Christmas 2009
Hello fellow appreciators of fine arts and cured meats,
Well, today is the 28th of December and the main part of Christmas is well and truly over. I've been generally enjoying myself and eating more than I should... it's been pretty good. Well actually it's been very good. Waking up at 10pm, watching some TV shows or a movie, then playing games for a few hours.
I do intend to talk about my Christmas Day shortly, but first I intend to talk about Nightwatch. If you don't know, it's a Russian film, made in 2006, that is about... well, let me lay it down: the forces of light and the forces of darkness had a big war a thousand years ago, and they realised neither was going to win; they were just too evenly matched. Each side created a small team to police the actions of the other side and to make sure they stuck to their side of the truce. The light guys created the 'Nightwatch' and the dark guys created the 'Daywatch'. This film, obviously, is about the former group. It's based on a series of books and was filmed in the Russian language. Dave, the famous racketeer and screaming wearer of women's clothing, went to see it a few years ago and, as I recall, had recommended it. He'd also spoken of the rather interesting way they'd handled subtitles. Apparently they mixed in with the scenes and looked really cool.
So a few months ago on a rather infrequent Tesco trip with Mustard, I bought the director's cut of Nightwatch and Daywatch (the sequel) for a paltry five English pounds. So today I'm looking at the films on offer. There's Amelie and Stardust and... oh, a very strange looking anime movie called Mind Game which I suspect might be a right laugh. And also there's Nightwatch, which came with a good review. So I take pot luck and select Nightwatch. Subtitles don't bother me, no sir. Years of anime have taught me to even enjoy them.
So, I put in the DVD. The opening scene is sliiiightly dodgy in that the music's a little too clichee for the scene, but it's nothing to worry about. I check the settings for the subtitles and it appears that my only option for subtitles is, and I shit you not, 'English for the hard of hearing.' Well, that's just fan-fucking-tastic. But hey, I can take it, how bad can it be?
So we get to the film proper, and I take a moment to realise my paragraphs are starting to begin with 'so' a lot. We start with... well, my memory is a little hazy... I believe I may have been in a self induced coma for large parts of the film. As I recall, it started with the big fight scene. Well, I say 'big', it felt a bit cheap. I was to come to know later that the entire film was done in a pretty low budget, but at this point I didn't know this, so it was just a bit cheap for my liking.
Then we get to the scene with the old woman. Haha, dear me. Here we first meet our protagonist, err... I forget his name. Let's call him Turd. Turd the charisma free beautiful fool. He doesn't just have no charisma, he drains it from those around him. So we see him walking intoa strange apartment in the most beautiful white jersey the 1980s had to offer. His hair also seems to have suffered a fate worse than death, but it's long, thick and black like the man I pleasured last night. Wait.... yeah, I think there might be some spoilers here. If you don't want to know about the gayest prince since Andy Peters, skip this entire section. Hell, skip the entire post. That's right, fuck off.
Where was I... oh right. So out man skips into this shitty apartment where there's this .... well, she's old but not really old.... so old woman. She's in a fruity red number and seems to be possessed by the spirit of Martin Luther King Jr. Now, see, our charisma free hero has a problem. I'm not talking about the one where he goes into playgrounds and exposes himself to the world's press. He has woman problems. Yes folks, that's how we're kick starting this bag of fresh turds. Luckily this 1940s stripper has some kind of magical powers and can fix his problems. See, his woman has fucked off with some other bloke and she's pregnant... and it's not the child of our hero. Oh shit, it's all going wrote from the start. Luckily, as I said, the old bugger can help. She can get his woman back and murder the unborn child for what I can guess is no fee whatsoever. Sounds like a deal to me. Well, he accepts rather easily and agrees that the sin of killing the child will be on his head. She pours him a drink of piss and he drinks it. This brings the woman round. Next we have the scene with the killing of the unborn baby. Jesus Christ. No it's not gory, it's not really nasty, but the woman dances like Paul Daniels if we imagine Paul Daniels to be a 6'2" black king of all men called Manpour. It's really a sight to see. At first it seems sort of normal with her just wringing her hands in all sorts of strange ways, but the dancing gets more profilic until you start to wonder if you're still watching TV or if you are actually experiencing an epileptic seizure. Fortunately for me I suspect it may have been the latter.
