Charlies Angels - Full Throttle (unrated)

Fallen Angel

Charlies Angels 
Full Throttle (unrated)
USA 2003 Directed by McG
Columbia Blu Ray Zone B

Warning: Angelic spoilers unleashed.

Okay, I’ve revisited Charlie’s Angels Full Throttle again and, I have to say, I was disappointed that the Blu Ray and various home video releases available in the UK are still the original, cut down and censored theatrical cut of the movie. Well, I wasn’t having any of that so I upgraded from my DVD of the old unrated US edition of the movie to a new US Blu Ray edition of the same, so I could once again watch the slightly sexier version of the movie, including extra blood splashes gushing out of the mouths of the Angels when they are hit in the face (which may not seem like much to some but, hey, I won’t abide censorship). So I’m now finding out that the UK is the only country which doesn’t have the uncut version released in some format so, yeah, if you want to watch this movie properly, make sure you import the unrated edition over from the states (and make sure your player can play the correct zone/region into which it’s been encoded over there) . 

Now, I’m still not sure why this brilliant movie failed at the box office when the first one was so loved by audiences. I remember taking the day off work so I could see this in its first day in cinemas (in the theatrical version, naturally) and I absolutely loved it and assumed it would be a big hit again. I mean, everything seems a tad more than the first film and, well, what’s wrong with that? Clearly, not everyone agreed with me. 

This one starts, just like the first film, with a pre-credits, end of mission action sequence zooming in from the Columbia lady logo, featuring the three angels played by Drew Barrymore, Lucy Liu and Cameron Diaz but, unlike the first film, it directly relates to the plot of the rest of the movie. Following both that and a second parody of the old TV series opening credits, we go straight to a scene where Bruce Willis, in a cameo, is shot by a masked assailant... who later turns out to be his already ex-wife Demi Moore playing an ex-Angel... who is the brains behind the whole criminal operation. Add in more fun with an evil ex-boyfriend of Barrymore’s character and absolutely heaps of action and we get what, to me, seemed then and does now, like a rollicking good, highly entertaining, female-centric action movie.

And, like I said, everything seems a little more. The idea of using completely different colour palettes for each scene seems, somehow, much more blatant, for example... the pre-credits scene where Bruce Willis gets killed is lit entirely in blue (or possibly with a blue filter over everything) and a scene later, which is a parody of an episode of CSI, is lit entirely in red like an old photographer’s developing room. And another scene where the lighting is so stylised is in a parody of the prison release scene from the remake of Cape Fear. And, as I’m describing this, you can already see that there are absolutely loads of pop culture references scattered about the movie. 

For instance, the CSI parody scene uses the old The Who song, Who Are You? which I believe was used as the theme tune to one of the variants of CSI and, I believe I’m right in saying Cameron Diaz is made up to look like one of the male stars of that show in this scene? And Bernard Herrmann’s famous Cape Fear theme is also used in a few places in the movie, to push the obsessive nature of Barrymore’s ex-boyfriend’s obsession with killing her in revenge for his long imprisonment. 

Among other such confections, some of the more interesting references include a reunion at Rydell High School (although, sadly, none of the stars of the Grease films turn up for this) and at least two references to Singin’ In The Rain, one with the Good Morning couch gag at the end of the M C Hammer dance number near the start of the movie and the other is, for people who know the 1952 musical well, a parody of the “Zelda! Oh, Zelda!” moment at the film premiere scene at Hollywood. 

There are also quite a few cameo appearances by a whole host of people including Pink (who is in scene while one of her songs written for the movie is played in the background), Carrie Fisher as the Mother Superior where a back story origin of the popular villain from the first movie, the ‘creepy, thin man’ played again by Crispin Glover, takes place (the Playboy Mansion stands in as the building used for the convent here) and John Cleese as Lucy Liu’s father. Of course, one nice apparition of a cameo is actress Jaclyn Smith, reprising her role as original TV Angel Kelly Garrett, to offer a bit of advice to Drew Barrymore when she’s in trouble. 

