Movie review - "The Rainmaker" (1997) **1/2

 Francis Coppola tries John Grisham. It's not one of Grisham's big thriller pieces more a series of different plots centered around a young poor lawyer (Matt Damon in an early leading role). He romances a sweet little domestic violence victim (Clare Danes, being regularly thumped by Andrew Shue), goes to work for an ambulance chaser (Mickey Rourke) teams up with another ambulance chaser (Danny de Vito). lives with a little old lady (Teresa Wright) who has shonky rellies, and a family with a son who has leukemia (Mary Kay Place).

There's a lot of poor white trash: wife beaters, ruthless ambulance chasers, eccentric old ladies, sexy but noble alcoholic turncoat witness (Virgina Madsen). There's also rich white trash: insurance company lawyers, the insurance company (Roy Schneider). Plus noble white trash: kid with terminal illness, domestic violence victim. And a noble black judge (Danny Glover)

It has a sleepy, ambling pace - it takes 50 minutes for de Vito and Damon to set up their own business, which is really where it could've started. I think this is why it wasn't a big hit.

Terrific photography, great acting. Everyone is on form. It's another Australian film from Coppola - well acted meandering. The violent bits perk up. This was okay, just long.

Movie review - "Rumble Fish" (1983) ***1/2

 The public weren't ready to embrace this at the time but looking back it's become a Coppola fan favourite. The artiness of a treatment I think annoyed many back then but now is exciting and fresh - the Stuart Copeland score, the back and white photography, arty camera angles.

Matt Dillon is effective as Rusty James the young, thick wanna be gangster. Mickey Rourke is electric as his elder brother Motorcycle Boy. Coppola stepped up another notch when working with a writer he respected - Puzo, Milius - and that's the case with SE Hinton.

Dillon's fellow gang members include Vincent Spano (nerd who never seems to do as much as you think), Chris Penn and Nicolas Cage. Diane Lane is his gal, Sofia Coppola her sister. William Smith a cop who hassles them, Tom Waits runs a pool hall, Dennis Hopper is the dad, Larry Fishburne is a townsperson.

The last third of this didn't quite work for me - instead of building it seemed to dissipate and Rourke's death seemed throw away. But it was always interesting, strong acting, stimulating.

Movie review - "The Expendables" (2010) ***

 Loud, fun, expert. Expert ish. Just so much fun seeing all these hams together. Stallon gives a lot of time and space to Jason Staham. Jet Li's role isn't much but he has a fun character. Dolph Lundgren has the best part. I forgot Terry Crews was in the movie. Eric Roberts is ideal.

I had a good time watching it.

Movie review - "Iron Man 2" (2008) **

I heard it wasn't very good and it isn't. I watched it for completion's sake. The photograph is lovely and the cast is strong but it's not exciting. It just feels made for money.

Gwyneth Paltrow and Scar Jo are wasted - they even wear identical clothes. Mickey Rourke is kind of fun as a villain but his character is rote. Garry Shandling isn't allowed to do anything much.

There's no sense of fun, danger, excitement. Robert Downey's X factor isn't exploited. I mean, it's in focus and all that.

Top Ten - My fave bit parts/dailies in film

1) Adelina Poerio in "Don't Look Now" (1973) - if you've seen the film you'll probably guess who it is (nothing to do with the sex scene unless there's a longer cut version I'm unaware of!)... if you havent seen the film I won't spoil it for you... and it's a film worth seeing (maybe not right before a trip to Venice though...)

2) Mickey Rourke in "Body Heat" (1981) as Teddy the arsonist... this is kind of cheating since Rourke went on to become famous, but its a great debut... its a brilliantly written part, as a smart con with a code of honour (Lawrence Kasdan's script is incredible) and Rourke's casting makes it sing... you can see why everyone thought he was going to be a star...

3) Frederick Piper as the milkman in Hitchcock's version of "The 39 Steps" (1935)... very clever writing... a model who to do the comic thriller, perhaps the hardest genre of all to do well... Charles Bennett did the bulk of the script (he's shamefully not credited in the play adaptation of the film), though I'm not sure if he was responsible for that particular scene... there is a scene like it in the original novel though not treated comically).

