their incestuous love triangle reaches its fever pitch. Luke begins his training with Yoda, an alien that both looks and sounds exactly like the disabled love-child of both Kermit and Miss Piggy, whilst everybody else just tries to avoid the massive shiny helmet of Darth Vader. Meanwhile, Vader himself is attempting to track down the young Skywalker with all the determination of a knob that's dressed up as Batman, whilst hanging a 'Fathers For Justice' sign off Buckingham Palace. For most people, this is the best film in the Star Wars franchise and for others it's simply the best film ever made. On the flip side however, some people even consider this film a further stain on the reputation of cinema after the dumbing down of movies began in the mid-70's with its predecessor and Jaws. I won't really be giving that train of thought much time here though on the grounds that those people are simply pretentious, boring twats.

Go Forth And Multiply

Of all the big questions that humanity has pondered, the most important must of course be what species Piers Morgan is and how do we kill it? After that I suppose the next issue down the list might be ‘is there a God?’ and ‘if so, why is he such a twat?’ I should point out that I'm an agnostic and don't completely deny the possibility of the existence of the magical sky man. It would be arrogant of me to say there's no such thing as there's currently no chance that I can prove or disprove the concept either way. Having said that though, nor can I prove that in his spare time, God isn't a blacked up drag Queen called Sweet Latisha with diamond encrusted nipple tassels and a skull-shaped ivory cock ring. I can guess that, that is probably not the case in, as much as I can guess, he probably doesn't exist either but for now I suppose I just can't know for sure. Sadly however, a lot of the world is ironically a lot more closed minded than this, electing to instead believe a gut feeling or childhood indoctrination over something as silly as the freely available facts. Not only that but if you even attempt to point out the obvious ridiculousness of blind faith then they tend to get a little pissy for some reason. I don't know why this is the case but I'm going to guess it's possibly the result of an underlying insecurity that suggests they're worried we non-believers are probably right. Call a sensible skinny person fat and they'll just look at you as though you're stupid. Call a sensible fat person fat and they'll go crying to the ice-cream trough because secretly they know you might be right. 

In 1979, the geniuses that are Monty Python dared to make a comedy which had the nerve to take place around the same area and time as when Jesus was allegedly performing his magic tricks. Despite The Life of Brian making fun of the fictional title character and actually treating the real words of the Bible with surprising respect, the religious folk unfortunately failed to see the funny side. In fact, many of them failed to see the movie at all instead deciding once again to just believe what they'd heard and wrongly protest the film on the assumption that it ridiculed their faith. Had they  actually bothered to see it then they would have realised that in reality it depicts a world that validates their beliefs and instead makes fun of people who act irrationally in the name of religion. By protesting the The Life of Brian without having watched it, the Bible-bashers inadvertently became the exact thing the movie was taking the piss out off. Imagine the 'don't worry about the vase' scene from The Matrix but played out between a bunch of hilarious but mischievous comedians and a gang of humourless God Botherers and that's basically what happened here... and now it's happening again.

Today is not a washing day...

Darren Aronofsky's Noah is the latest film to get a religious kicking from that vocal minority of brainwashed fuckwits with some countries even going as far as simply banning the film outright. The movie tells the story of Noah who lived in that first half of the Bible where God is portrayed as being a great angry cunt who, like an evil dictator, punishes those who defy him. He's basically a bit like Hitler but without even the redeeming feature of a funny moustache. Anyway, God doesn't actually appear in this film with Noah instead suffering from a series of hallucinations that suggest to him that he needs to build a big old boat before the world floods and kills everybody. Rather than putting this down to too much cheese before bed and not enough schizophrenia medicine in the morning though, Noah does as he thinks he's told and decides to make a floaty wooden box for every single animal that he can find... as you do. Anyway, this is all going quite well thanks to a fair bit of help from some giant rock monsters until, of course, King Ray 'I'm the Daddy now' Winstone finds out he's going to be drowned and doesn't quite fancy the idea. On top of that, Noah's three sons have started to worry that they might not have anything to fuck whilst on the ark whilst somehow forgetting that they'll be surrounded by a boat load of mostly sleepy animals. 

I should say at this point that, although I'm still yet to see his debut film Pi, I am a huge fan of Aronofsky's films and so was really excited to see this movie. However I'd also say that I was probably left feeling a tiny bit disappointed by it in the end which isn't to say that it's a bad film at all but simply that it just doesn't quite hit the extraordinary heights of Black Swan or The Wrestler. As the film went on, and I tried to work out why I wasn't quite connecting to it, I think I came to one ironic point. Despite all of the controversy from Gods angry cult, the reason that this film doesn't work quite as well as a masterpiece such as Requiem For A Dream does is simply because of the batshit stupidity of the original source material. Aronofsky can do his absolute best with this story but at the end of the day it's a morality tale in which every single animal on the planet hides in a boat as God punishes the naughtiness of man with a merciless global genocide. The irony of this being that for me, the biggest criticism is the ridiculousness of the Bible story that the film is based on, but for everybody else, the controversy centres around the looseness of the adaptation. 