And speaking of returning Angels, I can’t find any mention of it now but my understanding is, one was asked to return and definitely didn’t. I remember reading at the time that Kate Jackson was asked to reprise her original TV role as Sabrina Duncan, as the rogue angel gone bad... but she didn’t want to show her old character in a bad light... so the name was changed and Demi Moore (who to be fair, does look a little like her in this movie), took the role instead. Again, I don’t have any evidence now that this was the case but I certainly remember reading this back in 2003 at some point. 

Whatever the case, catching up with this now, I’m amazed that this one did so poorly at the box office. I was waiting for another sequel for a while before I realised this one must have bombed... it’s a great shame because McG directed two absolutely stunning Charlies Angel’s films and, frankly, Full Throttle certainly doesn’t let the first movie down in any way. I loved it then and I love it now. This one will always be on my top tier Hollywood action movie recommend list, along with the first. Don’t turn your back on this one, it’s fantastic. 

Charlies Angels (2000)

 

Angel Delight

Charlies Angels (2000)
USA 2000 Directed by McG
Columbia Blu Ray Zone B

I remember when I first saw the first Charlie’s Angels movie at the cinema back in 2000. I’d remembered I half liked the TV show as a kid back in the 1970s but nothing had prepared me for this particular experience, which is easily one of the greatest American action movies of the decade coupled with art design which elevated it far beyond the expectations of its target audience. I think I saw it about five times at the cinema and, I’m glad I did because, you can’t see that cut anymore, it turns out. I’ll get to that later.

Okay, so the film opens with an earlyish example of company logo vandalism where, after the Columbia torch lady comes up, the camera pans to the side and around her into the sky next to her, before transforming into the sky around a passenger aeroplane to establish the setting for the first scene. Now cinema adaptations of old TV shows were not always successful and hadn’t quite gotten into their stride in terms of the new ones around at this time. We’d had Mission Impossible at the cinemas (which I didn’t see for at least another fifteen years, you can read my review of it here) but director McG obviously knew there would be a certain amount of cynicism attached to a remake of Charlie’s Angels, loved by so many people back in the day.

So he deals with it all right out of the starting blocks, in one of the most riveting and silly opening sequences of the year, completely winning over this audience member and, judging by how successful this first movie was, quite a lot of people. He cleverly starts it off in a slow journey with the camera around the interior of an aircraft with not an Angel in sight. Then we follow a character played by L. L. Cool J, who makes contact with a minor villain for this segment. The rich colours of the aircraft include a lot of red and the look of the film is all important in terms of bombarding the audience with some eye popping designs. Then the script does a very clever thing, after the villain reveals he has a time bomb strapped to him which is counting down... he starts watching an inflight movie which is a fake remake of the old TV series T. J. Hooker and, the two chat briefly about how they hate stupid movie remakes of TV shows. So, yeah, McG already undermines any audience reaction that the film is not, at the very least, self aware and then, he suddenly speeds everything up and piles us into an action sequence... as L. L. Cool J opens the plane doors, throws out the villain and jumps out after him. He’s joined by Lucy Liu’s Angel character called Alex mid air and, the two of them manage to get the bomb off the bad guy and then drop him, with themselves, into Cameron Diaz’s waiting speedboat, Diaz playing Angel Natalie. 

It’s at this point that L. L. Cool J takes a voice changer out of his mouth and pulls his face off, to reveal it was a mask used for the third and, behind the scenes, most important of the Angels, Dylan, played by Drew Barrymore. It was Barrymore who had already bought the rights to the show before the film went into production and it was her who stood to make a fortune from the success of the movie (and its sequel, which she did to the tune of $40 million for the first one and, although not confirmed, $80 million for the less successful but, equally fun sequel).

Then, in a brilliant move to get fans on the side of the movie even more, we hear the voice of John Forsythe, the original voice of Charlie, who is reprising the role for this and the next one, as McG takes us on a parody remake of the original TV show title sequence, including some nods in scene reconstructions from the original show. It’s brilliant, uses a new version of the original theme music over some of it and, yeah, this is the way you overcome a reluctant audience... with sheer brilliance. 

And then the film somehow manages to keep going even stronger, as it reveals the new Bosley (played by Bill Murray), a red herring villain played by Tim Curry, a brilliant action henchman, The Thin Man, played by Crispin Glover (his real life dad tried to kill James Bond in Diamonds Are Forever, reviewed here), Luke Wilson, Matt LeBlanc, Tom Green, Kelly Lynch and the truly brilliant Sam Rockwell. 

