Classic monster effects on display in ‘Harbinger Down’Date: 8/27/2015 A reboot of a Sixties TV show and an unofficial remake – or is it a homage? – to a 1980s horror film are featured in the film review column this week.
On Video On Demand and Streaming: Harbinger Down
The filmmakers behind this new horror science fiction film had a mission to keep alive the skills of practical special effects – the old school brand not using CGI – and makeups and they certainly accomplished that.
What they didn’t reach was doing a story that was original as it should have been.
There is a backlash against CGI in the fan community. With so many low budget films relying on sloppy computer animation and background to stretch production dollars, audiences yearn for old school effects that seem more “real.”
Writer and director Alec Gillis raised more than $300,000 through Kickstarter for the film and it does have a great look and feel to it. The story is way too derivative of John Carpenter’s “The Thing.”
Lance Henriksen is Graff, the owner of a crab boat who takes along his granddaughter and her associates on a crabbing trip. They are doing some research work for her college.
What they find is a frozen Russian spacecraft, which they haul aboard and when it thaws out, something comes alive. It changes shape, it seems damn near invulnerable and it eats people.
For someone who has not seen “The Thing,” I’m sure this movie would pack far more of a punch. The effects are quite good and show the strengths of old school techniques to younger audiences.
Henriksen is the anchor of the movie and does his usually fine job as the grandfather who just wants to help out and protect his granddaughter.
While I can’t fully recommend it, I will give it a tip of the hat when it comes to creature construction.
In theaters: The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
Director Guy Ritchie came to prominence with some gritty, quirky crime stories – “Snatch” and “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” – and has come back from a career slump with two popular Sherlock Holmes adaptations.
His new movie is a big screen remake of the popular television series inspired by the James Bond films. Like all such ventures the conventional wisdom is that a new film should walk the line between satisfying the fans who grew up watching the series while at the same time giving it something new to attract a younger audience.
Ritchie and his screenwriting team did a far better job with the latter as they did with the former.
This film serves as an origin story detailing how CIA operative Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill) and Russian spy Illya Kuryakin (Arme Hammer) first meet. Solo, we learn, is an Army veteran and art thief who is being forced to serve his sentence as a spy. He is cool, fashionable and unflappable.
Kuryakin is a great adversary. All business, he is relentless in reaching his goal.
The two are paired together along with the daughter of a nuclear scientist when the American and Russian governments learn that scientist is creating a new generation of nuclear weapons for an unidentified third party.
Ritchie’s films are known for their editing, their sense of humor and effective use of action and “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” stays well within those expectations.
I enjoyed it, but I had never seen the TV series. Some viewers were left cold by this film being an origin tale and by weighing the narrative a little more in the favor of Solo. I did think Solo’s backstory was a little unnecessary.
The two leads do a fine job and Alicia Vikander (last seen as the artificially intelligent robot in “Ex Machina”) steals a lot of attention as an action star with Audrey Hepburn looks and style.
While the film doesn’t have the same sense of surprise I had when seeing Ritche’s first films, it’s a way above average summer film.
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