THIS JUST IN !!! 11am CDT USA June 27, 2004

Father Geek reporting... in a bit of what can only be called Karmic Irony the word has just arrived here at Geek Headquarters in the heart of Texas that a "controlled" fire stunt on the set of the remake of the HOUSE OF WAX filming in Australia went terribly wrong today and fed by the wax props spread to and consumed the entire set, equiptment, sound stage, etc... BUMMER!!! Hope no one was hurt... But I can't help but think that somewhere Vincent Price and Charles Bronson are having a little satanic chuckle... more on this later...

Now back to our original column as it was posted late Saturday (the 26th) night...

Father Geek here at my rolltop desk work station in Austin, Texas with the latest weekend report from Latauro and the wilds of Central Australia (that large plot of rabbit infested land just West of New Zealand)... What's happening in film down there... well, read on geeks, because here's AICN's regular weekly column...

The Downunder Report...

Did you know I can hold my breath for 3 minutes and 33 seconds?

AICN-DOWNUNDER

This week is momentous. It marks the release of THE PRINCE AND ME, starring Julia Stiles. For years to come, people will proclaim this as being the greatest week of cinema Australia has ever seen. Grandchildren will ask their elders to relate the story of what it was like to walk into the cinema and see it for the first time. June 24th will forever be Prince And Me Day.

No, I haven't seen the film, and no, this isn't an ad for a scathing review further down the column. I'm mentioning it because - and I don't know if anyone outside of Australia and Denmark is aware of this - the prince of Denmark, mere weeks ago, married a girl from Australia. I don't know how similar their meeting was to that of Ms Stiles and *her* Danish prince, but I can almost certainly assure you that in real life, THE PRINCE OF DENMARK SPOKE DANISH.

It's a conceit that must surely piss most of Europe off. All European characters speaking with English accents, to indicate 'foreign' to US audiences. Even Australia is victim to it: I haven't heard an American do an Australian accent without it becoming thick English cockney (yes, even Meryl Streep's accent sucked). I dread to think what will happen if they attempt a New Zealand accent (yes, there is a difference between Aussie and NZ accents, and even Aussies mostly suck at NZ accents). Is it really that hard to get right? Is it really something that's difficult for audiences to grasp? Given the sheer amount of people who claim that foreign accents are a huge turn-on, wouldn't you want to try to nail down the exotic speak?

Maybe they will soon. Maybe one film will hit it big, and there will suddenly be a slew of films trying to be the Next Big Accent. Watch. It'll happen.

In the meantime, if you want actual reviews (and not two-word sentences designed to make my friends laugh, as with last week), I've reviewed SHREK 2, INTERMISSION and DAWN OF THE DEAD. One film gets praised, one gets trashed, and the other gets a 'pretty good, but not great'. Think you can guess which is which? You may be in for a surprise.

Also, there's a bunch of news from Australia and New Zealand. What more could you want? Porn? Really? Maybe next week!

NEWS

* NZ-based John Finn's Wife (love the nick, dude) has been speaking lately to some people involved in "Tintin" licensing. After a meeting with Nick Rodwell (The Top Dude at Tintin Inc, also married to Mrs Herge), these people said that contracts with Spielberg had been signed and that Tom Hanks may be Captain Haddock. To be taken with a very large amount of sea salt (see what I did there?), but John Finn's Wife suggested Oliver Reed. Were he not dead, of course. More newsies as they come to hand...

* Jerry Goldsmith has been replaced by Paul Grabowsky as score-maker for Fred Schepisi's four hour telemovie EMPIRE FALLS, starring Paul Newman, Ed Harris and Helen Hunt. Grabowsky has previously composed the scores for Schepisi films LAST ORDERS and IT RUNS IN THE FAMILY.

* Oh, it's great that every week we get to listen to the bullshit from the Australian Family Association. Concerned that society as we know it will collapse if ANATOMY OF HELL plays in cinemas, the AFA has complained to the Office of Film and Literature Classification about the R18+ rating given to Catherine Breillat's film. ANATOMY contains (gasp! shock!) sex, so with any luck people over the age of eighteen will be spared such depravity. We'll let you know how it turns out.

AWARDS AND FESTIVALS

30TH SEATTLE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

Australian documentary BORN INTO BROTHELS (from Zana Briski and Ross Kauffman) won Best Documentary from the audience awards. Australian film MARIA FULL OF GRACE also won an audience-voted award, to Catalina Sandino Moreno for Best Actress.

