Film Guide

It’s been a while since I sat down and watched some Ice Road Truckers – the last I saw of these crazy truck drivers who work on the edge of the word was in the spin off series Deadliest Roads.

Things have changed from the original Ice Road Truckers, where winter roads were carved out on the ice across oceans and lakes, and the real danger was breaking through to an icy watery death. This time the truck drivers haul equipment and supplies to miners in the Canadian tundra in the dead of winter on a 350-mile snow and ice covered highway.

Most of the team from Deadliest Roads are back, along with a couple of rookies and a ten year veteran of the Dalton Highway, and the name of the game, as always, is to see who can deliver the most loads during the time frame that the road will be open.

The main danger this time is loosing control and rolling your truck, especially dangerous if you’re carrying jet fuel, and we get to see some close calls and a couple of drivers manager to put their trucks off the road and require towing out.  Read the rest of this entry »

The Shadow Line kicks off with the discovery of Harvey Wratten’s blood soaked body in the back seat of a car on a dark abandoned lot. Of the two cops who find it, one tries to tell the other it’s a robbery gone wrong. The other cop however, is closer to the truth in arguing that it’s a gangland execution.

What ever it is, we’re not going to find out for another seven hours. And to be honest, after the first hour, I’m not sure I can be bothered with watching another six episodes. The Shadow Line just hasn’t grabbed me.

Fortunately I decided to stick with it, and somewhere during the second episode, Hugo Blick’s dark, twisted drama grabs me and won’t let go. Written, produced and directed by Hugo, The Shadow Line starts off as a simple police drama, with a stella cast, but turns into a tour-de-force of British TV drama with many threads of different stories intersecting and combining to cumulate in one of the most unexpected endings you experience in any TV drama.

The murder at the beginning turns out to be a lot bigger than you think, and opens up a hornets nest of trouble, and introduces a variety of key players, each of whom seem to have their own interests in how things turn out.

Good cop with a shadowy past, DCI Jonah Gabriel (Chiwetel Ejiofor) seems to only want to uncover the truth, the dead mans business associate Joseph Bede (Christopher Eccleston) only wants to finish the deal and get out of the business, whilst the dead man’s psychotic nephew Jay Wratten (Rafe Spall) wants amongst other things, revenge. And then there is the puppet master, known as Gatehouse (Stephen Rea) who just seems to like being in control.  Read the rest of this entry »

With The Third Reich, the History Channel takes us on a unique and disturbing look at the rise and fall of Hitler’s Germany. Unique as it takes a look at it from a mostly German perspective. Don’t worry though, this isn’t a piece of pro-Nazi propaganda, it’s just a well made documentary that takes you inside the mindset of the German people during the rise (disc one) and fall (disc two) of The Third Reich.

Each disc begins with the cliched warning “Much of what you are about to see and here is graphic in nature, and may be disturbing to sensitive viewers,” and whilst there is some very graphic scenes, the warning I think goes beyond just the visual, because as you will soon learn from disc one, the German people didn’t elect an evil dictator, they voted for a saviour, a man who could pull Germany out the the mire and shame of the defeat they endured after World War 1. A man who would make Germans proud to be German again.

It’s akin to watching a train wreak, you can sees what’s going to happen, but you can’t do a thing to stop it. Through the build up of Hitler’s rise it’s easy to see why people liked him, and you do wonder what you would have done if you were in their place, with no foresight of what would happen. It’s scary to contemplate just how easily we can be swayed by a charismatic leader, and never know just how the truism “Power corrupts” will work itself out.

Disk two deals then with the downfall of Nazi Germany and the consequences the German people suffered for the actions of their government, and they on compliance. The scary thing is that the rebuilding of Germany wasn’t completed until the 1980s. Then of course there is the fact that the German people will never escape the dark shadow that blots their history.  Read the rest of this entry »

Nikita is a TV show that is based on a French film of the same name, a French film that has already had an american re-make and a canadian TV show based on it. So it’s easy to assume that Nikita isn’t exactly going to be an original idea. Not that that matters, because as far as I can remember, the American film version was fun, and with McG being executive producer (which he was for CHuck and Human Target as well) you can almost guarantee that Nikita will have enough fun, action, style and twists to put a smile on your face and keep you coming back for more.

