Film Fanatics: December 2001

by Emma King-Farlow

News and Reviews

It seems that no less than eleven of film star Jack Nicholson's teeth are going to be auctioned on a TV show. The selection of baby teeth and adult molars have already attracted offers of over £5,000 from some serious (or should that be seriously disturbed?!) fans. Jack's choppers join Mel Gibson's hair as part of the growing list of celebrity body parts that are being made available to the highest bidder! There's really only one word - eew!
Harry Potter director Chris Columbus has spoken about the need to protect the film's young stars from the increasing pressures of fame, from which other child actors, such as Home Alone star Macaulay Culkin, have suffered. Talking to Katie Couric during her Harry Potter special on American television network ABC, Columbus said that he wants "to make sure Michael Jackson isn't inviting Dan Radcliffe over for the weekend."
Okay, now that's just showing off! Students at the University of Southern California were left unable to compete when a classmate turned up for a lecture with movie star Tom Hanks in tow. The class had been set an assignment to bring someone to the campus to interview on camera and the student thought 'Uncle Tom' would be as good as anyone - their mother is Tom's sister-in-law!

KANDAHAR (PG):

An Afghan-born female journalist named Nafas receives a suicide note from her sister, left behind in Kandahar, saying that she can no longer endure life under the Taliban and she plans to kill herself during the millennial eclipse. Nafas smuggles herself over the border and then across the country to Kandahar, encountering various people along the way, as she tries to reach her desperate sister in time to prevent her death. Moshen Makhmalbaf's astonishing and critically acclaimed film could not be more topical.

The Observer: "The trek echoes Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress as Nafas falls sick and experiences despair, and various companions turn back or fall by the wayside. ...This is a society crippled in body and spirit, struggling to remain alive, its sense of community shattered. ...At times the English dialogue seems stilted, as one might expect from an unprofessional cast directed by someone whose first language is Farsi. But this is unimportant. What the people say rings true and there are images that stick in the mind. ...Harry Potter is being distributed here in several hundred prints, while Kandahar is opening at a single specialist venue in London (it will get a wider distribution next month). This is a pity because the movie is urgent, accessible and deserves to be widely shown. We've all seen documentaries recently on life in Afghanistan, but good fiction, which this film is, can involve us on a deeper emotional level and add to our experience and understanding."

The Evening Standard: "Someone who had heard of the film, but not yet seen it, said.last week: 'I hear it's powerful, but the acting isn't all it should be.' Don't believe it: the power of present realities under the now-retreating Taliban infuses every living person in it, making acting redundant. Makhmalbaf's film is a cry for help - now, we hope, answered by the invasion forces. But it's also a painful and appalling overview of the veiled head-to-toe humility of women constantly incarcerated inside the 'cells' of their burqas, and of the tutelage in aggression that mullahs administer to adolescent boys who go straight from Koran to Kalashnikovs. ...Watching this mesmerising film is like experiencing a nightmare in the sun."

The Mail on Sunday: "The arrival of Moshen Makhmalbaf's striking [film] could hardly be better timed. [It was seen] first at Cannes earlier this year, but since then the world has turned darker, and the film with it. ...The week's other films seem irrelevant beside Kandahar."

GHOST WORLD (15):

Best friends Enid (American Beauty's Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson) graduate from high school together with very different plans for the future. The disaffected and sharp-tongued Enid befriends a middle aged misfit (Steve Buscemi) with a penchant for collecting old 78 rpm records, while Rebecca has her sights set on a career and a flat of her own.

The Evening Standard: "The film itself is relaxed enough to find room for... mini-homilies on mores and manners that comprise daily mundanity. It has an intelligent bite, a degree or two cooler than Woody Allen's, but packing the same cocktail kick."

Heat: "It's smarter than the average teen comedy, with a dark, bittersweet edge. The cream of US indie acting talent - Birch, Buscemi, Illeana Douglas, Bob Balaban - play a collection of funny and fascinating characters blessed with a wryly sharp script. [But] there's no real story or point to it, so what you're left with is an aimless series of episodes in the life of a messed-up adolescent. [Nevertheless] this critically-lauded, quirky comic-book adaptation is the cool antidote to Harry Potter mania."

The Mail on Sunday: "Thora Birch.is superb as a sulky high-school graduate who befriends a geeky saddo 78 collector, played by Steve Buscemi with an awkwardness you can almost smell. The script crackles with bitchiness and comic anti-corporate sentiment, and the film's bold colour and design are a constant delight. Naughty but very, very nice."

HARRY POTTER AND THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE (PG)

People, it's finally here. The eagerly awaited film version of JK Rowling's first record-breaking, international best-seller has finally arrived on a tide of expectation and hype and is currently riding high at the top of the box office charts in both Britain and America. The tale of the orphan Harry, whose miserable life with his aunt and uncle takes a turn for the better when a mysterious letter arrives to inform him that he has a place at Hogwarts school of wizardry, needs little introduction, so we'll crack on with the reviews!

