Thursday, January 22, 2009

Warbirds, movie review

Warbirds

The Final Battle has Begun...




In this episode Spaceman J is shifting gears slightly from the usual diet of rotting Zombie flesh and going for something a little less putrid.
"Warbirds (2008) is not exactly a movie and not really a TV show. This piece of work was made for the Sci-fi channel and apart from Chinese piracy I doubt if it's available anywhere else other than utorrent download. I wasn't expecting much but the concept intrigued me,
What is almost as exciting as a world wide Zombie invasion ? World War II ! What is almost as scary as being attacked by a horde of stinky re-animated corpses ? An attack by a flock of scaly resurrected Dinosaurs !
So when I saw this disc down at the pirates' lair I thought;
"Brilliant ! An example of the little known genre of WWII vs The Dinosaurs, only 8 yuan worth every kuai ".
But oh ! how wrong I was. Let's get the setup out of the way first before we plunge into the battle...

The year is 1945, the place somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. In the final stages of WWII an isolated Imperial Japanese island base is excavating new fortifications when they discover something strange. On the other side of the war, an all female flight crew delivering a new B-29 bomber to the front line is diverted to carry out a secret mission of the utmost importance.
The bomber, piloted by Lieutenant Maxine Hotbody West (Jamie Mann) but commanded by Colonel Jack Heroic Toller is forced down due to some unusual damage right into the heart of that mysterious island.
Then what happens ? Well to give the writers some credit they don't mess around with the tedious process of plot exposition or finely finessing character development, they get straight down to business, namely;
They get attacked by flying Dinosaurs ! Bloodily and repeatedly attacked by massive flying dinosaurs both in the air and on the ground. To save themselves and their mission the Americans try to forge an alliance with the few surviving Japanese and plan an escape using the bases' Zero fighters.
That is were it started to lose me. Suspension of disbelief is a funny thing, sometimes you buy it and sometimes you just don't. An all female flight crew I believe, they actually did that during the war. A flight crew made up entirely of gorgeous women always in spotless uniforms, perfect makeup and luscious lipstick ? Sure why not it's a movie. Flying Pre-historic monsters ? I can buy that after all what was Godzilla ? But when we discover that this team from the Miss Teen America beauty pageant are also crack fighter pilots in Japanese Zeros things start to get stretched too far. Before you comment yes I know the picture is of American P-51 Mustangs and not Japanese Zeros but that discontinuity is the least of our problems.
Air to air combat between WWII era fighters and Pterandons has got to be more one sided than this, What was the top air speed and altitude of a Zero fighter ? I looked it up, a Zero could do 500 kmp.h and had a ceiling of above 5000m, not to mention the guns. Fighting a flying reptile would be like an F-16 fighting a 9 meter albatross. And there are hundreds of these things, what do they all eat ? Coconuts and fish ?
The final insult to credulity is the manner of the the Dinosaurs' destruction. What is their top secret mission ? what is the mysterious object in the bomb bay that must be delivered at all cost ?
Why it's an A-bomb of course ! Not just an A-bomb but THE A-bomb destined for Hiroshima, the most potent weapon yet created and the most expensive object on the planet is hanging like a sack of potatoes in the bomb bay, fully armed and primed to go at the pull of a lever.
Now that's ridiculous.
Giving credit where it is due the CGI effects are certainly well done and give a good look to the monsters and external shots of the aircraft. I guess the technology has advanced to the point where even a pooch like this can get some nice looking work done cheaply. The interiors still look like plywood sets knocked up in a garage though.
It is almost as if the producers wanted to get a certain retro 1950s giant monster B-movie feeling going but didn't have enough belief in their own material, they couldn't sell it and I don't buy it.

Final verdict: 2 Ninja Stars **

Friday, January 16, 2009

Blake's 7 TV review

For me one of the great joys of broadband internet has been re-discovering some of my favorite old TV shows and introducing some new friends to these old classics. For me one of the best has always been Terry Nation's BBC space opera classic Blake's 7 now available at blistering fast download speeds from our friends on utorrent.

B7 ran for 4 series from 1978 to 1981 but all of this stuff you can read on Wikipedia anyway so lets get down to Spaceman Jack's contribution.
I am halfway through watching series 2 for the first time in probably 20 years and it stands up pretty well in the 21st century a time of CGI Sci-fi and digital downloads. The cardboard and plywood special effects of the BBC that feature in B7 are so very familiar to fans of Terry Nation's other big success Dr Who. Bits fall off control panels and sets wobble visibly as the actors touch or move around them. In the debut episode the Federation freighter looks like the bastard child of a papier-mache bathtub and a shoebox hanging on strings. On this space ship the command "Engage engines Time distort 5 !" means "Remove handbrake, Light 5 fire-crackers out the back tube and hold on tight !"
Anyway that old tub takes Roj Blake, Kerr Avon, Vila Restal and the rest of the gang of convicts to prison planet for life but fate intervenes. Through a series of unlikely plot twists this group of Rebels, Criminals, disaffected intellectuals and telepathic aliens gain control of The Liberator, a super fast and super sweet advanced tricked out Alien Spaceship. Thus equipped do our gallant heroes Sallie forth like Robin Hood robbing from the rich fighting the system shooting at the cops and blowing shit up, but in space.
Actually its the costumes that really mark this as space opera from the 70's check this out.



Nice threads dudes ! The eponymous Blake is under the delusion that balloon sleeves are the way to go this season, not only make you look bigger in the event of a hostile encounter but they can also slow your rate of descent in the case of a severe fall.
Costume designers with few exceptions have decided that future clothing means synthetic plastics, sometimes to and outlandish degree. (Watch season 2 episode 7 the killer and see if you like the triangular brown vinyl suits ).
But on the other hand Servalan was probably the best dressed Space Villainess yet encountered witness this outfit....

Isn't she delightful ! Just the thing for a summers day massacre. By the way the weapon in her hand is a standard issue Federation Blaster pistol and is capable of a rate of fire of 2 firecrackers per minute. The 2 bodyguards in black acrylic are Mutoid slaves, a sort of cybernetic vampires made from humans mind wiped by the Federation sort of thing. They obey their master's every sordid whim without question, drink plasma and wear BDSM gear.
But its not just about nostalgia, I am really enjoying coming back to this old show. What made B7 different was the dark style of the writing, that made it a nice antidote to the millennial Federation of Gene Roddenbury's Star Trek. For B7 the core is rotten, the center cannot hold and mere anarchy is set upon the universe. Here alliances are temporary, friendships are rare and treachery is common.
So very 21st century Enjoy !

Final rating: 5 Ninja stars * * * * *