The woman dances like John Candy in the 2006 film 'Candy Cane' and the Nightwatch appear. To say they have an interesting introduction doesn't really do them justice. A few of them just sort of appear in a confused rabble, and then a woman who can turn into a tiger appears and puts a frying pan between the old dear's hands so that she burns herself. Now in retrospect, I understand what they were doing and why, but at the time it was just a garble of strange images that were desperately trying to be cool. Most which, by the way, fell flat on their communist arses. But why stop there brother? We've just been introduced to the Nightwatch! Cool guys eh? Well, not really.
What happened next... well, we learn that our hero was an 'Other'. That is to say... people who have a sort of connection to this light/dark bullshit and can join whoever they want. In fact, that was a part of the truce; to let new people join whichever side. I don't know how these people come about, or why our man only found out his 'power' at 38 (I'm guessing that's the age of the actor). Next.... erm..... I think we see the kid in the swimming pool... he's bleeding from the nose, possibly due to a rape attempt gone horrifically wrong... and I think... yeah, he goes off to see some vampires. He doesn't have a choice really, since he is being 'called' by said vamps. As far as I can tell, this means he has to follow the voice and he is also somehow very susceptible to suggestion, which might explain his hair cut. In the mean time, we see out hero. He's a right dark bastard now, with shades and everything! Yeah, it's showtime, fools. He does some stuff... gets a phone call... and, looking back, I think I also understand what he was doing now, but the film didn't really make it clear at the time. He sort of seems to follow this kid and ends up going on a train. He tries to get close to him, but there's this paedophile in the way or something, and then all these crowds get on the train and push him around. He shouts a lot... actually, shouting and screaming (not shouting words, just the sort of prolonged 'aaargh') happen a lot in this film... but doesn't seem to get the kid. He also notices this woman who causes him to shout some more because apparently something is horrible about her. With some masterful shit effects, we can see that wind is blowing her hair from below and there are some flies or something around her... and she has sone rather silly large glasses on (this Diedre Barlow). Well, apparently this is some sort of event, but, as usual, you've no real idea what's going on.
So our man arrives at some warehouse somewhere. The other people in the Nightwatch seem to be trying to get hold of him for some reason, but he's a renedage and seems to not really want their help, which is strange because he gets his arse utterly handed to him by the first vamp in a fight scene loosely reminiscent of a shit I took earlier in the day. Yes, he finds the boy, in the hands of a vampire. Oh no! Well, he's Nightwatch, he can kick some arse! Actually, no, he's just regular and shit. He gets stabbed a load of times, but somehow managed to kill the vamp with a reflection of some light (from the truck of the Nightwatch, incidentally). The kid seems to have disappeared without a trace, as has the other vamp. Oh well, who cares about those details eh?
Next... we see who appears to be Jim from Neighbours (you know, he's also in Lost as Penny's dad... Charles Whitmore) sitting at a nice desk. The Nightwatch come in with the beaten body of our main man and set him down. Jim bellows that he wants him on his desk and so they drag him there in one of the most misused pieces of slow motion in the film. They get him there and he patches him up somehow. He also has a strange scene where he sort of sees the main character's memory of the strange woman on the train. Oh this is bad, so bad Jim has to crawl across the floor to his notes when walking would have done. Yes, that bad. They make love and our main hero gets up, read for the fight once more... and apparently killing the vamp was a bad idea for the truce or something. I don't know, I was entertaining a major stroke at this point. There's lots of shitting around and Jim gives our man an owl. Well, I may have skipped 45 minutes here to another scene where the two are together or not, I just don't remember to be honest. Anyway, so he gets this stuffed owl as a companion. Well our hero doesn't want any of that! He's going to tackle the strange woman on the train by his own bad self. But somehow he gets the owl, and it's in his flat... and it transforms into a sort of average looking woman. This transformation is pretty typical of the film's special effects. You're left wondering whether you've just seen 25 years into the future at your own demise, or whether someone did, in fact, take trouble in making this film. So now he has a woman with him... she doesn't seem to have any abilities either from what I can tell.
