Even though it's really only a few weeks since I saw the Indiana Jones movies for the first time, I can just about begin to imagine what it might have been like to hear they were making a new one after 19 years, and wondering if they were going to mess it up. I thought Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade was such a great way of ending Indy's story that maybe it should have been left alone. But credit to all concerned -- they've done themselves proud.

The movie is set in 1957, and the plot concerns a crystal skull with psychic properties which will, if returned to a certain temple in South America and reunited with its twelve fellows, will grant its bearer Ultimate Power. Or so the legend goes. But does the plot really matter in an Indiana Jones film?

The action set-pieces are as good as ever (I found myself grinning in places, just as I did when watching Raiders of the Lost Ark), and wear their absurdity gleefully on their sleeves. Perhaps the silliest point is when Indy survives a nuclear blast by taking refuge in a handy lead-lined fridge -- but this inspires cheerful laughter, not derision.

I was also impressed by the number of good performances. The passing years haven't had any discernible impact on Harrison Ford's ability to play the action hero. Karen Allen returns as Marion Ravenwood, who gets to do more stuff this time, and hence to be the feisty character she never had much chance to be in Raiders. Cate Blanchett's Irina Spalko (leader of the Russians after the Ultimate Power promised by the skull) is a proper female villain you can boo. Shia LaBoeuf plays Mutt Williams, a young greaser who at first seems to have the same function as Willie Scott in The Temple of Doom -- namely, to be the sidekick who's hopelessly out of his depth (at moments of uncertainty, he combs back his hair, clutching the comb like a talisman); but, unlike Willie, Mutt proves useful by the end. And there's John Hurt as Indy's former colleague Harold Oxley, who's been driven mad by the skull.

Although I pretty much dismissed the plot as irrelevant a few paragraphs ago, I did actually like the way Crystal Skull made the Indiana Jones 'format' (for want of a better word) work in a 1950s setting. And, most of all, if this fourth movie is to be the last (and I really don't see how there could be another), it makes a fine end to the saga of Indiana Jones. It adds to the series rather than diminishing the previous three, which is as good an outcome as one could ask for.

M. Night Shyamalan tends to make movies by taking a particular genre -- ghost story, superhero, alien invasion, and so on -- and interpreting it through his own individual style, which is intense, relatively quiet, focusing tightly on a small number of characters. The Happening is Shyamalan's disaster movie and, whilst I didn't find it nearly as bad as some of the reviews suggest, I did think it was quite hit-and-miss -- mainly because the story he wanted to tell didn't translate fully into his style of movie-making.

In the north-eastern USA, there's something in the air: a neuro-toxin that turns off the in-built human self-preservation mechanism, effectively making people kill themselves -- and people aren't sure what's causing it. We see all this through the eyes of high-school science teacher Elliot Moore (Mark Wahlberg) who, along with his wife Alma (Zooey Deschanel), joins the mass exodus from Philadelphia, in the hope of staying ahead of what's happening...

What I think Shyamalan does particularly well is to depict a plausible reaction to an unknown and invisible threat. People milling around a lot and then seizing on a possible exit with an everyone-for-themselves mentality? I can buy that. And there's something particularly chilling about an invisible force that causes people to harm themselves rather than others; and Shyamalan captures that very effectively in some scenes, such as one near the beginning where a cop shoots himself, and then a succession of other people calmly pick up the fallen gun and take their own lives. This scene, like many other moments, is all the more effective for what it doesn't show.

But showing little doesn't always pay off in a genre that thrives on spectacle; and, try as he might, Shyamalan doesn't manage to make shots of trees blowing in the wind feel suitably frightening. Particularly in the film's later stages, it can feel that he's trying too hard to weave menace out of flimsy materials. For instance, there's a scene where Elliot is looking for Mrs Jones, the paranoid old woman in whose house he's stayed the night, and he sees a figure lying on her bed; opening the door, he finds that the figure is a doll. He walks carefully into the room, and the dramatic music gets louder and LOUDER... Does Mrs Jones's body come into view hanging from the ceiling, or something equally horrific? No -- she just appears behind Elliot, wagging her finger and giving him her paranoid version of a good telling-off. Hardly up there with the best of the set-pieces that Shyamalan is readily capable of producing.

