This is the Recession the Box Office has to Have

For those of you out there that follow Australian politics, you might remember this quote by former Treasurer and Prime Minister of Australia, Paul Keating.

"This is the Recession that Australia had to have"

And at the moment, it would seem the Box Office is going through the same thing, with 4 lacklustre months in the Box Office (the current top grosser at present is Rango which is about $117 million dollars), it would seem that this may be the recession the Box Office has to have.

But what caused this, what events led to this happening, well dear reader let me count the ways:

1. Limited Sessions:

Cinemas depend very much on the right session times and in some cases of late, the movies only seem to get the ideal session times at times when people's chances of getting to those films may be limited and when they can get a chance to get to it, that film will have played for about 2 or 3 weeks and as a result it will most likely be on its final weeks or final week.

Which only makes things worse if that person happens to be a traveller also and doesn't have the luxury of having that movie in their living area, as a result they either have to miss that film or wait for the disc.


2. Limited Showing Weeks:

Recently I had a chance to see Google's Amazing News Archive of old newspapers from The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald, two major newspapers here in Australia and in one of those issues it showed Top Gun playing for 47 Weeks, almost a year in cinemas.

In this day and age that is absurd but reading that got my thinking, what if theatres returned to that as a way of getting people back to the cinemas because most movies these days run on average of about 2-3 weeks (the recent release Sucker Punch comes to mind) if some films are lucky (Avatar and The King's Speech being two of them) they might go on longer for about 4 or 5 weeks but again it feeds into the first point, which is that limitation of cinema showings which can also be incredibly damaging to a movie's theatrical run.


3. Emphasis on Children's Films:

At the moment, most of the prime time sessions are going to children's films, no doubt due to it being School Holidays at the moment and cinema chains will be eager to entice young kids and their families to come to the cinema.

But it also I think feeds into a much bigger problem, and that is a complete lack of movies for adults as most of those like Wall Street 2 to use as an example are pushed back to very late in the afternoon and the evenings, as a result it becomes harder for those movies to make some money from the sessions and justify staying in cinemas for longer than the exhibitors will be wanting to keep it if it's becoming nothing more than a drain on session bookings they might want to start using for future pictures or ones that are more successful.

But lastly, even if that movie and for this example I'll use Peter Weir's The Way Back, there's also every chance that the studio backing it may decide not to give it a wide release which again can limit on its exhibition and grossage which is what happened to Way Back, it was given a very small and limited theatrical release in Feburary and was gone before most people had a chance to see it.


4. High Prices

Probably the last reason on this list is the issue of high ticket prices in some cases, which for adults can be as high as $20 on average plus on top of that you add another $10-$15 on average for Popcorn and Drinks plus the surcharge if it happens to be a 3D screening.

Now for most people that is a fair chunk of change and that again can limit the number of people that go to a cinema session or out for that night altogether as they might decide to stay in that night feeling that they won't be able to afford it and as they say, it's the little things in life that make it worth living.

But some of you are probably asking the Question "What can be Done about it?" and to be honest with you, I just don't know, I guess it will depend on how the rest of the year plays out, what with the blockbuster season just now starting to kick off with Thor and in all honesty, there may very well be little that can be done about it.

But for now it seems, it would appear that we are indeed in a Box Office Recession, whether it's a short or long one remains to be seen.

Film Review - Megamind (2010)

Megamind, the latest from Dreamworks Animation is the story of two super beings, Megamind voiced by Will Ferrell who is blue and has a large brain and Metro Man (Brad Pitt) who is essentially a Superman type figure, but when Metro Man is defeated, Mega Mind finds himself without purpose.

And so does this movie which is Mega boring, now I know that over time there has been great animated movies last year's Toy Story 3 being one of them and great Superhero movies the first Superman being one of them but this fails at both of those mainly because there is nothing here to hold the viewer's interest, so much of it feels like it's been done before and more interesting in other pictures.

And not only that, it wastes the talent of Tina Fey, who had no reason to do this at all but did so anyway, why she did I'll never know but apart from those even the animation feels sterile and did I mention how boring this movie is, for god's sake why didn't someone inject some excitement into this, I mean there were times where I wanted Dr. Claw and his MAD organization from Inspector Gadget to come and take over the movie, at least that might have been good, instead of this disaster.

All in all, skip this, .5 out of 5.

Film Review - Thor (2011)

Thor is based on the Marvel comic and stars Australian Chris Hemsworth as Thor, the God of Thunder and son of Odin played by Sir Anthony Hopkins, but after a battle with the Frost Giants, Thor is exiled from his home of Asgard to Earth, but that is only the beginning.

Now before I go into the film itself, I want to talk about my expectations for this were, after I saw the trailer for this it made me think that I was going to expect a slightly better version of last year's Clash of the Titans, which wasn't all that much of a movie to begin with but were my expectations met?

Well, no as I thought this was 'Thor'-ing being a representation for boring, allow me to explain why:

1. No Strong Villain: Probably my Paramount objection to this is the lack of a strong Villain for Thor to do battle against, I have said this before but I will say it again that in an action picture or sci fi picture or whatever you have to have a strong villain for it to work, look at how successful the Star Wars Trilogy is still after all these years, chock that up to Lord Darth Vader and the awesome might of the Galactic Empire, here Loki just comes across as a total gimp who posed no real threat and personally, I wanted Kratos from the God of War series to come in and rip his guts out so he'd become the villain, now you'd have a movie.

2. Lack of Imagination: Next would be no real imagination in the script, the early scenes on Asgard and the fight with the Frost Giants was well done but the scenes on Earth felt a lot like the small town scenes in Superman II and the SHIELD stuff felt lifted from last year's Iron Man 2 and even with the whole frost world, it looked more like Mordor after a 100 year Blizzard.

