Mary and Max (3 Stars)

This is a stop-motion animated film made in 2009.

An eight-year-old girl called Mary Daisy Dinkle lives in Mount Waverley, Australia. She doesn't have any friends because of a birthmark on her forehead. Children can be so cruel. Her home life isn't pleasant because her mother is an alcoholic. She drinks cooking sherry. That's awful stuff. There are only two sherries that I drink: Harvey's Bristol Cream and Emva Cream. Harvey's is slightly better, but I like Emva Cream because I drank it when I was young. It brings back memories. I used to drink Emva Cream with my mother while we were watching horror films. I was only 11 when I first drank it, so I drank it in small measures. It became more as I grew older.

Emva Cream is still sold today, but very few shops stock it. The most commonly sold sherry in England is QC Cream, a sickly sherry that's almost as bad as cooking sherry. It's only popular because it's cheap. It's the sort of drink that people buy to get drunk, not to enjoy it. Honestly, I can't recommend it to anybody. Emva Cream, when available, is only slightly more expensive.

But I'm getting off the subject, as I often do. Mary is puzzled by many things, such as where babies come from. Her mother tells her that they're found in the bottom of beer glasses. Mary is interested in America, and she knows that Americans drink a lot of Coca Cola, so she wonders if Americans find babies in the bottom of Coca Cola cans.

One day Mary is reading an American telephone book, and she's fascinated by the weird names in America. She rips out a page, and she writes a letter to Max Jerry Horowitz to ask him where babies come from. Max is a 44-year-old Jewish atheist who lives in New York. He suffers from various illnesses, primarily Asperger's Syndrome.

Getting off the subject again, many people like Whoopi Goldberg don't understand how a person can be Jewish and an atheist at the same time. Whoopi is misguided in believing that Jewish is a religion, not a race. In school one of my friends was a Jewish Catholic. The Jews are the descendants of Abraham via Isaak and Jacob. As far as the Jews are concerned, there are only two races on Earth: the Jews and the Gojim (everyone else). It's possible for non Jews to adopt the Jewish religion, although it doesn't happen often. Unlike Christianity and Islam, Jews don't have missionaries, because Judaism is the religion of the Jewish people. Those who adopt the Jewish religion call themselves Jews, which complicates matters.

When a Jew marries a non-Jew, the child is considered a Jew if his mother is Jewish. This means that Jewishness can be passed down through several generations from mother to daughter. Any son in the line is considered Jewish, but not his children. I had a Jewish girlfriend when I was 18. If the relationship had lasted more than a few months, I might have had Jewish children.

Now let's finally talk about the film!

The film follows the friendship of the two outsiders over a period of 20 years. They confide their innermost secrets in one another. At times the letters stop. Max spends eight months in a psychiatric hospital, and when Mary's letters remain unanswered she thinks he's no longer interested in her.

Things improve over the years. Max wins the lottery and buys a lifetime supply of chocolate, but he's not greedy; he gives the remainder to an elderly neighbour. Mary has plastic surgery to remove her birthmark, and she marries a handsome young neighbour. After completing university she writes a book about Asperger's Syndrome, based on her best friend Max.

The film see-saws emotionally. There are alternate happy and sad scenes. It's like a normal life. I've had happy and sad times in my life, though they probably didn't swing from one extreme to the other as quickly as in "Mary and Max".

The overall impression is that it's a bittersweet film. Would it have been better with real actors? I can't say for sure, but I think not. The figures made of clay add to the film's pathos.

Success Rate:  - 3.2

	Order from Amazon.com
	Order from Amazon.co.uk
	Order from Amazon.de

Black Hawk Down (3 Stars)

Netflix Thursday #20

This is a 2001 film directed by Ridley Scott about a mission by the US army in Somalia in 1993. It's based on true events, though simplified in parts for the big screen. The Somalian rebel leader Aidid was deliberately starving the population in order to become more powerful. The Americans had tried in vain to capture or kill him. On 3rd October 1993 an operation was launched to capture two of the most senior men in his group.

Was the operation successful or not? That depends how you look at it. The two Somalians were captured, so the mission was technically a success. On the other hand, 19 American soldiers were killed and 73 were wounded, the highest number of casualties in a single day since the Vietnam War.

The slogan on the poster is "Leave no man behind". It's something that the American armed forces are proud of. But is it a good military strategy? Based on the evidence of this film I'd say No. The problems begin when an American private falls out of a helicopter. A team is sent to rescue him, which leads to a Black Hawk helicopter being shot down. More troops are sent to rescue the soldiers from the helicopter crash, but many of them are cut off from their comrades and need to be rescued.

