Django Unchained (5 Stars)

This is the latest selection from my top 100 film list that I decided to watch with my son Benjamin. It's currently in 40th place.

I don't have much to write about it today, apart from sharing some information I recently read.

There's a scene where Leonardo DiCaprio, playing the slave owner Calvin Candie, had to bang his hand on the table. He did this so vehemently that he broke a plate and cut his hand. This wasn't scripted, but it looked so good that the cameras continued to roll.

Is Samuel L. Jackson, the head slave Stephen, staring at Leonardo because of the unexpected blood on his hand?

Leonardo went on to smear his blood onto the face of Broomhilda, played by Kerry Washington. That's an amazing improvised scene. I'm surprised that Kerry even put up with it. Some actors are true professionals.

Success Rate:  + 2.3

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The World's Fastest Indian (5 Stars)

True Stories #38

Name: Burt Munro

Lived: 25 March 1899 – 6 January 1978

Film dates: March to August 1967

Film made in 2005

This is a film that almost wasn't included in my true stories feature. At the end of December I went through my film collection and picked the films I wanted to watch. I stood in front of my bookcases, running my fingers over the Blu-rays first, then the DVDs. I removed every film from the shelf that was a true story. There were about 50 altogether. I put them all on a desk, and went through them, removing films until there were only 30 left. I didn't put the other 20 back in my bookcase. I left them on my desk, which is just as well, because I later decided to increase my feature to 40 films, so I put 10 back in my main pile.

I didn't put the films in any particular order, except I was deliberately leaving the best films until last. Then yesterday I looked at my last three films and thought to myself, "Huh? Where's the World's Fastest Indian?" It was the highest placed true story in my top 100 film list, so why wasn't it in my pile of films? I went back to my bookcases, and there it was, filed under W. How did I possibly miss it? And more to the point, are there any other films I've missed?

That left me with four films, which would have been a total of 41, but I closely checked the other three, and I decided to omit one of them because it's not accurate enough. All true stories have a certain amount of dramatization to make them more interesting, but I don't want to include any films which deviate too far from the truth.

The Indian in the title refers to Burt Munro's 1920 Indian Scout motorcycle. For years he'd been modifying it in his shed in Invercargill, New Zealand, increasing the speed from the original top speed of 54 miles per hour to more than 150 mph. Now, at the age of 68, he finally wanted to travel to the Bonneville Salt Flats in America to set a new land speed record.

The film is a road movie, from New Zealand to America, with a large portion of the film showing his journey from Los Angeles to Bonneville. In my last review I promised that I would post a gallery of the colourful people he met on the way. Here they are in chronological order.

Tom, Burt's next door neighbour and biggest fan.

Tom's parents, who like Burt, except when he revs up his motorbike at 5:30 am.

Burt's girlfriend Fran.

Burt's first contact in America: a grumpy taxi driver who picks him up at the airport in Los Angeles.

Burt's first friend in America: a transvestite called Tina.

A waitress in a Los Angeles diner. 

A used car salesman from El Salvador. Is he honest? Maybe.

An Indian called Jake helps Burt when he breaks down on the way to Bonneville.

Ada seduces Burt after letting him repair his trailer at her house.

Burt stops at a roadside bar to buy a cup of tea. "We ain't seen a cup of tea in here ever", is the reply. The closest the barmaid can serve him is a glass of Coke.

Burt exchanges a few words with a hen-pecked husband called Leroy.

That's the hen. Leroy could do worse.

Rusty picks up a hitchhiker, a young soldier on leave from Vietnam. He talks enthusiastically about his work spreading something called Agent Orange. He tells Burt that the war will be over in six months.

The first person Burt meets in Bonneville is Jim Moffet, who wants to set a speed record with a car. We don't find out whether or not he succeeds. He's highly respected in the racing community, so he manages to pull a few strings to help Burt compete.

Rolly and Marty aren't competitors, they're just spectators who like to watch fast bikes.

This is a better photo of Marty, played by the underrated actor Walton Goggins.

I'm not sure what Wendy and Alice do. They probably work at the Bonneville Salt Flats, but I have no idea what their job is.

They hang out with the competitors. Who wouldn't want to sit with a beautiful woman?

And here's one last photo of the amazing Anthony Hopkins.