And it’s a nice enough story of industrial espionage disguising the true intentions of the villanous antagonists of the film, who really were a fairly good twist reveal about two thirds of the way through the movie. It’s another old story but any weaknesses in the script (which went through at least thirty drafts by numerous writers because they wanted to get it right... there’s a reason why this film seems so polished at all levels), which are few and far between, are more than carried by the combinations of criminally good acting, imaginative fight choreography, some amazing dance sequences and some beautiful set designs with every different scene bringing in a strong, themed colour palette significantly different from each preceding scene. 

It’s also quite innovative in terms of what they do with the camera in this one... so, for instance, those amazing high speed push/pull Vertigo-like zooms during the off circuit racing car chase or, during that same sequence, the way lorries rushing in front of each car in a side view are used as very fast transitions to cut between the two cars. It’s amazing stuff and the film is full of little jolts of brilliance like this, giving the whole production a very highly stylised feel, almost like a comic book. The director himself, if I’m remembering correctly from the time, said the film takes place in ‘Angel time’, a kind of heightened, beautiful alternative to real life... which would explain, I guess, why opening the plane door to save all the passengers at the start didn’t result in all the passengers getting sucked out to their death.

I have one big criticism with the movie plus, a fair few criticisms of the home video releases of the film. Let me get started on the thing which totally popped me out of the film and my seat when I saw this the first time at the cinema. There’s a big, bold cue at one point in the film and it’s composer Akira Ifikube’s Godzilla leitmotif. As soon as I heard this my mind was like, “No way” and I was expecting a sophisticated joke based on one or more kaiju eiga. Instead, it becomes clear after about five seconds that it’s just been used as an opening and sample base for a piece of modern techno music, which the director was using from one of many (probably no comparison for an original score where this movie goes) needle drop musical selections. So yeah, that was disappointing.

Now, the 15 rated version of the movie as released in UK cinemas is longer than any other country’s versions and stuff like a full on sequence involving nunchucks never made it to home video, which is a damn shame and should not be censored, especially since the UK always had a ban on the weapons being included in films until around about this period (yeah, you can guess what looking at a UK home video version of Enter The Dragon was like before this point... this is why God invented mulitregion players). I also happen to remember.... although nobody else I know seems to (perhaps they didn’t do multiple cinema trips like I did) that the drive through hamburger scene near the start of the movie included an exchange of dialogue with a bit of a put down by the Angels directed at the burger seller... I remember it being the only false note/crack in the ‘nice gal’ facade of the Angels and felt it was just out of place. Well, if I didn’t imagine that scene (and I’m pretty damn certain I didn’t), then I guess somebody on the film also realised it didn’t promote empathy with the angels and, the scene is significantly shorter on the home video version, for sure. 

Those minor grumbles aside though... I’d have to say that Charlie’s Angels by McG is still a pretty great art/action spectacle with some beautiful, innovative sequences which I think a lot of today’s modern film students could learn a lot of lessons from. An absolute classic which is maybe a little dated already in some of the attitudes on display but, yeah, who cares about that kind of stuff when it’s put together so well. My one warning to viewers is... don’t waste your money on the cheapo, UK Blu Ray double pack edition as I did... as the version of the sequel, Charlie’s Angel’s Full Throttle, is not the proper, full on unrated US cut of the movie, but the standard theatrical, ‘sans blood spraying every time someone gets hit in the face’ version of the film. If you want the full, unrated version of the sequel on Blu Ray, you need to pay out the extra for the US edition of the film which clearly states it has both cuts on there (as I have just done, once I discovered which print of the film was on the second disc). This is disgraceful behaviour by the UK distributors based, I would suspect, on the fact that they don’t want to shell out the cash to resubmit the longer cut to the admittedly evil UK film censors at the BBFC.

Presence

Wrapped Attention

Presence
Directed by Steven Soderbergh
USA 2024
Extension 765
UK cinema release print.

Warning: Very light suggestion of a spoiler.

I don’t know. You wait ages for a new Steven Soderbergh movie to come out and then two come along at once.