The Daily Mail: "It truly is a wizard show. .Fans of all ages will want to see it again and again, meaning it could well overtake Titanic as the biggest money-making film of all time, repaying its £110 million cost many times over. ...Shooting the movie in British locations with a mostly British crew and all-British cast helped ensure that the film has been mostly free of the saccharine gloss that has choked the life out of many a Hollywood film. And the controlling hands of author JK Rowling and producer David Heyman have kept the picture true to the novel. ...Some young children will find some of the dark bits rather frightening, but most would have already read the book and know what's coming. Will they become bored and restless? No. ...There are 152 minutes of Potter magic to be enjoyed; and Harry's first spell is captivating stuff."

The Observer: "Like the book, the film is a mish-mash of myths ancient and modern. Better for children unacquainted with the Bible, fairy tales and classical mythology to encounter this lore here than not at all. ...Hogwarts is a magical place, one of the triumphs of the film's British production designer, Stuart Craig. But it's here that the movie takes a darker, more impressive turn when Harry and his two new friends - the high-spirited Ron (Rupert Grint) and the smart, sensible Hermione (Emma Watson) - embark on a rite-of-passage quest to defeat the evil but unidentified Voldemort. ...The trio discover that courage and friendship are to be treasured above all else. ...Harry Potter is old wine in new bottles, or old-fashioned values and virtues cloaked in state-of-the-art special effects. From the craftsmen in Jim Henson's Creature Workshop to composer John Williams with one of his lushest scores, no one has stinted on this picture. ...Harry Potter affords hope of magical powers available to the brave, the decent and the resourceful in our.anxious times."

The Evening Standard: "Chris Columbus puts almost everything in the book into the film he's directed. As film-making goes, it may not rate an award in auteurship. But as a transcription of almost every page in the authorship of JK Rowling, it is a winner. You may say Terry Gilliam or Joe Dante would have done it better, more eccentrically, stylishly, with more personal panache. Wrong, wrong, wrong: that's what such flights of fancy would have been. ...The film, like the books, is a prolific demonstration of how the human imagination can make all.wishes come true and look real."

Heat: "If you enjoyed the book, and just want to see it up on the screen in all its magical glory, you'll love this. Lashings of skill, care and money have gone into transforming JK Rowling's novel into a series of perfectly executed and beautifully designed set pieces. If you have not read the book, you'll have no trouble following the film, but you might think it's all a bit.well, meandering. ...The Philosopher's Stone is a wonderful, original book buoyed by a real winner of a premise, an array of superbly drawn characters and generous portions of wit. Judged purely as a film, this perhaps doesn't deserve to be (as it will probably become) the biggest movie of all time, but it's still a fine adaptation and close to the best we could have hoped for."

The Times (Culture): "The answer is yes. Yes, young Harry Potter fans will love this film. Yes, adult Harry Potter fans will love this film. Yes, even the agnostic and sceptical will be entertained. [But] Columbus has erred on the side of caution: his film is afraid to let his young audience experience the kind of dark moments that make a film stay with you for the rest of your life. The trouble with this Harry is that he's all sweetness and light - when it was his sadness and scars that made him a hero of our time. If only Columbus had been a bit more brave, a bit more like Harry, he'd have made a far better film."

Film quiz

Just how much of a film fanatic are you? Answer these questions, add up your scores and find out!

Easy (one point for each correct answer):

Which British director was at the helm of the multi Oscar-winning film American Beauty, in which Ghost World's Thora Birch also appeared?
Which classic Francis Ford Coppola film, set in Vietnam and starring Martin Sheen and Marlon Brando, has just been re-released with almost an hour of additional footage included?

Less Easy (two points for each correct answer):

Michelle Williams, currently affecting a very convincing English accent in new release Me Without You, is best known for playing blonde teenager Jen Lindley, in which television programme about angst-ridden, American teens?
Reese Witherspoon, star of Legally Blonde, played the character Tracy Flick in which high school comedy?

Difficult (three points for each correct answer):

What is the name of the annoying poltergeist who, despite appearing frequently in the Harry Potter books, does not actually appear in the film?
Gina Philips, star of horror flick Jeepers Creepers has previously been seen playing a secretary in which American television programme, set in the office of the legal firm 'Cage & Fish'?

(Answers at bottom of page.)

Film chart

Since the figures are not always available until after the event, the Box Office chart may occasionally be a couple of weeks behind. Sorry!

UK BOX OFFICE (week ending 22 November)

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
The Others
Legally Blonde
American Pie 2
Kiss of the Dragon
Jeepers Creepers
Atlantis: The Lost Empire
Amelie
Ghost World
Moulin Rouge

Quiz answers

Sam Mendes
Apocalypse Now: Redux
Dawson's Creek
Election
Peeves
Ally McBeal

How did you do?

0-4 points: Who needs film when you can listen to the radio, eh?

5-8 points: You're a fan all right, but you're not a fanatic yet.

9-12 points: Move over Spielberg, there's a new man in town!