3. Waste of Talent: It's hard to believe a movie this boring has all of this talent attached: Director Kenneth Branagh, Actors Natalie Portman, Stellan Skarsgard, Rene Russo, Hopkins and even Writer J. Michael Straczynski, the worst of this is Portman, a good and intelligent actress reduced to a giggling nitwit when in the presence of the big strong man, if Anne Hathaway had been in that role it might have worked but not with Portman.

As for Hemsworth well he is charismatic but tends to go into the Gerard Butler style of SHOUTING SOME OF HIS LINES LIKE THIS at times but apart from that I didn't mind him too much.

4. The 3D Effects: Last but certainly not least is the 3D effects work done for the film, quite frankly it sucks the big one the size of a vacuum hose, the CG effects look very substandard and in a post Avatar world it isn't good enough it looked more like digital tinfoil more than anything.

And as for the 3D, grrrrrr, let me repeat it as best I can, Dark, Dim, Fuzzy and every bit as bad as Tron Legacy's appalling 3D, made half the movie look fuzzy, seriously guys 3D is starting to get really annoying.

So all in all, I didn't enjoy this movie and as this is the first of the 2011 blockbusters to see release, it's not a good sign, hopefully Green Lantern by Martin Campbell and X-Men First Class by Matthew Vaughn will deliver the goods, 1 and a half out of 5.

Film Review - Tough Guys (1986)

Tough Guys stars Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster as two former convicts who have finished serving a 30 year jail sentence for robbing a train in 1955, but getting out has only begun the fun that awaits them.

Tough Guys is a fun movie that works mainly because of its two leads, in fact in some scenes it's easy to mistake Kirk Douglas for his son Michael and Burt Lancaster is also quite good as are Eli Wallach and Dana Carvey.

But despite that and a nice opening song by Kenny Rogers and Burt Bacharach, the written material isn't as lively as the actors are, essentially running out of steam after the 1 hour mark and coming up with a rather contrived chase scene for the movie's third act, and it's a darn shame as there are some quite funny and touching moments in this movie.

But does it affect my overall opinion, well not really as I was quite entertained by most of the movie to let the problems slide, 3 out of 5.

Film Review - Warlock (1989)

Warlock is a fantasy movie that starts in 1691 where a Warlock (A Male Witch) played by Julian Sands is sentenced to death for crimes against Man and God, but using some black magic he escapes his dungeon to 1988, but he is not alone.

Warlock clearly owes it's debts to both Highlander and The Terminator and sadly, this movie isn't anywhere near the same league as those for a number of reasons, let thee count the ways:

1. The Cast: In both Terminator and Highlander, you had charismatic actors that gave it their all and were compelling to watch, here both Julian Sands and Richard E. Grant have got the charisma of a pine tree.

2. The Story: Again in both of those aforementioned movies, the heroes and villains had frequent clashes with each other throughout the story and it gave a sense of what the heroes of those stories were fighting for, in Terminator it was preventing the rise of the machines and in Highlander it was preventing a great prize falling into the wrong hands, here the Warlock and Redfern are after this book and frankly, who gives a shit.

3. The Direction: As well as those two problems, Steve Miner the director doesn't infuse the film with any sort of energy or excitement whereas James Cameron and Russell Mulcahy did something with their movies and were a big part of why they were successful, here that just isn't the case.

But I will say this though, there are some parts of the film that work mainly to do with the opening scenes with the very biblical dialogue and the way the characters talk to each other, it's good stuff and there should have been more of it.

And so in closing, a boring fantasy film that is not worth anyone's time or money but also mentions two others that are, rent those instead, 1 out of 5.

Film Review - The Last Boy Scout (1991)

The Last Boy Scout stars Bruce Willis as Joe Hallenbeck, a former Secret Service agent turned Private Detective who ends up investigating the murder of an LA Stripper played by Halle Berry and who's partner is played by Damon Wayans, what the two will uncover is something much grubbier indeed.

Boy Scout is a real step down from Man from Hong Kong in terms of quality of entertainment, Willis though is on top form and delivers what I think is one of his best performances, the rest of the film however doesn't keep up with him, on the one hand it is one of the nastiest movies I've seen in a good long while with many scenes of coarse language, scenes of a young girl spewing F-Bombs and having guns flown in her face, women getting tortured and pumped full of bullets and so on, and I thought Robocop 2 was sadistic.

But not only is it nasty, the climax of the film is also extremely boring, where Willis and Wayans have to save the day, whoop de do, if you want to watch Bruce save the world or a whole bunch of people, go rent Die Hard and another thing, this movie was written by Shane Black, who wrote Lethal Weapon and is to direct the next Iron Man film, but whereas Lethal Weapon was directed by Richard Donner, this was directed by Tony Scott, a less than impressive action director at the best of times.

In short, a nasty and boring action film that is only slightly redeemed by Willis, but even he can't save this from the not recommended pile, 1 out of 5.

Film Review - The Sicilian (1987)

The Sicilian stars Christopher Lambert as Salvatore Guiliano who lives in Sicily and wants to buy land for the poor people there, but he will encounter significant resistance to do just that.

This movie quite frankly, is fucking terrible, first off it wastes a great cast with not only Lambert but also Terence Stamp, Joss Ackland, John Tuturro and Andreas Katsulas all of them are given nothing to do here at all, second the film lacks focus big time, there are some big ideas here but the way director Michael Cimino handles them is pathetic, everything crumbles to dust and the movie is far far too long, nearly 2 and a half hours, which is completely unacceptable given the film's enormous failings.

On the other hand the movie looks good with those dramatic shots of the mountains and it also has a good musical score but the movie lacks focus on a story level and it wastes a terrific cast so only a .5 out of 5.