A Knight's Tale

If I were to mention the name 'Heath Ledger' to you, what would be the first film that would pop into your head? Either Brokeback Mountain, or more likely The Dark Knight, for which he won almost every acting accolade imaginable. But before these roles earned him critical acclaim, Ledger starred in a historic adventure movie called A Knights Tale. While almost everyone would agree that its nowhere near his finest work, it's still a great deal of fun, and is one of my favourite Heath Ledger films.

Released in mid-2001 under the direction of Brian Helgeland (Writer of Oscar winners L.A. Confidential and Mystic River) the movie stars Heath Ledger as William Thatcher, a humble peasant who's life is turned around when he becomes a formidable jousting champion. What we get is a pretty typical rags-to-riches tale that, while showcasing nothing really new, does provide a very entertaining way to kill 2 hours.

We begin in Medieval Europe, where a group of noble squires find their master Sir Ector has passed away while in the middle of a jousting tournament. Since they need him to win the tournament so they can eat (having had no food for 3 days), and all he has to do in the final bout is not fall off his horse, William takes his place, careful not to reveal himself since only those of noble birth may compete. To everyone's surprise, including William's, he wins, and with that, his fellow squires Watt and Roland (Alan Tudyk & Mark Addy respectively) are content to go home and live in peace. But, believing that, with sufficient training, he can become a professional jouster, and attain glory and riches through his exploits. But realising that he cannot compete since he is not of noble birth, he obtains fake Patents of Nobility and competes under the pseudonym Sir Ulrich Von Lichenstein.

With his Patents, false name, unique emblem, and Sir Ectors armour, Will starts to win tournament after tournament, earning trophies, horses and respect. When his armour is broken, he obtains revolutionary new armour from a blacksmith called Kate (Laura Fraser), as well as another addition to his team.

In the final bout of his first tournament, he competes against Count Adhemar (a nasty Rufus Sewell), who becomes the films antagonist. After losing to him, Will vows to defeat him during their next encounter. Unfortunately, Adhemar is forged to withdraw from jousting, making Will feel that his subsequent wins are hollow & meaningless.

Why so serious?

In the course of the film, Will falls in love with a noblewoman Jocelyn (Shannon Sossamon), and continues to peruse her, eventually winning her love after nearly losing a tournament in Paris.

I don't want to say much more about the story for several reason. Firstly, I don't want to spoil it for you. Secondly, because you can probably guess how it goes from here. And lastly, because I've already described most of the film anyway. It follows a pretty repetitive pattern. Will jousts, he talks to/about Jocelyn, jousts, talks to/about Jocelyn etc etc. It follows a very conventional formula for almost everything: Story, characters, plot twists, the happy, everything worked out OK ending, even the romance is pretty mundane. Jocelyn does nothing to earn Will's affection. He just see her and thinks 'Wow, she's hot. I must be in love'.

With all that in mind, you may be inclined to avoid this mostly unoriginal and, at times, fairly recurrent flick. But if you're after movie that you don't have to analyse and think about to much, it's definitely work a look. The set's look nice, the jousting is enjoyable, the characters, while nothing new, are likeable and engaging, and the final joust actually gets me a little choked up. So if your a Heath Ledger fan, give it a shot. Just don't compare it to The Dark Knight, or you'll be very disappointed.

Fargo

The Coen brothers are one of the most prolific movie-making duos in cinema history, responsible for numerous critically acclaimed films such as Blood Simple, Miller's Crossing, Barton Fink and the 2007 Academy Award Best Picture winner No Country For Old Men, as well as many others. But in 1996 they released what many consider to be their finest work, the dark comedy/crime thriller Fargo. It was my introduction to the Coen brothers' work, and to this day it is still one of my favourite movies.

The movie revolves around a car salesman from Minnesota, Jerry Lundegaard (William H. Macy), who is buried under mountains of debt. To appease his financial worries, he hires 2 thugs Carl & Gaear (Steve Buscemi & Peter Stormare respectively) to kidnap his wife so he can collect the ransom money from his wealthy father-in-law Wade (Harve Presnell). Sounds simple right? Well, as we've seen time and time again, it takes a pair like the Coen bothers to make a seemingly straightforward plan so wonderfully complex.

The movie opens with Jerry driving to Fargo, North Dakota to meet Carl & Gaear. They agree to receive $40,000 and a new car in return for kidnapping Jerry's wife. While they attempt to kidnap her, we see Jerry go through several other methods of illicitly obtaining money such as obtaining loans for cars at his dealership with erroneous details, and promoting a real estate deal with Wade and keeping the principal for himself.

Meanwhile, Carl & Gaear kidnap Jean, and as they are heading through Brainerd, Minnesota to their safe house, they are pulled over by a state trooper because of their licence plates. But when bribing him fails, Gaear shoots him, and then 2 people who drove by and witnessed the killing. This incident gets the attention of Marge Gunderson (An Oscar winning performance by Frances McDormand), a polite, intelligent and heavily pregnant Police Chief. Throughout the film, she begins to put together the pieces of the puzzle, quizzing Jerry, Shep (the man who introduced Jerry to Carl and Gaear) and 2 hookers that 'encountered' the kidnappers.

As she is busy solving the crime, we see Jerry's blood pressure slowly soaring, and the 2 comically mismatched crooks trying to cope with their situation. The end result: absolute hilarity.

This film is first class. It has so much going for it that it's difficult to know where to start. The plot is well constructed and beautifully intricate, the characters are a diverse mix of conventional, unusual and downright outlandish.The Oscar-winning dialogue is funny, witting, and always entertaining, and the acting is just what you would expect from a Coen brother movies. One of their finest accomplishments, and a film I never get tired of no matter how many times I watch it.

