Author: troubledproductions

Contemplations On Chucky: Day 4 (Bride Of Chucky)

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Director: Ronny Yu (The Bride With White Hair, Chasing Dragon)

Budget: $25million

Box Office: $50.7million

  • Yay, actually looking forward to this. This was the first Chucky film I ever saw, the second one I saw was the third one, the third one I saw was the first one, then the fourth one I saw was the second one. It makes complete sense if you just pretend “this is the prequel to the one I saw earlier”. Hoping it still holds up.
  • Very cinematic opening. This is no longer a horror movie, this is a horror MOVIE. Always good, plus you have to remember this was a lot of people’s first introduction to the character, their hadn’t been a film made for almost a decade
  • Jason and Michael Myers masks (as well as Leatherface’s Chainsaw) in the police lock up. I like that as it means they share a universe, which means this film series also shares a universe with Freddy Krueger, the Evil Dead, and Hellraiser. Also in this locker room, references to Creepshow, and there’s a reference to Pinhead later on in the film. Why is that horror is really the only genre that can get away with referencing other films so openly? You don’t have characters from Goodfellas suddenly turn up in Scarface etc. I think it’s because of the way we view horror now, as I’ve said multiple times before horror is best as communal viewing, you watch it with others and you feel part of a community. As such you need things there that kind of exclude people who aren’t a part of that community, and these little in-jokes are great for that. They feel like little rewards for knowing the genre. It would be like if in the middle of Avatar they referenced the Titanic movie and if you understood the reference you got a lollypop.
  • So far both scares have been Lewton Buses. If they do it a third time that’s a bad sign.
  • Nope, someone appeared behind the cop and slit his throat. Nicely done. The two previous Lewton Buses meant you expected another one so you were surprised when it played it straight.
  • John Wayne entrance (start at the feet and move up the body) of Jennifer Tilly’s character of Tiffany. I love how the first kill in this movie isn’t done by Chucky, it sets the tone well of “anything can happen”
  • Our first sighting of Chucky, well, parts of him anyway, his face is still chopped up as a result of the last film. I like that, continuity which adds to the character and changes them. It also gives the character a new defining look which is pretty good from a marketing perspective too as more merchandise and cosplay opportunities.
  • Instead of using an original score for this they use a Rob Zombie track, works perfectly for this montage of rebuilding Chucky.
  • Oh my God I forgot John Ritter was in this.
  • Oooo so’s Katherine Heigl.
  • Gordon Michael Woolvett playing David, the sterotypically gay character here. He does it well enough to suggest he could have had a future as the sidekick in a romantic comedy.
  • Tiffany attempts to bring Chucky back to life from a book called “Voodoo for Dummies”. That’s pretty funny.
  • A random goth (played by the recently deceased Alexis Arquette) turns up and pretends to have killed someone to get into Tiffany’s good books. If a friend needs you to kill someone then they’re not really you’re friend at all.
  • “you know what the French call an orgasm? The little death” Basic rule for seduction: don’t mention the French. Oh, or death I suppose.
  • Wait, that character is called Damian Baylock? Fantastic subtle reference to The Omen there.
  • Tiffany performs a striptease, (well, takes off a glove) whilst Damian is handcuffed to a bed, whilst talking about Chucky. Very weird that she’s basically talking about an ex during foreplay, I can’t imagine that’s an effective technique.
  • Finally Chucky lives, kills Damian by ripping out his lip piercing and smothering him with a pillow, that’s the third most common cause of death in Shoreditch.
  • “You know me, I’ll kill anybody but I’ll only sleep with someone I love”, see I’m the complete opposite.
  • “you fuck” “but you won’t, not Jade anyway” damn I miss John Ritter.
  • “You keep your orchid dry now”, is that some kind of homosexual slang for something? Like a weird way of reminding you to wear a condom?
  • Tiffany decides to tickle Chucky then throw him in a playpen. She’s forgetting the basic rule of life; don’t tickle a serial killer. I got tickled last week by someone and I elbowed them in the chest, and I’m barely a killer.
  • Kidneythieves cover of Crazy, so THAT’S how I first heard this song.
  • Tiffany shoves Damien’s body in a box and gets Nick to move it. He mentions it’s heavy but doesn’t do the obvious “what you got in here, a body?” joke.
  • “a woman spends all day slaving over a hot stove for a man, the least he can do is do the dishes”, or buy her one of Jamie Oliver’s 30 Minute Meal cookbooks. That way she still has time to wash, clean, and do all the other stuff women do; knitting, giving birth, putting cats in blenders.
  • Why do people in horror movies watch so many horror films? Horror is as self referential as I am.
  • “I promise to love, honour and cherish till death do us part”. Why would someone manufacture a doll that says that? That’s hugely sexist and a terrible example to set to women; “be a bride and your main duty is looking after your husband”.
  • Chucky kills Tiffany by pushing a TV in the bath, this death was supposed to be in the first movie but got changed to a hammer to the head. Probably for the best as advances in CGI mean it’s easier to do it now and it looks brilliant.
  • Chucky puts Tiffany’s soul into the other doll, because, reasons.
  • “I wouldn’t marry you if you had the body of GI Joe”, but then he wouldn’t have a penis.
  • “turn to Chapter 6, page 217”, so she turns to chapter 11. I’m starting to see why he killed her.
  • So now he needs an amulet to transfer his soul into a human body, why didn’t he need it in the previous three films?
  • Oh, this character is openly gay. That’s actually pretty progressive.
  • Where did Chucky get that knife from?
  • Funny that Tiffany idolises Martha Stewart, who later on went to jail.
  • Definitely the most imaginative death in this series so far, Tiffany and Chucky load up a bunch of nails into the car airbag and launch them into John Ritter’s face, making him resemble Pinhead. “fun” fact: Chucky’s line of “why does that look so familiar?” was ad-libbed by Brad Dourif.
  • “Rude fucking doll”, i think of all the ways to describe Chucky, “Rude” isn’t the word I’d use.
  • “at least you haven’t forgotten how to show a girl a good time”, I tried that on my last date, blew up a cop car. I’m single now so that tells you successful that tactic was.
  • Interesting duel narrative here. Not just are Chucky and Tiffany making their way across the country and killing people, but the two human characters are beginning to suspect each other of being murderers. More films should do that, place doubt in the characters heads, paranoia that eats away at the relationship.
  • “Multiple murderers, mass murders happen all at once, multiple murders are serial killings” useful information to know.
  • Okay so the lighter that Chucky used to blow up a cop car came from the guy that got his throat cut in the opening scene, nice bit of continuity there.
  • Discount Matthew Lilliard playing a swinger here, who steals the main characters wallets.
  • “Chucky, he’s a Good Guy doll, they were programmed to say all kinds of shit”, no, they only had three sentences.
  • “That thieving slut” dude, you kill people.
  • Okay I love this kill, Tiffany kills the swingers by throwing a champagne bottle at the mirrored ceiling above them. The look on her face was just terrifying, and it’s a really inventive way to do it. Visually it’s brilliant too as the characters were on a water bed so the glass shattered into the bed, causing a mix of blood and water to gush into the air.
  • Chucky spots a wedding ring on the guys disembodied finger and tries to take it off but can’t, so he turns his back to Tiffany and tries to bite it off. Weird display of manners there.
  • Maid walks into the swingers bedroom, see’s broken glass and blood on the floor and says “lol, newlyweds”. Is there something about weddings I don’t know about? Is it traditional for newlyweds to break glass and bleed? If so I don’t think I want to get married.
  • A superb jump scare there where David knocks on the van window in the middle of a heated discussion. Probably the best jump scare in the film, incredibly effective.
  • “something really stinks in here”, how is he the only person to notice that?
  • David finds John Ritter’s body and predictably freaks. He then points a gun at the main characters, confusion abounds, before Chucky and Tiffany reveal themselves, guns in hand. A truck then runs over David, most literal gay bashing i’ve ever seen.
  • Actually just realised it’s a bit weird that David called the police over, all they would have seen is him pointing a gun at two people, would have been hard to explain.
  • Wait, why are the police chasing them? They don’t know the dead body’s in the van, all they saw was a guy pointing a gun at them, then that guy got hit by a truck. Yet the police don’t seem to be interested in the truck that hit someone.
  •  “How did you end up like this?” “it’s complicated. If it was a movie it would take 3 or 4 sequels just to do it justice”. God damn that’s self-referential. I love it.
  • Why is Tiffany doing Katherine Heigl’s make up before transforming her soul into her? Surely it would be easier afterwards?
  • So the two characters are tied up, completely helpless. They get out of it by depending on Chucky’s misogyny, which leads to an argument where Tiffany says “plastic is no substitute for a good chunk of wood”, then Chucky getting kicked out of a window, and Tiffany being kicked into an oven. If Chucky was a feminist serial killer he’d have gotten away with it.
  • Chucky and Tiffany basically kill each other. Nice poetic way to end it, they’re in an obviously toxic relationship that is responsible for their own deaths. Nicely done.
  • So that’s it, it’s over. You’d never guess that Katherine Heigl would become such a massive star, or that Nick Stabile wouldn’t.