This is a heart-warming film. It's not enough to say that it's a feel-good movie. That's an overused expression. In my first review I wrote, "When the final credits roll you will close your eyes and feel glad to be alive". That's no exaggeration. If you don't believe me, watch it for yourself.

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Joy Ride (5 Stars)

Today is the fourth time I've watched this film since I started my blog, but it's the first time I've given it a five star rating. I wanted to give it four and a half stars, as I did in the past, but then I asked myself what's wrong with it that justifies deducting half a star. The answer is nothing.

This film, directed by J. J. Abrams, is a story of road rage, driven to the extreme. The brothers Lewis and Fuller Thomas play a trick on a trucker with their CB Radio. Lewis pretends to be a woman and flirts with the anonymous trucker. The problem is that the anonymity only goes one way. They don't know who he is, but he knows who they are. He's observing their car on the road.

Paul Walker made this film in 2001, the same year as "Fast & Furious", but he looks much younger. It's all a question of the make up. He was 27 when he made the film, but he was supposed to be a college student, so a few years were shaved off his appearance.

Leelee Sobieski is beautiful, isn't she? Her age goes in the opposite direction. She was only 17 when she made the film, but she's also a college student, the same age as Lewis, so they're probably both supposed to be about 20.

As a horror film with elements of a road movie, this film is brilliant. It's truly terrifying. At the halfway mark it seems like the story is over, but the suspense quickly builds up again. The anonymous trucker tells them (via CB radio) that he's had his fun and he'll leave them alone. Maybe he really meant it. Maybe he just wanted to lull the Thomas brothers into a sense of false security. Whichever was the case, the worst was still yet to come.

I ought to listen to J. J. Abrams' commentary track. He obviously wasn't sure where he wanted to go with the film. There are three alternate endings on the disc, and one of them is 29 minutes long. They're all worth watching, but I think that the ending that he finally chose is the best one.

The film is now out of print on DVD and Blu-ray. That's tragic. It's worth looking for a copy on Ebay.

Success Rate:  - 0.4

The World's Fastest Indian (5 Stars)

Dancer's Top Films #21

Anthony Hopkins calls "The World's Fastest Indian" his best film. That might surprise people who know the many excellent films he's made in his career, including his Oscar winning performance as Hannibal Lecter in "Silence of the Lambs". Sit and watch this film, and you'll understand what he means. It's the most uplifting feel-good movie ever made. It tells the tale of a man who has a dream and refuses to give up, even though all the odds are stacked against him.

And it's a true story.

In 1962 Burt Munro was an eccentric 63-year-old living in a shed in Invercargill, New Zealand. He spent every day modifying his 40-year-old Indian motorcycle, which gives the film its name. The Indian Motorcycle Company built motorcycles from 1901 to 1953. The original bike, as it was sold, had a top speed of 54 mph, but Burt was reaching speeds over 150 mph. His dream was to travel to the Bonneville Speed Trials to set an official world speed record. People laughed at him, but they couldn't stop him doing what he wanted to do.

The film is for the most part a road movie. We see Burt travelling across the USA, from Los Angeles to Utah, meeting characters who are increasingly unusual.

Tina is a transvestite who works as a clerk in his Los Angeles motel. A naive question: did transvestites appear in the open in the 1960's? People were a lot pruder in those days.

Maybe I'll provide a full gallery of the fascinating characters he meets in my next review. They're a cross-section of American society, from the richest to the poorest.

I'll just give you one spoiler. Burt Munro succeeded in his dream. He set a speed record of 205 mph for motorcycles under 1000 cc, a record that still stands today.

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Django Unchained (5 Stars)

Dancer's Top Films #35

I don't hesitate to call "Django Unchained" the best western ever made. When Quentin Tarantino made the film in 2012 he was deliberately breaking the rules that had been implicitly set for westerns for decades. The lead actor is black, which had only ever been done in the comedy "Blazing Saddles". Even more significantly, westerns have always ignored the subject of slavery. Slaves are never shown in westerns, even though slavery was common in the years before the Civil War. Tarantino doesn't just acknowledge slavery in this film, it's the main subject.

Django is a slave who's given his freedom by the bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz. He's a German who used to be a dentist. It's been five years since he last practised dentistry, but he still uses his wagon with a wobbly tooth on the top. It's difficult not to laugh.

