Pirate Radio

Pirate Radio (AKA The Boat That Rocked)
April 1, 2009
Universal etc.
Comedy, Musical, Historical
DVD
C+

I'm ambivalent about this movie, so let's get the negatives out of the way first.  This is the fictional, if inspired by true events, story of, yes, a pirate radio station in the days when the BBC did not like to play rock or pop.  Specifically, it's 1966-67, and as such I recognize that it's a period piece and this was not the most feminist of times or places.  That said, I feel that the way that sex and women are presented is excessively retrograde.  The next British movie I'll review, In the Loop, is not really feminist either, but it does treat the women as people with believable motivations, and there is nothing as creepy as the scene where a man tries to trick his partner into deflowering another man.  (Perhaps he's also trying to trick the other man, since it seems unlikely they would've gotten away with it, but this makes the scene no less creepy.)  Considering that writer-director Richard Curtis did The Tall Guy about twenty years earlier, it's fair to expect better than this.

The movie was released in a longer version (with the "boat" title) on the date I've listed, and perhaps there are fewer dangling threads in that.  To take a minor example, what the heck does Thick Kevin do on the boat?  Everyone else has a clear job but he just hangs out.  To take a more significant example, how does Philip Seymour Hoffman, as the "spirit of rock" character the Count, manage to survive after the boat sinks, while the Swedish crew disappears without comment?

The soundtrack and costumes are good at least (although the former is sometimes anachronistic), and there are some enjoyable performances, most notably Bill Nighy as Quentin, whose every line delivery and movement is perfect.  I might've rated this higher at the time, although what bothers me about it now bothered me then.

There are some Harry Potter connections here, with ex-spouses Kenneth "Lockhart" Branagh and Emma "Trelawney" Thompson playing respectively the main villain and the mother of the character closest to being the film's main character.  David Sterne was a Ministry Wizard in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and is Marianne's Captain here.  Rhys Ifans, who's Gavin, would be Xenophilius Lovegood in Deathly Hallows, Part I, while Nighy would be Minister Rufus Scrimgeour.

Tom Brooke played a Production Assistant in Bridget Jones 2 but is more memorable here as Thick Kevin.  Kirsty Mather, who's John's Boat Girl, had recently been a Hen in Mamma Mia!  Chris O'Dowd, who's sweet and goofy as Simon (the most-betrayed-by-a-woman character) would be the love interest Rhodes in Bridesmaids.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
November 15, 2002
Warner Bros.
Children's, Comedy, Fantasy, Mystery, Horror
DVD
B

My review of the book is here:  http://rereadingeverybookiown.blogspot.com/2013/11/harry-potter-and-chamber-of-secrets.html.  I have somewhat changed my mind about the movie, but first I want to cover the regulars for this entry.  (Stars indicate newbies.)

1. Sean Biggerstaff as Oliver Wood
2. David Bradley as Argus Filch
3. John Cleese as Nearly Headless Nick
4. Robbie Coltrane as Rubeus Hagrid
5. Eleanor Columbus as Susan Bones (still not speaking, since she's not British, but she does join Hermione in crushing on Lockhart)
6. Violet Columbus (another of the director's daughters) as Girl with Flowers in one of the moving portraits*
7. Emily Dale as Katie Bell
8. Warwick Davis as Professor Flitwick
9. Louis Doyle as Ernie MacMillan*
10. Alfred Enoch as Dean Thomas
11. Scott Fearn as Adrian Pucey (although Terence Higgs before)
12. Tom Felton as Draco Malfoy
13. Richard Griffiths as Uncle Vernon Dursley
14. Rupert Grint as Ron Weasley
15. Robert Hardy as Cornelius Fudge*
16. Richard Harris as Albus Dumbledore
17. Josh Herdman as Gregory Goyle
18. David Holmes as a Slytherin Beater (although specifically Adrian Pucey before)
19. Jason Isaacs as Lucius Malfoy*
20. Toby Jones as the voice of Dobby the House Elf*
21. Matthew Lewis as Neville Longbottom
22. Harry Melling as Dudley Dursley
23. Devon Murray as Seamus Finnigan
24. James Phelps as Fred Weasley
25. Oliver Phelps as George Weasley
26. Leslie Phillips as the voice of the Sorting Hat
27. Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter
28. Chris Rankin as Percy Weasley
29. Adrian Rawlins as James Potter
30. Fiona Shaw as Aunt Petunia Dursley
31. Charlotte Skeoch as Hannah Abbott*
32. Geraldine Somerville as Lily Potter
33. Danielle Tabor as Angelina Johnson
34. Harry Taylor as the Station Guard
35. Emma Watson as Hermione Granger
36. Jamie Waylett as Vincent Crabbe
37. Mark Williams as Arthur Weasley*
38. Bonnie Wright as Ginny Weasley
39. Luke Youngblood as Lee Jordan

Also, Amy Puglia, who was a Quidditch Player last time, is just a Pupil this time.  Maria Coyne and Oliver Lavery-Farag again play unspecified students.  Ben Borowiecki is again a Diagon Alley Boy, here named Angus for no known reason.  (It's not like he has lines or anyone talks to him.)   Christopher O'Shea would again be an extra in Order of the Phoenix.  Jamie Dunlop makes another of his three uncredited appearances as a wizard.  