So then... erm... he finds out the kid is his son and he might be some saviour or something... but he has to choose his side... and the female vampire is still alive.. and the kid's mother sort of appears for a bit (who a lot of people confuse with the strange woman on the train)... and yes, so they look after the kid. But then they decide the strange woman on the train and her mad curse matter more... so some other members of the Nightwatch get to look after the kid. Our man goes to see the woman to get rid of her curse before everyone dies or something.... he follows, by the way, a failed attempt by some other guy in one of the most pointless and confusing scenes in an already pointless and confusing film. So anyway, let's forget this other guy failed and let our man have a go. Naturally he succeeds, and the problem is lifted. Just got to worry about the boy, who has been hearing the 'call' again and has run off to the vampire. But out man shows up just in time and the lord of darkness is there and he pulls a sword out of his neck and..... well.... something happens I'm sure, but I'm not sure what really. We see some of the battle like we saw at the start, cutting back occasionally to our man who seems to be shitting around... oh, and a bit from a computer game we saw earlier. It seems to be presented as if it were part of the film... but I have no idea why it was here (or indeed why it appeared earlier... I mean it's a PS2 fighting game where you get to play as people from the film... well your guess is as good as mine). So anyway, our man decides he wants to try and stab the boy in the face (yeah... I know) but the lord of darkness doesn't seem to like this one, and they talk for a bit about whether our main man wants to kid, his son, dead. The kid joins the bad guys, the end.
There's a summary of Nightwatch, one of the strangest films I've seen in a while. It reminds me a little of the other low budget film that pretended to be high budget, Casshern. While I think Casshern was a little better (but not a lot), they both seemed to suffer the same problem. There just didn't seem to be much of a consistent story, there were no real characters, no great actors (hell, no good actors), and special effects that just tried way too hard to be 'cool'.
If you've any doubts about this film, let me tell you that you get to see a ten year old boy topless for a good five minutes (and he has a better body than me), and the same kid tells one of the Nightwatch that he shouldn't be embarrassed if he is naked. That's the man being naked, not the kid.
Oh, and finally, Nestle sponsor this film. Well, I don't know that for sure, but the product placement is beyond silly at some points. In fact, hell, I'll tell you. The cursed woman is making a lovely cup of Nescafe in her home in a Nescafe cup (which we see fully on the screen several times). A screw from a passing plane lands in her coffee (yup...) and so she needs a fresh one. She opens up her jar of Nescafe and sees it is empty. Oh no! So she goes to the shop, where there are hanging advertisements for Nescafe. She buys some Nescafe and the guy who fails to convince her about that curse bollocks (I think I mentioned it) says, "Hey, good taste."
So, long story short, you've had a review of what I wasted a few hours of my day doing and you can shove the Christmas story up your arse until tomorrow because right now Jamie is waiting for me to play Left 4 Dead 2. Yes, that's right mother fuckers.
Well, today is the 28th of December and the main part of Christmas is well and truly over. I've been generally enjoying myself and eating more than I should... it's been pretty good. Well actually it's been very good. Waking up at 10pm, watching some TV shows or a movie, then playing games for a few hours.
I do intend to talk about my Christmas Day shortly, but first I intend to talk about Nightwatch. If you don't know, it's a Russian film, made in 2006, that is about... well, let me lay it down: the forces of light and the forces of darkness had a big war a thousand years ago, and they realised neither was going to win; they were just too evenly matched. Each side created a small team to police the actions of the other side and to make sure they stuck to their side of the truce. The light guys created the 'Nightwatch' and the dark guys created the 'Daywatch'. This film, obviously, is about the former group. It's based on a series of books and was filmed in the Russian language. Dave, the famous racketeer and screaming wearer of women's clothing, went to see it a few years ago and, as I recall, had recommended it. He'd also spoken of the rather interesting way they'd handled subtitles. Apparently they mixed in with the scenes and looked really cool.
So a few months ago on a rather infrequent Tesco trip with Mustard, I bought the director's cut of Nightwatch and Daywatch (the sequel) for a paltry five English pounds. So today I'm looking at the films on offer. There's Amelie and Stardust and... oh, a very strange looking anime movie called Mind Game which I suspect might be a right laugh. And also there's Nightwatch, which came with a good review. So I take pot luck and select Nightwatch. Subtitles don't bother me, no sir. Years of anime have taught me to even enjoy them.
So, I put in the DVD. The opening scene is sliiiightly dodgy in that the music's a little too clichee for the scene, but it's nothing to worry about. I check the settings for the subtitles and it appears that my only option for subtitles is, and I shit you not, 'English for the hard of hearing.' Well, that's just fan-fucking-tastic. But hey, I can take it, how bad can it be?
So we get to the film proper, and I take a moment to realise my paragraphs are starting to begin with 'so' a lot. We start with... well, my memory is a little hazy... I believe I may have been in a self induced coma for large parts of the film. As I recall, it started with the big fight scene. Well, I say 'big', it felt a bit cheap. I was to come to know later that the entire film was done in a pretty low budget, but at this point I didn't know this, so it was just a bit cheap for my liking.