And it does.

But it’s more than just a good TV show, it’s a great TV show. Sure it’s pretty much fluff, but it’s entertaining fluff. It’s fun to watch fluff, and because of the uncertainty of TV shows these days, it feels like McG and Craig Silverstein decided to go hell for leather and fit as much as they could in the first season, in case it was there only shot.

I doing so they have created a show that never slows down, that has more twists that a family bag of Twisties and still manages to throw in a season ending cliffhanger.

Without giving anything away, the show essentially has what could have been a two season story arc, where we see one of the main players move from one distinct situation to another. It’s things like this that keep the how fresh all season long.  Read the rest of this entry »

The History Channel takes an in depth look at American street gangs, exploring gang communities, gang rivalries as well as gangs based upon racism. Or so the DVD claims, and based on the quality of other History Channel DVDs I’ve seen, I was expecting a well rounded, well produced and informative DVD. The fact that it was season 6 should have meant that it had some legs and was popular, on the flip side it doesn’t reflect well on America that something like this could be in it’s sixth season.

Sadly however, Gangland: Season 6 just doesn’t deliver. Possibly seasons 1 through 5 didn’t either. Gangland is a brilliant example of American TV at it’s worse. The kind of show that shows you what it’s about to show you, then shows you and then tells you what it just showed you, resulting in 20 minutes of program being delivered over a 60 minute period. THis in itself is bad enough, but then Gangland uses ex-gang members and ex-undercover cops to tell the story. Imagine being a member of a notorious gang that executes snitches, but there you are, on camera telling the gangs deepest, darkest secrets, claiming that you’re not worried about retribution. Something just doesn’t sit right. Add to that the way the lines are delivered, the cheesiness of them, and you just can;t get past thinking these guys are actors pretending to be ex this and ex that.  Read the rest of this entry »

Guy Ritchie’s 2009 re-invention of Sherlock Holmes was an okay film, mainly because of the two lead roles were supremely cast. It was the combination of Robert Downey Jr. as Sherlock Holmes and Jude Law as Dr. John Watson along with Ritchie’s developing Holmes’ character into more of a brawler that may have been traditionally perceived that made the film enjoyable for me. The story itself was somewhat ho-hum.

Jump forward a few years and Ritchie has bought back his winning combination for the sequel A Game of Shadows (which I keep wanting to call A Game of Thrones) and in doing so manages to intensify the action and the brilliant chemistry between Holmes and Watson to the point that you feel that it must have been a blast for Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law to film this new chapter.

The plot is somewhat complex and at times becomes a bit much, but the action is relentless and Ritchie manages to firmly plant a smile on your face for most of the film’s duration, be it through the sheer audacity of Holmes’ behaviour, or the stunning set pieces or the running humour.  Read the rest of this entry »

For the uninitiated, Being Human is a dark BBC comedy about three flat-mates, living a less than normal existence. One of them is a vampire, one a werewolf and one a ghost. In the second season the werewolf accidentally turned his girlfriend who then became a permanent member of the flat. Whilst it was enjoyable to have the show extended into a second season, the sophomore effort was marred by the reliance on a religious bad guy who seemed to suck the life from the show, however, it did end on a bit of a cliffhanger, which is resolved nicely in the beginning of Season 3.

This third season gets back on track, with the main focus being on the eternal vampire vs werewolf battle, and the flat-mates having to relocate to Wales due to vampire Mitchell’s late night snack on a commuter train. With the police hunting for Mitchell, and Mitchell keeping tight lipped about his involvement to his flat-mates, it’s a set up for a game changing confrontation, especially now that there’s a bit of a thing going on between Mitchell and sexy apparition Annie.

