'Sharknado' (2013)

SHARKNADO: A Play-by-play Summary

As the movie opens, the viewer is treated to bountiful aerial shots of the Californian Coast. This is the final instance the film doesn't contain something ludicrous/outrageous. We're introduced to a fetching waitress shortly thereafter, who rebuffs an eccentric 'former surfing great' barfly's attempts to fondle her. She's also quick to dodge an inquiry pertaining to the most unrealistic looking scar since Potter's lightning bolt situated on her upper leg. She bristles at the mention of sharks. Meanwhile our protagonist is literally surfing up a storm out in the seawater, for an ominous and improbably fast moving storm begins to emerge on the skyline. When our protagonist starts a convo with a skilled fellow surfer, they have a fleeting comp to see who is the superior surfer. Then a shark is sprung and sadly sullies the low-key face off. The dorsal breaks the surface and the poor surfer is promptly dismembered. The man helpfully suggests to the ill-fated girl to "GET OUTTA THE WATER!". Yeh, that sorta isn't an immediate option considering that they're, you know, 100 yards or so offshore. 

Horrifying suspense.

Then the film scales priorly unseen levels of craziness as an arsenal of jaw-snapping, streamlined, computerized sharks bear down on the beach and start bowling over bathers left right & centre. The banquet is short-lived however, as it eventually occurs to onlookers that some hazardous shite is in progress, so they theatrically run away. Although you might observe some of the beach-goers tearing back & forth up and down the beach flailing their arms which is yet another bizarro element to this movie that can quite easily be missed. The viewer is then granted several shots of limbless, screaming people beachside before we go back into the bar. But not before the guy utters what might rival Casablanca's "Here's looking at you, kid" as the greatest line in movie history: "Sharks don't like Vegemite!"  Upon nursing his injured Aussie, jet-skier friend's wounds. 

Naturally, after witnessing the unspeakable horror just described, our band of main characters are joking and engaging in lively conversation back at the bar. Yes that's right, these people are bantering frivolously literally moments after the Carcaradon  carnage unfolded on the beach. Okay. Also, the main character simply chalks the shark influx up to 'just the storm', which would be like if I was playing monopoly and decided to rip the board game in two and throw the game pieces everywhere and proclaim that 'the storm outside made me do it, I'll be fine to carry on the game once the storm clears'. Anyhow, Included amongst this motley group is the self-described Tasmanian who was just mauled. Call me a pessimist but I'm a little unsure whether someone who less than an hour ago had a rapacious, mega shark latched onto his leg would be back at the bar so soon merrily joking with pals. However their repartee is curtailed by reports the storm is reforming and set to wreak increased havoc with sharks riding in its coattails. No sooner is this development imparted than a shark ploughs thru the establishment into the diner. No, really, that actually happened. I've heard of 'the customer's always right ' but 'the customers always BITE'?  The shark starts sliding itself around the floor snapping at patrons, before the aforementioned fetching waitress does the only thing you CAN do in this situation and impales the shark with a pool cue. Amazing.

Later, the Santa Monica pier is engulfed by the storm and the Ferris wheel rolls away, as our heroes attempt to flee the rapidly flooding city via car. It's upsetting to watch one of my favourite cities inundated but If I was that Ferris wheel, I'd roll away too, simply to escape the steadily worsening plot. The sharks are circling and apparently nudging at the car's underside with their noses, which is far too nonsensical to even flirt with scariness. The quartet decide to gun it, but not before the lecherous old eccentric coot from earlier is set upon and demolished by a shark/s. After roughly 3 seconds of feeling upset, they move on from his demise and push fwd, eventually seeking refuge at Tara Reid's house. Reid plays a perpetually pissed off ex-wife whom chastises her former husband as often as she can. It's a real acting stretch from Reid, whom delivers an award-worthy performance. And by award I of course mean Razzie award for the most obnoxious 'acting' of the year. Later, back at Reid's abode, and with raging floodwaters  torrenting outside, our heroes sit tight and try to wait the ordeal out. 