What I'm trying to say is that if the private had been left to die, the day's casualties would have been one dead and zero wounded. "Leave no man behind" is a proud slogan to chant among servicemen, but does it make sense? Was it worth sacrificing 19 lives to save one man? If I'd been the man lying on the ground I'd have yelled at my comrades to leave me to die.

As my regular readers know by now, I've been on holiday for the last four weeks. I'm in England with my daughter Fiona and her family, and I'm staying until 12th December. It's my first visit since the pandemic, so I wanted to make it a longer visit. This has an effect on my viewing habits. Fiona doesn't have a DVD player and relies on Netflix for entertainment. This is frustrating to me, but I'll talk about her and her family in this post.

Fiona watches Netflix every day. She doesn't watch films, she watches reality shows and true crime series. I have to admit, if that's what someone wants to watch, Netflix is sufficient. Good luck to her.

My grandson Samuel (two years old) also watches Netflix every day, closely supervised by his parents. He watches "Masha and the Bear" and "Cocomelon". Sometimes I put on other children's series for the sake of variety. He enjoys these for a while, but then he says "Bear, Bear", so I put "Masha and the Bear" on again. Okay, Netflix is all a small child needs.

But what about my son-in-law, Mehdi? With the exception of "The Walking Dead", he only watches films. He watches a film every day, more at the weekend. He likes mostly action and horror movies. I've been observing his habits closely. Every day he clicks through Netflix's new movies and recommendations. Sometimes he immediately spots a film that he'd like. Sometimes nothing attracts his attention, so he either re-watches a film he's already seen or he picks a film that he might like. He's at Netflix's mercy. He can only watch what's being thrown at him.

A few days ago I watched "Forest of Love" with Mehdi. He loved it, and he said he wanted to watch more films made by Sion Sono. Oops! There aren't any more of his films on Netflix. In my opinion, Mehdi has the inclinations to be a real film fan. Not everyone watches seven or more films a week. He's suffering from having to rely on Netflix, but he doesn't realise that he's suffering, because he's never owned a DVD player. He doesn't know what he's missing.

I'm not saying Netflix is bad. It's good for my daughter. It's good for my grandson. But it's bad for anyone who's a serious film fan, except as an additional extra to a DVD or Blu-ray player.

Success Rate:  - 0.1

	Order from Amazon.com
	Order from Amazon.co.uk
	Order from Amazon.de

Finding Nemo (5 Stars)

I might never have watched this film. I've known about it for years, and I knew that it was highly praised, but I had no interest in it. I don't like animation films. There's no particular reason, I just don't. However, my daughter Gillian bought this film for my grandson Oliver on DVD, and he came to me and asked me to play it for him. I pretended to play it. I put the disc in my Blu-ray player, but I actually played the film from Disney Plus to get better quality. I avoid DVDs whenever I can, but Oliver didn't need to know that.

Not counting a few failed attempts, this is only the second film he's watched. The first was "Madagascar 2". I'm happy to make these new experiences with him. Will he become a big film fan like me? I don't know, but I'll certainly encourage him. He repeatedly said the words "This is my film". It means something to him that he owns the disc. That motivated him to watch the whole film from beginning to end.

I'll briefly describe the plot, even though I suspect that I was one of the last people to watch it. Nemo is a clownfish who lives with his father in the Great Barrier Reef on the North-East coast of Australia. On his first day at school Nemo swims off and is caprured by a scuba driver. He's brought to an aquarium in the office of a dentist in Sydney. His father sets out to find him, even though Sydney is more than a thousand miles away. That's a long journey for a little fish.

The film is beautiful. The bright colours of the seascape and the even brighter colours of the fish are breath-taking. It's an ocean full of danger, with sharks and other predators.

I watched the film in German. Please don't criticise me. When it comes to animated films, even the original version is dubbed. It's possible that the German version is even better than the original version, because Germany has a whole industry with high quality voice actors. I'd like to watch the film again in English to compare the versions.

I read today that "Finding Nemo" is the highest selling DVD of all time, having sold more than 40 million copies worldwide. That's well deserved. It's a great film that can be enjoyed by children and adults.

Oliver's happy. Maybe I should buy him another film.

Success Rate:  + 8.0

	Order from Amazon.com
	Order from Amazon.co.uk
	Order from Amazon.de

The Hulk (2 Stars)

What went wrong?