Contemplations On Chucky: Day 3 (Child’s Play 3)

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Director: Jack Bender (Game Of Thrones, The Sopranos, Lost)

Budget: $13million

Box Office: $20million

  • This film is weird, was definitely seen as the weakest at the time. It was released only nine months after the second one yet the in-universe time difference between the two is about 9 years. It’s actually lucky this film was badly received as it meant that there wouldn’t be a sequel to this for almost a decade, by which time real time had caught up with the movie’s timeline. Stupid of Universal to demand a sequel that quickly really. They asked the writer to start it before the second film was even released. As such the writer (Don Mancini) was out of ideas as he used a lot of them in the second one, and because it wasn’t released yet he had no idea about what people thought worked in it and what didn’t, so he was basically going into the third one without knowing how the second one was going to be received.
  • Okay that is one hell of an opening credits sequence. It shows the Chucky doll being remade, there’s something about melted plastic forming into shapes that is quite unsettling and it’s used wonderfully here, especially when combined with the music.
  • Oooooo a presentation, I hope it ends with a duck on a boat.
  • “the notorious lakeshore strangler” not so notorious of course that when people say his name people don’t go “who?”
  • “Why put the Good Guy doll back on the market?” Guy there asking a very sensible question.
  • “Before this it was our biggest seller”, well, yeah but that was eight years ago, eight years ago from today Alexandra Burke had a UK number one, doesn’t mean she’s due for a comeback any day now.
  • “I really don’t think this is a good idea” I like this guy, he’s really sympathetic, shame he never appears after this and is probably going to be fired.
  • “Doesn’t matter what we’re selling whether it’s cars, nuclear weapons, or toys” As a toy manufacturer I’d suggest you stick to toys. There’s not much room on the Fisher Price “My First Nuclear Bomb” playset.
  • “The Good Guy of the 90’s” Looks exactly the same as the 80’s one. And why do they keep insisting on using the model that was accused of murder and has been burnt and chopped up? Try fixing one that hasn’t been almost completely destroyed.
  • I always felt these films have missed out on a really creepy shot of a line of Good Guy dolls in a toy store, all perfectly still except for the eyes are all moving at the same time, seemingly following someone walking through the aisle, then the eyes on one of them dart quickly the other way.
  • Businessman doing business things, like playing golf and watching  business news, good work Vincent Adultman.
  • Random fact: Peter Jackson was asked to direct this. First there was Nightmare On Elm Street, now this. Can Peter Jackson just make a god-damn horror movie now so we can stop wondering?
  • Chucky uses a bunch of toys to create horror movie scares. See, this annoys me as if they had more time in the scripting process this would have been a highlight of the series. As it is it’s good, but not quite great. Although the scene at the end with the two dolls “conversing” whilst sitting in chairs is unsettling enough to justify it.
  • Actually where did those two dolls come from? They said this was the first one in eight years, did he keep two dolls around in his office for almost a decade? Weird guy.
  • “Nothing like a strangulation to get the circulation going” obvious sex joke is obvious.
  • Psychological profile of Andy describes him as a “juvinile” The real crime is illiteracy. And murder. And making tea by putting in the milk first.
  • “these fantasies of killer dolls” weirdest fetish ever.
  • “Who are you?” “I’m a Good Guy”. This advert reminds me of the biggest problem I have with this re-release of the toys, the children who brought them eight years ago will all be grown up now. Children now won’t have any idea who they are, so why on earth would they want a toy they don’t know when there’s so many better ones available?
  • Guy is found tied up in the cupboard, yup, definitely nothing homoerotic about that.
  • “Do you know who I am?” Has a character, actually no, scratch that, a person, ever said that who hasn’t been a complete arsehole?
  • “You are without a doubt the most pathetic thing I have ever seen”, I take it he hasn’t seen his own penis then.
  • “asshole” “what did you say” “I said you asshole” “you think you’re pretty funny don’t you?” “yes”. That woman is basically me if I was older, and a woman, and in the military, and looked better, and was in shape.
  • Person knocks the toy out of a child’s hand, and then immediately disappears. The person who knocked it out of his hands was walking down the stairs, and the toy got knocked down them too. So in the next shot they should have been there, but nope, just disappeared yet.
  • “who the fuck are you?” “I thought you guys only said three sentences”, yeah the other two are “Go fuck yourself” and “I’m your friend to the end”
  • “What am I doing wrong?” Well when you’re shooting you miss the target, that’s your biggest problem.
  • It’s weird that they didn’t actually teach him proper gun use and instead are depending on one of the other cadets to do it.
  • “It’s not a baton Barclay”, well to be fair how would you know as you’ve never fucking taught him how to shoot.
  • “This is my rifle, this is my gun, this is for fighting, this is for fun”. To clarify the gun is his penis. And there’s a shot of him grabbing his own dick, a close up.
  • “A soldier’s rifle is his best friend”, well that’s just sad.
  • Chucky crushes the garbage collector because….reasons. That’s the trouble with constant sequelization of horror films, the characters lose their motivations. In the first film Chucky didn’t kill many people, and only really did it for personal vengeance from when he was alive, or when people discovered him. Was similar in the second one, only he seemed to have a connection with Andy so he also moved onto those who were mistreating Andy, so he was almost going against those who wrong his potential vessel. In this one he’s so far killed two people, none of which were necessary, and the second one actively helped blow his cover. If he didn’t kill the garbageman after escaping the truck then Andy wouldn’t have suspected he was there so it would have been easier for him to go about his nefarious ways.
  • Chucky slices the back of Andy’s foot. I very rarely say this but I definitely wrote a better version of that. If he got the achilles tendon that would have severely disabled Andy for the rest of the film. The actual slicing should have been a lot more visceral too, it should have made people wince, as it is it just looks like nothing.
  • “Chucky’s gonna be a bro” that’s racist. And stupid, why on earth did he reveal himself to Andy then? He’s just making things difficult for himself.
  • “I got myself another slave” I’ll take “lines that would have sounded a lot worse if the main character was black” for $1,000 please.
  • “I’m trying to weed out a thief”, but you stole it first.
  • Chucky kills someone via heart attack, even he seems disappointed by that. Funny thought, about time that happened.
  • “Do yourself a favour and get the hell out of Kent”, people have been saying the same thing to me for nigh on 30 years.
  • You may remember this character said earlier that the reason soldiers need short hair is so that someone can’t grab it and slit your throat. Predictably he dies by someone slitting his throat.
  • The idea of switching out paintball bullets for normal bullets is a good idea on paper (I actually used it in a short story for GCSE English) but it’s stupid and ridiculous in execution for two reasons: 1) Guns which fire paint rounds are usually specially modified to allow it and can’t fire normal rounds. 2) It’s standard military practice to check your ammunition before firing. So a nice idea but one that defies logic.
  • “Now we can play hide the soul” is that similar to hide the sausage? If so I don’t want to play it.
  • Surely they’d notice they’re not firing paint rounds when they change the ammunition or when their shots hit a tree or something and there’s no paint.
  • Obvious fake snow is obvious.
  • So out of all these trained cadets, not one of them noticed a live grenade being thrown towards them.
  • We now go to a nearby fairground, which to me is way too close to the military exercises to be considered safe.
  • So now we’ve moved away from the army base, which is a shame as there were a lot of opportunities for interesting set pieces that weren’t really used. Okay the fairground also has a lot of interesting things that could be used but they only have like 12 minutes left in this film in which to do so, and that’s including credits.
  • Wait, the fairground ride has paper masquerading as fire, yet has a real f*cking scythe?  More to the point, nothing of interest happened in the ghost house, massive disappointment.
  • See, now there it makes sense to have blades, in a fan, but they should still be covered by something.
  • Andy ducks to avoid being hit by a rollercoaster train. Wait, the train is still going? And nobody can see or hear the attempted murder that’s going on?
  • Chucky gets his hand cut off, again, I think that’s happened in ever film so far. You’d think he’d be used to it.
  • Chucky falls into the fan and gets cut, and seems to explode. Quick question; how on earth is this going to be covered up? How are they going to explain the gun?
  • Wait, I know that cop. That’s the manager from Chuck. Cool.
  • So now the end credits. Overall somewhat enjoyable, definitely the weakest so far though and way too many missed opportunities.