4) Xander Berkley as Dr Lamar in "Gattaca" (1998)... to go into too much detail would give away spoilers, so I'll just say he has one of the most affecting lines (to me anyway) ever, "my son's not all that they promised. But then, who know what he could do." (to get the full impact you really have to see the whole film, which is worth it)

5) Estelle Reiner in "When Harry Met Sally" (1989). You know the scene. You know the line. Magic. (An aside... it's a shame Estelle Reiner never teamed up with Martin Scorsese's mother in a film-director's-mothers-who-steal-scenes-in-their-son's-movies mega match.)

6) John McGiver as the clerk in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” (1961) - Mickey Rooney’s yellowface has tended to overshadow the excellence of the support cast - Buddy Ebsen, Patricia Neal and McGiver ... who does wonders in his one scene. An aside - is this the first Hollywood movie where two prostitutes go off into the sunset together ?

7) Linda Rae Jurgens who plays Mrs Metcalf in “Top Gun” (1986) - Tom Skeritt’s wife - she’s in the scene where Maverick, having his end of act 2 crisis of confidence, comes to see Viper for a pep talk after Goose has (spoilers but seriously?) died - he knocks on the door and Mrs Metcalf answers it and he asks to see her husband and she says he’s out back and then she lingers and asks how Maverick is and what he’s been up to and tells him to come over for dinner sometime and Cruiser looks sort of awkward waiting for the scene to end - and it’s so random - and I love i because it feels so obviously like a bit part actor trying to drag out their bit with some impro(she clearly doesn’t want to move out of shot ) but you can also see why they kept it in because it does expand the world of the film eg life at Top Gun isn’t just about flying comps and homoerotic volleyball games and singalongs it’s also about families and going to have dinner at the homes of senior officers - and her role raises all sorts of interesting questions (is this the life awaiting Kelly McGills?, does she have a crush on Maverick ? Is it lonely for the women of Top Gun with all the men playing endless games of volleyball and standing around in locker rooms?). I wish I could find the clip - the actress is lobbying on twitter for a role in the sequel and I say why not?

8) Joy Page in "Casablanca" (1942). You probably don't remember the name - I had to google it - but if you've seen the film you'll remember the scene. She's the Bulgarian refugee who asks Rick if she should sleep with Major Strasser to get a visa. The scene is a marvel of screenwriting to get around the censor. Maybe she's not the world's best actor but she was effective. She got the gig because she was Jack Warner's step daughter and didn't do much acting after that.

9)  Michelle Joyner in Cliffhanger (1993) - superb sequence and she’s amazing ... (I actually can’t remember anything else in the film) ... and I can’t recall her in any other movie ... but what a moment ...

10) Danielle Duclois who plays Denise, the daughter of Robert de Niro in Midnight Run... possibly my favourite sequence/scene in a great film. Wendy Phillips is outstanding as the wife too. Some of the reasons why people love this film and moment - I love how director Martin Brest gives the end of the scene to Duclois, and the storyline with Jack and his family isn't resolve, and it does push the story forward.

Soundtrack review - "Johnny Handsome" (1989) ****

Ry Cooder did plenty of superb scores for Walter Hill - this was one of his best. Cooder was obviously inspired by the film's southern setting and reacted with an atmospheric, pungent score. The main theme is beautiful but the real stand outs for me were the rocking "Clip Joint Rhumba" and "Cajun Metal" (these tunes just say "Walter Hill movie" for me - tough, swaggering pieces) and the achingly lovely "I Like Your Eyes". The album is more consistently successful than the film.

Movie review - "Year of the Dragon" (1985) *** (warning: spoilers)

I still remember the trailer for this movie in the cinema and how much it gripped me - the intercut between a line crossing the screen and various set pieces: "Is Chinatown so bad now?", shoot outs, Arianne interviewing John Lon,e Mickey Rourke looking pensive. I really wanted to see the movie and always felt a little dissatisfied by it - so dark, such an unlikeable hero, yet with so many amazing sequences.