That's the question that everyone has to ask who sees this film.

Ang Lee is one of the world's greatest living directors. He's made many brilliant films in his life, including "The Life of Pi" and "Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk" and "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon". He's won two Academy Awards as Best Director, for "The Life of Pi" and "Brokeback Mountain" (which I still haven't seen).

So how could Ang Lee produce this awful piece of trash? When it was complete he realised what he'd done. He felt so depressed that he wanted to give up filmmaking, but his father convinced him to carry on. Fortunately. This would have been a poor film to end his career. Two years later he won his first Academy Award as Best Director.

So what's so bad about the film?

First I'll say what's good. There's a nine-second Stan Lee cameo. It's actually a double cameo. Stan is shown walking out of a building with Lou Ferrigno, the bodybuilder who played the Hulk in the television series from 1978 to 1982. Both of them are security guards, one tougher than the other. Stan tells Lou that they need to beef up security. Never a truer word was spoken.

The other thing I like is the cinematography. Ang Lee uses imaginative split screen images frequently throughout the film. Sometimes different scenes are shown side by side; sometimes the same scene is shown from different angles; sometimes we see different phases of the same scene, seconds or minutes apart, being shown simultaneously. Sometimes it's even a fake split screen, i.e. there's a line across the screen, but something crosses the line. Here are a few examples.

Beautiful. It looks even better on screen, because the frames aren't static. The lines wander across the screen, changing the size of the images relative to one another. This is the only reason I've given the film a two-star rating. It's the only thing the film has in its favour.

It would be too difficult for me to name all the film's faults. I'm sure I would forget some, so I'll stick to the biggest errors. Just look at this screenshot of the Hulk. What did Ang Lee spend his $175 million budget on? Obviously not the CGI. The Hulk looks like a cheap plastic children's toy. It's embarrassing. He didn't even look that bad in the television series made 20 years earlier.

The Hulk's clothing has been a recurring joke since he first appeared in the comics in the 1960's. When he grows in size his shirt is shredded, but he never loses his underpants. They're a revolutionary brand that can stretch to four times the size without being damaged. When the Hulk turns back to Bruce Banner his underpants shrink back to their previous size. I'm not naive. I know the reason for this. It would have been inappropriate to draw a completely naked green monster in the 1960's.

Ang Lee tries to fix this problem, but his botched attempt makes things even worse. When Bruce Banner turns into the Hulk the first time he keeps his stretch pants. Then he turns back into Bruce Banner a short distance away from Betty Ross. He's shown completely naked from behind. Ah ha! So his underpants fell off because they were too loose after being stretched? That makes sense. Almost. The next camera shot shows him walking towards Betty, and his underpants have magically re-appeared, guaranteeing the film a family-friendly rating. This is a stupid continuity error. At the very least the camera angle could have been changed to only show Bruce Banner from the waist up. Didn't Ang Lee notice his blunder?

The acting is lacklustre, even from Eric Bana (Bruce Banner), who I usually admire. Josh Lucas (Glenn Talbot) and Sam Elliott (General Ross) are annoyingly shallow. Jennifer Connelly (Betty Ross) is an actress I've never liked. She can't express the slightest emotion on screen, so her performance in "The Hulk" is typical for her.

The film's biggest problem is the story itself. From what I've read, there were problems with the screenplay, and the re-writing made it worse. The original story should have shown Bruce Banner battling Crusher Creel, better known as the Absorbing Man, while attempting to find his father. This was re-written, making Bruce's father the Absorbing Man. So Bruce has to battle his evil father? This is a ridiculous story, even for those who don't know the original comics. Why not just stick to what Stan Lee wrote in 1962? Stan knew what he was doing. He was a genius. The new generation of Marvel screenwriters are high-school dropouts who have no idea how to write a good story.

Even worse, the Hulk's origin runs through the whole film, new details added through things remembered in dreams from scene to scene. Using dreams to solve a mystery is bad storytelling. Ang Lee should have thrown this script in the trash can where it belonged.

When I last watched this film in 2014 I said I probably wouldn't watch it again. After Stan Lee's death it floated to the top of my to-watch list in a list of Marvel films based on Stan Lee's creations. It was difficult for me to watch the film today. I found myself getting bored, wondering when it would finally end. Now I can say with certainty that I won't watch it again. I'll keep it in my collection, because I'm a completist. I need to have all the Marvel films on my shelf, neatly ordered. I know that's obsessive, but it's the way I am. Maybe the person who inherits the films after my death will enjoy it. Probably not.

