If you die down there, you're welcome to share my toilet.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

(2002)

(SPOILERS) More of the same really, continuing Chris Columbus’ unswerving mode of following Steve Kloves’ sticking like glue to JK Rowling’s early structural template. Another mystery on the Hogwarts premises (you’d have thought the teachers would try to keep the kids clear of mortal peril until they’d at least graduated) that inevitably ties in to Voldermort. It’s marginally more honed this time, though, which means that when Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets – even the title is eminently resistible – finally knuckles down, it flows better. Unfortunately, it also has several major red flags to contend with.

Dobby. Sure, he’s supposed to be annoying, I know. Gollum by way of Jar Jar Binks. But did he have to be so wretchedly designed (not remedied by house elves of later instalments)? Some of the CG in this film is pretty good (the Basilisk, for one, and the flying car for another), but Dobby is never more than Smeagol-lite in attributes. Toby Jones voices him with duly pathetic dedication, but a fitting end would have been to have the elf’s head shoved in a blender, rather than being granted release from service to Lucius Malfoy.

It’s also a considerable problem how unwarrantedly long this movie is. Does it need to be pushing towards three hours, particularly when you could happily lose most of the first 40 minutes and barely notice? Doubtless Harry will be redone as a Netflix TV show at some point and at such a time this will seem positively spry, but as it is, the only verdict can be guilty as charged of indulgence in the first degree.

Exhibit C is Gilderoy Lockhart, the Frank Spencer of the wizarding world. It’s a decent performance from Sir Ken, much breezier and possessed of a light comedy touch than his recent Poirot, but the character beggars belief. Are we really to believe that a narcissist celebrity wizard is venerated by other wizards despite being patently inept at every turn? Why does he continually volunteer to perform spells in front of his peers if he knows he’s terrible at them? JK must have at least considered this point, as at one point Gilderoy imparts that the only thing he is (conveniently) any cop at is memory charms (by means of which he stole credit for others’ achievements). Unless he was intending to perform one on the entirety of Hogwarts, though, it doesn’t really wash.

Countering that are several sterling additions, though. Jason Isaacs is magnificently composed in his malevolence as Lucius, and there’s an enjoyable scene (relatively) early on where he and Mark Williams’ Arthur Weasely cross paths. Very different characters and performers, but it’s a treat to see them bring that into play (likewise, it would have been nice to see more between Lockhart and Snape, so evident is the latter’s disdain for the former).

Shirley Henderson’s Moaning Myrtle is also memorable. Nice to see Robert Hardy as the Minister for Magic too, who instantly seems like he’s always been there. I have to say, however, I find Robbie Coltrane’s “ever so ‘umble” giant-of-the-people serf irritating for the assumption we’re supposed to love him. That’s the class system for you.

As with its predecessor, elements of the novel’s plot are rather lost in translation. The gist of the opening of the Chamber of Secrets is explanatory enough, and the reveal regarding Tom Riddle is reasonably sound; that, through the awesome power of anagrams, he’s a younger version of Voldermort attempting to manifest. But it entirely escaped me that Lucius (at least in the books) didn’t realise the diary’s properties when he stowed it in Ginny Weasely’s cauldron (apparently to rid himself of an incriminating dark object and bring Arthur into disrepute – which all seems bit thin). Perhaps Voldermort should have been a touch clearer in his instructions.

By and large, Chamber of Secrets is amiable but very forgettable; it’s never a good sign when the most annoying elements (Dobby, Gilderoy) are the ones that stick in the mind. There is, fair’s fair, an amusing sequence in which Harry and Ron transform themselves into Slytherin boys in order to find out what Draco knows, but there’s also another of those quidditch games to get confused by. And Rupert Grint’s still streets ahead of the other juniors performance-wise at this stage, with Emma Watson’s rather over-emphatic delivery leaving her trailing a distant third.

So Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets was Columbus’ last real involvement with the series (he retained a nominal producer credit); after this, the results would be universally more engaging and less sugar-coated (Columbus would try his hand at Young Adult again with Percy Jackson, but his directing career has been noticeably subdued since). Also Richard Harris’ final appearance as Dumbledore, sadly. The first two entries are much as I remembered them, undemanding, overly beholden adaptations that give non-fans little reason to invest themselves in the material. Fortunately, that would change in one fell swoop.

Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.

I’m smarter than a beaver.

Prey (2022) (SPOILERS) If nothing else, I have to respect Dan Trachtenberg’s cynical pragmatism. How do I not only get a project off the ground, but fast-tracked as well? I know, a woke Predator movie! Woke Disney won’t be able to resist! And so, it comes to pass. Luckily for Prey , it gets to bypass cinemas and so the same sorry fate of Lightyear . Less fortunately, it’s a patience-testing snook cocking at historicity (or at least, assumed historicity), in which a young, pint-sized Comanche girl who wishes to hunt and fish – and doubtless shoot to boot – with the big boys gets to take on a Predator and make mincemeat of him. Well, of course , she does. She’s a girl, innit?

This entire edifice you see around you, built on jute.

Jeeves and Wooster 3.3: Cyril and the Broadway Musical (aka Introduction on Broadway) Well, that’s a relief. After a couple of middling episodes, the third season bounces right back, and that's despite Bertie continuing his transatlantic trip. Clive Exton once again plunders Carry On, Jeeves but this time blends it with a tale from The Inimitable Jeeves for the brightest spots, as Cyril Basington-Basington (a sublimely drippy Nicholas Hewetson) pursues his stage career against Aunt Agatha's wishes.

Just because you are a character doesn't mean that you have character.

Pulp Fiction (1994) (SPOILERS) From a UK perspective, Pulp Fiction ’s success seemed like a fait accompli; Reservoir Dogs had gone beyond the mere cult item it was Stateside and impacted mainstream culture itself (hard to believe now that it was once banned on home video); it was a case of Tarantino filling a gap in the market no one knew was there until he drew attention to it (and which quickly became over-saturated with pale imitators subsequently). Where his debut was a grower, Pulp Fiction hit the ground running, an instant critical and commercial success (it won the Palme d’Or four months before its release), only made cooler by being robbed of the Best Picture Oscar by Forrest Gump . And unlike some famously-cited should-have-beens, Tarantino’s masterpiece really did deserve it.

I think it’s pretty clear whose side the Lord’s on, Barrington.

Monte Carlo or Bust aka Those Daring Young Men in Their Jaunty Jalopies (1969) (SPOILERS) Ken Annakin’s semi-sequel to Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines tends to be rather maligned, usually compared negatively to its more famous predecessor. Which makes me rather wonder if those expressing said opinion have ever taken the time to scrutinise them side by side. Or watch them back to back (which would be more sensible). Because Monte Carlo or Bust is by far the superior movie. Indeed, for all its imperfections and foibles (not least a performance from Tony Curtis requiring a taste for comic ham), I adore it. It’s probably the best wacky race movie there is, simply because each set of competitors, shamelessly exemplifying a different national stereotype (albeit there are two pairs of Brits, and a damsel in distress), are vibrant and cartoonish in the best sense. Albeit, it has to be admitted that, as far as said stereotypes go, Annakin’s home side win

Poetry in translation is like taking a shower with a raincoat on.

Paterson (2016) (SPOILERS) Spoiling a movie where nothing much happens is difficult, but I tend to put the tag on in a cautionary sense much of the time. Paterson is Jim Jarmusch at his most inert and ambient but also his most rewardingly meditative. Paterson (Adam Driver), a bus driver and modest poet living in Paterson, New Jersey, is a stoic in a fundamental sense, and if he has a character arc of any description, which he doesn’t really, it’s the realisation that is what he is. Jarmusch’s picture is absent major conflict or drama; the most significant episodes feature Paterson’s bus breaking down, the English bull terrier Marvin – whom Paterson doesn’t care for but girlfriend Laura (Golshifteh Farahani) dotes on – destroying his book of poetry, and an altercation at the local bar involving a gun that turns out to be a water pistol. And Paterson takes it all in his stride, genial to the last, even the ruination of his most earnest, devoted work (the only disappoint

Death to Bill and Ted!

Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey (1991) (SPOILERS) The game of how few sequels are actually better than the original is so well worn, it was old when Scream 2 made a major meta thing out of it (and it wasn’t). Bill & Ted Go to Hell , as Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey was originally called, is one such, not that Excellent Adventure is anything to be sneezed at, but this one’s more confident, even more playful, more assured and more smartly stupid. And in Peter Hewitt it has a director with a much more overt and fittingly cartoonish style than the amiably pedestrian Stephen Herrick. Evil Bill : First, we totally kill Bill and Ted. Evil Ted : Then we take over their lives. My recollection of the picture’s general consensus was that it surpassed the sleeper hit original, but Rotten Tomatoes’ review aggregator suggests a less universal response. And, while it didn’t rock any oceans at the box office, Bogus Journey and Point Break did quite nicely for Keanu Reev

I’m the famous comedian, Arnold Braunschweiger.

Last Action Hero (1993) (SPOILERS) Make no mistake, Last Action Hero is a mess. But even as a mess, it might be more interesting than any other movie Arnie made during that decade, perhaps even in his entire career. Hellzapoppin’ (after the 1941 picture, itself based on a Broadway revue) has virtually become an adjective to describe films that comment upon their own artifice, break the fourth wall, and generally disrespect the convention of suspending disbelief in the fictions we see parading across the screen. It was fairly audacious, some would say foolish, of Arnie to attempt something of that nature at this point in his career, which was at its peak, rather than playing it safe. That he stumbled profoundly, emphatically so since he went up against the behemoth that is Jurassic Park (slotted in after the fact to open first), should not blind one to the considerable merits of his ultimate, and final, really, attempt to experiment with the limits of his screen persona.

If you ride like lightning, you're going to crash like thunder.

The Place Beyond the Pines (2012) (SPOILERS) There’s something daringly perverse about the attempt to weave a serious-minded, generation-spanning saga from the hare-brained premise of The Place Beyond the Pines . When he learns he is a daddy, a fairground stunt biker turns bank robber in order to provide for his family. It’s the kind of “only-in-Hollywood” fantasy premise you might expect from a system that unleashed Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man and Point Break on the world. But this is an indie-minded movie from the director of the acclaimed Blue Valentine ; it demands respect and earnest appraisal. Unfortunately it never recovers from the abject silliness of the set-up. The picture is littered with piecemeal characters and scenarios. There’s a hope that maybe the big themes will even out the rocky terrain but in the end it’s because of this overreaching ambition that the film ends up so undernourished. The inspiration for the movie

Everyone creates the thing they dread.

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) (SPOILERS) Avengers: Age of Ultron ’s problem isn’t one of lack. It benefits from a solid central plot. It features a host of standout scenes and set pieces. It hands (most of) its characters strong defining moments. It doesn’t even suffer now the “wow” factor of seeing the team together for the first time has subsided. Its problem is that it’s too encumbered. Maybe its asking to much of a director to effectively martial the many different elements required by an ensemble superhero movie such as this, yet Joss Whedon’s predecessor feels positively lean in comparison. Part of this is simply down to the demands of the vaster Marvel franchise machine. Seeds are laid for Captain America: Civil War , Infinity Wars I & II , Black Panther and Thor: Ragnarok . It feels like several spinning plates too many. Such activity occasionally became over-intrusive on previous occasions ( Iron Man II ), but there are points in Age of Ultron whe

Your Mickey Mouse is one big stupid dope!

Enemy Mine (1985) (SPOILERS) The essential dynamic of Enemy Mine – sworn enemies overcome their differences to become firm friends – was a well-ploughed one when it was made, such that it led to TV Tropes assuming, since edited, that it took its title from an existing phrase (Barry Longyear, author of the 1979 novella, made it up, inspired by the 1961 David Niven film The Best of Enemies ). The Film Yearbook Volume 5 opined that that Wolfgang Petersen’s picture “ lacks the gritty sauciness of Hell in the Pacific”; John Boorman’s WWII film stranded Lee Marvin and Toshiro Mifune on a desert island and had them first duking it out before becoming reluctant bedfellows. Perhaps germanely, both movies were box office flops.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

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