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Following on from the success of three seasons of Underbelly in Australia, New Zealand follows suit with it’s own take on the events that had some impact on the story told in Underbelly Season 2. It’s the 1970′s and a young Kiwi entrepreneur figures out that there is money to be had selling drugs and gets together with some nasty people to take his operation to a global scale. It’s an eye opening story of the birth of the drug wars in New Zealand, and how unprepared the police were to deal with it.

Promoted as The real Mr Asia Story – a slight dig to Underbelly 2: The Mr Asia story – Underbelly NZ follows the same format as it’s Aussie cousins, that is a mix of history, nudity and violence. It has the same charm, lovable and despicable characters that the Aussie Underbelly’s had, but for some reason never seems to come off as good.

But don’t get me wrong, it’s a solid show and well worth watching, and to be honest, if you’ve never watched any of the Underbelly DVDs, then this would be the idea jumping off point.  Read the rest of this entry »

It’s incredible how the BBC constantly manages to produce documentary series’ that are not only interesting, but visually spectacular. In How Earth Made Us we follow geologist Professor Iain Stewart as he crosses the globe visiting exotic and virtually unknown locations to show us a major force in our history that is seldom taught or recognised. Split into five themed episodes; Water, Deep, Earth, Wind, Fire and Human Planet, Stewart uses he knowledge, charisma and locations to show us how these elements have been the biggest factor in how our planet, and our history, has changed since the advent of man.

You’ll witness geological phenomena that you never would have dreamed could exist, such as a crystal cave in Mexico, deep underground, where the crystals are so big, Stewart looks positively lilliputian.

Stewart will take you down claustrophobic well shafts to show you how water has dictated the rise and fall of civilizations, and you’ll crawl through soft sticky mud to reach caves lined with salt that have aided our consumption of oil.

But as spectacular as the natural forces are, the final episode, Human Planet warns us of our over assertion on this fragile planet. We have become the biggest force in planetary change that Earth has ever endured, and if we’re not careful, our future will be very dark indeed.  Read the rest of this entry »

I have seen the original Arthur, and I think I quite enjoyed it. It was, however, too long ago for me to actually remember much about the film. Lets just say that I have fond memories of it, so much so that when I discovered that a re-make was in the works and Russell Brand was taking the role of Arthur Bach, made famous by Dudley Moore, I let out an audible groan. What, I wondered in not-so-quiet exasperation, do people see in Russell Brand? Adding insult to injury was the inclusion of Jennifer Garner, whose only enjoyable role was in that old TV show Alias, although not having liked anything she’s been in since leaves me wondering if she was any good in that, or if it was just the creative juices of now urber-producer JJ Abrams that carried her poor performance.

Seeing as my memory of the original is misty at best, I won’t attempt a blow by blow run down of what is different, but suffice to say that the main concept is the same.

Billionaire heir Arthur Bach is a drunken playboy living in constant state of debauchery, indulging himself in alcohol fueled sexual adventures and embracing his childhood fantasies with fanboy fantasies along the lines of racing through the streets of Manhattan in the Batmobile wearing the Batsuit. In short he’s a 30 year old boy, who has a nanny to do everything for him, including cleaning up the mess he leaves in his wake, including half naked women.  Read the rest of this entry »

How do you save a city in only 8 minutes? You repeat them over and over again until you get what you need. That’s right, it’s Groundhog Day! Well, more like Groundhog 8 minutes really. One man’s journey into another man’s ‘consciousness’ spiralling him back onto himself, Duncan Jones’ thoroughly enjoyable second outing Source code stands as a unique film whilst exploring similar themes to the director’s critically lauded first feature Moon (2009). Like a mad chemist’s fusion of Groundhog Day and The Butterfly Effect,with a twist or five of 80s sci-fi television show Quantum Leap for good measure.

The city in need of saving is Chicago and Source Code’s Bill Murray figure is a more intense and less humorous Jake Gyllenhaal playing US army chopper pilot Cpt Colter Stevens. Cpt Stevens wakes on a Chicago bound train with no memory of how he got there or who he is with; his last memory is of flying a mission in Afghanistan. The mystery slowly begins to unravel both for us the viewer as it does for Cpt Stevens but I won’t spoil anything by giving more away.

Taking writer Ben’s Ripley’s not-nearly-as-smart-as-it-thinks-it-is script, Jones and co. turn out a film that is as tightly framed and put together as the plot is wound. Sure, the story twists and turns, like a twisty-turny thing, but it does so in a very knowing, nose tapping kind of way. However, with its incredibly limited grasp of the science it is purporting to frame its story upon (uncertainty principle, many-worlds interpretation etc), Source Code’s story/screenplay sometimes comes off as unjustifiably smug and self assured. Considering half of writer Ben Ripley’s (extremely limited) previous experience includes two of the latter Species sequels this is perhaps unsurprising (I know – there’s more than one?!) It is a credit to Jones and his team that they lift this middling script to an above average piece of cinema.  Read the rest of this entry »

Jason Statham has pretty much made a name for himself as an action star. After playing Bacon in Guy Ritchie’s Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, it took him about 4 years and a handful of films before The Transporter made him a household name. Since then he’s had a pretty stable reputation with only a couple of bad moves (Dungeon Siege & Crank: High Voltage), and even though his most recent films don’t seem to have made it to cinemas in New Zealand, Blitz is an enjoyable vehicle for Statham’s charm and fighting skills. Even better is that it’s based in his old stomping grounds, in London.