Of the main performances, Wahlberg, while not great, was quite a lot better than I expected him to be. But I thought Deschanel didn't instil her character with much personality at all (whether that is more down to her or the script, I'm not sure). And the movie would frankly have been better off without some of its elements; most of the humour fell completely flat, for example.

Shyamalan strikes me as a film-maker whose movies work better in the moment, but don't necessarily bear much close scrutiny afterwards. Watching The Sixth Sense was one of the most exhilarating experiences I've ever had at the cinema -- I walked out of it in a daze, as I hadn't seen the twist coming at all. Yet I've never watched that film again all the way through; maybe I don't want to, in case it spoils the memory, like watching a magic trick when you know the secret. The other movies of Shyamalan's that I've seen didn't live up to the experience of watching that first one, but at least there's usually the atmosphere and the set-pieces to enjoy. In The Happening, there isn't always that, perhaps because it's the kind of story that needs a bigger canvas than Shyamalan is comfortable (or skilled) in working on. It's a film that's good in part -- but only in part.

Got a bit behind with these: I taped this when it was on TV, but only just got around to watching it. To recap, this is my third post in a series as I watch the Indiana Jones movies for the first time, before (eventually) going to see the newest one (the previous two instalments are here and here).

So, this time is Indy on the hunt for the Holy Grail -- or, more accurately, on the hunt for his father, who was in the process of deciphering the Grail's whereabouts, but has been kidnapped by the Nazis, who seek the Grail for their own nefarious purposes. Flouting the law of diminishing sequels, I found that I enjoyed The Last Crusade the most of the three. I wasn't grinning as much as when watching Raiders of the Lost Ark, but I could put that down to familiarity with the formula as much as any inherent qualities of the individual films. The third movie is still non-stop action, but has a much better plot (it feels more like a proper globe-trotting adventure than the other two), and the female lead does not scream and need rescuing all the time (shame they had to make her a baddie for that to be the case, though).

Best of all, however, is the presence of Sean Connery as Indy's father, and the friction generated between Henry Jones Jr and Sr. I would go so far as to suggest that The Last Crusade is the ideal Indiana Jones film: it's exciting, it's funny, it has its tongue in its cheek without laughing behind its hand (pardon the imagery)... It's an old-fashioned adventure yarn of the best kind, a perfect end to the series -- which, of course, it was for 19 years. Right now, I feel as though The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull will have to be something very special for it to have been worth making. Log on to the next episode of IndyWatch to find out if it was...

I never read Marvel comics as a kid, so my prior knowledge of Iron Man was limited to Saturday morning cartoons. The animated series was bright and gaudy and quite silly; but what I take particularly from the Iron Man movie is that superhero tales can sometimes benefit from being bright and gaudy.

Gazillionaire weapons magnate Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr) is in Afghanistan, returning to his plane after demonstrating his company's new missile to the military, when he is abducted by terrorists who demand he build them such a missile. Instead, Stark builds himself a super-powered suit of armour and escapes. Returning to the US, he announces at a press conference that, having seen first-hand the destruction his weapons have caused, he is halting Stark Industries'  manufacture of military technology. Stark then devotes his time to refining that suit of armour, and using it to beat the bad guys -- but there is an enemy closer to home than he realises...

The world that Stark inhabits is more technologically advanced than our own, or at least the US is; his world's Afghanistan is not, and therein lies a key problem with the movie: the shiny, hyper-real hardware of Iron Man does not sit well in what looks like the real world. The film's script may stress the fictional nature of its 'Ten Rings' terror group, but their methods are all too common to reality. The movie ties itself up in ethical knots as Tony Stark tries to demonstrate his moral superiority over the terrorists by acting as brutally as they do.

It's in the later sections, when Stark is being the superhero fighting the supervillain (the climactic fight reminded me of Spider-Man vs the Green Goblin, with a dash of Spider-Man vs Doc Ock), that the movie really shines, because it's then that Iron Man is in his natural environment, as it were. Distanced enough from reality, Iron Man becomes a fine piece of cinematic entertainment. Downey makes for a different, more relaxed kind of superhero;  Jeff Bridges and Terrence Howard do well in their respective roles as Stark's ambitious deputy, Obadiah Stane, and his friend and military liaison James Rhodes. Gwyneth Paltrow does her best as the female lead -- Stark's PA, Pepper Potts -- but the role itself seems underwritten: Potts saves the day rather than needing to be rescued, which makes a welcome change from the norm; but it's as if the writers weren't sure what kind of personality they wanted her to have, and she ends up without much of one at all.

