Hello, and welcome to another edition of Five Cool Things, where I talk about all the interesting, fabulous, and, yes, cool things I’ve discovered since the last time.
This week we’re talking about a supernatural comedy, a panel show designed to keep comics from laughing, Ryan Gosling making friends with a rock in space, a movie that inspired Sinners, and a less-talked-about Hitchcock film. Let’s get to it.
Ghosts UK
Allison Cooper (Charlotte Ritchie) inherits a crumbling old house in the British countryside (think Downton Abbey but smaller and way less maintained). She and her husband, Mike (Kiell Smith-Bynoe), decide to not sell it but fix it up and turn it into a motel.
Buy Ghosts (UK): The Complete SeriesProblem #1 is that they don’t have any money, and this place needs a lot of work. Problem #2 is that the house is full of ghosts. Problem #2 isn’t so bad at first because nobody can actually see the ghosts, but when Allison falls (or rather is pushed – some of the ghosts can interact with the world in small ways with much effort) out of a window, making her legally dead for a few minutes, she awakens with the ability to see and interact with the ghosts.
Basically anyone who died on that property throughout history is now a ghost stuck there. This includes a caveman (Laurence Rickard), a Regency Period poet with a crush on Allison (Matthew Baynton), a disgraced Tory PM (Simon Farnaby) who died whilst engaged in an affair and thus spends his afterlife sans pants, and many others.
Most of the first season finds Allison and Mike trying to find ways to make money to fix up the house and the ghosts attempting to stop them (for they do not want it turned into a hotel, which would bring in many annoying people).
Just about everyone involved in the show is a comedian of some kind, making it a very funny series. There is an American version (which is why this one is called Ghosts UK). I’m sure I’ll watch it after finishing this one, but I can’t imagine it will be able to improve on this wonderfully funny show.
Project Hail Mary
While my house is completely full of books, stacked in every nook and corner, my brother has never been much of a reader. A couple of years ago, presumably as a way to remedy his lack of reading, he bought an Audible subscription. He mostly listened to sports autobiographies and the like, but some time back he started listening to Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir.
Buy Project Hail Mary paperbackHe loved it. I think he’s listened to the entire thing four or five times now. He’s been telling me to read it ever since. For my day job, my brother and I custom-build cabinets and other things. The other day we were on a job building a very nice, and very big kitchen island for a customer. My brother and this lady started talking about Project Hail Mary. It was a fun moment getting to watch my brother talk about a book with someone, and me just listening, for I had not read it.
I’ve started it now and mostly enjoy it (though he does tend to prattle on about science stuff – I really don’t need to know how this imaginary alien takes a poo). I’m not quite finished with it but decided to watch the movie this weekend anyway.
It differs from the book quite a bit (most of that science stuff is left out). What’s left is a big, crowd-pleasing sci-fi blockbuster with a terrific central performance from Ryan Gosling, some wonderful puppeteering and voice work from James Ortiz, and some stunning visuals.
Gosling plays Ryland Grace, a molecular biologist on a mission to save the Earth. The plot gets a little complicated. But basically he’s sent to a nearby star to figure out why it isn’t being eaten up by microorganisms that are eating our own sun and most of the suns that are closest to us. While there, he discovers another life form, which he calls Rocky (because he’s basically made of rocks). They form a friendship and save their worlds.
Gosling is funny and charming but is also able to fully nail the drama inherent in a man who is all alone on a suicide mission in the middle of space. He really proves what a movie star he is in this film.
It runs a little too long for my tastes, and it gives up a perfect ending in order to extend its runtime for another 20 minutes to give us a less interesting one. But mostly, it is darn entertaining and a real crowd pleaser.
Last One Laughing UK
Season Two of this British comedy show just dropped, and I’m already in stitches. The premise takes ten comedians, puts them in a room for six hours, and asks them not to laugh. If you smile or laugh once, you get a yellow card; if you do it again, you are kicked out. The last person in the room who has successfully not laughed wins.
Buy Last One Laughing on PrimeIt is a funny thing watching very funny people try to make others laugh while not laughing themselves. And that’s the thing: comedians love to laugh themselves, which makes this show really difficult for them. Laughing is contagious. Often you’ll see two of them start talking, and then one of them will have to leave, walking away with a strained face, trying desperately not to laugh.
