FILM REVIEW: Pride and Glory

UK Release date: 7 November 2008
Starring: Ed "Hulk" Norton, Colin "Feck" Farrell, Jon "Angie I love you all is forgiven just ask the spinach" Voight


Norton: So, what do you think?

Farrell: About what, feck?

Norton: My anger. Is it angry enough?

Farrell: What the feck're you talking about, y'fecking eedjit?

Norton: In the film poster. I'm going for serious angry. Not Hulk angry, that would be too much. But not broody angry either, like in 25th Hour. That wouldn't be enough. I'm looking for something a bit Primal Fear - y'know angry with a dash of crazy - and a bit American X. Misplaced righteous angry. D'you know what I'm saying Colin?

Farrell: Feck if I do, yeh? Feck.

Voight: Ed. Eeeeed. Ed. What is the matter Ed? Edddie. Edward. Eeeeed.

Farrell: Ye've got a great big wodge o'feckin spinach in there teeth there, boyo fiddle-de-dee. Feck.

Voight: I'm playing a vagrant off Broadway in two years. Getting started on research. Ignore it. Have you seen Angelina Jolie-Pitt by the way?

Farrell: Oh yes I have and she is a feckin foine looking woman there, be'gads feck.

Voight: That's my estranged daughter you're drooling over buddy. Watch it. But yes, she is hot. And I love her dearly. Angie, if you can hear me baby all is forgiven!

Norton: Jon, do you think I've hit just the right anger notes on the Pride and Glory poster?

Voight: You have indeed. Any more angry and I'd have wet myself. Any less and I'd have punched you in the face for looking at me funny.

Norton: Good. That's good, wet yourself, that's a good balance, thanks.

Voight: What's this film about again?

Norton: You should know, you're in it.

Voight: Oh no, I don't read anyone else's lines and I have so few that I don't usually know what's going on in these roles.

Norton: Colin, do you know what it's about?

Farrell: Me? Feck me, no, fer feck's sake, I just do it fer the money and the fame and to keep meself in fags is all don't ye know fiddle-de-dee.

Norton: Great, so no-one knows what this stupid film's about. Now I'm really angry.

Voight: That's good. Go with that.

Norton: Is it? Great. Make-up! No, give me that, I'll do a better job...


Shatner rating: Denny Crane
Should I bother? Maybe. But it would have been better with Christopher Walken in the Voight role.

FILM REVIEW: Pig Hunt

UK release: 2 November

Pig Hunt. The title is just so damned tantalising. Is it about a young woman's journey of self-discovery? Or a dying man's last wishes fulfilled? Perhaps a touching tale of a young boy as he tries to recover from the loss of a parent, possibly through the intercession of a wisecrackin' ole hog?

No. It's about pigs. And hunting. But Wait™ – because it's a horror-thriller-splatter-gore-fest and turnabout's fair play and Black Sheep kicked box office and DVD rental ass and no-one can resist bacon (not even those tree-hugging vegetarian lefty types)... dum dum daaaaaah - the pigs are the ones doing the killing! OMG that is soooooo awesome!

There are only a tiny handful of very important problems with this premise:

1/ Pigs have hooves, not hands. No opposable thumbs. Which means no clever manipulation of guns or other hand-held implements. Which means Victim #5 will never get to open that barn door only to find a massive hog with a striking resemblance to Travolta in Wild Hogs (shades, bandana, etc) standing upright and firing a double barrel shotgun. Which means this is not so much about pigs that hunt as pigs that attack in groups. Like a swarm. Maybe it should be called "Swarming Pig Death". Unless it's about a boar. Because they can be nasty. Is it about a boar? It is? Then shouldn't it be called "Boar Hunt"?

2/ Pigs don't speak, which means no pithy asides, eg "Hasta la vista, bacon". And that's a shame. Sarcastic pigs would have made for a great film.

3/ Statistically, "death by pig" is more about falling pigs or undercooked pork (which might possibly have even killed Mozart) than outright pig attack.

