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Centurion 8/10 is like if the first battle in Gladiator had been extended to fill up the whole film. A film of proper Roman brutality and bloodshed. It's a few years AD and Roman forces are trying to push north through Britain to occupy the whole island. Opposing them are the Picts, who use guerilla warefare and sneak tactics agains the Romans' superior technology. It's really good to see a rock-hard Roman general get drunk, lead a massive barroom brawl, then get back to soldiering the next day - all the while bantering with his men and doing proper modern swearing.
Bicentennial Man 8/10, A.I. Artificial Intelligence 8/10...
I still can't choose between these two. After ten years, give or take, A.I. seems somehow more credible but also more distant, vague, abstract and more whimsical and dreamlike. Bicentennial Man is warmer, more tangible, funnier (if you can take Robin Williams), a lot more coherent and watchable and eventually more humane. You can see Bicentennial's ending a mile off (well, a half hour off) but that doesn't stop it being very effective, affecting and satisfying - on a narrative and emotional level if nothing else. A.I.'s ending is weird and daring and for those reasons should be applauded but I don't think I'm alone finding it difficult to properly engage with. The film's initial concept is Stanley Kubrick's but the movie's execution is recognizably Spielberg, up until the ending which seems like more Kubrick than anything he really did do when he was living. Re acting, David (Haley Joel Osment) does the only acting I really like in this film. Everyone else takes a back seat to the boy robot which I suppose was the intention, and necessary. Similarly Williams is the main draw for Bincentennial, and he makes a fine robot; but the real unexpected treat of this film and its moral anchor is assured, mild-mannered man of the world Sam Neill as the family's patriarch.
Freeway 8/10 wasn't quite as spectacular as I had remembered and the ride is bumpier but young Reese Witherspoon still gives an unblinkable performance as a disadvantaged teenager who refuses to become a victim of Kiefer Sutherland's psychotic but ostensibly respectable killer. Things get very out of hand very quickly - but remain a lot of fun - as the film turns into an all too literal metaphor for Little Red Riding Hood.
Q: The Winged Serpent 8/10 is a low-budget monster movie from 1982 inspired by earlier Japanese monster films and inspiring in turn the 1998 Godzilla remake. The film features the best helicpoter shots of Manhattan I've ever seen, bar none, as the camera emulates the POV of the flying beast. All the street-level scenes look totally authentic to the location and, knowing writer-director-producer Larry Cohen's reputation, were probably shot unofficially, on the fly, with no permission and with real crowds instead of extras. The scope and scale of the story is WAY out of proportion to its $1.2m budget but it works brilliantly by keeping up a quick pace throughout and efficient use of its monster.
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