Contemplations On Chucky: Day 2 (Child’s Play 2)

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Director: John Lafia (The Blue Iguana, The Rats)

Budget: $13million

Box Office: $32-35million

  • I understand they want to restart the Good Guy toyline but do they have to use the decapitated head of the one that was accused of murder? Just build a new one, doll’s heads aren’t exactly hard to come by. I used to have some on my BBQ.
  • “every tabloid is running a story on Andy Barclay and his killer doll” In America maybe, over here we were talking about Jamie Bulger and Suzanne Capper. Well, after Child’s Play 3 anyway but none of the other films talk about press reaction to murder so I’m going to have to use this opportunity to segue into a little rant here. Both of the aforementioned cases were terrible incidents which shouldn’t have happened and the people involved deserve whatever happens to them after death, whether it be an eternity of torment or blank nothingness. But the press took advantage of these murders to launch a campaign against “video nasties” and called for horror films to be more heavily regulated. Now, ignoring the fact that the newspapers that were calling for this most heavily are the ones who are now decrying a regulatory body and saying that any calls for press accuracy are “censorship” (I could write an entire essay on how ridiculous the notion is that deliberate fiction is more dangerous than disguised half-truths). The Suzanne Capper one had a somewhat tenuous link to the films as the dickholes torturing her played audio clips from the film whilst torturing her. Although it later turned out that they didn’t take these clips from the film, they took them from a popular song out at the time that was being played on Manchester’s Piccadilly Radio. A newspaper at the time reported that “21,000 4-9 year olds watched Child’s Play 3 when it was transmitted”, it later turned out that the figure was an extrapolation of people who were asked and applied that figure to the population as a whole, the actual number was two, and the margin of error applied to it means that it could have been just one. As David Elstein said at the time “but why spoil a good story by asking what the figure’s mean”, which is a damn funny thing for him to say and I commend him highly. Now the Jamie Bulger thing is a lot more tenuous. Even today people blame the films for the murders, but what evidence was there that the two were linked? One of the murderer’s dads, might have rented the film once, months before. If this is what the newspapers use as evidence I’m glad they don’t run the courts. Basically, fuck the tabloids.
  • “we rebuilt it head to toe”, but why?
  • A tricky thing with horror sequels is explaining how the killer came back. This one just goes for “his soul never died”, simple but kind of effective.
  • “what do you want me to do with the doll?” “stick it up your ass” I don’t think it’s that kind of toy.
  • Hey, it’s Jenny Agutter. I’d have assumed she’s too good for stuff like this.
  • “possessed by the soul of Charles Lee Ray” “who?” Would the world forget that quickly?
  • “what’s your favourite thing in the whole wide world?” “chocolate”. Me too kid, me too.
  • “besides chocolate” there’s other food besides chocolate? Lies and slander!
  • That house is so weirdly painted it reminds of The Shining.
  • “First rule, don’t touch the old stuff” I his wife won’t touch the old stuff anymore, that’s why he’s so angry.
  • “What do you think?” “Oh I’ll get used to him”. That’s the closest a foster parent can get to saying “I hate him he’s a little shit”
  • Christine Elise as Kyle, I always found her a really underrated actress, okay this is the only thing I saw her in but her performance is charming and likeable.
  • Jenny Agutter gets annoyed at Kyle for working too much, yeah, those damn rebellious kids, always working and obeying the rules. I bet she keeps tidying up behind herself too, she’s out of control I tell you!
  • “I bet blue is your favourite colour”. That’s sexist!
  • Andy is impressed by wooden toys, despite having a working electric car in his old house.
  • This family keeps a Good Guy doll in the house then get annoyed that Andy is scared. Those damn kids and their post traumatic stress disorder.
  • Why is he taking Chucky home? Why not just throw it in the bin or something? I’m assuming that workplace has bins.
  • “that’s a gold card, it’s just as good as cash”, really? Can you roll it up and use it to snort cocaine?
  • “you have to admit he’s a troubled boy, he may need more attention than we can give him” The father threatens to kick Andy out of the home and send him back to the orphanage and a life of neglect and suffering, because of a broken china statue. What a dick.
  • “Hi, I’m…….Tommy” that genuinely made me laugh.
  • Chucky’s eyes widen when there’s a risk of the other dead doll being uncovered. They’re really doing a lot to make the doll a character this time around, giving him unexpressed thoughts and worries, it really helps sell him as a character.
  • Andy gets tied up and gagged with a sock, Kyle sneaks in and blames him, how did he think she did it to himself? He’s way too young to be into that kind of sado-masochistic sex games.
  • “Andy, how did you tie yourself up last night?” I think she’s looking for tips. Now she’s definitely old enough to be into that kind of sadomaso-I’m going to stop there.
  • “especially new students who’s main concern should be getting on my good side” I’d have thought his main concern would be learning, since it is, you know, a school.
  • Shouldn’t she be easily able to tell that that’s not the handwriting of a child?
  • She locks him in a classroom. Isn’t that like, majorly illegal? What if he needed to go a toilet? Would she prefer he piss/defecate himself?
  • Chucky stabs her, with an air pump? Okay then.
  • “you’ve been very naughty Miss Kettlewell”, he says whilst brandishing a ruler, and the S&M continues.
  • “his teacher called”, did nobody phone home and tell the parents that the teacher is now dead? Did no cleaners or other teachers go in the room?
  • “what are you suggesting we do, send him back? “you don’t have to make it sound so horrible”, but it is horrible. You can’t take in a child you know is damaged and cry and complain that he’s not the right sort of damaged. Do your job as a parent and help.
  • Andy grabs a carving knife and goes to the basement to kill Chucky. I like that, it shows character development. He’s not sitting around as a victim waiting to be hunted, he’s hunting the hunter. It flips the dynamic slightly and is good to see, especially since he is just a child, but he’s a child who’s done this before.
  • What is it with Chucky and biting?
  • Phil dies via broken neck. Quite a good method of death actually, looks impulsive enough that a child could have accidentally done it.
  • Jenny Agutter and Christine Elise share an emotional scene which is far better than this film deserves.
  • The scene with the social worker collecting him whilst Kyle stands there has a really weird low angle which makes the space behind them seem massive and Andy seem tiny, very well created shot. Actually this film has a had a lot of moments like that, the cinematographer from this film also worked on Ed Wood, and was the DOP on Edward Scissorhands.
  • Ah man Jenny Agutter’s dead and she died off screen. Actually this scene is really good, the music, the look, everything just works to build tension until the reveal of the body, and then the slow rise of Chucky under the bedsheets behind Kyle, classic horror movie technique but very effective.
  • “That’s a Good Guy isn’t it? I love those things” really? The doll only came out two years prior to this, you’re at least in your late 40’s. It’s weird for you to like it that much.
  • “You know how some dolls pee, this one bleeds?” Hah! I would happily watch a Kyle/Chucky roadtrip sitcom.
  • “you goddamn women drivers”, ah, casual misogyny, although he is a mass murdering psychopath so I really shouldn’t be shocked that he’s not a very nice person. “yes, he killed hundreds, but he always said please and thank you”
  • Chucky sets off a fire alarm and Kyle gets the blame. Not that important a scene but the make-up on Kyle looks amazing, she looks thoroughly beaten and scared.
  • It turns out Chucky has been in the body for too long to get transported out. I guess that’s the end of this film series.
  • Wasn’t the implication earlier that the Chucky case caused a lot of bad publicity for the company and they were risking going out of business? That’s a very big production line for a product range that’s going under.
  • “Andy hurry up he’s right behind you” Why do you think he screamed?
  • Chucky’s hand gets trapped and he kind of 127 Hours his way out of it, literally just rips his own hand off.
  • “don’t be afraid” yeah, it’s just a piece of machinery that could probably kill you immediately, nothing to worry about.
  • Chucky shoves a blade into his stump, groovy.
  • Security guard/engineer notices a build up of dolls on the production line. So he didn’t notice the screaming etc before that? He also didn’t notice the two people running around the factory. He sucks at his job.
  • He puts his head directly under the mechanism of the machine whilst fixing it. He’s an idiot.
  • An unholy mess comes out of a machine, it’s 5 dolls fused together. Very Cronenberg.
  • More so as Chucky is shoved into a machine and all you can hear is agonised screaming, acidic burning, and mechanical whirring.
  • Chucky is dragging himself along the floor, at this point it would mainly be a mercy killing.
  • Andy pours molten wax over Chucky, because there’s no kill like overkill.
  • Molten wax Chucky is genuinely disturbing as hell. An air hose gets put in his mouth and he explodes in a mass of blood and plastic.
  • Film ends with a shot of a smiling Good Guy sign waving. I like it, very genteel way to end a violent movie.

