Review #1,371: 'Mission: Impossible' (1996)

It's hard to believe that Brian De Palma's Mission: Impossible is now 22 years old. What's even harder to believe is the fact that this franchise is still going, and stronger than ever, with the sixth entry into the series, Mission: Impossible: Fallout, about to be released this very week. Despite some wobbles since, the series got off to a very strong start in the hands of De Palma who, while pissing off a few hardcore fans of the original television show with some bold character decisions, delivered a thriller that really set the heart racing. It's also aged incredibly well. While the gizmos now seem somewhat dated (the McGuffin is a floppy disk), there was always an old-fashioned broodiness about the film that has given it a timeless quality. Of course, it's all just an excuse to make Tom Cruise run, and run he certainly does.

Jim Phelps (Jon Voight) and his Impossible Mission Force (IMF) are on a mission in Prague to retrieve a list of secret agents' real identities. The mission goes awry, with most of the team (which also consists of Emmanuelle Beart, Kristin Scott Thomas and Emilio Estevez) winding up dead, leaving only Ethan Hunt (Cruise) to figure out what the hell just happened. With Hunt the only survivor, IMF director Kittridge (Henry Czerny) suspects him to be the mole within the agency he has been trying to smoke out for years. Hunt flees to try and uncover the mole himself, finding a lead in the mysterious Max, a contact the mole had been communicating with using passages from the Bible. Finding himself disavowed by the government and without a team to help him, Hunt starts recruiting, finding a brand new team in fellow disavowed agents Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames) and Franz Krieger (Jean Reno). Their first mission is to break into the CIA headquarters in Langley and steal back the list, in the hope of finding the rat and proving Hunt's innocence.

There are three key set-pieces in Mission: Impossible that perhaps no other director is better suited for. De Palma is the master of long, tension-building moments of suspense, and Hunt's infiltration of the CIA is an iconic moment for good reason. He must enter into a room from above, copy a file while dangling from a wire, and exit within a set time. Any noise above a certain decibel level will trigger an alarm and cause a total lockdown, as will any additional weight on the floor. Filmed in complete silence, it's a masterfully choreographed sequence. As a trickle of sweat makes its way to the rim of Hunt's glasses, you won't exhale until it's all over. De Palma is better known for leaning of Hitchcockian influences, but his approach here is more Jules Dassin. There are other exciting moments too, and thank God, as the plot is about as baffling as its lead stars affiliation with Scientology. The thrills also distract from some pacing issues, which normally arise when Hunt is left to mope around in a hotel room, and some revelations you can see coming from a mile off (the shifty, knife-wielding Frenchman is a baddie, really?). Mission: Impossible really only has its momentum, so it's best just to strap in and go with it.


Directed by: Brian De Palma
Starring: Tom Cruise, Jon Voight, Emmanuelle Béart, Henry Czerny, Jean Reno, Ving Rhames, Kristin Scott Thomas, Vanessa Redgrave
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,138: 'Independence Day' (1996)

What I remember about Roland Emmerich's Independence Day as I child is the cheesy one-liners, that Presidential speech that has everymen and war heroes alike puffing out their chest with patriotism, and a portrayal of a world where America acts as the sole voice of reason to a bunch of lesser powers who fully embrace their own stereotype. I always hated it, and could not fathom why the movie had gathered such a loyal army of fans throughout the years, even amongst critics. The film was, and still is, very much a modern-day blockbuster, but watching it again 15 or so years later, it now seems wonderfully old-fashioned.

Dismissing the more studious, and admittedly more intelligent, first contact movies of the 1970s as liberal wishful thinking, Independence Day harks back to the alien invasion pictures of the 50s, where a more us-against-them approach catered to the Cold War-influenced paranoia of the time, and squared-jawed heroes, loony scientists and military personnel alike put their heads together to defeat a force from outer space. Here, we get Will Smith as Captain Steven Hiller, a hotshot pilot who manages to capture one of the tentacled martians after a disastrous dogfight; Jeff Goldblum as David Levinson, a genius satellite technician who uncovers the aliens' plans; and Bill Pullman as President Thomas Whitmore, a young ex-pilot going through an image crisis.