So, Iron Man isn't the best superhero movie I've ever seen, but neither is it the worst. It has its uncomfortable moments when it tries to grapple with reality and loses; but, once it lets itself be a superhero romp, the film is just fine.

Previously on IndyWatch: our intrepid hero watched the first of the BBC's weekly re-runs of the Indiana Jones movies, and found it quite entertaining. Will the second be as good? Read on to find out...

Hmm, I'm starting to think that maybe it's not such a good idea to watch all of Indy's adventures so close together, as it does tend to highlight how similar they are. At the start of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, I was grinning at the brio of the action, just as with Raiders of the Lost Ark. But I must admit to feeling a bit jaded by the end (even though Temple has the better ending of the two, as at least Indy has to do some work to beat the bad guys), even though there were genuine thrills like the mine-car chase (I wonder, did they make a theme park ride of that?).

I suspect this was mainly down to the script, which seemed quite... uninteresting in the middle; and in particular made the mistake of having a 'heroine' who was completely useless -- 'I broke a nail' gags are funny once, but not for two hours. These films would have told much better stories if they'd had female leads who could (and did) take care of themselves instead of needing to be rescued. Hopefully there'll be a character like that in the next two movies...

I'd hoped to write more than that, but there's really nothing else I want to say. Then again, maybe that says more than anything.

To be continued...

Straight out with it:: I have never sat down and watched an Indiana Jones movie. But, with Indy 4 coming to a cinema near me later this month, now seems a fine time to catch up. And, happily, the good old Beeb are showing the first three on successive Sundays; so last night, I sat down and watched Raiders of the Lost Ark (without any popcorn or Chocolate Orange, alas, but I managed).

Do I need to bother with a plot summary? It's 1936, and Indiana Jones (who, let's say, is the kind of archaeologist one would not imagine bothering to wait around for geophysics results and stuff like that) goes off to Egypt to stop the Nazis (aided by Indy's nemesis, the archaeologist Belloq) finding the lost Ark of the Covenant. Along the way, there is much adventure, before the baddies all get zapped by a deus ex machina (or is it a machina ex deus?).

No, the plot doesn't bear much scrutiny; but it's not that kind of movie. Watching Raiders, I found myself grinning a lot -- not because I thought the film was corny, but at the sheer joy and exuberance of it. It's as though Lucas and Spielberg realised exactly how daft the whole genre was, but were determined to celebrate it regardless. The main criticism I'd make is that, for such an apparently feisty heroine, Indy's old flame Marion has too little to do, unless you count being captured and rescued. As for the rest, I think it's best just to enjoy the ride.

Join us next week on IndyWatch for Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom...

Having seen a trailer for this movie and thinking it looked quite amusing, I decided to catch it before it disappeared from my local cinema screens. And In Bruges did indeed prove to be quite amusing, but unfortunately that was about all.

This film is about Ray and Ken, two Irish hit-men parcelled off to Bruges by their boss, Harry, to lie low after a hit and await further instructions. Ken (Brendan Gleeson) is determined to enjoy the sights and the culture; Ray (Colin Farrell) would rather not be there at all, or at least down the pub -- until he stumbles across a film-shoot and meets the lovely Chloë (Clémence Poésy), whom he tries his best to woo. And things soon get a whole lot more problematic for Ray: he killed a little boy by mistake during the hit, for which Harry wants Ray dead -- and gives Ken the job...

The first thing to say in the movie's favour is that the two leads give great performances: Gleeson plays Ken such that you could almost -- but not quite -- forget that he's a hit-man at all. But Farrell is especially good, making Ray crassly offensive and yet oddly charming; the impression gained is that he would insult you -- if not worse! -- but would do so mainly because he doesn't know any better. There are also some nicely humorous moments (many of which, yes, involve Ray saying the wrong thing); and, of course, Bruges itself is stunning.