Contemplations On Chucky: Day 1 (Child’s Play)

On By troubledproductionsIn Contemplations On ChuckyLeave a comment

So, halloween is just around the corner, knife in hand, ready to jump out and disembowel people when they approach it (or alternatively, hand out sweets, depends how you celebrate it), so what better time than now to waste time watching horror films start a new blog series? Similar to Musings On Marvel which I did earlier this year, and extremely similar (I.E: Pretty much the same as) last years Nightmare A Day, I’ll be watching a film every day and blogging my thoughts. This year I’m doing the Chucky series, and I thought I’d start with the first film, because I’m not a complete idiot.

Director: Tom Holland ((Psycho II (unpopular opinion, I prefer it to the first one) Fright Night (including the sequel and remake))

Budget: $9million

Box Office: $44.2million

  • The cop just threw his jacket away. Littering!
  • Pretty impressive shot there. Cop attempted to shoot someone but they move out of the way and it shoots a car window instead, camera was behind the car window so it looked beautiful.
  • How different would this film have been if he put his soul into a ninja turtle toy, or a transformer?
  • Oh man I’d hate to be the shop worker who has to tidy this up in the morning.
  • “Oh god I’m dying”, really needed a better delivery of that line there. Sounds way too “ah well, shit happens”
  • “You did this” Murderer is annoyed that somebody killed him. Really the hypocrisy is worse than the murder.
  • Shop exploded. Obviously. Yet no fire alarms went off. See, that’s why you have health and safety laws.
  • “I saw this one” yeah, children famously hate repetition.
  • This toy company has it’s own cereal that’s basically diabetes in a box.
  • That giant doll costume is really really creepy.
  • Even without the soul of a psychopathic killer I still get the feeling these dolls would kill you. You specifically.
  • “so remember to tell your mum and dad you want a Good Guy”. I have two jokes for this. Delete which ever one you found less funny. 1) When I told my parents I wanted a good guy they were less than pleased. 2) No, you go get a job and buy your own dolls.
  • “and remember, you can buy all these good guy accessories too” Holy pressurised selling, Batman!
  • This kid is called Andy, I’m now saying this is a Toy Story prequel.
  • “How long have you been up?” “since forever” You lying little shit.
  • “it looks delicious” Liar!
  • “I have to give you your super duper birthday tummy gummy” That sounds strange.
  • A news report on Charles Lee Ray, do they often put news reports about serial killers on just after children’s TV shows this early in the morning?
  • You did not need to have a box that big just to put children’s clothes in. It’s just a waste of wrapping paper.
  • “there’s a guy in the alley selling the toy you want”. That statement asks more questions than it answers. 1) Why were you in the alley behind the store? This was before shops could hire snipers to shoot smokers so you could have gone out the front. 2) How did Chucky climb back into the box and close it, and clean up the blood? 3) It’s been a while since I’ve brought toys, but “stranger in an alley”? I really doubt they have a decent returns policy. “if you’re not satisfied, fucking die”
  • “Are you happy with your job here?” No manager would ever ask that question.
  • “A Good Guy, I knew it” What gave it away? The fact it was in a Good Guy box, or the fact that the box has a see-through front so you can tell what it is before you opened it?
  • The toy company has it’s own cake mix. Evil!
  • “Hey Chucky, you’re not watching me”. It’s because you’re boring, kid.
  • “Chucky wants to watch the nine O clock news” She doesn’t find it weird that a child asks to watch the news.
  • So, inside the doll is the soul of an an adult male, and he just got kissed by a child. This must be hell for him.
  • “What is wrong with me?” Off the top of my head, I’d say low self-esteem, a lack of maternal affection and a genetic predisposition for anxiety and depression.
  • How did she get hit so hard (with a toy hammer no less) that she stumbled about 6 feet back with enough force to fall through a window? Were the windows made of sugar glass?
  • If a body lands on your car, is that covered by insurance?
  • “I live there”, thankfully the police don’t ask for proof or clarification.
  • So the detective investigating this is the same one who shot Charles Lee Ray? Wow, well coinci-mental
  • “Why? What’s happened to Maggie?” Well the detective is from homicide, try and put 2 and 2 together.
  • “You got any idea what these are?” What, the footprints, I’d say they’re footprints.
  • “what would Andy be doing on the counter anyway?” There speaks somebody who obviously has never had children, those fuckers climb everything.
  • PJ Sneakers? What the fuck? No! That’s just ugly capitalism.
  • “I don’t know who did that, and I don’t care”, wait, you don’t care who killed them?
  • “I want time alone with my son” “okay, we’ll clear out”, is that how police investigations work? They stay there until they solve the case, or until somebody politely asks them to leave.
  • The main kid in this called Andy, and there’s a character called Sid, this is basically Toy Story.
  • “his real name is Charles Lee Ray”, why did he tell you that?
  • “it’s because of Aunt Maggie you’re behaving like this”, no it’s because you’re a failure and I hate you.
  • “Why don’t you sleep with me tonight?” Wait, but at the moment you suspect your kid is dangerous, so why would you want that? Why not do the opposite and sleep far away, locking the door.
  • “you sure you’re alright about last night?” He goes to school the next day? I know it’s just a family friend but surely he’d get a day off for that?
  • How did he get on a train without either 1) paying (you really think a six year old kid has that much spare change?). 2) Someone phoning the police.
  • Pretty good use of music here, they’re seemingly incorporating the basic noise from a train running on the tracks into the music. Simplistic but rather brilliant.
  • What was Chucky’s plan if Andy didn’t need a piss at this precise moment?
  • Andy urinated for over a minute, how much does this kid drink?
  • “random noise, I’ll fire towards it” Good plan.
  • Andy runs towards gunshots.
  • How did Andy find Chucky in the burning wreckage?
  • Why has she not thrown that box out? Or at the very least compacted it down for recycling. Earth-killers are the true evil.
  • Good Guy even make their own god-damn batteries?
  • “Talk or I’ll throw you in the fire”. Look, this will go one of two ways, either 1) You’re threatening a serial killer. Or 2) You’re going to burn your childs favourite toy because it wouldn’t talk to you.
  • “I brought it from a peddler behind my work, I’ll try there” Stupid idea.
  • “he’s a cop” How do you know that? All he’s done is knee a homeless rapist in the groin, that’s the least that anybody would do.
  • “It was struck by lightning the night that Charles Lee Ray died? “How do you know that?” Well I imagine a serial killer dying, and a big toy store blowing up would make the local news. And he’s a member of the police so I imagine he’s up to date with current events, even ones as small as the police shooting someone.
  • “I was the man who killed him” “why didn’t you tell me?” Is it a policy to tell civilians every single person you’ve killed? If so that’s going to make meeting new people a lot more difficult for me.
  • Chucky attempts to strangle him, instead of, you know, using the knife.
  • Chucky finally decides to use the knife.
  • Obvious Green Screen is obvious.
  • “this is his accomplice” then why aren’t you there? Why did you insist on seeing a civilian first, and then take her to a possibly dangerous scene?
  • Why does he have a voodoo doll of himself? Does he put it near the heater so that even when he’s walking around in the snow he’s warm? That’s what I would do.
  • “I have a date with a six year old boy”, Phrasing!
  • Chucky stabs the voodoo doll, instead of, you know, just stabbing the guy laying in front of him. Lazy.
  • The actor playing Andy seems to genuinely be in fear. No child actor is that good (apart from Ruby Barnhill and Madison Wolfe of course) that I’m not suspicious that that child is actually in fear of his life. In which case, meh, you gotta do what you gotta do.
  • Chucky bites a lot. If that’s his natural instinct he probably did it a lot whilst human too, so why did it take so long for the police to catch him? Or has him becoming a doll given him really weird fetishes?
  • Random fact: Whilst doing the voice-over work for when Chucky is thrown in the fire, Brad Dourif’s (the voice of Chucky) daughter crawled into the recording room. Nobody noticed until she started crying as a reaction to her dad screaming. I don’t have a joke to end this on, just found that interesting.
  • This woman who works in a department store is a better shot than most movie cops.
  • I like how this ends with a “phew we’re safe, but oh shit, everyone thinks we’re crazy”. Kind of a happy ending, but also a downer. It’s a happy downer, like a post-orgasm penis