The posters and trailers focused on the image of the giant alien ship looming over major American cities, and indeed the moments of catastrophic destruction (usually of famous landmarks) and giant energy beams still manage to amaze, with the special effects still holding up 20 years later. Yet the movie spends most of its time at ground level, and crams it with enough characters and side-stories to fill another 3 films. The three central, intertwining stories aside, we also have a sub-plots involving Hiller's wife Jasmine (Vivica A. Fox) encountering the wounded First Lady (Mary McDonnell), and a boozed-up crop duster played by Randy Quaid, whose claims of alien abduction have made him a laughing stock. Throw in Robert Loggia, Judd Hirsch, Harvey Fierstein and Brent Spiner, and there's enough going on to make your head spin.

Yet Independence Day manages to burst through the convolution by sheer force, delivering a story that is simplistic, ham-fisted and very stupid, but never unspectacular. The three leads help make their characters memorable and incredibly likeable with charisma alone, as the script never allows them to be anything more than an archetype. It's the very definition of big, dumb and fun, and was a bit of a game-changer in its day. Disaster movie audiences were no longer satisfied unless they witnessed carnage on a global level, and blockbusters today are still trying to replicate the success of 'ID4', including the director himself, who tried and failed on an astronomic level with the utterly atrocious 2012 (2009). I didn't see it coming, but my opinion of Independence Day has completely changed. Perhaps the movie's age gives it a nostalgic charm it never had before, so I'm hardly anticipating the sequel.


Directed by: Roland Emmerich
Starring: Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Mary McDonnell, Judd Hirsch, Robert Loggia, Randy Quaid, Vivica A. Fox, Brent Spiner
Country: USA

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,091: 'Basquiat' (1996)

Artist-turned-director Julian Schnabel's re-creation of the New York art scene of the early 1980's is captured with the authenticity of a photograph from the time come to life. If anybody should be familiar with the vibrant energy and atmosphere of this era, it would be Schnabel, as he brushed shoulders with the likes of Andy Warhol and the topic of his debut feature, Jean-Michel Basquiat, as a key contributor to the American 'Neo-Expressionism' movement himself. What the film fails to do however, is capture the driving force behind Basquiat's art and the demons that drove him to heroin, which is odd given that Schnabel - here thinly disguised as a character played by Gary Oldman - was close friends with Basquiat.

Born into a middle-class family in New York to parents of Haitian and Puerto Rican descent, we first meet a 20 year-old Basquiat, played by Jeffrey Wright, living in a cardboard box. Already a cult figure in the city thanks to his spray-painted poetry under the guise of 'SAMO', a chance encounter with Andy Warhol (David Bowie) and art dealer Bruno Bischofberger (Dennis Hopper) propels him to the front-and-centre of the art scene. Basquiat is charming and charismatic, but also detached and inwardly focused. While this may compliment his art, he remains a mystery to his girlfriend Gina (Claire Forlani) and becomes clinically depressed when an article dubs him Warhol's 'mascot'. Wright gets all the mannerisms and facial expressions spot on, but he also bring a deep soulfulness to what is a terrific, career-making performance.

Peppered with a massive supporting cast that also includes Benicio Del Toro, Michael Wincott, Parker Posey, Willem Dafoe, Christopher Walken, Tatum O'Neal and Courtney Love, Basquiat seems frequently distracted and never really goes deep enough to unravel the thought processes of the enigmatic artist. There are moments of undeniable beauty - Basquiat dreams of moving to Hawaii and imagines the New York skyline as a surfer catching a wave - and there is a building air of tragedy as he begins his inevitable decline into isolation and drug addiction, but the film follows the familiar biopic formula to a tee. See it for the wonderful sense of time and place, and a truly astonishing performance from Wright.