So why didn't I like In Bruges more? Mainly, I think, because the humour didn't always seem to sit very easily alongside the sometimes quite brutal violence. The end result was neither funny nor dramatic enough to be more than a second-tier movie for me. Though I must admit the film ends at exactly the right point.

And finally: I've never been to Bruges, but seeing this has made me think I'd find it interesting. Another entry for my list of places to visit...

This BBC documentary closed by looking at the rising popularity and influence of fantasy over the last fifty years. Once again, interesting subject matter, and better than the others in some ways (e.g. no random celebrity talking heads); but also let down by some strange editorial decisions. The coverage was uneven, beginning with Michael Moorcock, then jumping to Terry Pratchett, who was the subject of about half the programme. Of course, this was fair enough, as Pratchett is probably the most significant fantasy author of the last twenty years. But then...

Then, we turned to fantasy films, which had not previously been mentioned in the series, and really deserved an episode of their own. All this programme could do was skip from The Thief of Bagdad straight to the recent Beowulf movie and the films of Guillermo del Toro. Next up were fantasy games -- again, a subject all of their own -- and  a bit about how games players can now tell their own fantasy stories, but not much about how the kinds of stories we tell in games are of an entirely different sort from the ones we tell in prose.

Then it's back to books, and the recent developments in modern urban fantasy, with Neil Gaiman given as an example; cue, as predicted in this blog previously, clips of Neverwhere. Now, much as I like Neil Gaiman's work, I would have thought he's too wide-ranging to be so easily classified -- though I suppose the majority of his work can be described generally as 'modern urban fantasy'. Anyway, the programme finished by touching briefly on the New Weird, focusing in particular on China Miéville, who, if I remember rightly, was the only contributor to feature in all three episodes -- but, for whatever reason, they didn't interview him about his own work.

I was pleased to see the programme acknowledge some of the complexities of fantasy, that it can both act as a comfort blanket and confront important issues head on -- but still the story was left incomplete. You would be forgiven for thinking that modern urban stuff is the norm in contemporary fantasy publishing, when in fact there's still a lot of mediocre (or worse) sub-Tolkien fantasy being published; the programme suggested that the latter was just a blip at the end of the 1970s. And no mention of the most popular fantasy author of recent times, J.K. Rowling.

And so, the final episode of The Worlds of Fantasy was like the series as a whole: interesting in parts, but far from comprehensive, even allowing for its short length. What a shame.

The main reason I wanted to see Cloverfield was that J.J. Abrams' name was attached to it, and I like the twisty, turny plots of Alias and Lost. What hadn't crossed my mind was that, since Cloverfield was a monster movie, it was unlikely to have a complicated plot, or even much a plot at all, necessarily -- monster movies, after all, tend to be about spectacle and destruction. And, indeed, the interest in watching Cloverfield lies more in the visuals than the story (apparently there is a back-story, but it's mainly available on associated websites, with only oblique hints in the film that, to see, you either have to know to look for, or be paying closer attention than I was).

Cloverfield is a monster movie seen through the lens of a video camera. It begins at a leaving party in New York, at which Hud (the cameraman) has been tasked with collecting friends' goodbye messages for Rob (for whom the party has been thrown); Hud, however, is more interested in using this as an excuse to talk to Marlena, an attractive girl he's noticed. I would estimate that this section of the movie lasts about fifteen minutes, and it's as tedious as you would expect a video of a complete stranger's party to be.

Then the action starts. The ground shakes, there's a distant explosion, and a large lump of metal lands in the street -- it's the Statue of Liberty's head. We then follow Rob, Hud, Marlena, Rob's brother Jason, and Jason's girlfriend Lily as they try to escape, whilst a giant creature tears up the city, shedding spider-like parasites that have a lethal bite. Over the course of the film, our group diminishes in number. There is spectacle. There is destruction.

Framing the movie as someone's video footage is an interesting choice. The obvious point of comparison is The Blair Witch Project, but the two films are in very different genres: Blair Witch is a creepy horror film that works because of how much it doesn't show; Cloverfield, being in a genre that's expected too show things, might not seem to be the ideal movie to employ shaky camerawork and a monster that's generally only half-glimpsed. And watching it did leave me with a new-found appreciation for the 'stagecraft' of Big FX Scenes.

