Postdog

OK, with certain actors, you know what sort of film to expect if you've seen a couple of them already. Van Damme falls into this category, and having seen quite a few of them already, I thought I'd give this a shot when it was on Telly the other night. I expected it to be an undemanding action flick with JCVD doing a bit of martial arts and saving the day at the end, and in that respect I was right.

The plot outline is basically a mix of "Under Siege 2", "Outbreak" and "The Cassandra Crossing", all fine films in their own right. Granted, Under Siege 2 is hardly a masterpiece, but I'm using the same criteria of knowing what to expect before you see it, and if I have to watch two similar films, I would rather watch that one than this.

It wasn't the actual story that made this so awful - as I said, on it's own it's a run of the mill action film and in that respect no worse than many others. What made this so bad was what I can only describe as arty farty direction and production. At one point in the film it went into a split screen, one bit following one character, the other bit another. I think the premise behind it was that both bits of action were happening at the same time and both ended at the same time so you might as well show both at the same time. This made it difficult to follow exactly what was going on because you didn't know who to watch.

Later on it got worse. No more split screens, but you'd be watching a piece of action, and it would suddenly for a second or two switch angles, freeze frame, or go back a second or so, and you just could not follow it without getting a headache. More "cuts" like this occurred throughout the remainder of the film, and towards the end I'd just had enough. I'm not going to say what happened exactly, but it involved another train, and at that point I'd had enough. I "watched" the ending on fast forward (fortunately I had recorded it rather than watch it live) and the silliness continued.

JCVD may be a big name, but he is not a great actor and he does not make great films. If you watch his films you know this already, but to be fair, if that's what you want to watch, most are actually watchable. This one is not!

And by that, I mean probably the only one he actually acts in.

I'm not really a fan of Sly's. Yeah, I've watched his films over the years, all the rocky's, all the Rambo's (First Blood was best but despite seeing it about 6 times I still cannot make out what he says at the end of the film), Daylight, Cobra, Nighthawks, Judge Dredd, Cliffhanger, Demolition Man and a few others. The point I'm making is that I will watch him, but I won't go out of my way or pay good money to do so. I basically find most of his stuff just run of the mill.

The original "Get Carter" was and is one of my favourite all time films, it being released about the time I became an adult, so I never went out of my way to watch this version (The same could be said for another Caine film remade, "The Italian Job" - I'll maybe watch it if it's on TV and there is nothing else, but aside from that, no).

Anyway, the Stallone "Get Carter" was on TV last night, and as I usually do with films like this, I set the video so I could watch it later, or not watch it later if it turns out to be rubbish. I watched it this morning because I had a few hours to kill, and I was surprised. Now nothing is going to compare with the original as far as I'm concerned, and side by side, the original wins hands down, but as a stand alone movie - and a stand alone Stallone movie to boot - I must admit I was pleasantly surprised and enjoyed it thoroughly. I genuinely think it's the best film Sly has ever made.

This film was on TV today, and being a big McCloud fan from the 70's, I thought I'd watch is. As a McCloud film, I enjoyed it, but as a Londoner and a Brit, I cringed, as this film followed the stereotype of London and England I have seen in so many films. For the benefit of everyone, please note that London is not split into tourist spots and dingy East end pubs, we no longer have fog (OK, that wasn't in this film but I saw that in a recent Murder She Wrote), and the countryside is not littered with posh country mansions (as depicted in this and MSW). Most importantly, apart from a few lines dedicated as tourist attractions, steam trains have not run on our railways since the 60's.

OK, I realize I'm too late for the programmes mentioned as they were made in the late 80's, but even then they should have known better - I appreciate London and England being put on the cinematic map, but I would enjoy them more if they were more realistic, and I just hope the lesson has been learnt.