Movie: The Immitation Game

This is easily the best movie I've seen so far this year.

I know it's only January, but I stand by that statement. Even going back twelve months, it's still the second best movie, sitting just behind Guardians Of The Galaxy.

This is a great movie to watch, and I want to emphasize the term "Movie", as opposed to a historically accurate documentary, because, as a movie, it is essentially a fairy story based on some real life events that happened at some point in time. I've read the criticism about the historical inaccuracies of this film, but a cinematic film has to take a specific form in order to work as a two piece of storytelling. Therefore, it's impossible to fit everything and everybody in. If you did, you would end up with something totally incomprehensible and unwatchable. Events (and people too) have to be compressed, or even invented in order to drive the narrative towards a conclusion two hours later. I fully understand that people were offended by some of the things in this movie, but for me, it inspired me to do some research and discover the real truth for myself (the Internet is very good at allowing you you to do that).

This movie has three things that I have a big interest in: Computing history, Cryptography, and Britain in World War II, particularly the Battle Of Britain period. Therefore this movie hits the right notes for me. The movie looks fantastic.

The story line switches frequently between three time periods, but it is done so cleverly that you are never left confused about just where you are. The bulk of the story takes place during the second world war.

The acting in this film is the highlight, Benedict Cumberbatch, who happens to be my favourite actor at the moment (primarily because of Sherlock and Star Trek), and Mark Strong gives a suitable mysterious performance as the MI6 guy. The actor playing a young Alan Turing, Alex Lawther, did a pretty good job as well.


Turing's code breaking machine, the Bombe (strangely named Christopher in the movie):

My conclusion: Great movie, not entirely accurate, but close enough to give a a real feel for the character of Alan Turing.

I'm off the read Andrew Hodge's book now...

My Mothers 90th Birthday

Standing guard...

The fun begins...

Movie: Exodus 3D

Spectacular visuals, but lots of dull bits as well.

I'm not religious at all, so I was hoping that, although this is a bible story and subject to debate, there was not going to be much in the way of the presence of god. Fortunately it was fine. God is mentioned, but fairly briefly. God makes an appearance as a small child, but it is left up to the viewer to determine if the child is literally god, or just a figment of Moses's imagination after being hit on the head by a large rock.

The ending was a bit anti-climactic. Moses drives into the village with the ten commandments in the back of his wagon. Fade to black, credits. Mind you, we were just subjected to a fantastic rendition of the parting of the Red sea. That sequence alone was worth watching the whole movie for. And you really need to see it on the big screen in 3D. It would be completely diminished on a TV, no matter how big it is.

Good to see a couple of Aussie boys in important roles. Joel Edgerton plays Rameses, and Ben Mendelsohn plays the weaselly viceroy.

Movie: Fury

This movie, I am happy to say, is just a good old fashioned WWII war movie, but made with the advantages of modern technology.

The casting of this movie is what makes the whole thing work. You have Brad Pitt, who just gets better as he gets older, as the leader who is most at home in his tank. Then you have Shia LeBeouf, who does his best work ever with this role. I just wish he gets himself sorted out because he is clearly a very talented actor. Then there is Michael Pena, who comes across as a very likeable guy, and Jon Bernthal, who somehow manages to come across as both likeable and unlikeable at the same time.

And finally last , but certainly not least the is Logan Lerman, who plays the new guy, the guy straight off the boat and completely clueless about what he is going to soon face up to. I was sitting there, thinking "where have I seen this guy before?", and of course, with the later help of IMDB, I now know he was in Noah, and he was in the Percy Jackson movies. I just couldn't put my finger on it.

But all together, this cast is just a magic mix.

The stellar cast of Fury: Shia LeBeouf, Logan Lerman, Brad Pitt, Michael Pena and Jon Bernthal, with their Director, David Ayer.

One more thing. I'm a big fan of 3D, and there is no doubt that certain scenes in this movie would have looked fantastic in 3D, but I'm glad that is movie is not in 3D  given the subject matter. I think it would have been more of a distraction than anything else.

However, this is a great movie. I'm very tempted to go see it again next week.

Movie: Stephen Fry

I went to see Stephen Fry  at my local cinema. He wasn't there in person of course. He was in England and he was beamed in. He put on a one-off show to promote his new book, "More Fool Me", another volume of his growing autobiography collection. You can get it from here, and other places no doubt: http://www.stephenfry.com/store/

Stephen Fry is a great entertainer. His words are witty, interesting and well constructed. And he knows about Perth, Western Australia, where I live.

He started off the show talking about the countries where he was being broadcast in cinemas, hence the mention of Perth.

He read a chapter from his book, concerning a visit to his place by Lady Diana and Prince Charles. It went on for a while, but every sentence was so well constructed that I was carried along.

But alas, before I knew it, it was over. I was having such a good time that I was disappointed when it was over. I just wanted him to go on for just a little bit longer.

Please Sir, can I hear just one more chapter?....

Movie: 3D Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

This movie is just plain fun. It makes no attempt at any type of intellectual comment on the world at all.

This is the type of movie that 3D is particularly suited to. There is one scene in which the turtles are careening down a mountain side which just wouldn't look good in plain old 3D.

The movie is yet another reboot of the turtle origin story. Fortunately, the turtles do NOT come from outer space, which was one of the early ideas for the film. In fact, they weren't going to be teenagers either. The film was going to be called just Ninja Turtles, and some people speculated that the turtles would be middle aged aliens! Fortunately, good sense kicked in along the line and that idea was dropped. Now, I'm all for letting film makers experiment with the source material, but in this case, a teenage mutant ninja turtle will always bee a teenage mutant ninja turtle

One change I did find fresh was the way that April O'Neil was tied closer to the origin of the turtles. I thought was a nice addition to the existing story.

By my count, this is the third reboot of the turtle story. I quite liked the energy of the first one. the second one, the CGI TMNT was ok, but not outstanding, and this one is just different enough to make it enjoyable

Movie: 3D Sin City - A Dame To Kill For

It's hard to believe that the first Sin City movie was 9 years ago. I can't believe there haven't been many more movies made with the unique visual style of Sin City. I would love to see a superhero movie made with in this very unique and original style.

For those who aren't familiar with this style of movie, it's literally a comic book made with real people. It's very dark, it's mainly black and white, but there are splashes of colour. It reminds me a little of the Humphrey Bogart detective movies of the forties and fifties, but everything is hyper-real.

This film is visually stunning. It's also horrendously violent. People lose body parts on a regular basis throughout the film. The spurting blood however is white, not red.

The plot is fantastic. There are a number of sub-plots, which are mostly connected up by the end, but there is still enough mystery to open up the possibility of a third installment.

The casting is brilliant. Nearly all of the main characters are back, and there are quite a few little cameos throughout the film. Try spotting Stacy Keach. Powers Booth is just superb as a crooked senator, but Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Josh Brolin are brilliant as well. They are not playing real people in this movie. All of the characters are hyper real. Mickey Rourke returns as Marv, this time more as a good guy. This is a role he seems to have been born to play, to use an old cliche.

I know it doesn't really mean much, but the box office of this movie doesn't look to good. According to box office mojo, this move has made only 27 million on a budget that I suspect is quite substantial, where as the first Sin City movie made 150 million on a 40 million budget. I just hope that this doesn't mean an end to this style of film making. Do we really need a 19th reboot of Batman?....