The film was a box office failure, deservedly. Supposedly it was a success in the first week, but then dropped in popularity. This was probably when people started telling their friends how bad it was.

I can only think of one value that Ang Lee's Hulk film might have: it can be shown at film schools as an example of a big budget film by a successful director that went astray. Students can write essays on the film's faults and attempt to explain how they happened. I'm sure that there's a psychology behind bad films. There has to be an explanation why directors are blind to a film's faults until after completion, when it's too late.

Success Rate:  - 0.2

	Order from Amazon.com
	Order from Amazon.co.uk
	Order from Amazon.de

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (3 Stars)

I don't know what's happened to Guy Ritchie. The first films that he directed, "Lock, stock and two smoking barrels" (1998) and "Snatch" (2000), are two of the best films ever made. "Snatch" almost made it into my list of 30 films to watch before you die. From then on it just went downhill. One flop after another. I admit that I enjoyed his two Sherlock Holmes films, but I seem to be in the minority. Everything else he's made is unwatchable.

Now comes "King Arthur: Legend of the Sword", the first in a series of six films about the legendary British king. I had mixed feelings about going to see it in the cinema. The trailer looked strangely anachronistic, with people wearing clothes that would be acceptable today. I half expected to be disappointed, but I gave it a chance.

King Arthur is said to have ruled over part of southern Britain in the 5th or 6th Century, but it's not certain whether he ever really existed. It's possible that he's just a figure in a series of plays and poems that were written as late as the 11th Century. There are only vague historical references to a man of this name, but he may not have been a king, and even if he was a king the stories about him were certainly written at a later date. In particular, he's said to have ruled from a castle at Camelot, but this is a mythical city that wasn't invented until the 12th Century.

The 500-year period after the Romans left Britain in the 5th Century is often referred to as the Dark Ages. This time is dark from our current point of view. The Romans were diligent at keeping records. There are scrolls chronicling the population, tax income, court cases and every smallest detail of public life. We know practically everything about Britain from 77 to 400 A.D. Then the Romans left, leaving the country in the hands of squabbling warlords. As well as defending their lands against invading Vikings and Saxons, they fought against one another. Education was a low priority, and very few people outside of monasteries knew how to read and write. It was considered unnecessary to keep records. We know almost nothing about daily life, and we can't even be sure about the names of the rulers. It wasn't until the reign of King Alfred of Wessex (871 to 899) that it became common to keep records. It's a tragedy that the years from 400 to 871 have been wiped from history.

Guy Ritchie is fanciful in his telling of the story of King Arthur, inventing his own legends as he goes along. He presents Britain as a country co-inhabited by mages, beings who inherited magical powers. The mages were tolerated because they supported the kings, but after Modred attacked King Uther's castle in Camelot Uther decided to slaughter all the mages. In turn Uther's brother Vortigern, who was trained by mages and can perform smaller feats of magic, kills Uther and usurps the throne. Uther's infant son Arthur is sent away for his protection and is adopted by a prostitute in a London brothel. When he grows up he doesn't even know his own identity. The key is a magical sword called Excalibur. Only Arthur, the true king of Britain, will be able to pull this sword out of the stone where it's embedded.

This is a fantasy epic rather than a story grounded in reality. It belongs to the Swords and Sorcery genre. The film fails to excite. Charlie Hunnam lacks charisma as King Arthur. Jude Law is compelling as Vortigern, but all the other characters are forgettable.

This time I'm not in the minority in my opinion. The critics and the public agree with me that this is an unremarkable film, average at best. Based on the abysmal box office results the next five films won't be made. Let's give Guy Ritchie a chance to rediscover his magic somewhere else.

The Hulk (2 Stars)

Today is the first time I've watched this film since I saw it in the cinema when it was first released. It's so long ago that I had to check when it was. July 2003. That's a long, long time ago. I never bought it on DVD until now because I was so disappointed. Seeing it on sale cheap last week I decided to give it another chance.

This is the biggest failure of all Marvel films this century. That's all the more amazing, considering that the director was Ang Lee, a man who (usually) does nothing wrong. Look at all his other fantastic films like "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", "Life of Pi" and "Lust & Caution". What went wrong with "The Hulk"? I don't know. There must have come a point in the film's development when he realised he had a turkey on his hands, but it was too late to go back. Supposedly he was so disappointed when he saw the final product that he wanted to give up film making, and he had to be persuaded to carry on by his father.