Directed by: Julian Schnabel
Starring: Jeffrey Wright, Michael Wincott, Benicio Del Toro, Claire Forlani, David Bowie, Dennis Hopper, Gary Oldman, Parker Posey, Christopher Walken, Willem Dafoe
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,044: 'Hellraiser IV: Bloodline' (1996)

The fourth instalment of the already-tired Hellraiser franchise signalled the last time that original creator Clive Barker would be involved, and also the final film of the series to be shown on the big screen, with the subsequent sequels heading straight to VHS or DVD. Doug Bradley, who at this point was the only surviving cast member from Barker's terrific 1987 original, described Hellraiser IV: Bloodline as the "shoot from Hell", and its troubled production saw director Kevin Yagher demand his name be removed from the credits, instead opting for the go-to pseudonym Alan Smithee. While things never looked good for the film, Part IV of Miramax's cult franchise isn't actually quite as bad as you would expect.

In 2127, engineer Dr. Paul Merchant (Bruce Ramsay) uses a robot to solve the Lament Configuration puzzle box on board space station The Minos. The opening of the box destroys the robot, and Merchant is taken in for questioning by a group of armed guards suspicious of his intentions. Whilst being interrogated by the groups leader, Rimmer (Christine Harnos), Merchant reveals that he is part of a cursed bloodline that stretches back to 18th-century France, where his ancestor, toy-maker Phillip L'Merchant (also Ramsay), builds the box for a rich aristocrat who desires to summon a slave-girl from Hell. While L'Merchant fails to prevent the demon Angelique (Valentina Vargas) arriving in our world, generations later New York architect John Merchant (Ramsay again) is haunted by visions of the box, building a skyscraper resembling the Lament Configuration.

After two sequels with little to recommend other than Kenneth Cranham's wonderfully over-the-top thesping, Bloodline at least attempts to inject a fresh take on the Hellraiser universe. The decision to portray the arrival of Hell on Earth over three vastly different time periods is an interesting one, even if it is somewhat clumsily handled and often poorly acted. Yet for the bulk of the film we are stuck in the less-interesting modern day, or 1996, and it is here that Bloodline suffers from formulaic storytelling. The introduction of the demon Angelique offers the chance for some twisted sexual tension between her and Pinhead (Bradley), yet this isn't explored enough, and ultimately fizzles out in favour of more time with the over-exposed, iconic Cenobite, whose role was significantly beefed up by the studio following Yagher's departure. It's certainly one of the best of the series' sequels, yet given how bad the movies that followed are, that's hardly saying much.


Directed by: Kevin Yagher
Starring: Bruce Ramsay, Valentina Vargas, Doug Bradley, Christine Harnos, Adam Scott
Country: USA

Rating: **

Tom Gillespie

Review #790: 'Trainspotting' (1996)

Has Britain ever produced a film so influential on pop culture? Whether it be the stylish posters, portraying it's various colourful characters in a manner of poses, decorated with that eye-catching use of orange and white, the use of title cards at the beginning of the film introducing us to the line-up of junkies, thugs and pushers who inhabit the film, or that memorable soundtrack, which tapped into the underground rave culture of the 1990's, Trainspotting was the most iconic film since 1994's Pulp Fiction. But, an alarming 18 years on, does Trainspotting still maintain it's raw power and grimy hipness? The answer is yes, with a touch of no.

Most of the controversy surrounding the film at the time was it's unflinching, and some would say glamorous, portrayal of heroin addiction. The opening 15 minutes is a relentless, highly energetic introduction to the Edinburgh drug scene, where addict Mark Renton (Ewan McGregor) informs us of the delights of heroin, a life choice for the characters in the film as opposed to the 2 point 4 children suburban life we're all meant to be striving for, where washing machines, dental insurance, and electric tin openers are necessities. Why does he prefer to spend time shooting drugs with a bunch of low-lives, sat in the squalor of a drug dealer's house? Who needs reasons when you've got heroin, Renton tells us.

