TV / FILM: 2005 Roundup

2005 - The Good Bits

A New Year always puts people in reflective mood, especially the media. It’s all look-back-at-this and look-forward-to-that. OK, so newspapers have to fill an awful lot of space while staff are on Xmas holidays. But that’s no reason why I shouldn’t do my own roundup of the year.

MY TOP MOVIES OF THE YEAR (in no particular order)

The Descent
This is how horror movies should be made. Forget trying to make them PG13 for the kids; forget relying on bucketloads of blood; forget sequels too far; just throw us in the dark, chuck in a vicious predator and keep the mood as paranoid as a dope smoker in a meeting of alien abductees. Truly frightening stuff. And if IMBD.com is to be believed, America should finally get it in cinemas in 2006 - I urge you to see it on the big screen!

Batman Begins
Batman is real! That’s what makes this movie so great - for the first time there are no pantomime villains or insane superhero toys. It tries to ground everything as much in the real world as it. And Christian Bale just picks the role up and makes it his own, with no fear of previous incarnations. This is a complete rebirth for a franchise that was nothing more than a bad joke.

Sin City
Brutal. Absolutely brutal. That’s no surprise if you’ve read the comics, as Frank Miller’s world offers no compromises and Robert Rodrigues has basically redrawn those strips across the movie screen. While it won’t be to everyone’s tastes, it’s a major achievement in comic-book cinema. I mean, have you seen The Punisher?

Sideways
Two blokes driving around wine country the week before one of them gets married... Does stuff blow up? Is there a car chase? Pointless nudity? Then what’s in it for me? Yeah, yeah. About as far away as you can get from the usual crap Hollywood squeezes out of its enormous arse, this is a gentle, funny, interesting tale of an unlikely friendship. If you’re out there Michael Bay, please take notes.

Wolf Creek
Another day, another horror. But Wolf Creek manages to be more than the simple psycho-killer tale we’ve all seen before thanks to the well-played lead roles and the believability of it all. In a year where a trial took place for killings in the Australian Outback, it seems way too real. The film’s strength is that it doesn’t hit viewers with unnecessary gore. In fact, it says something that one of the worse moments is when a character realises the scope of what has gone on.

King Kong
Peter Jackson avoids a massive banana skin after the success of his Lord of the Rings movies. Sure, it’s too long, there are whole subplots that don’t go anywhere and should be trimmed, and the dinosaur chase sequence is clearly not finished to the high standards of the other CGI (that’s the nice way of saying it’s laughably bad). But Jackson’s Kong is a character worthy of our sympathy and Naomi Watts makes Anne Darrow much more than a simple scream queen. You’ll kick yourself if you don’t see it on the big screen - if only for the jaw-dropping dinosaur fights.


MY TOP TV OF THE YEAR (in a very particular order)

1 Battlestar Galactica
For a show about a fleet of spaceships running from their robot enemies, this is one of the least sci-fi programmes you’ll ever watch. BSG chooses to put character and relationships before the usual techno-rubbish you’ll hear spouted in Star Trek (and where did that nonsense-speak get Trek? Cancelled a year before its 40th Anniversary). Drama is king here, and the rivalries, paranoia and politics of a bunch of strung-out survivors beats anything Lost has to offer by a long way.

2 Deadwood
Hang on a minute. You’ve taken that bloke from ropey antiques drama Lovejoy and turned him into an actor. Ian McShane’s portrayal of frontier villain Al Swearengen is just one of the reasons to watch this show. And while I wouldn’t suggest the blue language is a plus, there’s something deeply bold about a programme that regularly refers to its saloon whores as “cunt”.

3 Six Feet Under
Bowing out gracefully after just five seasons, Six Feet Under never had a bad episode. Just think about that. How many other shows can boast the same thing? And I’m not ashamed to admit that the deeply affecting character dramas made me cry on more than one occasion.

4 Invasion
I almost stopped watching this after the pilot episode. That first story seemed like a bad soap mixed with elements of sci-fi, giving me horrific flashbacks to Point Pleasant. Luckily, I had to keep watching this to do my job (I’m pretty sure that’s the only time I can use that phrase in 2005!) Slowly building the story around two families, Invasion proved to be cleverer than its premise made out. Week after week the alien aspect grew, but with unexpected revelations even for the alien clones themselves, until you’re not even sure if the title of the show is appropriate. The US network coupled this show with Lost, and that’s exactly the right place for it.

5 Supernatural
Take two boys trained as monster hunters. Add a bitchin’ car full of weapons. Throw in the guts to show up and impersonate everyone from the FBI to Homeland Security. Baste with the best tricks Asian horror has to offer and sprinkle on effects Hollywood can be proud of. Enjoy!

6 Lost
Okay, so it occasionally drifts into the ham section of the delicatessen. But Lost continues to surprise and entertain regularly enough to make it essential viewing.


QUOTE OF THE YEAR
“His face now enters the pantheon of stars whose charisma transcends speech. Keaton, Chaplin, Garbo, Gromit.” - New York Times
Yes, the New York Times goes completely over the top in its praise of the Wallace and Gromit movie. At least it unintentionally reminds us of that great David Brent quote from The Office: “If you were to ask me to name three geniuses, I probably wouldn’t say Einstein, Newton... you know. I’d go Milligan, Cleese, Everett... Sessions.”