Due to the fact that the original Bible story is a relatively short one, Aronofsky has padded it out with strange mutant animals, Helms Deep style battles and an environmental message that surely nobody could take issue with…? Well, issue with it they did take as some braindead church goers seem unable to understand the definition of the word 'adaptation'. Apparently in his mission to roll a turd in glitter, Aronofsky decided to combine several Noah-esque tales from various different cultures in an attempt to create a more cinematic and believable story. As a result of this, the religious obsessives have been throwing their shit out of the pram in anger because he dared to make some logical changes to their original holy text. However for me, this is the same argument that people make whenever any book is adapted into a film and the fans get all pissy about it. 

People assume that because both books and films have the primary purpose of telling a story that the two mediums should be easily interchangeable.. but they're not. What might work in a novel might not in a film (for one of a million reasons) and as such will need to be adapted. Incidentally, that rule applies both ways but you rarely seem to hear people bitching about how shit the novelisation of their favourite film is! Anyway, my point is that a film has the right to tell the story that it wants to regardless of the content of whatever it's based on, and as such should be taken on its own merits. Note the use of the word 'adaption' as opposed to 'replication'. Blade Runner and The Shining are two prime examples of great films that took significant liberties with the books that they were adapted from and last time I checked they hadn't been banned in any countries, so why should Noah? Considering the believers are so fucking obsessed with sticking to the text, it's also worth noting that the ark in this film is built to the exact specifications as is laid out in their book. However despite this being the case, filming on Noah ran into some delays when Hurricane Sandy struck New York producing both storms and floods that the set was unable to cope with. So much for sticking to the 'facts’, hey?

I should re-emphasise too for the sake of fairness that it's not every religious person who is this narrow minded, with most, I'm sure, living perfectly social lives and having a good sense of perspective. In fact, according to the actual source of all information... I read on Wikipedia that the Arch-bishop of Canterbury referred to Noah as being, “interesting and thought-provoking”. It's just that the crazy ones tend to scream louder then the sane ones and it's easy to get pissed off by their manic and irrational hatreds. Not liking the film is one thing but banning it is something completely different. Just because they believe their bullshit doesn't mean anybody else should be dictated to by it as well. But like I say.. for the most part I'm sure religious people can see this film for what it is. It's just a shame for the odd nutcase, the American Bible belt, the worlds supply of creationists and the Governing censors of Pakistan, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, Malaysia and Indonesia. It's also worth pointing out that in a few of the countries that it's been banned in, it wasn't banned because of a love of the Christian Bible but rather because they have their own different religion that this film seemingly contradicts. Like I mentioned above with my 'fatty and the trough of ice-cream' analogy, I guess you have to question the certainty of a religion that feels it has to deprive its members of an alternate perspective.

But ignoring all that, is the film actually any good? Well as I said, the story is a bit silly but by giving it a sense of timelessness, Aronofsky does a good job of making it fun. Set in a world that's kind of Star Wars-y and a bit Planet of the Apse-y this feels more like a sci-fi movie than it does any of those 1950's biblical epics that made a shit tonne of money and had a running time of about nine days. If there has to be a film about this story then I honestly think this is the best it's going to be although I kind of wish it had been more intense. Aronofksy is at his best when making a film that's just fucking brutal to watch and despite the apocalyptic theme of this, it didn't quite reach the horror of his previous efforts. However when things did come to a head, the film itself came into its own with Ray Winstone's character adding some much needed anger and Noah himself enduring a full on descent into guilt and madness. In fact when the flood does arrive, the film almost becomes a biblical remake of the previously mentioned film The Shining as the ark’s captain stomps about after his confined family with murderous intent. Before this however, the movie occasionally gets too close to taking itself a little too seriously considering the absurdity of the story. There's some scenes early on in which Anthony Hopkins obsesses over a quest for berries which was fucking hilarious and I still can't quite work out whether that was intentional or not. 