BOX OFFICE

Who could have possibly predicted that the DreamWorks sequel would beat out the rest? Yeah, big surprise there. DAWN OF THE DEAD and SUPER SIZE ME just came in short of the top five this week, though Morgan Spurlock's documentary did beat BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE's record as Australia's biggest opening weekend for a doco.

Annnnd the top money went to...

• 1. SHREK 2
• 2. HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN
• 3. THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW
• 4. TROY
• 5. RAISING HELEN

RELEASED THIS WEEK

MURDER BY DEATH meets "Temptation Island", Lindsey Lohan (who?) continues to battle Hilary Duff (who?) for the coveted tweenies (the coveted what?), everyone in Denmark suddenly gets English accents, and snow + dreams = snowdreams.

Here's what's new downunder...

• CLUB DREAD
• MEAN GIRLS
• THE PRINCE AND ME
• TOUCHING THE VOID

REVIEWS

SHREK 2

I didn't like the first one.

I know that puts me in the minority section, similar to my views on CATWOMAN, cheese and Jesus. But it just did nothing for me. There was no story. There were a couple of plot points, but the vast majority of the film was padding. It was sloppy storytelling, particularly for a film that's poking fun at fairytales.

So, when I promised to take my cousin to see any film of her choice for her twelfth birthday, I should have known she'd pick SHREK 2. Every kid is hanging out for it, most adults too. Being the dutiful cousin that I am, I happily took her along to see it, putting on a big smile every time I spied her looking up to check my reaction.

Well, it was better than the first. But, coming from me, that's still not saying much.

I'm trying so hard to judge it on its own merits, because all I keep thinking is how lame the whole thing is compared to Pixar. You may consider it a tired comparison, but the SHREKs would not exist were it not for TOY STORY. Unfortunately, like all the major studios, they completely missed the point of TOY STORY. It's not the computer animation that makes them so successful; it's the story, it's the characters, it's the fact that we're not being patronised.

But, yes, the animation is an issue. So let's address it. I really like ANTZ. I love Woody Allen, and enjoyed the film as a whole. But when BUG'S LIFE came out, there was no comparison. BUG'S LIFE was simply a better story, and didn't need to resort to the clichés that ANTZ did. If there was an action sequence in there, it wasn't to fill in the time or simply change the pace - it served the story. But what got me more than anything when comparing the two was the character design. The ants in ANTZ had the correct number of legs, they were (roughly) the correct colour. They went for accuracy. BUG'S LIFE gave the ants two arms and two legs, and coloured them whatever they felt like (Flik was blue, for crying out loud). Yet they were a million times better. There was no awkwardness to the movement, it was all real. Yes, they went down the anthropomorphism route, but what other choice did they have? Bottom line: in my opinion, the bugs from A BUG'S LIFE looked about a zillion times better than their counterparts in ANTZ.

The same is true for SHREK 2. The standard of computer animation is set by Pixar, and SHREK just doesn't look as good. I keep flashing back to a quote from Leela in "Futurama": 'They're so lifeless-like'. All the characters look like plastic designs with fish-hooks pulling bits of their faces into expressions. They never feel like real people. If Pixar can convince me that a fish is real, if Weta can convince me that a clearly-CGI character has a soul, then surely DreamWorks can try harder with a character that is human? Or with a human-like ogre?

Another big thing that most studios constantly get wrong is the humour. I'm so sick of hearing how clever the makers of SO-AND-SO were for putting in jokes that only adults will get. One joke for the kids, one joke for the adults, one joke for the kids, one joke for the adults. The biggest laugh in SHREK 2 (at least in the cinema I was in) ? When Shrek farted. Meanwhile, the adults are chuckling knowingly to themselves when Fiona kisses Shrek upside down, like in SPIDER-MAN. Why is that clever?! Why do people think taking a recent pop culture moment and reconstructing it on screen is brilliant? It's like SCARY MOVIE 2. Not a single joke in the entire thing, just scenes from horror films re-done with the Wayans brothers smirking throughout. My advice to the makers of SHREK 2: go watch the Pixar films again. Listen to the jokes. They're character-based. The slapstick moments are earned. Sit in a cinema and listen to who is laughing. It's everybody. It's not the adults laughing at one moment and the kids laughing at the next. It's universal humour that everyone can appreciate, not a dividing line between demographics.

So what did I like?

I liked Eddie Murphy. And I really hate Eddie Murphy. I've never found him remotely funny or watchable in anything he's done, but I think he's good as Donkey. He fits the role well. Not that I think any of Donkey's lines are particularly funny, but I do enjoy the character. I liked when Shrek turned into Howard Keel. I liked some stuff that the overrated Puss In Boots did. I liked Larry King. I liked a couple of the scenic shots.