But the style doesn't eclipse the substance. Director Danny Boyle, making his second film after the excellent Shallow Grave (1994), is wise enough to keep focus. Renton's life is fascinating and sometimes exciting to watch, but it doesn't make us want to move to a council estate in Edinburgh and spend time with these types of people. Renton's closest 'friends' include pimp Sick Boy (Jonny Lee Miller), an expert in James Bond trivia; the speed-addled Spud (Ewen Bremner); the clean-cut, weight-lifting Tommy (Kevin McKidd); and the sovereign-wearing, utterly terrifying psychopath Begbie (Robert Carlyle). And with heroin, comes destruction. Boyle shows us an overdose beautifully scored to Lou Reed's 'Beautiful Day', and a truly ugly cold turkey scene.

But the film has becomes a victim of it's own stylish choices. Back in 1996, Trainspotting felt fresh, exciting, and slightly dangerous, but it's been ripped-off so many times in such a lazy and poor fashion that it has become slightly dated. Just three years ago, another Irvine Welsh adaptation, Ecstacy, adopted the same poster layout as this. Don't get me wrong, Trainspotting is still an excellent film, it has just lost some of it's youthful vigour and confrontational attitude that served it so well almost two decades ago. McGregor is excellent: a charming, charismatic, yet often repulsive narrator akin to Malcolm McDowell's Alex DeLarge in A Clockwork Orange (1971), and his mug will no doubt decorate the walls of many a student house for years to come. Still one of the most important films to come out of Britain, just a slightly damaged one.


Directed by: Danny Boyle
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller, Kevin McKidd, Robert Carlyle, Kelly Macdonald, Peter Mullan
Country: UK

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #732: 'Fargo' (1996)

The Coen Brothers' screw with the audience from the get-go with their 1996 Best Picture nominee Fargo, widely considered their finest work amongst a filmography that can be compared to that of any of the greats. Claiming this to be based on a true story when it is in fact anything but, the Coen's cement Fargo's twisted and now highly recognisable quirkiness from the first second, only for us to transported into this strange and oddball world of funny accents, eternal snowfall, wood-chippers and kinda-funny-lookin' criminals. In fact, the movie is not even set in Fargo at all. We glimpse it briefly before moving onto Brainerd, Minnesota, where the tremors of a dangerous arrangement are played out with violence and greed.

Car salesman Jerry Lundegaard (William H. Macy), in a desperate attempt to make some quick cash to fund a real estate deal, hires two hitmen - Carl (Steve Buscemi) and Gaear (Peter Stormare) - to kidnap his wife and split the ransom money paid by her wealthy father Wade (Harve Presnell). With the deal arranged, Jerry makes a final plea to Wade for investment, only for Wade to accept. Jerry tries to call the kidnapping off, but it is too late, and soon enough Carl and Gaear are leaving a trail of murders behind them. With a triple shooting at Brainerd that leaves a state trooper dead, pregnant police chief Marge Gunderson (Frances McDormand) is called in to investigate the crime spree.

What the Coen's, cinematographer Roger Deakins and music scorer Carter Burwell created with Fargo is a film like no other, where a giant statue of a lumberjack carrying an axe looms over the film like some unconventional deity, and the characters are equally as mocked as they are warmly captured. With their small-town ways and strange, chirpy Swedish-American accents, not many of the characters in Fargo seem to notice the darkness that has crept into their town, and seem content with planning fishing trips, shuffling along the buffet table, or discussing the weather. The accent works like a character itself, a portal into these character's lives. You've most likely quoted "you betcha!" or "oh, geez," in homage at some point if you've seen this movie before.