Attempts to convince Reid and her new boyfriend (a thoroughly loathsome character whom seems to naysay people before they even get a chance to say anything at all) that the streets are swimming with sharks prove unsuccessful. However the disbelieving boyfriend has no choice but to believe the sharky malarkey after he opens the front door only to be eaten immediately by a particularly nosy shark who thrashes its way across the threshold. The house begins to fill with water and The rest of the gang holed up in the house try to ward off their endothermic eaters-to- be, but their attempts to repel the ravening fish end up being quite, forgive me for this, TOOTHLESS. They eventually make for the partially submerged staircase to supposed safety. Later on, once they've left the house, they encounter a schoolbus of kids dangling precariously from a bridge with sharks dilly dallying about below. The less said about this scene the better, but our hero does manage to save people using elaborate abseiling equipment which was seemingly on hand the entire time. I guess the viewer isn't supposed to query why someone would randomly have a harness and various safety equipment with them on a whim. Then an aerial army of sharks are spotted twirling about in the atmosphere like propellers due to a tornado which is catalysing their skyward spinning. Wait a sec, tornado...+ sharks...= SHARKNADO! Now I know how they thought up the title, ingenious! Wait a go- portmanteau! Haha, I've heard of fly-fishing- but FLYING FISH! Boom

Later, they all happen upon a new hideout, a warehouse, which for reasons now unclear to me, is stacked to the rafters with various armaments. Some stuff then happens that give the term implausibility a bad name and eventually a helicopter scene occurs. Well, of course. It is hear where the cute waitress names the causer of her scar tissue- a shark- which in a heart-wrenching scene- she says the shark "grabbed my leg". There's a reference to Jaws here too, which is more of a filmic facepalm than nod considering Jaws' standing as one of Classical Hollywood's finest films and this film's status as valueless dreck. In a moment sure to induce quizzical looks, a hammerhead plummets from the sky and slams onto the torso of a man lying on the ground. Then the hero is swallowed by a shark holding a chainsaw which he uses to incise a hold in the shark's side which he climbs out of heroically. Embraces abound and Tara Reid finally gives us something other than a pouty, permanently displeased 'bad hair day' expression and truth be told I was actually happy for Tara. The movie basically sets fire to believability and throws its ashes off the end of the earth, so much so that I was half-expecting the film's cast to all link arms and perform a celebratory rendition of the song 'Car Wash' whilst twirling umbrellas at film's end. Alas, this didn't happen, I wish it happened

Best (worst) dialogue:

"Are they sharks?"

Bestest (badder) dialogue II: 

"I hate sharks."

Actual tagline:

Enough Said!

My tagline:

When the eye of a storm becomes the breeding ground for terror.

Movie Title Acrostic Poem:

Shit
Hilarity
As
Relatively
Klutzy
Ninnies
Adroitly  
Destroy 
Oceanic-beasts

Best character decision: 

I can't remember who it was but whoever decided to commandeer a chopper (that was laying around) and drop a bomb inside 'the eye of the tornado' deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. 


Conclusion: 
This film makes some of the most ridiculous movies you've seen look positively veracious. Once again, the titular creature is rendered a murderous villain which is also very irritating. Production values waver between woeful and very very mediocre and the performances leave a helluva lot to be desired. The dialogue is diabolical. So, yes, This is very poor tosh, but it's self-aware poor tosh, and it uses its ineptitude as ballast to draw laughs out of the viewer. Which it did. It was hilarious

Rating:

2.9/10

Grand Budapest Hotel (2014 film)

Wes Anderson's Grand Budapest Hotel makes an extremely strong (early) case for film of the year. Armed with Anderson's trademark quirkiness and brought to life with verve by a cast of terrific actors, Budapest is an original and frequently funny escapade that easily rivals prior films in the director's masterful canon.

 The film's events, which unfold at a frantic pace and hardly seamlessly, are relayed to the audience via the elderly 'Zero' (Abraham) who is narrating the backstory of the hotel to an unnamed author (Law). The film then jumps from the '80s to the point of view of Fiennes' Gustave H (perfectly cast), runner of the grand Budapest Hotel in the early 1930s whom talks in a rapid-fire fashion and wittily addresses his charges as he efficiently goes about running the establishment.

 A young emigre Zero (played by relative newcomer Tony Revolori) is the lobby boy who is serving an apprenticeship under H and does his mightiest to please his rather demanding mentor. When Gustave H is implicated in the murder of Madame Z, with whom he shared an unusual courtship, he and Zero are forced to evade authorities and ensure the survival and longterm wellbeing of their beloved hotel, after its inheritance by the devious son of the deceased (Adrien Brody). Included amongst all this is a very amusing, drawn out jailbreak, masterminded by a fellow inmate (Harvey Keitel). 