And that’s that. The first of many (well, about 5) in a new series.

 

Why We Love…Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

On By troubledproductionsIn Why we loveLeave a comment

1. The Songs

Start off with obvious here; the songs in this show are really good, and not just “good for comedy music” good, I mean “you will end up with at least one of them stuck in your head for weeks afterwards”. They range from the incredibly catchy, the deeply inappropriate, and the incredibly catchy yet also deeply inappropriate. The songs mean it’s different from almost every other sitcom around. It’s also GENIUS from a marketing point of view. You can post all the adverts you want, yet what is likely to get people to watch sitcoms is word of mouth and personal recommendations. With sitcoms that can be hard to do as you need to find the clip on youtube and send it over (if the show hasn’t taken legal action and got the clip taken down off youtube for breaking copyright. If it was the entire episode I’d understand, but a scene? You’re killing a chance for new people to discover your show), or force someone to watch an entire episode. With this you can go “hey, I’m watching a new sitcom called Crazy Ex Girlfriend, you should watch it” “I don’t know man, what’s it like” “I’ll just send you a song. A quick 3 minute clip that I feel is funny and encapsulates the show yet also showcases the characters in a quick, easily digestible and easily shareable manner”. I’ve got people into this show through my almost constant posting of songs from it.

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2. The Characters

In sitcoms you usually have your typical cliche characters within the core group; you have the ditz, the sexually active idiot, the “couple” etc. This doesn’t really do that, the characters are all snarky, bitter, and messed up. Not just that but holy crap the diversity is astounding. The male romantic lead can best be described as an “Asian Frat Bro”. Also, one of the story arcs of the first seasons is one of the characters coming to terms with his bisexuality. That may not seem like a big deal but there are very few bisexual characters (especially male ones) in television, and the ones there are tend to be either:

  1. Serial killers/sociopaths.
  2. People who use their sexuality for power.

So just having bi visibility in this show is something that’s incredibly progressive, and the fact that’s the case is deeply disappointing and says a lot about the state of current television. That story arc also gives us one of my favourite lines of the show:

“you’re gay? Then why do they call you White Josh not Gay Josh?”

“”They don’t call other Josh “Straight Josh””

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3. The Actors.

Yes, this is definitely Rachel Bloom’s showcase, she’s the lead actress, executive producer, co-creator, and writer, but the show belongs to everybody else just as much. Despite her character being the main character, she’s not afraid to let the other cast members shine, this is more than a vanity vehicle and comes off more like “look what we can do”. Santino Fontana will probably be recognised more for this than being the male lead in Frozen (and I’m glad I still haven’t watched Frozen as hearing a Disney character sing a song about UTI’s would either be weird or brilliant, I’m not sure which). Donna Lynne Champlin gives her character an air of what can best be described as “powerful vulnerability”, whilst Gabrielle Ruiz is thrown into the role of “sympathetic not-quite villain”, and carries it off beautifully, being an ultimately sympathetic character (from her point of view the series is about her downfall), yet one you still can’t like too much.

4. It’s Really Funny

It’s not just the songs that make this show funny, the script is hilarious. Whilst it’s the songs that draw you in initially, it will be the jokes that keep you invested. I was completely sold on this series before the first song (actually within the opening few minutes). Quick background about how I got into this show. I knew absolutely nothing going in, I didn’t know what it was about, what style it was, almost nothing. All I knew was Rachel Bloom was in the poster and I was bored. I got into her after hearing Fuck Me Ray Bradbury in Mitch Benn’s Podcast, two years ago. Since that I’d only really seen her in the deeply under appreciated puppet cop sitcom The Fuzz, but she wasn’t in that as much as she should have been. Then I saw the poster for this and noticed her in it, thought I’d give it a go. Within the opening we see her have a slight mental breakdown at work at the prospect of promotion, run outside and then pray whilst saying “dear God, I don’t pray to you because I believe in science”, which for an American show is a majorly risky firing shot, but hits the target easily. Although I suppose what makes this show more than just a standard sitcom (besides the music, obviously), is the emotion it portrays. Everyone who read my Bojack Horseman review (or has spoken to me for longer than 21 seconds) knows I like funny, but I LOVE emotion in sitcoms. Jokes can wear thin after the third time you’ve heard them, yet good emotional stories will stick with you. I identify with some of the characters here in ways that’s probably emotionally unhealthy (seriously, this song I feel is practically my theme music, but this also comes close). As one person I know said “[this show is] the best musical sitcom about a woman having a nervous breakdown I’ve ever seen”. And that sums it up wonderfully.