Then we get to the scene with the old woman. Haha, dear me. Here we first meet our protagonist, err... I forget his name. Let's call him Turd. Turd the charisma free beautiful fool. He doesn't just have no charisma, he drains it from those around him. So we see him walking intoa strange apartment in the most beautiful white jersey the 1980s had to offer. His hair also seems to have suffered a fate worse than death, but it's long, thick and black like the man I pleasured last night. Wait.... yeah, I think there might be some spoilers here. If you don't want to know about the gayest prince since Andy Peters, skip this entire section. Hell, skip the entire post. That's right, fuck off.
Where was I... oh right. So out man skips into this shitty apartment where there's this .... well, she's old but not really old.... so old woman. She's in a fruity red number and seems to be possessed by the spirit of Martin Luther King Jr. Now, see, our charisma free hero has a problem. I'm not talking about the one where he goes into playgrounds and exposes himself to the world's press. He has woman problems. Yes folks, that's how we're kick starting this bag of fresh turds. Luckily this 1940s stripper has some kind of magical powers and can fix his problems. See, his woman has fucked off with some other bloke and she's pregnant... and it's not the child of our hero. Oh shit, it's all going wrote from the start. Luckily, as I said, the old bugger can help. She can get his woman back and murder the unborn child for what I can guess is no fee whatsoever. Sounds like a deal to me. Well, he accepts rather easily and agrees that the sin of killing the child will be on his head. She pours him a drink of piss and he drinks it. This brings the woman round. Next we have the scene with the killing of the unborn baby. Jesus Christ. No it's not gory, it's not really nasty, but the woman dances like Paul Daniels if we imagine Paul Daniels to be a 6'2" black king of all men called Manpour. It's really a sight to see. At first it seems sort of normal with her just wringing her hands in all sorts of strange ways, but the dancing gets more profilic until you start to wonder if you're still watching TV or if you are actually experiencing an epileptic seizure. Fortunately for me I suspect it may have been the latter.
The woman dances like John Candy in the 2006 film 'Candy Cane' and the Nightwatch appear. To say they have an interesting introduction doesn't really do them justice. A few of them just sort of appear in a confused rabble, and then a woman who can turn into a tiger appears and puts a frying pan between the old dear's hands so that she burns herself. Now in retrospect, I understand what they were doing and why, but at the time it was just a garble of strange images that were desperately trying to be cool. Most which, by the way, fell flat on their communist arses. But why stop there brother? We've just been introduced to the Nightwatch! Cool guys eh? Well, not really.
What happened next... well, we learn that our hero was an 'Other'. That is to say... people who have a sort of connection to this light/dark bullshit and can join whoever they want. In fact, that was a part of the truce; to let new people join whichever side. I don't know how these people come about, or why our man only found out his 'power' at 38 (I'm guessing that's the age of the actor). Next.... erm..... I think we see the kid in the swimming pool... he's bleeding from the nose, possibly due to a rape attempt gone horrifically wrong... and I think... yeah, he goes off to see some vampires. He doesn't have a choice really, since he is being 'called' by said vamps. As far as I can tell, this means he has to follow the voice and he is also somehow very susceptible to suggestion, which might explain his hair cut. In the mean time, we see out hero. He's a right dark bastard now, with shades and everything! Yeah, it's showtime, fools. He does some stuff... gets a phone call... and, looking back, I think I also understand what he was doing now, but the film didn't really make it clear at the time. He sort of seems to follow this kid and ends up going on a train. He tries to get close to him, but there's this paedophile in the way or something, and then all these crowds get on the train and push him around. He shouts a lot... actually, shouting and screaming (not shouting words, just the sort of prolonged 'aaargh') happen a lot in this film... but doesn't seem to get the kid. He also notices this woman who causes him to shout some more because apparently something is horrible about her. With some masterful shit effects, we can see that wind is blowing her hair from below and there are some flies or something around her... and she has sone rather silly large glasses on (this Diedre Barlow). Well, apparently this is some sort of event, but, as usual, you've no real idea what's going on.
So our man arrives at some warehouse somewhere. The other people in the Nightwatch seem to be trying to get hold of him for some reason, but he's a renedage and seems to not really want their help, which is strange because he gets his arse utterly handed to him by the first vamp in a fight scene loosely reminiscent of a shit I took earlier in the day. Yes, he finds the boy, in the hands of a vampire. Oh no! Well, he's Nightwatch, he can kick some arse! Actually, no, he's just regular and shit. He gets stabbed a load of times, but somehow managed to kill the vamp with a reflection of some light (from the truck of the Nightwatch, incidentally). The kid seems to have disappeared without a trace, as has the other vamp. Oh well, who cares about those details eh?