But what I do think Cloverfield is particularly effective at is showing what it must be like to live through an unimaginable catastrophe. Yes, I can believe that things would be this confused; people wouldn't think straight; some probably would do very heroic/foolhardy things (though perhaps they wouldn't quite take it to such an extreme as Rob, who climbs a skyscraper and leaps across to the next building to rescue his girlfriend -- while insisting that Lily do the same in her party dress and heels) -- and yes, sadly, it would probably end tragically. Cloverfield may well be the most 'realistic' monster movie I've ever seen; certainly it's the most 'down-to-earth'. That doesn't make it the best, nor does it mean I'd want necessarily to see more monster movies made in this style -- but it's an interesting, if flawed, experiment.

A while ago, I found Roger Ebert's website, and I've discovered that he's my kind of critic. Which is not to say that I'd always agree with him, but that I like his approach: he's wide ranging, cares deeply about his subject, and writes both intelligently and entertainingly. His recommendation was a key reason I went to see No Country for Old Men; and the same goes for Juno which, to be honest, isn't the sort of film I would normally choose to see. But Ebert thinks this comedy about an unplanned teen pregnancy is exceptional; other reviews I checked said the same; and it's always good to step outside your comfort zone sometimes -- so I gave it a go.

I would not be as enthusiastic about the movie as Ebert is, but it's certainly very good. It wasn't as laugh-out-loud funny as I'd expected (though it is that in places); but it's all there in the glances and expressions. The lead performances are all excellent. Ellen Page plays 16-year-old Juno, a precociously articulate (but never unlikeable) girl who decides to have sex with a friend, gets pregnant; and, put off after visiting an abortion clinic, decides to put the baby up for adoption. Juno's words and gags are her armour, and she's thrown by her pregnancy; Page gives a marvellously nuanced performance as the girl trying to deal with the events of the movie. Michael Cera is also great as Bleeker, the other participant in Juno's sexual experiment. Bleeker is a runner (the film is punctuated with regular appearances by his team), a good-natured lad who, you sense, would like to express his feelings more, but words don't come naturally to him as they do to Juno. Only at the end do they find the perfect way to communicate with each other on an equal level, by sitting down with their guitars and duetting.

Then there is the couple who agree to adopt Juno's child. They appear to be perfect -- glamorous and living in a beautiful house -- though cracks eventually begin to show. Jennifer Garner portrays Vanessa, who desperately wants to be a mother, but thinks the essence of parenting lies in books and classes. Jason Bateman is equally good as Mark, Vanessa's husband, the composer of advertising jingles who would've liked to have been a rock star. During Juno's trips to visit him [*}, they find enough shared interests that -- the poignant realisation grows -- they could be perfect for each other, if only circumstances (and generations) were different. But, as it is, Juno and Mark don't go down that road; there's just an unspoken acknowledgement of what might have been, and a resignation that it cannot be. That's just one example of the great emotional complexity and subtlety to be found in Juno amid the laughs.

I could go on -- I haven't even touched on the characters of Juno's parents for one thing -- but I think I've made my point. If you haven't seen Juno, I heartily recommend it; even -- perhaps especially -- if you think it might not be your sort of thing.

* I was surprised to see Juno driving alone, but checked and found that, in some US states, the legal driving age is indeed lower than here in the UK.

I know it's not necessarily wise to put blind faith in reviews (it's better to triangulate them against your own taste first); but, when a film is hailed as a masterpiece by almost every review of it you read, it must be worth a look. And I enjoyed Fargo, the only other Coen brothers film that I've seen, so why not?

No Country for Old Men, based on the novel by Cormac McCarthy, is about a Texas welder (played by Josh Brolin) who makes off with $2 million he finds at the scene of a failed drug deal, and is pursued implacably by a criminal (Javier Bardem) so ruthless you wouldn't dare even to mock his haircut (I know that's flippant, but it's true even so), whilst Tommy Lee Jones's world-weary sheriff tries to uphold the side of law in the face of villainy he cannot comprehend.

This is a movie that reminded me, most forcefully, that film-making is still a form of art, that you can find charcterisation, metaphor, all the techniques you'd expect from literature, in the cinema as well. I was especially impressed by the movie's use of sound, and how the vast, open landscapes act as a counterpoint to the human characters. But that makes No Country for Old Men sound too much like a technical exercise, when it's a thoroughly gripping thriller.