Speaking of taking-itself-too-seriously, people often slag of Russell Crowe for coming across as a bit up himself but fuck them because I think he's great. Although his Noah isn't exactly a sympathetic man, he's always watchable thanks to that mad ‘Travis Bickle’ glint in his eye that suggests he's kind of glad that a real rain has finally come down to wash away all the whores, skunk pussies, buggers, queens, fairies, dopers and junkies. Perhaps more credit though should go to Jennifer Connelly who has the more thankless task of reminding the audience of Noah's hidden goodness by cowering from him and crying for an hour or so. Oh, and when she's not doing that, she's out preparing for the flood by trying to find a workable womb for her sons to impregnate whilst completely ignoring the option of simply taking one for the team. In fact, incest does seem to be another theme running through this film as in order to repopulate the world they only have one girl, Emma Watson, with them who’s not only been raised as a sister to the boys but also turns out to be barren anyway. Having not seen her in much else, it is nice to see Watson having a post-Potter career by competently portraying the anguish of a girl who has a Fault in her Chamber of Secrets. Still, the incest thing is again more of a problem with the Bible than it is this film with it here simply adding to the whole Star Wars-y vibe that I mentioned before.

Master and Commander: The Early Years

I suppose the real star of the film is, as is often the case with Aronofky's films, the composer Clint Mansell whose soundtrack is predictably phenomenal here. I guess I have nothing else to add to that point except that I recommend you check it out on YouTube... and then listen to everything else he's done whilst you're at it because his work is fucking amazing. Aronofsky himself too reminds us he's in charge here with the odd creative flourish such as a weird montage of birds flying and a cool scene in which cells divide and begin to evolve through time. It's kind of like that Fatboy Slim music video for Right here, Right now but here sadly ends just short of the creature turning into a short fat man in a T-Shirt saying, “I'm Number one so why try harder?” Anywho, as ever, I’ve waffled on for far too long so I'll end it here by saying that a lesser Aronofsky film is still a more satisfying prospect than a good effort from most other filmmakers. If you've not already seen Noah then my advice would be to ignore the religious criticisms and if anything, just make an effort to see the film if only to piss them off. But then what do I know? As I said in the opening paragraph, I'm not an atheist- I'm an agnostic, so maybe the fruitcakes are right all along. After all, God’s flood was designed to wipe out the evils of man and seems as the world is now run by such angels as the cuddly Putin, the maternal Mugabe and the self-deprecating Kim Jong Un, I suppose there must have been some divine help in creating our Utopian World of Peace. Ha then again... What a load of old shit. 

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Come With Me If You Want To Live

Due to it consisting exclusively of scroungers, deadbeats, nutters and fuckwits, if I can avoid my mums family then I damn-well will. However thanks to some recent bullshit I accidentally found myself on the Facebook profile of one of my seventeen year old cousins who I'd not laid eyes on in over a decade. Despite having refused to do a days work in her short and pointless life, it seems that right now the fat, skanky little tart is living freely in her own flat after having pushed offspring out from her slutty little minge. In the job section of her profile she had simply written, “I'm a full-time Mummy <3”, which was a sentence that annoyed me so much that my eyes burst and sprayed blood everywhere. Between my Aunty and her current partner, the two alpha-rats have created eleven children who, as in the case of my teenaged cousin, have also began to pop out their own ugly, state funded mutants. Like a plague of human filth, they breed, consume, and die having contributed nothing to society beyond being a constant supply of brain-dead guests for those shit chat-shows in which toothless yokels scream blue murder at each other after stealing from people who work. Urgh... To conclude this rant I'll get to the point... Believe it or not but the life cycle of these parasitic clagnuts is actually encouraged by the film The Terminator... kind of!

I'm going to hope that everybody on the planet has seen this film although for the sake of those suffering from head trauma, I suppose I'll do a quick recap. Basically, in the future, humanity is at war with the machines because they're better than us and we have this pissy little habit of not wanting to die. To try and scupper our resistance, the robots initiate the standard war time procedure of travelling back through time and murdering our leader’s mum Sarah Connor before she can give birth to him. I actually think that Churchill was planning to do that to Hitler before the Americans finally got their shit together and found some perspective. Also at the same time as this, humanity has also sent Sarah a soldier for protection because we need her alive and the tacky haired bitch seemed oddly underprepared. I suppose this was back in the 80's when most women weren't expecting to be randomly slaughtered by a naked, psychopath with bright red-eyes... Ah who doesn't feel a tinge of nostalgia for our pre-bathsalts days?!

Cum with me if you want to live...

