BFI Days Of Fear & Wonder Sci-Fi Season – Future Shock! The Story of 2000AD (2014)
Borag Thungg puny mortals, given that I haven’t crafted a full review for a couple of weeks a thrill power injection was sorely needed for the blog, and I was electrified with inspiration on Tuesday nights inaugural event of the BFI’s intergalactic Days Of Fear & Wonder Science Fiction film season. I can’t imagine a more apt way to blast off proceedings than with this exhaustive, hilarious and rousing documentary on one of Britain’s most stalwart science fiction achievements, a celebration of a still pulsing phenomenon with Future Shock! The Story Of 2000AD, Launched in 1977 and still going strong almost four decades later the publication was a rites of passage for many, incubating quiet seeds of insubordination in its impressionable audience, with a punk scrawled ethos stretched across a SF anthology veneer which instructed you to never trust authority, to always champion the underdog, and to not be ashamed to revel in mindless, excessive and occasionally creative violence. I was thoroughly obsessed with the comic back in my youth and brought it religiously like a true Squaxx dek Thargo, before moving on to the more serious Marvel and DC material which then were warming up to tackle more adult themed and cerebral fare, a fundamental turning epoch in the storytelling form which the documentary examines with a quietly brilliant insight. Essentially that whole renaissance of the art form from kids comics to ‘graphic novels’ was culled from the paddock of 2000AD’s writers and artists, which in turn the documentary asserts secured the bedrock of the modern movie blockbuster – it amuses me no end that the day this film received its premiere was the same prog that this was announced.
The structure is that of most great documentaries, let the subjects do the talking with as little interference or steering as possible, intercut with animated stills from the comic to illustrate the subject and psychos under discussion. From a fanboy perspective it was just scrotnig to finally see artbot legends like Carlos Ezquerra and Brian Bolland in the flesh so to speak, alongside stalwart thrill power purveyors such as Alan Grant, John Wagner, Kevin O’Neil, Dave Gibbons, Bryan Talbot, Steve Yeowell and some of the newer crew whom I’m afraid I’m not familiar with. From the writers pod they managed to secure Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison and Pete Milligan, so of course conspicuous by his absence is the medium’s titan Alan Moore who was approached but unsurprisingly declined to appear, although his legacy and aura hangs heavy over the production like a tarnished wizards cowl. The real star of the show however is the Mighty Tharg* himself Pat Mills, the editor-in-chief and original creator of the comic, a foul-mouthed left-wing proto anarchist firebrand whose expletive laden tirades are the stuff of legend – there’s more than little of a cloned Malcolm McLaren in him when seen in the flesh. Moving from the early conception of the comics ultra-violent precursor Action (now this is amusing, I distinctly remember reading, and being dazzled by Hook-Jaw and Dredger) comics the path is an exhaustive trawl through the past thirty-five years of subversive SF, from the golden age of the 1980’s to the so-called dark ages of the 1990’s, all the way through to the current lone warrior in the newsagent which is the last remaining comic book series since the obliterating impact of the internet and other non-fiction distractions.
Full blaster marks to the documentarian Paul Goodwin and his tenacious producers Helen Mullane and Sean Hogan for marching in step with the comics unconventional and mischevious spirit, by tackling head-butt on some of the controversies of the publications exalted history. The shameful and absolutely pathetic treatment of the creators by the parent company come under scrutiny (no intellectual rights to the characters they visually and verbally created, enduring terrible pay and sneering conditions) and the documentary is far from hagiography, dwelling for an appropriate period on the so-called dark ages of the 1990’s when 2000AD really plumped the depths of stupidity with ‘satire’ such as the Space Girls– eurrgghh. They also address the total lack of female writers or artists on the publication, a situation which has only changed very recently and which they are now actively trying to address, although some independent, central female characters did arise in the comic such as Judge Anderson and Halo Jones – more on very her shortly. Historically it was very much a boys club with carefully demarcated gender publications imprinted in the entire industry, so its encouraging to see how that situation is gradually evolving. Most fascinating for me was the concerted effort that DC comics made in the late 1980’s to poach the best writers and artists over to the newly conceived Vertigo ‘adult’ comic imprint – Karen Berger gets a fair amount of facetime in the documentary – with Gaiman and Morrison being quite open about their career aspirations. Given how shoddily they were treated by 2000AD’s corporate puppet masters you really can’t blame them for jumping ship and the Atlantic to be paid properly, treated like artists and as they say ‘have the opportunity to mess about with iconic characters in both the Marvel and DC multiverse’ – what comic fan wouldn’t jump at that chance?