Now I find Soderbergh quite hit and miss as a director but he has done some excellent movies in the past. I was surprised, however, when I sat down in the cinema the other week, to find two back to back trailers advertising two new films directed by Soderbergh and also both written by David Koepp. Both looked, at the very least, pretty interesting. The second of the two, Black Bag, will presumably be upon me before I even know it but the first of these, Presence, was the one I was most looking forward to because it’s marketed, inevitably because of the vibe the camerawork gives off, as a horror movie.

Now Presence is not, technically,  a horror movie but it does have a strong supernatural content and although there is a certain lurking fear of the unknown as part and parcel of every shot of the picture, it’s ultimately more of a drama which happens to feature a ghost. And that ghost is… well it’s certainly someone but, for the majority of the film where the identity of said spirit is withheld, that ghost is you. The audience watching the movie. Because the Presence of the title is a point of view, roving camera representing the audience looking through the eyes of the ghost. And that’s every shot of the movie and those shots are composed of mostly long takes with lots of smooth, languorous, fluid camera movement.

The story of the film is about a family that moves into a house which, yeah, definitely has a spirit in it... lurking and waiting for this family (as it turns out, specifically this family) to buy the property and move in. The family consists of a mother, played by Lucy Liu, who has made a big mistake at work which could possibly get her in trouble. Then there’s the husband, played by Chris Sullivan, who is possibly involved with some kind of shady dealings which is hinted at (much to his regret). Then we have the two kids… the athletic, pain in the neck brother Tyler, played by Eddy Maday and his sister Chloe, played by Callina Liang, who has just lost her two friends from an unusual double drug overdose. And it’s the sister Chloe who is the main subject of the ghost’s attention, via the camera eye of the audience. Is the ghost in love with her? Is it the ghost of her dead best friend watching over her? Well, all I will say on that count is, the secret behind the death of the friend is actually very relevant to the drift of the story… just not in the way you may at first think.

And then Tyler’s new college friend, played by West Mulholland, comes into the picture and he also seems to have an interest in Chloe (much to the ghost’s outrage, expressed in one scene where he and Chloe are trying to have sex). And then there’s the character of a psychic, who eventually enters the picture once the family realise that there’s definitely something going on in the house… and she’s both the blessing and the curse of the film.

A blessing because she’s obviously there to lay a few ground rules about the nature of the ghost to the audience, so that there is a sense of understanding of what’s going on later… but also a curse because, once I’d gotten an angle on the… let’s call them temporal traits of the spirit in question… I was much less surprised by the ending. I figured the ghost could only be one person and, while I got the identity of the person slightly wrong… and only because I was expecting the writer to go the whole hog and pull off a complete ‘bootstrap paradox’ at the conclusion... I was pretty close in all the bits which are important to that ending. However, because the slight mistake I made on identity, I still got a kick out of the very last shot of the movie, where the ghost is revealed in a silver nitrate mirror, as made by the Victorians (and since it’s Soderbergh and Koepp, the other cinematic connotations of silver nitrate must also surely have been in the minds of the writer and director).

And the film is absolutely brilliant, as far as I’m concerned. My expectations were somewhat lowered by a review I’d heard and also some bad word of mouth on the film but, for me I think this is an early contender for one of the best movies of the year, to be honest. The cinematography is hypnotic and the real tension of the movie comes from various characters looking into the camera as they sense the ‘presence’ nearby. It’s nicely scored too and, due to the obvious format choices, certainly has a nice fly-on-the-wall, immersive feel to it. The actors were all great too, which helps a lot because the way they were written and performed (though I suspect there was maybe some improvisation going on too) means you really care about what happens to them (and something does happen to at least one of them, for sure).

So that’s me done with Presence and it’s a solid recommendation from me on this one. Bring on the Blu Ray.

Red One

 

The Long
List Goodnight

Red One
USA/Canada 2024
Directed by Jake Kasdan
MGM

I actually wanted to see Red One when it came out at the cinema but, alas, it was released in November over here in the UK and I really try not to watch Christmas films out of season (aka, out of December!) so I waited a few weeks. Weeks in which my perception of the film was changed by word of mouth... both from audiences who had seen it on Twitter and, yeah, it took an equally bad pasting from the critics too. So it would be true to say that, by the time I got to see this movie for myself (aka, in December!), my expectations for the movie had plummeted way below zero.