Fargo also treads dangerously along the black comedy line, somehow making a man being blended through a wood-chipper hilarious and throwing us off course entirely with Marge's bizarre and uncomfortable catch-up drink with lonely friend-from-school Mike (Steve Park). But the Coen's have always done that, and probably never more successful than with this. The cruelty that the Coen's inflict on the rather loathsome characters seems somehow just, and offer a truly loveable character in Marge, one of the Coen's greatest creations, and wonderfully performed by the Oscar-winning McDormand. This is a masterpiece, a defining moment for Joel and Ethan Coen, who have created a haunting, strange, dark and very funny noir, and possibly the greatest film of the 1990's.


Directed by: Joel Coen
Starring: Frances McDormand, William H. Macy, Steve Buscemi, Harve Presnell, Peter Stormare
Country: USA/UK

Rating: *****

Tom Gillespie

Review #656: 'Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills' (1996)

With the recent release of the closing chapter to the trilogy, Paradise Lost: Purgatory (2011), and the Peter Jackson-funded West of Memphis (2012), it seemed a perfect time to re-visit the original HBO documentary that focused on the original trial of the accused now known as the West Memphis Three. Knowing now that they have only recently been released in 2011, the first thing that shocked me about the first film was realising it was made way back in 1996, and the trial was back in 1993. I was 8 in 1993, and I cannot imagine the torment that Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley, Jr. went through, spending almost twenty years in prison for a crime they did not commit. Paradise Lost is still as utterly sickening as it was when I first viewed it over five years ago.

The question here is not if these three were innocent of this hideous crime - you can make your own mind up about that - but it is how can three teenage boys be sentenced to life in prison (and the death penalty for Echols) with not a shred of evidence against them? The irony is that these murders were believed to be the work of satanic sacrifice, but the West Memphis Three were condemned to a modern day witch-hunt by ignorant townsfolk terrified of them because they wore black and refused to blend in with the dungaree-wearing hicks in their dirt-poor neighbourhood. It seemed like everyone was against them, eager to lay the blame on something they simply did not understand. Judge David Burnett highlighted the need for evidence of a motive, so the answer was to get 'expert' testimony from a man with a mail-order PhD in the occult. When his lack of qualifications is highlighted by the attorney representing Echols, this is dismissed without a second thought.

Film-makers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky were granted unlimited access to the entire trial, so as a documentary, it is incredibly detailed. After the uproar this film caused, this access was quickly denied for the sequel, no doubt they were terrified that more shameful misconduct would be unearthed. Interviewers are given by the parents of the accused and of the three murdered boys (Christopher Byers, Michael Moore and Stevie Branch), and their emotion is laid out raw. Special attention is given to John Mark Byers, stepfather to Christopher, who handed the film-makers a hunting knife stained with blood as a present, which was quickly handed over to the authorities. Byers is a strange and often terrifying character, pumping bullets into a target and stating his wishes that he could do the same to the three boys on trial. It is easy to find yourself thinking that he must be the real killer, but as the trilogy of films progress, I learned that appearances can be deceiving, and that I was guilty of the exact same thing that led to the imprisonment of the West Memphis Three.

This is powerful stuff, provoking more emotion than probably any other film I have ever seen. The atmosphere is extremely gloomy, right from the get-go when we see crime scene footage of the young boys hardened corpses lying naked in the woods. It certainly doesn't pull its punches, and Metallica's magnificent soundtrack, the first time they have ever allowed their music to be used in film, only adds to this. But ultimately, it's the story itself that proves to be the most powerful aspect. They were guilty from the moment they came to court - these sullen kids with their black clothes and long hair. Individuality doesn't go down well in the Bible Belt, it would seem. As each heavily flawed accusation flies at Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley, you must simply watch and grit your teeth. This is a truly terrifying story and also one full of tragedy, both for the young boys who were murdered and for the three that were the fall guys swept up by an almost neo-Nazi institution.


Directed by: Joe Berlinger, Bruce Sinofsky
Starring: Damien Wayne Echols, Jason Baldwin, Jessie Misskelley, John Mark Byers
Country: USA

Rating: *****

Tom Gillespie