5. Season Two Is Out This Weekend (with a new theme song)

Or today if you’re in America (you lucky people). I watched the first season of this on Hulu, but I had to abandon that website when they started charging (you can have either adverts, or you can charge, having both is just greedy and highly user-unfriendly, especially with the amount of problems the website has with shows suddenly skipping back to the beginning and making you watch all the adverts again. It’s a good service for free, but a diabolical service if you pay for it). As such I was unsure of how I was going to watch the second one, would I have to resort to illegally finding it (which is something I have issue with. Although if the show is not shown in the country at all, is that still ethically dubious? Because you’re not taking viewing figures away from them as you have no way to participate to those numbers anyway). But then joy of joys, they announced it will be shown here on netflix, which makes sense as I think it was that which got the show over with people in here, they put the entire first season on a few months ago and people just fell in love with it. Best part is, UK fans won’t have to wait long, the episodes are shown in America on the Friday, then over here on the Sunday (which is actually less waiting time than Hulu, where you’d have to wait a week after airing). So yeah, this Sunday, it starts again, and I begin the process of getting songs stuck in my head on a weekly basis, I can’t wait to handle this in a solemn and dignified manner.

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This will be me this weekend

My Five Favourite (Childrens) Book-To-Film Adaptations

On By troubledproductionsIn ListLeave a comment

More details were announced yesterday about the Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them film. Well, films now, five of them in particular. I’ll admit I’m nervous that this will be just like The Hobbit films, where people will be excited for the first one, interested in the next one, and then just completely ignore the film series from then on (I remember being online when the third one was released, and if it wasn’t for me looking at the cineworld website I wouldn’t have even know it came out). Fingers crossed it turns out great, but to commemorate the release details here’s my favourite book-to-film adaptations. I will freely admit these aren’t the “best”, these are definitely my personal choice, choices which are likely to change depending on what day I’m asked.

5. The BFG (2016)

The most recent film on this list, and the one most likely to not be on it if I was writing this on a different day. This definitely isn’t likely to be on someone’s top five list for this topic, truth be told it’s not even mine, it’s only here because of the negative reception it received. It’s currently got a 66 on Metacritic, which is the numerical equivalent of “meh”. I went into this with relatively low expectations, I saw Pete’s Dragon the same week and it did absolutely nothing for me, I appreciated what it did well, but I don’t need to see it again and I won’t recommend it to anyone. Also their was a family in front of me that I could tell were going to be problematic, with a whole bag of popcorn thrown on the floor behind them (i.e. in front of me) before the film even started. Yet within five minutes of this film I had completely forgotten Pete’s Dragon, I had forgotten the popcorn, I had forgotten the general feeling of ennui that accompanies my general existence, I was completely lost in the world that this film created. I completely brought into the universe that was created, if I saw this film whilst I was a child my parents would hate it due to the fact they’d have had to watch it every single day. This film also means that my list of for the “best performace” for the end of year blog now has two child actors in it. Ruby Barnhill is superb in it, she spends a lot of time being the only real thing on screen, so it’s down to her to convince you that the rest is real, and she manages it. So to summarise; some films are funny, some films are heart-breaking, very few films can be described as magical, this is one of them.

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4. Coraline

Because it’s been too long since I’ve seen The Witches and I wanted a film that scares the hell out of everyone, children and adults alike. This adaptation of the Neil Gaiman book also has one of the best uses of 3D in cinema. There’s a scene where somebody stares down a long and narrow corridor, the 3D in this helps enhance the vertigo-like feeling. Most films just go with the “oooo something is poking out at you, woooooo” with 3D, very few use it to enhance the universe as much as they should. The film also has a unique look, a look that is NOT TIM BURTON! People seem to forget that it wasn’t Burton that directed Nightmare Before Christmas, it was Henry Selick, and he is perfect for this film. Heavily influenced by the work of Japanese illustrator Tadahiro Uesigi.

He gives the film a unique look that is perfect for Neil Gaiman’s work, and it’s a real shame that he got pulled off the film version of The Graveyard Book (been replaced by Ron Howard, which could work, but will be very different)

3. Harry Potter

I’ll admit this isn’t the greatest film series, for one thing it’s missing Rik Mayall as Peeves. But it also did one thing very well; it accentuated the Harry Potter brand remarkably. Before this you could be forgiven for thinking the world had reached peak Potter, that the brand had reached a plateau, but the films pushed it through so it was no longer a well known book franchise, it was a global phenomenon. Without the films the chances of there being a Harry Potter world are a lot lower, as would be a lot of merchandising opportunities. Plus, it also gave us Alan Rickman as Snape.

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And now I have a sad

2. Matilda

I know, another Roald Dahl book, but there is no way I could not put this film in this list. One of my favourite books as a child, and one of my favourite films as an adult. Mara Wilson is of course, superb, whilst Pam Ferris is terrifying as Trunchbull. Back when this was released there wasn’t as many book-to-film adaptations as there is now, so seeing the shots of Trunchbull in newspapers in the lead to the film was genuinely exciting. A book which everybody read as a child was finally coming to life, if it went badly I would have been so disappointed that I probably would have developed a crack cocaine habit, trust issues, and a slightly itchy foot. Luckily it’s very good, the music is superb, Send Me On My Way in particular never fails to raise a smile. Actually that’s true of the whole film, it’s the film equivalent of a sweet heartwarming smile. The most disappointing part about it is that it didn’t lead to Danny DeVito having a glorious directing career, which is a shame as he completely nails it here, getting the tone exactly right, and he casts himself as a terrible person. Very few people would do that, most people when they choose to be villains do it in a “cool” way, make the character dark and brooding and misunderstood, DeVito plays his character as one of the most repulsive characters in cinema, and does it in a way that makes your skin crawl, it’s truly brilliant.

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This film really speaks to me for some reason

1. Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory

Yeah, a third Dahl book. Truth be told I could have made this entire list Dahl adaptations, he’s lucky enough to have had a lot of very good books made of his work, but to me this reigns supreme. Not just one of my favourite children’s books adaptations, not just one of my favourite children’s films, this is one of my favourite films. It’s a shame Mel Stuart didn’t have a larger career after this, as visually this film is superb. Most of the acting is also pretty great (with the exception of one of the parents who is awful, just awful), but let’s be honest one of them stands head and shoulders above all the others.

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Just kidding, it was this guy.

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This film belongs to Wilder, his performance is like a sociopathic clown (something which 2016 is very familiar with), that scene in the tunnel in particular is one of the greatest scenes in cinema history, more so when you realise that Wilder never told the other actors what he was going to do, they all thought he was genuinely losing his mind, it’s brilliant. Now despite me loving this film, I’ve never read the book, I have read the sequel though, and this film sets the characters up so well in your head that it makes the book sequel better as you can clearly envision it in her head. The music is pretty darn good as well, Pure Imagination in particular surely has to go down as one of the greatest original songs created for film, it stands up as being so good it transcends the original source material, one of the only songs I can think that does that would be Rainbow Connection.

 

So that’s our list, where did we go wrong? Which Roald Dahl book should we have taken out? Why didn’t we put The Iron Giant in? If you have any questions comment and let us know, or do that if you have any other things you want to see us do.

Why We Love…..John Wick.

On By troubledproductionsIn Why we loveLeave a comment

Directed by: Chad Stahelski, David Leitch

Budget: $20million

Box Office: $86 Million

So this week the teaser trailer for John Wick: Chapter 2 dropped, with the full trailer being released tomorrow at New York Comic-Con. Usually I hate the idea of trailers for trailers, but I think I finally get their purpose. They’re basically a “heads up”, a “keep your eyes out for later this week”, and I know for certain that I’ll be searching for the trailer on Sunday. It helps that I really love the title for some reason, it’s both ordinary and superb at the same time. The original had a real sense of being part of a wider universe. There were a lot of moments in it which set up that this world wasn’t just for the benefit of the main characters, you got the feeling that everything continued to exist even once the camera stopped rolling. I remember coming out of that and wondering whether it was a comic book adaptation, it genuinely felt like one, but a good one.