But I did see it and, what can I say? Once again I am reminded why the opinions of both fellow audience members and a bunch of professional critics should sometimes be taken with a pinch of salt. Frankly, I loved Red One. It was everything I was expecting from a big budget Christmas movie plus, had the unexpected bonus of being cannily well thought through and a lot more clever than I think people realise.

So at the start of the film we are introduced to Jack O'Malley played by Chris Evans (I suspect taking on this role to further shed his squeaky clean Captain America image). He’s a somewhat criminal hacker known as The Wolf who is wanted by organisations like the FBI all over the world (in order to try and recruit him) and who, in his opening heist, shows that he would sink so low as to steal candy from a baby. At some point he is anonymously hired by someone to find the co-ordinates of an undisclosed location. Which he does, not realising he gives the villain of the film, played by Kiernan Shipka, the information required so her team can abduct Santa Claus, played by the always brilliant J. K. Simmons, for her own, world threatening and evil ends.

Meanwhile, Santa’s number one bodyguard Cal Drift, played by Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, part of E.L.F (Enforcement Logistics and Fortification) needs to get Santa back for his annual Christmas run in two days time. So, working with Zoe, who runs a kind of ‘mythical creatures police’ organisation, played by Lucy Liu, he recruits the cynical, world weary Jack to help him find where Santa has been taken.

Tolerating their differences before the expected male bonding, they follow the leads and punch their way through various adversaries to give a crowd pleasing conclusion to the film, aided by E.L.Fs technology such as a device which shrinks and grows toys and people to be used as equipment for the mission (such as toys like Hot Wheels cars for transport, Raving Bonkers robots... which I think were known as Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots in the USA... and so on). So yeah, you get some Ant-Man style shenanigans in the action sequences too but, apart from getting a nice joke around Jack, who upon seeing how the toys are enlarged and made practical immediately asks a shop owner if he has a Wonder Woman action figure... there actually is a really vital logic as to why Santa and E.L.F would actually have this specific technology in their arsenal in the first place (but I’m trying to do this without spoilers so, just keep a look out in the last sequence of the film to find just how this comes in handy if you are Santa).

And, as I said above, I loved it. It’s got its heart in the right place, has some great action scenes (like fighting giant sized killer snowman on a tropical beach), shoe horns in some nice moments with Krampus and, yeah, in my opinion has some good chemistry going between the leads. Added to this it’s got a great, dynamic score by the great Henry Jackman which keeps things going but, alas, is not issued on a CD at time of writing.

So yeah, sorry if it deflects any credibility on my part but, I had a really good time with Red One and I hope it gets a Blu Ray release at some point soon so I can show it to my folks next Christmas. An entertaining movie, I reckon.

Shazam! Fury Of The Gods

Nicked Fury

Shazam! Fury Of The Gods
USA 2023 Directed by David F. Sandberg
Warner Bros
UK cinema release print

Warning: Very minor spoilers but there’s no way I’m giving away the ending or the really important cameo in this review.

Wow. This film is awesome. And if you want to take that as my final, less detailed verdict of the film so you don’t feel like you need to read to the end, please do so.

And it’s not just the awesome cameo towards the end of the movie where an amazing character restores a semblance of the status quo to things here... although that scene was so brilliant it had me crying by the finish. Nope... the whole film is a great, fun and respectful sequel to the first movie, which was a little better than this but... this being only slightly less better than absolutely brilliant is still pretty good, I reckon.

Okay, there are a few negative criticisms I have to make about this one and I’ll get those out of the way first because, yeah, they don’t even begin to make a negative dent in the movie and I can’t wait to get this thing on Blu Ray (partially because I saw this at Cineworld and I’m guessing the physical copy will be more in focus than how they projected it there).

So, okay, I was disappointed that the big dramatic beat from the first one of Mary Bromfield (still not yet revealed in this iteration as really being Mary Batson, Billy’s sister he didn’t even know he had) getting into college is sidelined to a throwaway scene explaining why she didn’t go. I thought the emotional investment in this character set up in the first film wasn’t given it’s due, to be honest.

Another negative thing was... I didn’t quite understand the physics of the big dome utilised by the villains in this one. It has certain physical properties in one scene which are completely forgotten about in a later scene but, yeah, I guess anything is possible when you’re dealing with magic.