It’s a predictable story, Statham plays the role of Detective Sergeant Tom Brant, a British cop whose gone a wee bit rogue, getting in trouble for beating up suspects rather than arresting him. Seems like he would rather dispense old school justice and not have to worry about the paperwork.

His approach comes in handy however when a serial killer starts targeting cops in his own precinct, though he has to team up with Porter Nash who gets brought in the head up the investigation, a role that should have gone to Brant.

As predictable as it is, Blitz has a few pleasing twists and the story keeps moving at a reasonable clip with some nice action pieces and a scene that will make you never want to use a hammer ever again.  Read the rest of this entry »

It’s a dangerous game we play when we decide to watch a film based on the fact that it was directed by the same director who directed one of you favourite films. I’ve been stung by similar promises in the past and all it ends up proving is that it takes more than just one person to make a great film.

But essentially this was the sole reason I decided to give Fair Game a go. It wasn’t convinced that the pairing of Naomi Watts and Sean Penn would amount to much, and the film’s tag line, “Wife. Mother. Spy.” didn’t exactly scream “you must watch this film.”

So it was down to the fact that Bourne director Doug Liman was directing that I sat down recently and watched the true story of a covert CIA operative getting burnt by her own government as payback for her husband’s anti-wat stance.

The story is based on true events, and is a very believable story, even though it’s hard to prove with various people claiming different parts to be true or misleading. The important thing is that it’s a film that makes the whole affair believable, and in a riveting, must watch kind of way.

Naomi Watts and Sean Penn are, despite my concerns, perfectly cast in this tale of a couple pushed past the point of breaking. Watts plays the role of the tow the line, patriotic CIA employee, whilst Penn plays the polar opposite, we’ll fight for the truth no matter what type guy.  Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve heard a little about the Nanking massacre, and how foreigners set up a safty zone to help save the local Chinese population from the Japanese army, but I’d never heard about John Rabe or how a devote Nazi stood up and used his connections to try and save as many innocent Chinese civilians as he could.

Thanks to how history is taught, and to the many Hollywood films that are around, we tend to only think of Nazi’s as evil people. We never really stop and wonder if there was ever anyone who could be considered a good Nazi.

John Rabe has – and rightly so – been called the Schindler of the East. Both were German industrialists, both found their way to greatness quite by accident, and possibly only because of their concern for the future of their business. But once thrust into the situation, they both seemed to embrace it with open arms.

Rabe was working for Siemens in China, when in 1937 he is about to hand over management to new manager and fly back to Berlin for what he thinks is a promotion. He soon discovers however that the plant he has worked 30 years to build is to be decommissioned as his return to Berlin will not be for a promotion. It seems that Hitler has different plans for China.  Read the rest of this entry »

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Welcome back Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson to the genre you were made for. Enough of the kiddie comedies, action is where you belong. Especially the kind of action you get in Faster, a stripped down action/revenge film that sees The Rock play a bad guy with honorable if somewhat misguided intentions.

The back story sees The Rock play the role of the un-named ‘driver’ helping his brother out on a bank job. Driver’s skills behind the wheel are legendary and together he and his brothers crew pull off the bank heist.

But then another crew tracks them down and one by ones kills them, until Driver caves and tells them where the money is, resulting in his brother having his throat slit and Driver being shot in the back of the head and left for dead.

Ten years later and Dirver is all grown up, and walking out of a long stretch inside with only one thing on his mind: Revenge. He’s a one man killing machine who just won’t stop.

Faster doesn’t waste any time with cheesy dialogue, it’s bare bones action, with some pretty brutal scenes. It gets it’s hard edges softened though, buy the inclusion of the character named Killer, who is a wealthy dot.com kid who likes to live on the edge, and has made himself into a killer for hire. A shadowy figure employs him to take out Driver before Driver dispatches his final victim. Read the rest of this entry »

Danish TV show The Protectors follows the lives of new recruits and established members of the Personal Protection Unit, a specilaised branch of the Danish Intelligence Bureau established to be a force of competent, quick thinking bodyguards available to protect politicians, visiting heads of state and various VIPs.

Obviously this is a TV show with subtitles being that it’s Danish, but don’t let this get in the way of a good solid drama, because as anyone who has enjoyed a good foreign film will tell you, after a while you don’t notice the subtitles, your brain just subconsciously reads them for you.

Far from the glitz and glam of the current glut of American TV crime shows, CSI, SCU and various other letter combinations, The Protectors is not an over hyped, adrenaline over dosing, frenetic mix of the bold and the beautiful and fast paced case solving. It’s more down to earth. The characters have their flaws, and some of them look a little weird, one even looks like a serial killer.  Read the rest of this entry »