The high-point however for this darkest season of Being Human is the guest appearance of Robson Green, playing a very aggressive role as a vampire hunting werewolf, It’s a far cry from anything Green has done prior, but he seems to really enjoy the role and adds an extra element to the show.  Read the rest of this entry »

Sometimes when choosing DVDs to review I pick something that I think my wife will enjoy, because, you know, happy wife equals happy life and all that. One such DVD was Storage Wars. It’s not something I’d normally go for but sounded interesting enough, and I knew my wife would love it. What I didn’t realise was that rather than myself finding it just interesting enough, is that I would instantly enjoy Storage Wars as one of the most instantly entertaining and enjoyable reality TV shows that I’ve sen in a while.

The premise of the show is simple enough: When rent is not paid on a storage locker for three months in California, the contents are sold by an auctioneer as a single lot of items. The show follows professional buyers who purchase the contents based only on a five-minute inspection of what they can see from the door when it is opened. The goal is to turn a profit on the merchandise.

Whilst turning profit is the main motivating factor, the real action for Storage Wars is when real hidden treasure is discovered and a $200 bid becomes a $20,000 find.

Of course, it wouldn’t be reality TV if you didn’t have a groups of diverse contestants. And whilst the term contestants might be stretching it a bit as three of the four teams run various types of second hand reselling businesses, and the other contestant sells antiques, so in essence they are only doing their jobs.

But diverse they are. You have Darrell Sheets and his son, nicknamed the gambler, but essentially the most down to earth guy on the show, who doesn’t actually have a shop, but on-sells his gear some other way. Dave Hester is essentially the mean guy. And by mean, I mean petty and mean. He is the most despicable man on reality TV. You will instantly hate him. Jarrod Schulz and his partner Brandi Passante are the newbies to the whole storage auction thing, and by being married and business partners, help bring a little extra tension to the show. Initially this odd couple are the ones you’ll be rooting for, but later in the show, a subtle arrogance sneaks in. Finally there is Barry Weiss. Weiss is an antiques dealer who reminds me of Hugh Hefner and is essentially only on the show for the novelty factor, he always seems to luck out, but is always happy, and really upsets Dave by bringing clairvoyants to one auction, and that if nothing else, gets my seal of approval.  Read the rest of this entry »

I may be the only person I know who actually likes David Caruso in his role as Horatio Caine. It’s his gentle, calm and understanding nature that I love. His character is a role model to how we should approach life. It’s been too long since I last watched CSI: Miami, and whilst I enjoyed getting to know Horatio all over again, the rest of the show was somewhat lacking.

You’d have thought that a show that ran to ten seasons would be pretty awesome, but when you look at the stats, you see that the ratings really started to drop off with Season 8.

Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed watching Season 8, but mostly for Horatio. It seemed like he was the only one who still gave a dam, as the other actors really seemed to be just going through the motions, doing just enough to collect a paycheck.

The series as a whole feels more like a technology dependent police drama stuck inside a music video with acting that would make Days of Our Lives look impressive.  Read the rest of this entry »

I like Nigel Latta and have immensely enjoyed his previous Politically Incorrect DVDs, dealing with kids and teens. This time however Latta delves into the complexities of being a grown up, with such things as careers, money, growing old and bad haircuts. The show as a whole stays lively with a combination of that old Latta humour and funny skits and animations. Unfortunately however, some of the episodes just seem to fall flat, and the series seems to struggle to justify it’s existence from time to time.

The big disappointment however is that this ISN’T a ‘Politically Incorrect Guide.’ Rather it’s blatantly Politically Correct. There is nothing here that is likely to offend anyone, and Latta pretty much does nothing but point out the obvious whilst doing a Mr Bean routine.

If you’re a Nigel Latta fan you’re going to enjoy the DVD, you just won’t be blown away by it, you won’t be rolling on the floor in fits of laughter, and you probably won’t learn anything new from it.  Read the rest of this entry »