4/ No scary pig film will ever be a truly scary pig film because the only really scary pig film was Animal Farm, with those animated walking pigs. They were just freaky. (And remember: Four legs good, Two legs bad)

5/ Deliverance has already covered the hillbilly-and-their-pigs angle. No need to revisit it in any form.

But aside from all that, there is one truly tantalising possibility that lurks beneath the surface of this title: the reaction shot as our heros, revelling in their inevitable and inexorable victory over the invading horde of hog, tucks into a victory breakfast only to find that... dum dum daaaaaah! That's right: the bacon is in fact made of people. Pig Hunt Is People! Tasty Delicious Smoked People! Thinly Sliced and Pan Fried Until Crispy People!

Mmmm. Crispy people bacon. Now I'm hungry. Damn you, bacon!

PS: The tagline on the posters for this film is "Don't Be Scared!" Is that an instruction? Because it's dumb. Surely it should say, I don't know, something like "You'll be so scared you'll shit yourself and then try to hide in your shitty pants"? Or "Be really really scared! Of pigs! Killer pigs! Woooooooooooo!"? Just a thought.

Shatner rating: Denny Crane (I secretly want this film to be great)
Should I bother? No. Because it won't be great. It's about pigs.

MUSIC REVIEW: "Safe Trip Home" by Dido Florian Cloud de Bounevialle O'Malley Armstrong

Album: Safe Trip Home
Artist: Dido Florian Cloud de Bounevialle O'Malley Armstrong
Released: November

Statistically speaking, everybody in the UK owns three albums by Florian Cloud de Bounevialle O'Malley Armstrong (yes, that is Dido's birth name). Which means no-one has to buy another Dido album until she's released a fourth. This is her third. Save your money.

If you're a spineless puddle of a person and just have to buy this, then consider this quote from The Observer in 2001: "To be called one thing and christened another is actually very confusing and annoying. It's one of the most irritating things that my parents did to me. ...Florian is a German man's name. That's just mean. To give your child a whole lot of odd names. They were all so embarrassing. ...I thought it was cruel to call me Dido and then expect me to just deal with it."

See? She's annoying. Why do you want to encourage her?

Also, consider this: Dido's music is pretty much shit. Sure, all the ingredients are there - instruments, melodies, harmonies, backing vocals, contemporary production, partial nudity, innuendo-laden lyrics ("Safe trip home" indeed - might as well have called the thing "Felching") - but it doesn't add up to a tasty treat. Stale, predictable, bad aftertaste. Like a sausage roll you regret buying when you have a hangover.

The CD cover has an astronaut in space. I'm hoping it's Dido, left to drift slowly in low orbit until gravity draws her into the atmosphere and she explodes in a blaze of fire.

"Dido" is the name of the mythical Queen of Carthage. In Virgil's Aeniad, she kills herself for love. Here's hoping this Dido follows in her footsteps.

I don't really like Dido much. And I have a headache. So I'm probably not the best person to review Dido's new album. Oh well.

Shatner Rating: Quincy cameo
Worth a listen? No (though you're going to hear it anyway and mey end up owning a copy of the CD - it's like a law or something).

FILM REVIEW: Saw 5

UK Film Release: 24 October
Starring: Tobin Bell (who is wasted, absolutely wasted by directors in every role he takes on - the man is a genius people) Scott Patterson (who was in The Gilmore Girls and frankly, could have done better than this).

Five Saws. Count them. That's only two less than the greatest film franchise in history, Police Academy.

In a NoShow exclusive, we can reveal that when Saw catches up with Police Academy and Saw 7: Mission to Moscow is finally released, only then will the true mystery behind the muderous Jigsaw be revealed. The makers tell us there'll be a crossover film in which the insane yet inventive killer will teach Hightower, Mahoney, Lassard, Hooks and Dr Monseignor Larvelle Jones (the guy who does the annoying noises but who no one will admit is the funniest person in the world) that their lives have been worthless by putting them through sadistic, gore-filled ordeals that will result in major organs being lost.