The film has all the markings of an Anderson film, an ensemble cast featuring many Anderson regulars (Bill Murray, Adrien Brody, Edward Norton amongst them), hallmark visual flourish (many shots resemble postcards, contrasted with yellowed, slight sepia look of others) as well as rococo intertitles, and an extremely dense (in terms of dialogue) screenplay which is consistently funny and quick-witted. The snow kart pursuit on an icy mountaintop before reaching the edge of a hazardous precipice, a high. 

Anderson's varied camerawork occasionally disorient and has the (welcoming) effect of swirling the viewer up in the maelstrom. Whereas Moonrise Kingdom was set on an isolated island, and Tenenbaums focused on the trials and tribulations of a family with a focus on kin relations and peculiarities, Budapest is an Odyssean quest of a film, globetrotting and regular changes of setting abound. 

The movie also benefits from the stentorian narration of veteran thespian F Murray Abraham who gives a further sense of what Zero was going through amid the chaos of the misadventure. Grand Budapest Hotel is a cut above, smart, amusing and dramatically involving, the sublime cast, distinct visuality and superb screenplay elevate this to 'excellent status'.

8.6/10

'The Smiths' by The Smiths (1984)

As far as debut records go, ‘the Smiths’ is a masterstroke.  An unqualified success, that nevertheless stirred controversy due to the, let’s say unorthodoxy, of the lyrical content. The product of a disillusionment or at least a semi-detachment and shared coldness towards early 80s Manchester context, a momentous, seminal band was borne. Here’s a band so unique, so singular, so...Smiths. It’s difficult to compare this legendary outfit to other artists simply because in many respects they’re pretty well a full-tilt subversion of the traditional ‘rock group’. Bombast and brash confidence are replaced by self-confessed “shyness”, unwieldiness and lyrics that delve into profound (but in terms of rock music, atypical) themes. Headlining the band is of course, Morrissey, the acerbic champion of all things awkward, lugubrious and even taboo. A terrific singer and a marvellously creative songwriter- Morrissey is able to fashion prosaic comments on day-to-day Mancunian existence into memorable, exceptionally witty parabolic melodies. Of course, Morrissey’s genius is only helped along by his extremely capable support- guitarist Johnny Marr’s furiously quick chord progressions and eternally novel riffs are an illustrious trademark of the quartet’s sound. Marr’s guitar playing is inarguably extraordinary, and in this debut record, it’s well and truly on show from the get go.

The Smiths was released in 1984- following on from the late 70s eruption of post-punk acts such as fellow Mancunians Joy Division, Public Image Ltd, The Chameleons, Simple Minds etc. the band were able to foster a totally original sound and a wholly distinct image and persona that will prove as enduring as any. A fairly bold move, one might say, is to begin your debut record with a cyclical, sprawling borderline 6-minute song. ‘Reel Around the Fountain’ get things underway and does so in a thoughtful, repeating fashion. The lyrics are evocative and historically have been misinterpreted, generating controversy and whatnot. Whatever the case may be, strong imagery is conjured in the form of a summertime setting, an out-of-the-way fountain, a desperate sense of longing, and quite apparently, deflowering of some kind.  The melody here is both catchy and tender, as is Morrissey’s drawn-out enunciations of the chorus and the line “People see no worth in you, oh, but I do.” In interview once, Morrissey said that “to caress the words” when singing is a virtue, and it’s difficult to argue with that considering the tenderness and sincerity he’s able to imbue in his vocals here. It’s also here that the following point must be stressed: The Smiths’ musicianship and vocals interlock like no other. They work in concert so harmoniously.

Once ‘Fountain’ dissipates (and it closes gracefully) the Smiths launches into the post-punk stridence of ‘You’ve Got Everything Now’, a matter-of-fact lamentation about how once subordinate classmates have now got much more to show for their lives than the song’s protagonist. Morrissey is oft as his most amusing here- curt admissions like “And what a terrible mess I’ve made of my life. Oh, what a mess I’ve made of my life” are wailed ruefully, but self-consciously over the top of Marr’s energized guitar play. It’s a rocky, fast-paced track and an edgy foil for its mellow predecessor. One of the band’s most schizophrenic efforts follow straight after- the randomly sped-up punk-rock of ‘Miserable Lie’. Don’t be fooled by its gentle introduction, for around 50 seconds in, the air of sorrow and pity turns to anger as Morrissey alludes to Wilde in his cynical critique on the shallow mindsets of so many. It’s a grower, this one, slightly off-putting and jarring on first listen, the song’s appeal rises to the surface through multiple listens. Morrissey also unleashes some falsetto at the midway point, which only heightens the sense of desperation when delivering lines like “I need advice, I need advice, nobody ever looks at me twice.”