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So not this, definitely not this

I will admit I went into this with low expectations, I’ve never really rated Keanu Reeves that consistent, he’s had flashes of brilliance but I would never think “I’m really looking forward to the new Keanu Reeves movie” I went in basically expecting a dumb but fun action movie. Whilst it is fun it is definitely something more than that. The films starts off with his wife dying, now most films would have her killed by a dickbag (not a literal one), and then the hero has to go through and avenge her death. But this? This has her die of an unspecified disease, but before she dies she arranges for him to get a puppy to help him cope with her death. The villains in this KILL THE DOG! Most films don’t do that, even Kick-Ass 2 which was ultra violent had the lead villain balk at the idea of killing a dog (in the movie anyway), so the fact that it’s that which kicks off the story is a brave piece of storytelling, and it’s effective. He doesn’t even spend the film chasing the guys who did it, he gets his retaliation in then has to deal with the person’s father who’s the head of a crime family. The entire story is not generic revenge, it’s about dealing with the consequences of your actions, the second half of the film is basically what a lesser film would put in the sequel.

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But it’s not just the story it’s telling, it’s the way it’s told that is effective too. It looks beautiful, yes it’s quite dark in terms of lighting, but it’s not in a bleak way, it uses bright lights often to create the contrast between light and dark, it’s like an extremely toned down neon noir film. The choreography is superb as well, I do love a good fight scene in films, but only when done a certain way (I’m quite picky). I hate the fight scenes where every single punch/kick etc is accompanied by a cut, where the scenes cuts away just on the impact. It can be effective tool to use, but when it’s used with every single impact it just makes the scene disorientating, particularly when you change the focal point with the cuts so your eyes are constantly wandering (although Mad Max: Fury Road did this superbly where even when they changed angles they kept the action almost dead centre). This film does cut on impact occasionally but it also lingers long enough for the punches to have an impact. Both the colour and the choreography can be showcased best in this scene.

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Or just this

The film is even more impressive when you realise it’s a directorial debut for both directors. Previously they’d done mostly stunk work and assistant directing (it was actually their stunt work on The Matrix which led to Keanu Reeves suggesting them directing this), but they definitely step up to the plate here and knock it out the park. Utilising visual techniques from anime films, choreography (particularly in regards to “gun fu”) from Honk Kong cinema, mixed with an almost old-school Western movie vibe (to the point where if I had to put this in a genre I’d say “Neon Western”) combine to make something truly exciting even on mute. Even the character’s costume has a good look to it, it’s kind of “priestly gangster” and works well for the character. Basically I can’t oversell this film enough, it’s superb and you should see it.

Also watch:

The Drop. Another film I saw with low expectations which ended up being a personal favourite. Tom Hardy is superb and the storytelling is brilliant.

Nightcrawler. Similarly coloured, also great.

 

Morgan (2016) Review

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Director: Luke Scott (Loom, one episode of The Hunter)

Budget: $8million

Running Time: 92 Minutes

Quick Synopsis: Scientists create Morgan, a genetically engineered advanced human, who then goes “grrr”, “arg” and *stab in eye*.

First off, this film has been horribly marketed. I haven’t seen a single trailer at the cinema, or a poster. In fact if I wasn’t checking comingsoon.net every day I wouldn’t even know this film existed. Which is a shame as the trailer showed a lot of potential, a more human Ex Machina starring Toby Jones, Paul Giamatti, and the lead from (the very very creepy) The Witch. This could be a true cult classic. So my expectations were high going in. The opening scene is very well done, it’s shot like security footage and the screen is full of lots of little details which help make it seem more real. Actually there’s a lot of stuff like that, there’s nothing visually that seems fake. The environment they’ve created looks like people live there, and have done for a while. One scene in particular stands out; when Kate Mara’s character (I wouldn’t really call her the protagonist, and I’ll go into that later) is speaking to Toby Jones’ character. They’re just watching something on his computer screen, now, ordinarily you can just do that and it will be fine. But they did something different here, they wrote notes on post-it notes and dotted them around the room, notes on the facility etc. This really helped the world seem real and they should be commended for that. Also, Morgan, the title character, isn’t too heavily featured in the opening section. The scenes of her are either from far away, or the security footage which is almost overhead, as such you never really get a good look at her, you just see her through people’s descriptions of what she’s like. This is a masterclass in setting up a character, a masterclass in which they forgot to do the final exam and just spat on a piece of paper and handed that in. See when you do something like that, the reveal has to have a certain weight to it, you need the main character to step out of the shadows, or step into frame in a certain way, basically you need to have a moment where it feels like you’re opening the curtains to the character, and this film doesn’t do that. The first main look at this character is just a standard shot, someone’s talking to her and it cuts to her. As such this robs the audience of that “wow” moment, it makes her seem ordinary. Which is another problem I had with this film, most of the time you’re told she’s intelligent and advanced, but she’s not given many chances to showcase this as (spoilers) they don’t have her attack people on a large scale until quite far into the film. As such they have to just have other characters tell you how brilliant she is, then follow that up with things we associate smart people with, like playing chess, listening to opera music, and…..actually that might have been it.

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Even this person could listen to opera, doesn’t mean he’s not an idiot

That’s kind of a running theme with the movie, they built up Morgan to be something she’s not. The way the actress plays her is more Children Of The Corn than anything else, but only in the present day scenes. There’s a few flashback scenes where Anya Taylor-Joy REALLY nails it, in those fleeting moments the character is brilliant, likeable, and human, everything that’s not there in the present scenes. No idea why there’s such a stark difference between the two but it’s kind of disappointing. This would be more acceptable of course, if Kate Mara’s character was engaging, but she’s not. She’s not even really the protagonist, which is odd as it means the movie doesn’t really have one. It’s not a problem with the acting, she does brilliant with what she’s given, it’s just the way the character is written means she doesn’t have much substance. There are two characters who I found interesting, Boyd Holbrook’s character, and Michelle Yeoh’s character. Yeoh’s character is really the emotional linchpin of the movie, but it’s not one they do enough with. Boyd Holbrook is given what could be a really unimportant character, the chef. Yet his character has some of the best lines of the script. He’s the only one who finds the character of Morgan a bit “off”, and one of his reasons for doing so is that she made a perfect risotto, and he was unnerved by that as he feels cooking requires heart and passion, things which are inherently human. As such the fact that she managed this shakes his whole belief system and the actor handles it subtly and perfectly. In fact, whilst we’re on the subject, I really think Holbrook could be a fantastic romantic lead in a film, and I hope he’s given the chance.

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Honestly I think this film’s biggest problem is another film. Throughout this whole film I was just thinking, “that reminded me of Ex Machina, I really need to watch that again some time”, and that’s the main thing I got from this film, that I need to watch another film again. I wasn’t thinking about this film, I wasn’t thinking about how character’s deaths effected me etc. On the bright side this meant I also wasn’t thinking of the really asinine obligatory twist ending, and I also wasn’t thinking of how much I hated some of the fight scenes as they were cut too quickly so they didn’t flow naturally, it was shot exactly how a student would film it, which is an accurate summary of the entire film actually: a very well made student film.

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See, every problem can be solved by tea

Morgan

  • Creates the universe very organically.
  • Good side characters.
  • Some very good shorts.
  • It feels more expensive than it’s budget would make you think it is.

More-go Away

  • Lacks a good protagonist.
  • Really obvious twist.
  • Waste of Paul Giamatti.
  • Most things it does well, Ex Machina did better.
  • The trailer made you think the film would be about Morgan turning violent, but that doesn’t happen until the final third of the film.