Watching it years on and the virtues remain intact - it looks fantastic, with sumptuous production design; amazingly, a film focusing on Chinese gangsters still has novelty (you think it would be a natural for Godfather type sagas but filmmakers tend to steer clear).

The action sequences are brilliant - a shoot out in a Chinese restaurant, the climax where Rourke and John Lone run at each other across a train bridge blasting away, the scene where some gang members are forced to kill assassins, Rourke taking on two female assassins, the hit on Rourke and his wife.

The movie is full of imaginative touches, like the Italian gangster who speaks through an electronic device, the nuns used as translaters. It's genuinely visually impressive (there's even a sequence in the Golden Triangle) - for all Cimino's indulgences as a director he knew how to fill a frame.

There is some very good acting too - John Lone is a superb villain (even though the character's background could have been flashed out a little more), Dennis Dun a touching nerdy undercover agent.

Rourke does everything he can he's simply ten years too young - the part needed to be played by someone who looked like they served in Vietnam, who had pain and years. Rourke would come to look like that but there he's just Mickey Rourke with powdered hair. His character is hard to spend too much time with, with his constant racist cracks, misogyny and ignoring of procedure - he's not eve a particularly good cop either (Dennis Dun's work is more effective).

I can predict the argument that Cimino and Oliver Stone (the screenwriter) would make - "we're not endorsing the point of view of the hero, it's what real life cops talk like, it's based on historical fact" - but the film is racist. The hero is white, most of the villains are Asians, the one decent Asian cop is knocked off in time honoured tradition of the faithful servant, the one sympathetic Asian woman is basically a prostitute (badly acted by Arianne) who lives in a fancy apartment, falls in love with Rourke's character for no real reason whatsoever.

The version of the movie I saw felt cut down - parts like the corrupt cop and Rourke's wife felt as though there were more scenes in them.

I've got to say though, it is a film of power - it's intense and something lively always comes around the corner at you.

Movie review - "Body Heat" (1981) ****

Few screenwriters were on a hot streak like Larry Kasdan in the late 70s and early 80s: Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark, this, The Big Chill, Silverado... I like to re read the screenplay for this movie every couple of years, it's so good. Yes of course it's not the most original story in the world - couple get together, decide to kill woman's husband, things go horribly wrong - but it was marvellously updated to allow for explicit sex, bawdy humour and an ending where the baddy gets away with it. Also it has some fresh ideas - notably the fact the plot revolves around the incompetence of the lawyer, enabling a will to be struck out.

The casting is brilliant - William Hurt is perfect as the handsome but weak lawyer, never as smart as he thinks he is; Kathleen Turner very sexy as the femme fetale (although her performance with her drag queen delivery does too often spill into high camp, not helped by John Barry's OTT score); Richard Crenna the perfect industrialist husband; Ted Danson the tapdancing, likeable DA who hates investigating his friend; JA Preston as the decent cop; Mickey Rourke is electrifying as an arsonist. Sometimes it feels silly but then everything clicks and its great again.

Movie review - "Johnny Handsome" (1989) ***

This could have been regarded as a top level B classic - one of those genuine hidden gems. As it is, it's half way there.

It has so much going for it - a pulpy, but simple set up with great emotion underpinning it (hideously disfigured gangster has operation turning him good-looking but he still seeks vengeance on those who put him in jail); a well-cast star in Mickey Rourke (who, as has been pointed out several times by others, has turned into how Johnny Handsome looks at the beginning of this film); Ry Cooder's brilliant score; superb work as villains from Ellen Barkin and Lance Henrickson, plus Morgan Freeman as the bastard-but-not-wrong cop (you forget what a great prick Freeman can be, because so often he plays saintly creatures); Forest Whittaker is warm and sympathetic as the doctor; Elizabeth McGovern is pretty at least (despite her distracting southern accent); New Orleans location work; an ending with integrity.

And there are some scenes that have stayed with me for years: the opening shot; Handsome talking about beating up Carlyle; telling the speech therapist nun to stick with the program for other people, knowing that he's going to seek revenge; Handsome seeing his new face.