In terms of nerd credentials there is a fantastic moment in the piece when Gaiman reveals that he eventually convinced his friend Alan Moore to talk him through the rest of the outline he had for the beloved Halo Jones character. She is something of a trailblazing female character in a comic book milieu of chisel jawed heroes and damsels in distress, with fans often speculating on how her journey to continue to ‘get out’ might fare. Well, after a mere two hours of the eldritch wordsmith leading him through the six book arc that Moore had imagined Gaiman says he sat in stunned silence, tears streaming down his face. In terms of specific characters most of the attention of course is lavished on the iconic Judge Dredd (and a lot of love for the iconic Apocalypse War story arc which I’d argue is amongst the best the genre has ever offered) but both Strontium Dog and Minty’s personal favourite Nemesis: The Warlock also get their moments to shine, linking those series with the wider cultural and social concerns of Apartheid, intolerance, racism and uthoritarianism that plagued that most selfish of decades. Finally, me and my friends often speculate on why this strip never exploited its rich and diverse characters in other media (the abortion of the first Dredd film none withstanding), suffice to say that Tinseltown did come a knocking and their tactics and practices are widely exposed in the documentary which makes for some quite angry viewing.
The post screening Q&A was a spirited affair with most of the questions directed to Pat Mills as you’d imagine, the highlight was when he shared a hilarious anecdote about the intercine media cannibalism that occurs when a certain character or strip gets the attention of the Hollywood intelligentsia. Mills had created a character called ‘Accident Man’, a hitman who cleverly concealed his crimes by framing the deaths into bizarre yet plausible accidents. When an American studio executive discussed the character options for such a creation he explained that ‘Hey, hitmen aren’t cool anymore so it would be better to make him an insurance agent?, ‘You’ve got to be fucking kidding me right?’ Mills retorts, ‘ No, insurance agents are pretty cool in the States’ the grexnix responds. The producers revealed that they assembled a lot more footage covering other 2000AD characters they know have fevered fanbases, but they had to omit the material for time, so I guess you can expect a horde of Slaine, Robo-Hunter and ABC Warriors extras on the zarjaz DVD. Overall this is a terrific documentary both for pure nostalgia and as a detailed investigation into one of our emeralds isles most quietly influential post-war publications it’s also well crafted, exhaustive and thoroughly entertaining. Personally I’d put the comic up on the same plateau as H.G. Wells and Arthur C. Clarke in terms of our contribution to Science Fiction media, as its modest shadow stretches long across the contemporary media landscape, with the glut of superhero, horror and fantasy product infecting all forms of media. Already the second phase of the BFI handbook has teleported down to Minty prime so I must select my battles for phase two of operations in December, fret not as I’m just keeping in tone with the season and looking to the future with a wistful eye, we have plenty of material planned for November including the second Kubrick of the year o my brothers – real horrorshow;
*A quick aside, Tharg is mentioned and all of the old school creators in unison yell that ‘oh Jesus that was the worst thing we did, I fucking hated writing that twat….’
Judge Minty (2013)
I apologise for not posting much over the past few days, what can I say, I have been busy fighting crime Citizen;
I did manage to go and see The Place Beyond The Pines which was what it was, review to follow but I warn you now for various reasons I have a bastard week on the cards, but we’ll see how it goes….