Next... we see who appears to be Jim from Neighbours (you know, he's also in Lost as Penny's dad... Charles Whitmore) sitting at a nice desk. The Nightwatch come in with the beaten body of our main man and set him down. Jim bellows that he wants him on his desk and so they drag him there in one of the most misused pieces of slow motion in the film. They get him there and he patches him up somehow. He also has a strange scene where he sort of sees the main character's memory of the strange woman on the train. Oh this is bad, so bad Jim has to crawl across the floor to his notes when walking would have done. Yes, that bad. They make love and our main hero gets up, read for the fight once more... and apparently killing the vamp was a bad idea for the truce or something. I don't know, I was entertaining a major stroke at this point. There's lots of shitting around and Jim gives our man an owl. Well, I may have skipped 45 minutes here to another scene where the two are together or not, I just don't remember to be honest. Anyway, so he gets this stuffed owl as a companion. Well our hero doesn't want any of that! He's going to tackle the strange woman on the train by his own bad self. But somehow he gets the owl, and it's in his flat... and it transforms into a sort of average looking woman. This transformation is pretty typical of the film's special effects. You're left wondering whether you've just seen 25 years into the future at your own demise, or whether someone did, in fact, take trouble in making this film. So now he has a woman with him... she doesn't seem to have any abilities either from what I can tell.
So then... erm... he finds out the kid is his son and he might be some saviour or something... but he has to choose his side... and the female vampire is still alive.. and the kid's mother sort of appears for a bit (who a lot of people confuse with the strange woman on the train)... and yes, so they look after the kid. But then they decide the strange woman on the train and her mad curse matter more... so some other members of the Nightwatch get to look after the kid. Our man goes to see the woman to get rid of her curse before everyone dies or something.... he follows, by the way, a failed attempt by some other guy in one of the most pointless and confusing scenes in an already pointless and confusing film. So anyway, let's forget this other guy failed and let our man have a go. Naturally he succeeds, and the problem is lifted. Just got to worry about the boy, who has been hearing the 'call' again and has run off to the vampire. But out man shows up just in time and the lord of darkness is there and he pulls a sword out of his neck and..... well.... something happens I'm sure, but I'm not sure what really. We see some of the battle like we saw at the start, cutting back occasionally to our man who seems to be shitting around... oh, and a bit from a computer game we saw earlier. It seems to be presented as if it were part of the film... but I have no idea why it was here (or indeed why it appeared earlier... I mean it's a PS2 fighting game where you get to play as people from the film... well your guess is as good as mine). So anyway, our man decides he wants to try and stab the boy in the face (yeah... I know) but the lord of darkness doesn't seem to like this one, and they talk for a bit about whether our main man wants to kid, his son, dead. The kid joins the bad guys, the end.
There's a summary of Nightwatch, one of the strangest films I've seen in a while. It reminds me a little of the other low budget film that pretended to be high budget, Casshern. While I think Casshern was a little better (but not a lot), they both seemed to suffer the same problem. There just didn't seem to be much of a consistent story, there were no real characters, no great actors (hell, no good actors), and special effects that just tried way too hard to be 'cool'.
If you've any doubts about this film, let me tell you that you get to see a ten year old boy topless for a good five minutes (and he has a better body than me), and the same kid tells one of the Nightwatch that he shouldn't be embarrassed if he is naked. That's the man being naked, not the kid.
Oh, and finally, Nestle sponsor this film. Well, I don't know that for sure, but the product placement is beyond silly at some points. In fact, hell, I'll tell you. The cursed woman is making a lovely cup of Nescafe in her home in a Nescafe cup (which we see fully on the screen several times). A screw from a passing plane lands in her coffee (yup...) and so she needs a fresh one. She opens up her jar of Nescafe and sees it is empty. Oh no! So she goes to the shop, where there are hanging advertisements for Nescafe. She buys some Nescafe and the guy who fails to convince her about that curse bollocks (I think I mentioned it) says, "Hey, good taste."
So, long story short, you've had a review of what I wasted a few hours of my day doing and you can shove the Christmas story up your arse until tomorrow because right now Jamie is waiting for me to play Left 4 Dead 2. Yes, that's right mother fuckers.