Okay so from this point on I'm going to just assume that you've popped your Terminator cherry as I can't be arsed over-explaining everything and I'll be going into some spoilers... If you've not seen the film then from here on you should probably just fuck off and repair that half life that you've so far wasted the shit out of.... Anyway, so obviously the film is a classic blah, blah, blah... However if I have one question it is simply this- what was it about the 1980's that resulted in so many films following a main character as they to trick their dad into fucking their mum? Not only was there Back To The Future's creepy love triangle of incest but this too! John Connor gives his soldier mate a picture of his mum as spaffing-rations before sending him back through time to future spunk her into getting pregnant. This baby then grows up to be John which means that his mate who he got all hot and bothered with the sexy MILF pics turned out to be his own dad?! And I thought my friends were motherfuckers... But then if John had to send his dad back in time to screw himself out of his mum then how did that happen in the first place? Because presumably there's a point where the future hasn't happened yet and she's not able to get pregnant because she's not met the man who'll give her the unborn baby that'll hook them up... Err what? More confusingly of all though, how could anybody ever send their dad on a mission to fuck themselves out of their own mum? I mean seriously... These films were made to be fun and yet just the thought of that makes me want to dribble vomit down my tits in disgust. 

...And this is where all that stuff regarding my useless bag-of-puss family comes into it. If you pay close attention to Terminator 2: Judgement Day then you'll discover that it is set ten years after the first film with Sarah Connor apparently now being twenty-nine years old. This means that in The Terminator when she gets boned by the scratty looking soldier, she must have only been about eighteen or nineteen years old. Nothing wrong with that I suppose except for the fact that she’s not in a steady relationship, she's jobless and now she's got a child to bring up too. Who’s going to pay for that little bastard I wonder? Not only that but because her child is meant to be Earth’s saviour, we're all meant to be happy that this gullible mullet ends up hanging a crusty donut. Subconsciously this film is putting into kids minds that an unplanned teen pregnancy is both cool and acceptable...

I realise that this point is kind of anticlimactic in comparison to the indulgently long slurry of bile about my family at the beginning. Nor do I really believe an adult film should worry about being watched by children. But you know... It's my blog and sometimes I like to find reasons to call my relatives, “alpha rats” and “fuckwits”. To make up for this I'll distract you by quickly justifying the statement about kids being influenced by this when it is clearly a film for adults. Basically, children are fucking devious and will get whatever they want. I wanted to see it when I was younger and so to get around the watchful eye of my parents I simply asked my confused nan (from dad's side) to tape it off the television for me. She didn't know what the fuck it was and my parents didn't know what she'd done as 'Schwarzenegger' is a difficult word to spell. For a good few weeks I had a video lying around my room with a title written on in old lady scribble calling it, “Some Arnold Sharonarroneger thing”. It would have been the perfect crime had I not then spent the next few weeks finding any opportunity to leave rooms just to have an excuse to announce, “I'll be back”.

"I yam an gooood yaactoorr"

Other than being a contributing factor to my estranged fucking relatives though, The Terminator is obviously a complete masterpiece. If I'm being honest, it's probably also quite a small influence on their breeding in the grand scheme of things but still... There are plenty of things that make this film as great as it is but let’s face it, Arnie is probably the main one. I'm a huge Schwarzenegger fan and although I admit that he has been involved in some truly terrible movies he's also been in a lot of great ones too. I need to see Batman and Robin again about as desperately as I need a swift kick to an open wound on my bollocks but surely nobody can deny the genius of Total Recall or Predator? I love the fact that in real life he managed to take over a state of America by constantly quoting an out of context catchphrase but I'm also glad he's back on our screens now. He was away for ten years and it's about time he returned to what he was made for and starred in some brand new classics... Preferably that aren't also part of The Expendables franchise which as far as I'm concerned just looks too much like an explosive Hollywood remake of the British sitcom Dad's Army. I don't think that Arnie is the greatest actor of all time but I think he's better than some people give him credit for. In fact I would even argue that his only real problem is his distracting accent which although ‘cool’, it makes everything he says sound like he's just fallen down a massive hole. Arnie is capable of great acting when he finds the right part and with the right director to guide him. In this case it just so happens that for the role of an almost silent machine that simply cannot show any human emotion whatsoever... he's perfect!

To kind of conclude, I guess it's interesting to note that director James Cameron pulled the same trick with this franchise that he did with the Alien one too. Whereas this part-one is a kind of slasher/horror film, part-two then switched genres to become much more focused on action. I'm still quite a fan of the shitter films that came after those first couple and I'm quite looking forward to part five although I've no clue what the story will be. So far for that they've just cast both John and Sarah Connor with Sarah being interestingly younger than her son. Does this mean that we'll be travelling back in time to meet her as a teenager again? Possibly! The way this incestuous franchise works it really wouldn't surprise me either if John ended up being sent back to protect her just so he could fuck her and become his own dad. Meh, I'm optimistic either way and I guess we'll have to just wait and see! 

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