Shirley Henderson is the most in-jokily cast newbie, as Moaning Myrtle, soon after her appearance as another bathroom-weeper in the first Bridget Jones movie.  (She would return to both series.)  And Bridget's mother, an actual Ms. Jones, Gemma Jones, makes her first appearance as Madam Pomfrey, the school nurse.  Miriam Margolyes was in some of my other movies, and she first appears as Madam Sprout here.  (I had to limit tags, so Henderson and Margolyes are omitted.)

Alan Rickman and Maggie Smith both return (as Snape and McGonagall) and have their moments, although fewer than in the first movie.  Julie Walters, on the other hand, makes the most of the many more Weasley family scenes, in her role as matriarch Molly.

The main one-timer of note is Kenneth Branagh, as the vain Professor Lockhart.  Although not exactly handsome, he makes the role his own.  Along with Jason Isaacs, he shows that you don't have to be in the first movie to be impressive in the second.  (And of course there would be other later additions who would shine.)

I still have some gripes about this movie, yes, including "No Hogwarts without you," but I tried to be fair in my viewing this time.  Even with that scene, the line itself is OK.  It's the standing ovation that Hagrid gets that bugs me.  It is the first in a series of tone-deaf endings, and yet it is slightly balanced by the post-credit throw-away gag about Lockhart's latest book.  (The first movie's ending is just right though.)

The two main things I noticed this time were that the children's acting has generally improved (including Radcliffe's, who's less bland, although not at the level he'd attain later), and the movie is darker (although less than later of course).  I really do feel it is arguably both a mystery that we can solve along with Harry and friends (more so than the first movie), and a horror movie.  The latter is seen in the use of the spiders and the Basilisk.  At the same time, the movie is much more of a comedy than the first, especially in the first hour.  On the down-side, there's the beginning of the use of Ron for comic relief, which I don't resent as much as some in the fandom but it can be seen as a cheapening of his character.

There is less shiny wonder than in the first year, but this is compensated for by the general improvement.  Even the special effects and music are better than they were a year earlier.  (I like "Fawkes's Theme" best, capturing the healing and hope.)  I will admit that the pacing is not as good, but it's never dull.

So basically, it's a movie with growing pains, and good and bad mixed together, as suits the voice-changing twelve-year-old hero.

Near, far, in our motor car, oh, what a happy time we'll spend!

Peter's Friends

Peter's Friends
November 13, 1992
BBC
Comedy, Drama
VHS
B+

This is sort of an autobiographical film, in that the cowriters Rita Rudner (who plays Carol) and Martin Bergman are married and he's British and she sometimes felt out of place with his friends from university.  And much of the cast, including director Kenneth Branagh (who plays Andrew, Carol's husband), met at Cambridge and remain friends to this day.  Branagh was then married to Emma Thompson (who plays Maggie), and Thompson's mother plays housekeeper Vera.  Hugh Laurie (Roger) and Stephen Fry (Peter) were such good friends that they would often team up on television shows together at the time.  Even Tony Slattery, who's appearing as outsider Brian, was at Cambridge.  Oh, and there are lots of Harry Potter and/or Jane Austen points on this one, but I'll get to all that in later reviews, except to say that Laurie and Imelda Staunton (here as Mary) would again play a married couple.

This discussion of the "incestuous" background is not out of place.  The movie is about bonding and quarreling and flirting in a tight-knit group, and how (not) to deal with outsiders.  It is a witty if sometimes crude movie, very quotable (especially Andrew's lines).  The drama sometimes works and sometimes doesn't, but the film never ceases to be watchable, which is saying a lot for something that is almost solely dialogue.  The cast works well together (with Thompson probably the stand-out), although I will say that Slattery fan though I was and am (it was a pretty big thrill to see him be both goofy and naked), his later scenes don't really work.  Also, the script is a bit cliched and Peter's big reveal (at midnight on New Year's) doesn't pack the wallop it did twenty some years ago.

But there is an added poignancy, seeing the cast when they were relatively young (mostly mid 30s).  When I first saw the movie at 24, I couldn't relate to the feeling of not having accomplished all you'd imagined in your youth.  And I laughed my head off at the opening credits, seeing all those faces of '82 to '92 (yes, including Salman Rushdie), while now it's a time capsule, no longer a look at the recent past.  Similarly, the soundtrack was then filled with the hits of a few years before, and now (while still as good as ever) it is more definitely golden oldies.  In short, the movie doesn't mean what it did before, but then nostalgia never does.

Remembering