Napoleon Dynamite

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Remember the film Napoleon Dynamite? Of course you do. At one point in time, everybody was talking about this film. It was on the tip of everyone's tongues. So, what is the big deal? Why did everyone make such a big fuss over it when it was released. Having seem the film, I can honestly say... I have absolutely no idea! I simply can't fathom what it is about this film that makes it such a success.

This review is gonna be rather interesting.

The film was released in 2004 as Jared Hess' directorial debut, and stars Jon Heder (The Benchwarmers, Blades Of Glory) as the eponymous character. He plays an unpopular nerd living in Idaho, who spends most of his school time drawing pictures, conceiving mental fantasies and avoiding bullies. Receiving mixed reviews at the time, it has since gone on to become a cult favourite, and probably it's most iconic quote 'Vote For Pedro' has adorned thousand of t-shirts since.

Now at this point I would give a summary of the plot, but that's just it, there isn't one. There is no continuous story in the film. It's basically what would happen if you took a camera and followed a mildy unhappy, eccentric geek for a several days and then compressed it into an hour and a half.

And that's basically what you get. We observe Napoleon as he lives his day to day live. He lives with his Grandma (who like quad biking at the nearby sand dunes) and his brother Kip (who spends most of his time talking to 'babes' online when he isn't training to be a 'cage fighter').When his grandma has an accident, their Uncle Rico (Jon Gries) comes to look after them, and hatches a money making scheme with Kip. One day at school, Napoleon comes across a new student from Mexico, Pedro Sánchez (Efren Ramirez), and the 2 of them become friends. Later he meets a shy girl called Deb (Tina Majorino), who he also befriends.

 The Pride of Idaho

And there you go. That's the film in a nut shell. We have 3 outcast, socially awkward friends who do various things in school and then do various this outside of school. There really is little more too it than that.

Trying to explain why this film is great is like trying to explain the mysteries of the Universe, considering it's complete absence of cohesive plot. I guess the main reason is the characters. They are all so bizarre and over-the-top, but all really likeable in their own way. Even the antagonists like Uncle Rico are just so well played are comical that it's impossible not to like them. I think we can all see a bit of ourselves in Napoleon. Those times when we just didn't fit in a school, and just wished that our lives could be much different.

In the end, this is just a totally harmless guilty pleasure. It contains nothing abrasive or controversial; no sex, violence or profanities. It also has some really funny moments, mainly due to Napoleon's total ignorance to social norms. But most all, it's just a very nice film. Loveable characters, a docile nature, some genuine humour and emotion, and palpable bond between our 3 high-school heroes. Put all this together, and you have one of cinema's biggest surprise hits, and an-round pleasant experience.

Small Soliders

 For those of you who enjoyed The Mummy, I bring you another little gem from my generation, Small Soldiers. Admittedly, the first time I came across this was in the PC game, and I had no idea that there even WAS a film. So I when it was broadcast on TV some years ago, I knew I had to see it. Needless to say, I really enjoyed it.

If, like me, you grew up in the 90's, then it's more than likely you seen this flick. Released in 1998 under the direction of Joe Dante (Gremlins) and staring Gregory Smith (The Patriot, Rookie Blue) and Kirsten Dunst (Star of pretty much everything!), the movie tells the story of Alan Abernathy & Christy Fimple (Smith & Dunst respectively) who get caught up in a battle between to groups of super-intelligent action figures. Trust me it's much better than it sounds.

The movie begins with the acquisition of a toy company by GloboTech Industries. 2 of the toy makers, Larry and Irwin (Jay Mohr & David cross respectively) are charged by their new boss Gil Mars (Denis Leary) to create some new toys that really push the envelope, that are capable of doing things toys have never done before. Toys that literally 'do what they do in the commercials'.

So while doing research for materials, Larry finds a microprocessor chip known as the 'X-1000', made by the military. Overlooking this snippet of information, he orders a stockpile of them, and they start to put them the new toys. So what are the new toys they are about to implant armed force technology into? Military action figures of course! The Gorgonites & the Commando Elite. The idea being that, when kids play with them, they will fight with one another, with the Gorgonites programmed to lose.

Ya gotta light kid?

So Alan, while working at his fathers toy store, gets hold of an entire set of both factions, and plans to sell them to help turn over a profit, something the store is currently failing to do. But things go awry when the Commandos become active and plan to destroy Gorgonites, as they were designed to do. But fortunately, the Gorgonites, when they aren't getting their asses kicked, were also programmed to lose. So they escape the deadly clutches of the Commandos, and Alan eventually finds and befriends them.

Eventually tracking the Gorgonites to Alan's house, the Commandos, led by Major Chip Hazard (A sinister Tommy Lee Jones), wage a battle of, er, miniature proportions, involving homicidal dolls, highly modified garage equipment and damsels in distress. Yeah, Kirsten Dunst gets kidnapped, what a shock.

Unfortunately, I can't really say why I like this film without regurgitating my comments from the last review. All I can really say is this is a film I grew up with and, as such, I've always enjoyed it, and I always will. The characters are likeable, the story is pretty unique, it has some neat actions scenes, the rivalry between the 2 toy factions is pretty epic, and the whole package its just a whole lotta fun. The ending is pretty nonsensical, and doesn't feel very necessary, but that's kind nit-picky. So if you like simple, charming, harmless enjoyment, be sure to take a look.