The album’s forth track, ‘Pretty Girls Make Graves” has a sort of bouncy, undulating bassline and a biting, caustic lyric. It’s one of those oddly affecting tracks that has multiple play value due to its catchiness. The same cannot be said for its successor- ‘the Hand that Rocks the Cradle’ which is a superb song but markedly different and markedly less flippant. Slower, somewhat uncanny, and lyrically dense, images of changelings and Hammer Horror Films era and/or F.W. Murneau inspired monsters lurking about in the shadows come to mind here (“Ceiling shadows shimmy by. And when the wardrobe towers like a beast of prey...”), yet the vocals are delicate and affecting. It’s wonderfully tuneful and also sad, but also, as hinted earlier, rather eerie. Themes of obsession and an nonreciprocal affection seem to be the focal point here.

Before you know it, however, the moral murkiness of that song segues to the instantly recognisable, indelible riff of the hit song ‘This Charming Man’ (that is if you have the US version of the album, the track is omitted on other incarnations). Considered by many to be a standout in the band’s catalog, the song, in all its jangly guitar, semantic innuendoes and crooned vocals remains to this day a quintessential ‘Smiths’ song. Once the vivacity of the track fades, you’re once again assailed by a rip-roaring riff- punk-inspired and  thumping , it evokes the image of an aged steam engine ploughing down an antiquated rail-line, belching smoke and clanking its way towards  destruction. The song in question is ‘Still Ill’, a track that touches once again on disenchantment and hopelessness. However the song is not a downer, the lyric is at times cosmetically depressing but the song is still imbued with this sort of dark humour that propels the track into the stratosphere in terms of enjoyment, as Morrissey dispiritedly advises “And if you must go to work tomorrow, well if I were you I really wouldn’t bother, for there are brighter sides to life and I should know because I’ve seen them, but not very often.”  Faintly humorous, but heartfelt words.

The two-pronged attack of the classic ‘Hand in Glove’ and ‘What Difference Does It Make?” follows, and this twofer were (quite rightly) released as singles. The former particularly, is one of the band’s signature tunes, and features a line that Morrissey himself considers one his most cherished. Seemingly describing a special kind of relationship that transcends scorn from others and able to withstand external pressures, the protagonist speaks of fitting together with this other person,  as the title suggests, in harmony, or ‘hand in glove’.  Once again the track opens with this infectiously catchy jangle riff that is just so ‘Smiths’ in its sound, it’s very, very recognizable. What Difference Does it Make? is heavier, and denounces prejudice. The lyrics ring true, and the music is glorious, when those elements fire, what else need be said?  The mellower, sophisti-pop of ‘I Don’t Owe You Anything’ follows as the penultimate track, and it serves as a pleasant, agreeably midtempo  forerunner to the final song- perhaps the band’s most alternately sad and eerie work- entitled ‘Suffer Little Children’- a name inspired by a biblical passage found under the Gospel of Matthew. ‘Suffer Little Children’ boldly details  a harrowing and unspeakably tragic true crime case twenty years before (referred to as the Moors Murders) and is a tender tribute to those fallen, whilst saying that those responsible will “never dream” and that they’ll haunted by the ghosts of their crimes. It’s admittedly a very difficult topic to elicit yet alone write a song about yet the end product is effective. It’s haunting, uncannily touching and sad, yet at times unsettling, as sounds of someone laughing are embedded over the dark lyrics  (“They will haunt you when you laugh”) towards the back end. It’s a gloomy way for the album to bow out, but it works.

The Smiths made a name for themself big time with their eponymous debut and it’s easy to see why. Here were a crew of true originals. Endowed with a songwriter blessed with the remarkable ability to speak brutally honestly, but humorously too, about things that are often kept stored up within, and deputised by a trio of great musicians, The Smiths will endure for many, many years to come, and this record is as stunning a revelation committed to tape by any youthful group yearning to be heard. It’s a remarkable album, that warrants multiple, multiple replays, as it reveals a little more of itself with each and every spin. Never before have raw emotions and pent up frustrations, admissions of failings, challenges and inner struggles, unspooled to the tune of such wondrous musicianship.

10.0

Jacob Dunstan