But it doesn't quite hit the top mark. It goes far too long - all the way through there are bits were you go "why not cut that out?". For instance, why have a long transformation sequence? It doesn't make the story less silly - just cut to, and have him transformed. (That's what a 40s Warner Bros movie - this film's spiritual godfather - would have done). Also, Johnny Handsome's plan isn't that clever - I guess he's going through all this to make some money as well as get revenge, am I right? Elizabeth McGovern's character would have probably been more effective if she'd had been the doctor or speech therapist. And the last act never quite works - it felt as though it needed another complication or something.

More surprisingly, considering it was directed by Walter Hill, the action sequences aren't that great - there's two robberies, both of which seem stock - I felt his direction got bloated in the late 1980s. His handling of actors and atmosphere remains strong, though. It just needed to have more of the stripped back quality of old Bogie, Garfield movies.

Script Review – “Body Heat” by Lawrence Kasdan ****1/2

Wonderful modern day version of film noir. It takes all the old elements – loser protagonist, femme fetale, the husband, infidelity, plot to kill which goes horribly wrong, support characters who at first seem nothing but turn out to be very important – and adds fresh twists: constant sex, legal stuff, bombs. The first half is fine – it helps a lot reading to envision Kathleen Turner and William Hurt. When it really kicks into classic mode is the moment after Richard Crenna is killed and Hurt gets the phone call about a new will. Then it spins a fantastic web and it’s truly thrilling. Great supporting roles too: the arsonist, the husband, the tap dancing prosecutor, etc.

Moview review - "Man on Fire" (2003) ***

Tony Scott returns to Mexico for another Revenge type film about, well, revenge. Denzell Washington is a boozy former special ops soldier who becomes bodyguard for Dakota Fanning, then goes on to kick serious arse when she's kidnapped. The first half is bonding with Fanning, the second half is arse kicking. Tough guys, lots of smoking, interesting visuals, some nuns. Denzel isn't entirely well cast but Chris Walken and Mickey Rourke are in the support cast and they are spot on. 

There is always a worrying sort of aspect to these sort of films, with its superhuman hero who can bring down organised crime, but an undeniably appealing aspect to the myth as well. You know I didn't quite believe Denzel as an alkie (there's always something inherently decent about him as an actor). Tony Scott's flashy directing suits the story. I always find his films majorly flawed in some way but they always stick with me for along time afterwards. 

NB Apparently a romance sub plot between Denzel and Radha Mitchell was cut because audiences didn't like Denzel kissing a white woman - but I think the cut was a good one more on the grounds the real love story is between Denzel and Fanning, and throwing mom into the mix confuses it.

Movie review – “Domino” (2005) ***

You’ve got to hand it to Tony Scott, although best known for his Bruckheimer epics like Top Gun he likes to march to the swing of his own beat and he’s done that with this tale of Domino Harvey, daughter of actor Laurence Harvey who became a bounty hunter. It’s a bizarre tale on one level – on another, I guess she’s just another rich kid seeking thrills on the dark side of life. Keira Knightley isn’t much of an actor and doesn’t really give a great sense of what makes Domino tick (the film doesn’t mention the real Domino’s 15 year drug habit, for instance, which I think explains a lot about her) but she is a star and you certainly watch her; she’s certainly better than Laurence Harvey was in his movies.

For a while this film seems like an exercise in stylistics rather than an attempt to create a story with characters we care about – Scott is mega-hyped up on visual pyrotechnics for this one, with far out camera angles, vision stock, sound, etc – but once it settles down into the “missing $10 million” story it is fine.

Great supporting cast, with Mickey Rourke terrific as the gnarled bounty hunter who basically hires Domino because she’s hot and will make him look cool, and nice work from Edgar thingy who plays the love interest. Two Beverly Hills 90210 stars, Ian Zering and Brian Astin Green, are good sports playing themselves – the scene where Domino punches Green in the nose is very satisfying for all those who couldn’t stand David Silver on the show. The ending is spectacular and unexpectedly moving. Nice touch with the end credits listing the actors only by their first names.