Instead of this, watch:

Obviously

Gene Wilder

On By troubledproductionsIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

This week continues to show more evidence that 2016 is actually being written by George R.R Martin. It was announced on the 29th August that Gene Wilder had passed away due to complications from Alzheimer’s disease. The general reaction to this from people on social media seemed to be simply;

“fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck”

Almost everybody has a film he’s in in one of their favourites. He was truly a comedy icon, being nominated for an Academy Award in 1968 for his role in The Producers. Which is amazing for two reasons:

  1. 1) it’s very hard for comedies and comedic roles to be nominated for Academy Awards, in the history of the awards only six have won Best Picture (Annie Hall, It Happened One Night, Tom Jones, You Can’t Take It With You, Going My Way, The Sting).
  2. Because it just made me realise that that film is nearly 50 years old.

He actually had a remarkably high success rate; six of the films he was in are bonafide classics, which considering he was only in 22 films is remarkable to think about. But that’s not the only way that people loved him as much as they did, it wasn’t just the roles he was in, it was the way he approached those roles.

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Everyone remembers the scene in Willy Wonka where we’re introduced to him, frail, walking with the aid of a stick, before tumbling forward and springing to his feet. That was his idea, his reasoning for it “because then the audience will never know what I’m telling the truth about”, in that one decision he completely set up that character. That decision is representative of why people love him; he took comedy seriously. He saw it as an artform that you needed to work hard at, something you needed to put a lot of work into. That “it’s just a comedy” isn’t an excuse for complacency and laziness. Just look at the boat scene in Willy Wonka, he was so convincing there that the adult actors were convinced he’d genuinely lost his mind. Later on, in the scene where he yelled at Charlie the director didn’t tell the child actor what was going to happen as he wanted his reaction to be real. Gene Wilder stated this this scene almost broke him, he and the actor who played Charlie had become quite close on set and it made him feel really guilty about yelling at him, all he wanted to do was take him aside before the scene and warn him that he was just acting and he still loved him.

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Despite what this post may indicate so far, it’s not just that film that he was brilliant in. There’s also the aforementioned Producers, Young Frankenstein and his movies with Richard Pryor. One film which he was almost in was Trading Places, which was set to reunite him with Richard Pryor. But when Pryor was replaced with Eddie Murphy, Murphy requested that Wilder be removed from the film. His reasoning for this was so that he didn’t come off as a poor mans Richard Pryor. It makes sense I guess but I still wish that Wilder was in, purely out of intrigue to see what it would have been like. But I guess I can’t be annoyed, he gave us enough and to ask for more would just be selfish. But a part of me still wishes we were still given a little bit more of him. Rest In Peace, you sure as hell earned it.

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The Best Post-Show Role From Each Friends Cast Member

On By troubledproductionsIn ListLeave a comment

This is being written on 19th August 2016, as such it’s the 47th birthday of Matthew Perry. He’s actually a lot more versatile than his reputation would make you think, as his stint in The Ron Clark Story shows. That’s the trouble with being in a long running successful sitcom, you get so heavily associated with the character that it can be hard for people to not see you as that and it can be hard to break out into something new. It took two successful shows (The New Adventures Of Old Christine and Veep) for Julia Louis Dreyfus to no longer be seen as Elaine Benes.

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Although this guy constantly has fans of the show calling him by his character’s name

It’s quite sad as these actors often have fantastic roles outside of the sitcom. So for this reason, this week I’ll be discussing the best film from each of the six main cast members from Friends. So, let’s go.

Matthew Perry – The Whole Nine Yards

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Just looking at this you can tell what decade it was made

Made in a different era, when Bruce Willis was still bankable. It could be argued that Matthew Perry’s performance in this is basically his character from Friends, but the fact  it still worked over a feature is great news. Some characters work best in short easily digestible chunks, over a movie they tend to lose something or become annoying (this is less prevalent now of course as the majority of TV shows have at least one eye on the binge-watchers). Sadly this film was tainted by the release of a sub-par sequel, as is often the case. But for now, we’ll just watch this and laugh. Although I should point out, I consider this Amanda Peet’s film, she was amazing in it and easily overshadowed her more experienced cast.

Jennifer Aniston – Cake

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No contest, like most things in life, the answer to this is Cake. Even reviews which dislike the film point out how great her performance is. It’s heartbreakingly good, it’s so good you don’t even notice how good it is, because you don’t see it as acting, you see it as watching a real person. There’s no massive “this is the scene for the Oscar so I’m going to dramatically cry, dramatically, whilst acting, dramatically” scene, there’s just a complete performance from beginning to end that means you stop thinking of her as Jennifer Aniston, which for someone as well known as her, takes some doing.

Courteney Cox – Scream

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This was the easiest choice, not because of how bad her other roles are, but because of how good these are. It’s not hyperbole to say that these films completely changed how people perceived horror films in the 90’s, and a big part of that was obviously because of how many people watched them. I don’t think it’s too far fetched that at least a few people watched it because they were fans of Friends (it was still in it’s infancy but had a reasonably sized fanbase by that point). Cox relishes her role in this, the trouble with being in a sitcom is the characters usually have to be somewhat likeable to make the audience want to sit down and watch them every Friday night (there are some exceptions of course, the main one being It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, but that’s more cult than a mainstream success), whereas in a film you can play a terrible character, and she does so in this. Her character’s arc throughout the four films is one of redemption, one of acknowledging your role in disasters and attempting to improve yourself but always falling short. It says more about humanity than Friends ever did.

Lisa Kudrow – Bojack Horseman

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The first of two choices here which are basically glorified guest performances. But I had to put it in, her performance in this was heartbreaking. She delivered her lines with pure emotion and helped this show become more than just an animated show, she made it more human. There’s not much else that can be said about this that I didn’t already say in my Bojack blog. The show has actually been killing it with guest stars, it even got Mara “Matilda” Wilson in the third series, and she’s all kinds of awesome.

Matt LeBlanc – Episodes

This was also easy, but unlike the Cox situation, it’s because, truth be told, he hasn’t done that well since the show. He’s picked bad films which didn’t really help him at all, and then there’s Joey.

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Fun fact: it took longer for you to read this than it did for this show to get cancelled

Episodes, however, is fantastic. It’s beautifully meta about the entire industry, as such it’s never going to be a huge mainstream success, but people who watch it tend to love it. It has to be said that a lot of people watched this because of LeBlanc, they wanted to see how he was in it. Ok, they had to wait about 4 episodes to see him in a move which was either brilliant (as it allowed viewers to get to know the other characters) or stupid (as it annoyed people and made them leave). It was a huge gamble for the show to do it but it paid off, the show’s still running strong and has been nominated for Golden Globes, Emmy’s and BAFTA’s. LeBlanc is actually fantastic in it, playing himself with knowledge of what the audience thinks he’s actually like. This show is probably one of my favourite new sitcoms of the last 5 years, and unless it all goes Scrubs Season 9 on us, I can’t see that ending.

David Schwimmer – American Crime Story

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I was going to put his stint in Curb Your Enthusiasm in here, but realised then I’d have two sitcom appearances, and two of them playing themselves. The truth is, Schwimmer has moved more into directing since the show ended, and has done a good job, not quite Afleck levels, but he has an eye for what’s important. As such I was going to have to settle for sitcom guest appearances, but then American Crime Story happened. Holy hell is he good in this, who’d have thought Ross from Friends would put in one of the television performances of the year? As one review said:

“Schwimmer stole every reaction shot, no more so than in the finale.”

His casting was a masterstroke that paid off, not quite in “casting Bryan Cranston in Breaking Bad” levels, but certainly high up there. His performance was rewarded with an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Limited Series Or Movie, an award so prestigious that Ed Harris, Patrick Stewart and Michael Gambon have all been nominated, and lost! His next step is the crime drama, Feed The Beast, and no doubt his performance in American Crime Story has made it a lot more eagerly anticipated.

So, that’s our choices, where did we go surprisingly right? Where did we go horrifically wrong?