Periodically, host Jimmy Carr will give one of them a Joker, which means they have to stand up and do a comedy routine. Everyone else must sit and watch (and try not to laugh). Other times, he’ll have two of them do something like look each other in the eyes whilst discussing their biggest regret. It is all designed to make someone laugh.
While the contestants do their best not to laugh, at home we are free to bust a gut, and I find myself laughing loudly with tears streaming down my face.
From Dusk Till Dawn
There was a lot of talk on the worst social media app a couple of weeks ago about Sinners being nominated for a historic amount of Oscars. The popular complaint was that it was just a knock-off of From Dusk Till Dawn, the Quentin Tarantino-scripted, Robert Rodriguez-directed vampire movie. I watched that film in theaters back in 1996 and mostly liked it, but I wanted to see it again with older eyes and see how it compares with Sinners.
Buy Dusk Till DawnWhen it first came out, Tarantino was still a young buck. Reservoir Dogs had made a splash on the indie film scene, and Pulp Fiction took the world by storm. I thought he was the coolest director in the world. I loved the Rodriguez-directed Desperado and El Mariachi (which was basically Desperado but with a smaller budget and in Spanish).
From Dusk Till Dawn feels like two different movies. Its first half is a tense thriller with the outlaw Gecko brothers (played by Tarantino and George Clooney) taking the Fuller family (Harvey Keitel, Juliette Lewis, and Ernest Liu) hostage while they try to escape to Mexico in the Fuller’s RV. In the second half, they take shelter in a skuzzy trucker bar called the Titty Twister, where they find themselves under siege by a group of vampires.
I can remember walking out of the theater and talking with my friends about the movie. We all agreed that the first half was better, and that the second half, with its reliance on goofy, goopy gore, was not nearly as good. Many years later, I watched the film again and hated it. The first half felt like a movie made by some lazy Tarantino wannabe, and the second half piled on gore for gore’s sake.
This time I found myself really enjoying both halves. The front end is definitely not Tarantino’s best work, and Rodriguez doesn’t have the chops to make the dialogue-heavy script really sing, but it is fun enough. And I enjoy the back half more because it heavily relies on practical effects, something that feels like a rarity today.
Sinners is by the better movie, and beyond the basic story outline (group of people come together in an isolated place and get attacked by vampires), the two films have little in common. But From Dusk Till Dawn is still a lot of horrific fun.
Dial M For Murder
As it came in the middle of one of the greatest runs of films ever made by a single director, it is easy to overlook Dial M For Murder. Especially as it is a small film with only four main cast members and taking place in a singular location. But it should not be skipped by any film lover for it is a delight.
Buy Dial M For Murder from MovieZyngAdapted from a stage play of the same name, Hitchcock made very few changes to the script and no attempt to open it up. Ray Milland plays Tony Wendice, a man who plots the perfect murder to kill his wife, Margot (Grace Kelly), who’s been having an affair with Mark Halliday (Robert Cummings.) Things do not go as planned; someone still dies, and a police inspector (John Williams) is sent in to sort it all out.
The cast is uniformly great. The script is tight. Hitchcock’s direction is a bit subdued. There isn’t a lot he can do within the confines of the apartment settings, and he’s not pulling any trickery like the single-shot conceit of Rope. But his editing creates a fascinating rhythm, making you hang on every word that is spoken. It isn’t particularly tense, as you never for a minute think that Grace Kelly is in trouble, but its taut pacing keeps you on edge. It is perhaps lesser Hitchcock, but most directors would give their eye teeth to make something this good.
Wild Horse Nine
The new trailer for Martin McDonagh’s latest film just dropped, and I am here for it. Shortly before the Chilean coup in 1973, two CIA agents (John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell) are sent to Easter Island by their boss (Steve Buscemi). While there, they must face their own dark pasts and deal with the locals. I’m a big fan of McDonagh’s other films, including In Bruges; Three Billboards Outside of Ebbing, Missouri; and The Banshees of Inisherin, so I’m totally looking forward to this one.