Schultz's attitude to slavery isn't completely negative. Even though he says in an early scene that he's "no friend of slavery", he still purchases Django and keeps him as a slave until he's succeeded in killing the Brittle Brothers. After this he releases Django, and the two men become friends. He trains Django to become a bounty hunter, although it seems that not much training is necessary. Django is a natural when it comes to shooting people.

Schultz is naive when it comes to racism. He doesn't expect or understand the negative reaction to a black man riding a horse or walking around free.

Today is the fourth time I've watched the film, but I picked up a few small details that I didn't notice in the past. Django (Jamie Foxx) is enjoying a drink at the bar. He's joined by an Italian slaver called Amerigo Vessepi. He asks Django his name, then asks him if he knows how to spell it. Django tells Amerigo that the D is silent. Amerigo is played by Franco Nero, the actor who played the original Django in 1966.

After this Django is joined at the bar by Dr. Schultz, who's drinking a beer from a Bügelflasche, commonly called a flip-top bottle in English. This sort of beer bottle is common in Germany, but its use in the film is a blunder. The film takes place in 1858, but this type of bottle wasn't invented until 1875.

Bam! The sight of this young woman carrying an axe gave me such a shock that I had to pause the film. Could it possibly be Zoe Bell? I ran to my computer to check, and yes, it's her. I'm surprised that I never recognised her in the past.

She appears again in a later scene, where it's easier to recognise her. There's no special significance to her scenes. They're purely gratuitous. It's no secret that Quentin Tarantino is a fan of Zoe Bell, so he wanted to slip her into the film.

Quentin Tarantino plays a small role as an Australian miner. Is his accent any good? It sounds okay to me, but only an Australian can judge his accent. I welcome comments from my Australian readers.

Samuel L. Jackson plays a very untypical role. He's a slave, in theory, but he has a special position as the head of the household at the Candyland Plantation. He's a despicable character. He can be considered a traitor to his race. He unquestioningly accepts white superiority and looks down on the black slaves around him.

His boss is the head of the plantation, Calvin Candie, who's excellently portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio. He typifies everything that people praise about the Old South. He's elegant, well-spoken and a perfect gentleman; and yet he's a bigoted racist.

I admit that I've never liked Jamie Foxx as an actor. He's usually bland and emotionless, but in "Django Unchained" he's wonderful. Somehow Quentin Tarantino can coax the best out of actors.

One of the things I like about all of Tarantino's films is the pacing. His films move slowly, with long periods of conversation between the action. I don't know any other director who can make this type of film so successfully.

Success Rate:  + 2.3

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Ant-Man and the Wasp (5 Stars)

Together with "Captain Marvel", this is one of two Marvel Cinematic Universe films that were released between "Avengers Infinity War" and "Avengers Endgame". With the exception of the mid-credits scene, "Captain Marvel" takes place 30 years before "Infinity War", but "Ant-Man and the Wasp" takes place at the same time as "Infinity War".

I picked the two films that I watched today without remembering that Laurence Fishburne appears in both of them.

In "John Wick 3" he plays the King of the Bowery, the man who runs an empire with the help of carrier pigeons.

In "Ant-Man and the Wasp" he plays Bill Foster, a university professor who used to be an employee of Hank Pym. He claims that he was Hank Pym's partner, but that obviously isn't the case, because he was fired.

That's Laurence Fishburne as well. Sort of.

Wait! Is that Kim Jong-Un? I recognise him, even when he has a good hair style.

Who's that man getting into his car? That's a silly question. Everyone recognises him.

Abby Ryder Fortson, who plays Scott Lang's daughter Cassie, is a magnificent actress. Her talent is astounding, considering she was only ten years old when the film was made.

She already appeared in the same role in "Ant-Man", three years earlier, but she won't be returning to the role in future MCU films. Due to the time jump in "Avengers Endgame" she had to be replaced by an older actress. That's a shame.

In this film Janet Van Dyne, played by Michelle Pfeiffer, is a brilliant scientist. In the comics she was an air-headed debutante who was more interested in fashion than science. I wish they wouldn't change things.

I'm a big Marvel fan, ever since my early childhood. I read the comics regularly, and I know that I'll keep watching the films again. Nuff said!

Success Rate:  + 1.8

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