What's best about the film is the beautiful cinematography. What's bad about the film is the noticeable overuse of CGI, the poor story and the total disregard of the comic book origins. And then there's the lacklustre acting by Eric Bana (Bruce Banner) and Jennifer Connelly (Betty Ross). The responsibility for the poor script lies with Ang Lee alone. The script he received had Zzzax and the Absorbing Man as the villains who would challenge the Hulk. Ang demanded a rewrite, making the Absorbing Man Bruce Banner's father. That was so idiotic. Obviously Ang has father-son issues that he feels compelled to reflect in his films. Worst of all is the idea that Bruce inherited his susceptibility to gamma rays from his father. The film goes to great lengths to explain the scientific background of what happened. Why? In the comic Stan Lee just tells us that Bruce Banner was exposed to gamma rays and became the Hulk. That's all. No explanation needed.

Something else that disturbs me is that the Hulk has facial expressions reminiscent of King Kong. It wasn't until recently that I found out that this was deliberate.

I don't know if I'll watch this again. Maybe ten years from now I'll give it another chance. Till then.

Hanna (4 Stars)

Hanna is a 15-year-old girl who has been living alone with her father in the north of Finland since she was 2 years old. As well as teaching her to survive by herself he has given her a rigorous schooling, including teaching her to speak German (his native language), English, French, Spanish and Arabic. He tells her that she can return to civilisation any time she wants to, but when she does enemies will come who will try to kill her. She makes this decision shortly before her 16th birthday, and at this point her father leaves her to fend for herself. First she is captured by the CIA and is held captive in Morocco. After escaping she flees to Spain and travels across Europe, heading towards Germany with assassins on her trail.

Hanna is played by Saoirse Ronan (however her name is pronounced), a talented young actress who shows considerable skill in the action scenes. I expect great things for her. Eric Bana and Cate Blanchett give solid performances, as is to be expected from actors of their quality. This is an exciting film. For most of the film we are left guessing why the CIA is so determined to capture or kill Hanna, but in the end everything is explained. There's an obvious similarity with "The Bourne Identity". Unlike Jason Bourne, Hanna isn't suffering from amnesia, but just like him she has to run for her life while trying to find out who she is.

Star Trek (2 Stars)

As you can tell from the photo above, this is a review of the 2009 Star Trek film that effectively rebooted the franchise. Now don't get me wrong. I'm a big Star Trek fan. I love all the television series from the original series in 1966 up to "Enterprise" in 2005. I even liked the animated series in 1974, though I admit that the plots are more shallow than the other series. I enjoyed the first 10 films, even though most of them are weaker than the television series. And yet, I hate this reboot. It's awful. Maybe even 2 stars is too much for it.

I would have been happy if the film had been made with a different premise. Maybe the story of a different starship making voyages at the same time as the USS Enterprise. That would have worked. But to cast new actors playing the original characters that have since become part of the world's cultural heritage..... that's blasphemy! Only Karl Urban is a passable replacement for DeForrest Kelly as Leonard McCoy. Chris Pine is awful as Jim Kirk, and Zoe Saldana is so inept at playing Lt. Uhura that she should be banned from ever acting again. Zachary Quinto, an actor that I greatly like after seeing him in "Heroes", does the best he can as Spock, but he just isn't Leonard Nimoy. Simon Pegg is a reasonable choice for Scotty, but he overdoes the comedy. John Cho is utterly forgettable as Sulu. Anton Yelchin is a very poor replacement for Chekov, and also out of place, since Chekov wasn't part of the original crew of the Enterprise; he joined the ship in the second season of the original series.

As for the plot: the backstory with Kirk's father is unnecessary. The love affair between Spock and Uhura is so wrong that it made me want to throw a brick at my television screen. The only good thing about the film is the appearance of Leonard Nimoy as the old Spock. He alone has saved the DVD from being dumped in my trash.

No, I refuse to give you a link to the film trailer. Forget it.

Romulus, My Father (4½ Stars)

This is a fascinating true story based on the autobiography of the Australian philosopher Raimond Gata. His parents were poor Romanian immigrants. His father was a kind but impractical man, with good intentions that rarely succeeded. His mother was a cold woman, incapable of caring for her children, leaving them unfed and unwashed while she had affairs with other men. Raimond obviously loved both his parents, but makes no attempt to cover up their faults. The brilliant performance of the three main actors, Eric Bana, Franka Potente and Kodi Smit-McPhee lifts this slow-moving film to magnificent heights.