It's not a bad film. It's just bad storytelling dumbed down. Like I said, I know I'm in the minority... but I'll keep sighing every time I hear how good SHREK 2 is, and keep counting down the days until THE INCREDIBLES comes out.

INTERMISSION

What can I say about INTERMISSION that hasn't been said before? Quite a lot, actually, as I've seen practically no mention of it anywhere. I did glance at a review on imdb.com which said that the dialogue was completely incomprehensible. This I found funny, as the reviewer lives in New York, and INTERMISSION is Irish. Very Irish.

The most refreshing thing was seeing Irish and not Oirish. Oirish is THE DEVIL'S OWN. It's DARBY O'GILL AND THE LITTLE PEOPLE. It's THE GHOST AND THE DARKNESS. Though I don't purport to be any sort of expert on Irish culture, the film felt genuine. A lot of the time, though, it felt like it was trying very hard to feel genuine - a task that wasn't helped by repeated descent into cliché - but on the whole it worked.

It's a multi-character piece about love and crime and other things, set against the working class of Ireland. You want a better summation? Let me quote the poster:

'It's LOVE ACTUALLY meets TRAINSPOTTING - Ain't It Cool News'

I love that quote. It's like the cover of AMERICAN PSYCHO 2 ('10/10 - imdb.com'). But I digress.

The film featurs Colin Farrell, Cillian Murphy (whose work I'm enjoying heaps), Colm Meany, Kelly Macdonald and Shirley Henderson (from BRIDGET JONES'S DIARY and the second HARRY POTTER). It's a good cast, and a clever one. Not only do they all suit their roles to a tee, but it's a recognisable enough cast to ensure international distribution.

So, is it any good? Well... yes. If you have to divide everything into either 'good' or 'bad', I think in the wash INTERMISSION would come out as 'good'. It's not without faults - in fact, it's filled with them - but there's a sweetness to it that eventually saves the film. Yes, that sweetness tap dances dangerously close to pap at some points, but it's a welcome respite.

It's a good film, mildly distracting, mildly distracted, but worth your time if you're a fan of the multiple character flicks.

DAWN OF THE DEAD

I now have to make a confession that will no doubt strip me of my geek cred: I have not seen the original DAWN OF THE DEAD. I'm sorry, it's just never come up. I've never been in a position to see it, and rarely have the time to actively seek out old films I should have seen by now (though I always swear I'll amend this).

I was, however, in a position to see the remake. I wasn't chomping at the bit to, but that situation did present itself, so I went. In fact, I went with a friend who had just come of a fourteen hour work day, and I myself had been working to an insane degree lately. The point is that we both looked like the living dead, and I was worried that we'd be more inclined to identify with the zombies. But, in complete honesty, I wasn't expecting it to be good.

When the little girl on the roller skates appeared at the start, I thought Sarah Polley was going to have to protect her and it would get all schmaltzy. When Mekhi Pfiefer said all he wanted to do was bring his baby into the world, I figured he'd die saving it from the zombies. At one point, I expected the film to fall into the predictable subtext of "WHO ARE THE *REAL* ZOMBIES?". I was wrong on all counts. In fact, my expectations were completely turned downside up.

There's been a raising-of-the-bar with zombie films of late. UNDEAD was funny and brilliant, and knew exactly where it was going. 28 DAYS LATER (which was, in fact, both a virus film *and* a zombie film... they were bloody zombies!) applied a video game structure and an indie style to the genre. I haven't seen SHAUN OF THE DEAD, but I love the idea of a romantic comedy zombie flick (and I'm pissed I didn't think of it first). The resurgence of the zombie film has been a quiet, barely-noticed phenomenon.

DAWN OF THE DEAD feels like no zombie film has ever been made before. It feels like the scriptwriter just came up with the concept of dead people wanting to eat alive people, and this is the film that resulted. The direction isn't too much, or too little. I've never heard of the director before, but it was expertly handled. Even the casting managed to avoid cliché.

I look forward to seeing the original DAWN and DAY (I've already seen NIGHT... does that get me out of the geek doghouse?), but as a stand-alone film, the 2004 DAWN OF THE DEAD is really very good.

NEXT WEEK

- Uwe Boll beats out Steven Spielberg, James Cameron and God for directing duties on ALIEN VS GARFIELD

- David E. Kelley pitches new "Star Trek" series about Starfleet lawyers and the affairs they have with each other

- M. Night Shyamalan signs on to direct HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX, when he suggests a new ending whereby it is revealed that Harry is actually Voldemort, and Dumbledore can be killed with air

Peace out,

Latauro

AICNDownunder@hotmail.com