Birmingham Post - Lifestyle Blog

High Heels Over Bullwhips

Fri, 06 Jun 2008 02:47:00 +0000

I have just read a report stating that Sex And The City didn't make as much money as Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull in its first three days at the UK box office. Is this a shock? Is this a revelation? Not really when you consider that Indiana Jones and the Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull is a 12A and Sex In The City is a 15. The article was written to ignore this fact, the piece also fails to mention the over the last seven days Indiana Jones took £5.5 million pounds while SATC took £8.3 million making it clearly the number one film in the UK at the moment.
Its now commonplace that many films will opt for the safer 12A certificate as it will open the audience base to a much wider age range.
12A means that the BBFC have classified the film unsuitable for children under 12. However, they may still watch the film, as long as they are accompanied by someone over 18 at all times during the showing. Advice is given regarding the content of the film and the ADULT must decide if it is appropriate for the accompanying under 12.
15 is exactly what it says, you have to be 15 or above to see the film. On a 12A I have seen children as young as three or four being bought in to see films with their parents and in my opinion Indiana Jones was always going to carry this certificate while SATC would have been a disaster if it had gone for the same certificate. The television series ended four years ago but has continued to be seen on various television channels both terrestrial and non-terrestrial, has sold truck loads of dvd and the series still has a fantastically loyal fan base.
If the film makers had wanted to go for the biggest audience possible they would have gone for a 12A and piled people through the door, but this would have meant compromising on the end product, SATC has always been unashamedly adult in its theme and content and its one of the things that make it what it is, they would have lost the adult end of the market who would have felt cheated is they had gone for the lower certificate. Fans of the series know exactly what they like and expect, Carrie and the girls speak like real girls, act like real girls with the exception the fashion and income, they laugh, they love, they cry, they live a fantasy lifestyle that many women would aspire to, New York has become a regular destination for groups of women, who want to walk in the Manolo Blahnik's of Carrie, Charlotte, Miranda and Samantha.
Has SATC been a hit at the box office, you better believe it, but from some of the articles in the media you wouldn't think it. Credit where credit is due both film have done well, but for this week at least four girls from NY have taken on one of the greatest adventurers the big screen has ever seen and put him firmly in his place.

Indiana Jones and the theatre of expectation

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 14:49:43 +0000

I'm guessing by now a lot of you will have seen the new Indiana Jones movie, well what did you think, was it worth the wait, did it live up to the media frenzy that has surrounded the release?
I have spent a couple of days thinking about the difference between hype and expectation, I tend not to do hype but expectation is another matter, its not about a series of leaked press stories and some carefully choreographed publicity stunts, it shouldn't be about what some clever marketing executive dreams up to make up for the failings of the product they are trying to sell.

I remember standing outside the ABC cinema on Bristol road waiting for the doors to open so I could see what I still regard as one of the best films I have seen, Raiders of the Lost Ark, I waited hours and was by far the youngest person in the queue there by themselves, but I had read about this film, I had dreamed about this film, I had the poster on my wall, for me it was vital that I see this film the first day that I could.
I am now much older, and I do mean much older but I'm not sure if that accounts for the changes in the way I think about films and how desperate I am to see them at the first opportunity, but there was something about this film that I wanted to see, if not the first night, then pretty soon afterward, maybe it was memories of how I felt about the first film, that sense of childhood wonder, the expectation and ultimately the sense of fulfilment coming out of the cinema and seeing huge queues about to see a film that blew my mind, a queue that I so wanted to join.

Now I don't intend to write a review of the film but after seeing it the first thing I did when I got home was to put on the dvd of the first film and see how it should be done. Now don't get me wrong its not a bad film, I just expected more, I wanted more, I wanted that sense of awe, I wanted to be on the edge of my seat, I wanted to hold my breath and not realise I was doing so.
The new film feels safe, it feels like a product rather than an experience, it has all the action set pieces, just not the excitement, there is danger but no real sense of tension or peril and that's what I missed.

