Inception

I saw inception two nights ago. Its a bit of a mind duck, throwing you right in at the deep end from the off. Kind of reminded me of the matrix the way it has to explain a new world and the rules that surround it. I have a cineworld pass and could do with seeing it again to properly get my head around it but I thought it was great, very interesting and a great mind to come up with the story. Di Caprio plays his part well as do the rest of the cast. The visual effects are truely brilliant, making whole city environments and destroying them down to tiny particles, CGI at its greatest.

Underworld

MacIntyre's Underworld is a series of documentaries on the UKs criminal underworld and leading crime figures. The best picture I could find of Brian Cockerill, the man above was from his book cover. This brute of a mans job is to tax drug dealers in his area, basically he finds out where the drug dealers houses are, goes in weaponless (unless you count his enormous fists) demands the money and drugs from them, even torturing them to find out where they are then he leaves with the loot. Its a dangerous job but also very clever, because after being robbed of everything, which drug dealer would call the police to say whats happened? Non, because in finding him guilty they would be prosecuting themselves. Brian Cockerill comes across a nice normal family man in the documentary which is very unexpected for a man with his reputation, but you can see he is also very scary holding both fear and respect in the Underworld.

Ross Kemp

Ross Kemp On Gangs, Ross Kemp In Afghanistan, Ross Kemp In Search Of Pirates.

Ross Kemp goes deep into the heart of gangs, gangland territory, war zones and many other dangerous situations to uncover the opinions and frontline truths discovering answers only others have guessed at. He speaks to gang members, lethal people and on their turf, not in a London office block drinking tea. Just for that he has my respect because I don't know what I myself would have done in the situations he has found himself in. Ross infiltrates these street gangs to discover who belongs to them, what drives them and what the law is doing to curb there activity.

Kemp has also been to frontline Afghanistan to work with the soldiers based at Camp Bastian in Hellman Province. You see great footage of shoot outs of which some last all day, raids and meetings are also seen, it's an interesting watch if you have never bothered and worth while to see what soldiers fighting in this war experience.

With a growing rise on piracy off the coast of Somalia it was not surprising to find Mr Kemp yet again at the heart of it, this time with a different title, "In Search Of Pirates" because they are that hard to find he only actually spoke to one, and I think he was nearing retirement. But he rode on board with the Navy who are tackling this growing problem.

All the Ross Kemp shows are worth a watch whether they have your interests or not, you might just enjoy them and learn something along the way because if you think the worlds just a nice place where pretty flowers grow, your sadly mistaken.

The Coen Brothers

My dad brought me a Coen Brothers DVD Collection for xmas, its taken me until now to watch them all and I actually enjoyed 3 out of the 4 films. The box set contained 'The Big Lebowski', 'The Hudsucker Proxy', 'Barton Fink' and 'Blood Simple'. I didn't enjoy Barton Fink, it took forever to get going and then never actually did, the murder in the movie which turned out to be the highlight, came 10 minutes from the end and was wrapped up and concluded very quickly. 'The Hudsucker Proxy' was a brilliant film, very funny, heart warming with great characters sporting many great accents and brilliant script writing keeping me entertained throughout. Really love the film poster for it (above) as that flimsy, old, used piece of paper is shown in the film and sums up the film very simply.

'Blood Simple' was made in 1983 and is the story of a jealous bar owner hiring a hitman to kill his wife and her lover, but with a twist, obviously. The suspense and tension is captured really well, the texas setting feels a perfect and mysterious setting for the plot. Not a bad present in the end.

Gangster No1

Really great gangster film, very edgy with hardcore violence and camera techniques that added to the strange twisted feel of the film. The acting was excellent starring Malcolm McDowell, David Thewlis and Paul Bettany. Directed by Paul McGuigan. The story follows and up and coming Gangster/ Hitman slowly gaining fear and climbing up the underworld ladder. I would recommend this film as it is an origional 'Rise to the top' gangster film and who doesn't like a gangster? Apart from his victims. I will try and look at some more of Paul McGuigans films for future posts.

Le Prophete (A Prophet)

Great Film! It blew me away, I love gangster films and this one takes the prize showing the climb of a man treated badly by all his prison associates. Set in a French prison and following a young muslim man whos cell block is in the caucasian territory, he is asked by the big boss to kill a man or himself be killed, with no choice he furfills the boss's wishes and becomes his errand boy, this is the start of his ruthless climb to the top. The scenes really grab emotion and the tension that would be felt within the prison walls and within the company he keeps. The film has dark comedy moments that contrast nicely from say a murder scene just passed. Its quite a long film but thats a good aspect as the director hasn't rushed anything, the quiet scenes of the characters reflection on his life are just as important as the scenes with dialogue. Great film again, worth a watch, I really want to see Messerine which is another gangster film by the French. They are making a name for themselves in this field of film.