The tagline for Saw V is "You Won't Believe How It Ends". Well, let me hazard a guess... is it a twist? Like Planet of the Apes being Earth, or Soylent Green being people or Hightower getting Lassard strung out on smack, murdering Mahoney and framing Hooks in Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol: The Unseen edition. SPOILER ALERT!! Damn, too late again. Forgive me. Oh yeah, Maggie Gyllenhall's character in The Dark Knight dies... SPOILER ALERT... DAMN DAMN.

The director, writer, key grip and craft services for Saw V should hang their heads in shame. Not because this is obviously a franchise way past its sell-by date (the main character is DEAD, for the love of god... SPOILER ALERT...), nor because it's a reprehensible slab of pointless gore attempting to say something about the human condition and the nature of revenge, nor because the lead actor is Costas Mandylor, a man who last worked as Samo Hung's sidekick in Martial Law - that's Samo Hung who is a brilliant if tubby martial artist but has no ability to speak the English language, nor even because the inventive death scenes are becoming less and less inventive (there has not been one anally fatal scene yet).

No, quite simply, shame falls on this tawdry series because there has been no Guttenberg. Ban this filth... until they get The Guttenberg.

Shatner scale: Quincy cameo
Must see: No (until they get Guttenberg... then yes)

NOT LIVE FROM THE RED CARPET: The UK Premiere of W.

Broadcasting not at all live from the Red Carpet in The London's West End of London, we bring you speculative coverage of the star studded UK premiere of Oliver Stone's Political Hot Potato™, W. (As we are blogging about this in real time from a location nowhere near the premiere, we apologise in advance is the verb tense becomes slightly complex and multilayered towards the end of this (p)review.)

The star studded UK premiere of Oliver Stone's Astonishing Political Megadrama™ W. looks set to have been a stellar affair filled with starry studs of astrological proportions, and will have been no doubt be a galactically significant event in the minds of the sad bastards who gathered around the slightly damp off-red carpet in The London's World Famous Leicester Square (next to the Angus Bar and Grill).

Celebrity stalkers will have been out in force, jostling for space alongside paparazzos, "street performers" and the enthusiastic homeless, as they watch the hot celebrity stars arrive, studded and ready for action.

"Who the hell are you?" they'll no doubt have been shouting as Josh Brolin (son of the much famouser actor James Brolin and stepson to Barbara Streisand, which is pretty weird, no matter how you look at it) arrives.

"Where's the moustache?" they'll be have been are being shouting, as they realise that Josh Brolin's moustache - which made such a hairy splash in No Country for Old Men, American Gangster and The Valley of Elah - will have are not being attending this studded, starred and stud starred affair.

"Get off the carpet, y'fat bastard!" the crowds will no doubt have are been screaming as Oliver Stone pours out of the rented limo under the bright lights and grey drizzly skies of That London, with an apologetic "I just made it up as I went along" shrug.

"We love you, Lisa Bonet!" they'll chant as Thandie Newton runs under cover of many, many umbrellas for the nearest entrance, for fear of drowning under any larger than average droplets, only to slip down a drain en route, such is her startling thinness and delicate nature as an actress.

"Give me some change or I'll take off my pants!" Gary the Homeless was will have possibly may have been and still could possibly be shouting throughout.

In all, it will have been a studded starry gathering of studly stars, overshadowed only slightly by the current economic crisis, the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, global warming and the truly pathetic state of television today (all of which, let's face it, are totally George W Bush's fault).

The film itself will include stunning star studded turns of actorly impressionism, so much so that many in the audience will scream like small children as their feeble brains try to understand how Oliver Stone managed to get cameras into the freaking White House to film all those scenes, man. And when it's all over, they will have been are filing/filed out of the cinema in Leicester Square in London's Magnificent Leicester Square, next to the Leicester Square Tube station and Angus Bar and Grill, in stunned, studded, shocked and starry silence. And it will are might have maybe been good.

Shatner Rating: Denny Crane
Worth a listen? Sure why not? At least it'll make Obama's win all the more sweet...