Thirdly, but not so much of a big deal... one of the best lines in the trailers for the movie, about throwing a truck at a dragon, didn’t make final cut... which is a shame. However, the pacing of the scene in question is such that it would have slowed things down unnecessarily and been less credible so I suspect it was better out than in, in this instance.

That’s it. Those are my only negative things about the film. The rest is absolutely brilliant and I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. The cast from the original film, including stand up performances by Asher Angel as Billy Batson, Zachary Levi as Captain Marvel (because, two fingers up at Marvel who ‘legally acquired the name for one of their own characters... luckily, many audience members past a certain age can still remember what the name of the Worlds Mightiest Mortal is), Jack Dylan Grazer as Freddy Freeman (like the first movie, he’s basically the lead kid in this film), Grace Caroline Currey as Mary Bromfield (and Mary Marvel... again, lets call her by her real character name for the purposes of this review) and a load of other returners are all great here. And, by golly they sure fooled me in the first film because, apparently, this is Grace Caroline Currey’s first time playing her super hero alter ego. The girl they had in the first film (which I reviewed here) looked so much like her I just assumed it was the same actress playing both roles in that one so... yeah, don’t know why they bothered with someone else in the original.

And this lot are joined by some nice additions including a couple of super villains played by Dame Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu and, also, a nice turn from Rachel Zegler (in her second film, after playing Maria in Spielberg’s quite good remake of West Side Story). Plus a couple of cameos but, seriously, that one towards the end of the picture... absolutely gave me a huge rush of emotion (while simultaneously keeping me angry at James Gunn... more on that anger in a little while). One thing I did miss was the sequel set up from the post credits of the previous movie but... the final post credits scenes here (there are two of them) is very much a sequel to the post credits of the first. So, yeah, if the direction of DC hadn’t suddenly changed then that talking earth worm ‘Mr. Mind and the Society Of Evil’ adaptation story may well have been coming along at some point.

I’m not covering the plot here but the film is full of great little references both to other comic book characters (including little digs at rival company Marvel) and also some great pop culture references in general. Such as the ‘pediatrician’ scene from the trailer... I’d already spotted the haunted doll from The Conjuring movies in the shot in the previews but I’m happy to say Annabelle remains in the finished movie here. And a nice moment where a guy on the street calls the main character Captain Marvel... and he’s not only played by Michael Gray, who used to play Billy Batson in the Shazam TV series in the 1970s but he’s even wearing the same t-shirt costume he wore in it. And, wow, I love the symmetry of having a character originally co-created for Fawcett Comics (before DC bought the rights years later) by C. C. Beck, get a score by composer Christophe Beck. I mean, I doubt they’re related but, even so.

Oh... and I’m not even going to say anything about the wonderful Unicorns or the fact that the makers of Skittles must have paid a fair amount of money for their quite prominent plot point of a product placement... but I don’t care because, even if it will date the movie some years from now, it was just delightfully done.

And, well, it’s such a good movie with a brilliant, post bad gal defeat denouement scene that, in light of the first of the post-credits scenes here, you just have to hate James Gunn’s new DCU ending policy even more. After Blue Beetle, The Flash and the second Aquaman movie have played out in cinemas later this year, the decision has been made to pull the plug on the current movie DC universe with even their most highly anticipated movie originally on the slate, Wonder Woman 3, completely cancelled. So no more Henry Cavill as Superman (as set up at the end of Black Adam) and no more Justice Society (not to mention the Justice League). The whole thing sucks but these movies are teasing and building towards a series of event movies that will now, unless DC does an about turn sometime very soon, won’t happen. So yeah, while I’d like to see another Wonder Woman and a Justice League/Justice Society team up movie where they take on Black Adam before becoming his ally to ward off some greater evil... it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen now. Which is a huge pity, especially after DC have finally seemed to have been gaining traction after their earlier cinematic efforts didn’t quite get things right, it all seems to have been scuppered... unnecessarily, it seems to me.

But don’t let that sourness put you off going to see what is probably the best superhero movie that’s going to be in cinemas this year. I suspect Shazam! Fury Of The Gods might well make my top ten movies of 2023, by the end of it... time will tell, I guess.