This is one of the most highly anticipated films of the year, we have been reading about this film on an almost weekly basis for the last 12 months, speculation has been rife about the plot, the cast, the hair colour of the leading actor, who is in it and who is not in it. Indiana Jones and the curse of the crystal skull has been dominating the websites and the movie gossip columns, and it is set to dominate on a global scale, but will it dominate the hearts and minds of the audiences with the same level of passion that started the franchise almost three decades ago. I suspect that a new audience will love it, but if you know, I mean really know the first film and everything that made it what it is, I don't think 'love it' will be the phrase that you will be using, but that is up to the unstoppable Dr Jones to prove me wrong.

There May Be Trouble Ahead.

Mon, 12 May 2008 22:25:15 +0000

You know sometimes when you look at a film and on paper it looks like it could be fantastic, the right director, the right sort of budget and something that says to you this could be something quite special, but then when you look at it in the cold harsh reality of the commercial world and you realise that this film could have got it wrong and not just a little bit.
I will hold my hands up and say that I haven't seen Speed Racer yet, I will probably see it within the next few days, but I think that in a market place filled with block busters like Iron Man, Sex in the City, Batman: The Dark Knight, Wall-E, Prince Caspian and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
The two films that have me worried are The Incredible Hulk and Speed Racer.

Sex Sells.

Sat, 10 May 2008 12:08:01 +0000

Here we go again, another celebrity sex tape hits the internet, this time featuring Sex in the city star Kirsten Davis who plays the very prim and proper Charlotte in the hit TV series is alleged to feature in a sex tape that has had a number of images leaked onto the internet.
Most of the Internet movie and entertainment sites have some reference to the tape over the last couple of weeks. The tape is supposed to be very graphic, but whatever its content the publicity around it will be crazy over the next few weeks.
The agents for the star have put out a very firm denial that the tape has no connection with the star, but other sources say that it came from a former partner, where ever it came from people are talking about it.

Where have all the heroes gone?

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 15:57:43 +0000

Recently I had the dubious pleasure of seeing the new Rambo film, yes you are right, I have used the word pleasure in the same sentence as Rambo, the film is very, very funny, it doesn't intend to be, it just is. It's a shockingly bad film with no pretensions of being anything else. It is so over the top with its gratuitous depiction of violence it's laughable.
Coming away from the cinema its left me wondering what happened to all of the action heroes of my youth. I remember coming out of a cinema with two friends after seeing the original Terminator movie and not being able to shut up about it, I thought it was fantastic. I still think it was a ground breaking film, but I don't watch Schwarzenegger films anymore, (a personal issue) I just remember how I felt when I walked out of the Kings Cinema in West Bromwich all those years ago.

Why the Oscars would never have been cancelled

Wed, 27 Feb 2008 11:35:35 +0000

Did anyone really think that the Oscars would not go ahead this year? I mean really, really think that the event would not happen?
Let me run an idea by you, take one of the biggest, flashiest, money orientated industries, give them a six hour advert broadcast to tens of millions around the world, media domination for weeks before and days after, millions of dollars added to the box office take of the winners.
Now ask yourself does this sound like something that Hollywood would pass up?

The writer's strike may have cast a giant shadow over all of the arrangements for the biggest show of the awards season, but was it ever really in doubt? All of the industry knew that if you cancelled every awards show from the golden globes to the best actor in your local primary school play, the Oscars had to go ahead.
The significance of the Oscars ceremony cannot be down played, its importance to the US movie industry both trade and consumer, love it or hate it, it's something that we cannot get away from, everyday the latest twists and turns in the dispute were headline news, actors boycotted, shows were cancelled, pundits expressed concerns and the public lapped it up.

A top ten, from a man who knows his films:

Mon, 25 Feb 2008 11:14:30 +0000

My name is Michael and I love films.

I live and work in Birmingham and make my living, managing a cinema. I have a passion for words, books and narrative: give me a film that can tell a good story and I am happy. I am inspired by people and imagination and really have no time for fools no matter who they think they are.