What stops me from recommending it unreservedly is the ending: the storytelling gets more elliptical, the character you thought was the protagonist turns out not to have been, and it doesn't quite make sense on first watch. I need to see the film again, preferably after reading the book; then, I think, I'll appreciate the end more. But it doesn't get much better than seeing a movie and being able to say, 'I want to see it again'.

When I first heard that Tim Burton was going to make a film version of Sweeney Todd starring Johnny Depp, I thought it would be ideal source material for him. Then again, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory wasn't as good as I'd expected it to be. Well, now I've seen it and... and I liked it, but...

But what's the best way to react to the movie? I mean, the main character is a brutal murderer, and there are graphic scenes of people having their throats cut -- and here I am saying I enjoyed it?! Yet that's all part of the film's contradictory nature: in no sense does this movie glorify violence, but there's something almost comedic about the first sequence of Todd dispatching his victims; for all its blood and gore, it would be inaccurate to call this a horror film. I think the final scene
sums it up best: Sweeney Todd is the bloodiest romantic tragedy you'll ever see.

And that's why it works so well for Burton: it's macabre, it has that element of Gothic romance, it has a certain sense of heightened (un)reality. In short, it plays to many of Burton's key strengths as a film-maker; it's the sort of thing he can do well -- and he does. My main criticism would be tha quite a few of the actors seem to be playing to type (e.g. Alan Rickman's character is creepy and sinister -- again). But that's only a slight grumble when set against the film's many plus points. Well worth seeing.

1. Mockingbird by Walter Tevis (1980). My reading year got off to a good start with this piece of SF set in a future where reading has been banned (and, subsquently, largely forgotten), robots run everything, and the vast majority of humans drift through a pointless existence in a drugged haze, unless they decide to immolate themselves. The novel follows Spofforth, the world's most advanced robot, whose programming will not allow him to do the one thing he most wants, which is to end his life; Bradley, the man who arrives at Spofforth's university having taught himself to read; and Mary Lou, the woman whom Bradley teaches to read -- which, unfortunately for him, is illegal... This is not a flashy, noisy book, but it is a powerful examination of the dangers of losing one's connection to other people and history; and a hymn to literacy and the written word. I'll be reviewing this in more detail for The Zone website.

2. I am Legend by Richard Matheson (1954). A plague has turned everyone into vampires -- everyone, that is, except Robert Neville, who struggles to survive alone and to understand the cause of what happened. It's a good few years since I read this the first time; I re-read it now for the next meeting of my reading group, and got much more out of it this time around. It's quite interesting to read it just after Mockingbird, and to see what the two books share: both are evocatively written, for one thing; but, more than that, they pose difficult moral questions by placing their protagonists in extreme situations and interrogating their actions.

This comes particularly to light when I compare Matheson's novel to the recent film of I am Legend, which I saw a few days before reading the book.  The Robert Neville played by Will Smith is much more of a straight-ahead 'hero' -- yes, he does go through the emotional and moral wringer, but he pays his dues in the end; and he's not under the same level of duress as the book's Neville, who is constantly wrestling with his conscience, and is probably not someone you'd ever want to meet, even under more normal circumstances. The movie version is fine, it works well enough for what it is; but it really tells a different story from the novel, and I think the latter is more complex and satisfying.

3. Murky Depths, issue 0 (2007). Short 'promo issue' of a new magazine of 'graphically dark speculative fiction' whose main USP is that it includes comic strips alongside the more usual prose and poetry. Perhaps they tried to squeeze too much in, but I found the contents of this issue... just okay. I think the main problem is that they all appear to be 'one trick' pieces: the comic strips both lean heavily on their 'punchlines'; Lavie Tidhar's fake submission guidelines are all about the twist on that format; and Matt Wallace's tale of two bounty hunters has plenty of linguistic verve, but not so much in the way of a plot. Now, don't get me wrong: all these stories do work as far as they go -- for example, Tidhar's spoof is funny, and Wallace's prose is vivid (though pretty gory -- be warned if that's not your kind of thing) -- they just don't aim far enough for my liking. Still, I also have a copy of the (much longer) first issue proper of Murky Depths, and I'm sure I'll be reading that in due course.