Judge Dredd (2012)
I know, I know it’s going by the briefer sobriquet of ‘Dredd‘ but omitting the man’s profession seems unprofessional somehow, and I don’t fancy a knock on the door in the middle of the night followed by a five-year stretch in the iso cubes for not showing appropriate deference to authority. So after a couple of years of perusing horrible looking production photos, after cringing at the news of severe production difficulties the new Dredd movie is finally unleashed, a modestly budgeted SF action adventure picture set in a post apocalyptic future where the civilians and by association criminals have been concentrated in the enormous megalopolis of Mega City One, and only the Judges, authoritarian officers of the state whom have the power to sentence and execute criminals on the spot stand between civilisation and anarchy. With memories of the atrocious Sylvester Stallone vehicle from 1995 still stinging like a truncheon thwack to the kneecaps the fanboys were praying for a more faithful translation of the thirty-five years old comic character from the SF fanzine 2000AD, a prog unencumbered by the demands of modern star vehicles (‘But….but Dredd never takes his helmet off?!?!? Heresy!!!’) and when the news came down that the new film would be a hard R or 18 certificate some spark of excitement was ignited within me, that’s such a rare event these days, to get a film designed for an adult audience rather than appealing to the key market demographics and attempting a breaking and entering, smash & grab box-office weekend looting to get in and out with the treasure before the audience and critics realise the film’s atrocious. Having seen Dredd I’m still somewhat in a state of quiet admiration, I am happy to report that this was just about as gritty, violent and most crucially faithful a translation as we could have expected, it has some issues but overall this production throws all its modest resources at the screen with an arresting reaction, thus Dredd is destined to be one of this years guilty pleasures.
The future, and as is often the way some great cataclysm has occurred, probably a nuclear exchange of some sort, and in a world of dwindling resources the survivors of the human race have congregated in enormous mega cities, dominated by humongous tower blocks which can house over 100,000 people, horizontal urban gravestones in which you can live and die without ever setting foot out into the wider metropolis. Crime is rampant due to the inhospitable conditions and the state has cracked down by introducing the judges, armed policemen and women with the power to serve as judge, jury and executioner to deliver swift, on the spot justice, often of the most lethal variety. The most legendary lawman is the industrially inscrutable Judge Dredd (Karl Urban), who after effortlessly despatching a gang of drug razed goons is assigned a special mission by the Chief Judge, to escort the psychic Judge Anderson (Olivia Thirlby) on her first day of service. A series of murders in Peach Tree block soon comes to their attention, as some members of a local gang after mistakenly crossed swords with Ma-Ma (Lena Headey), a former hooker turned drug dealer par exellence, providing the city with the latest street craze slo-mo, which as its title suggests gives the user the impression of time being slowed to a immoveable crawl. After being trapped in the block following a hacker lockdown Dredd and Anderson must fight their way through the building to reach Ma-Ma, disrupt her gangland empire and ensure that justice is passed….
I’m a big, big fan of 2000AD and grew up reading the exploits of the worlds most granite chin, so from the opening chase scene it was just a great deal of fun seeing characters speak the argot of iso-cubes, to bathe in the graffiti and urban malaise, and enjoy the gratuitous violence and gunplay which the film delivers with a high explosive kick. The film is grittier than a council fleet of winter weather gravel spreaders, with me musing to myself at one point ‘Hmm this looks like a Danny Boyle film, with a riot of colours and fast lenses provoking a high NRG type feel’ only to see Anthony Dod Mantle crop up as the DP in the closing credits. Crucially the tone is right, yes I wish they had more money to lavish on the city and SFX which seems curiously bereft of aliens or robots as it is in the comics, and yes it’s not quite as crazy and exaggerated, as smoothly satirical as the print version, but given the resources they had – $45 million is quite frankly a pittance these days and those wishing that they’d given Verhoeven $200 million and final cut simply aren’t operating in the real world – I thought it took its gritty, dirty, kind of nasty aesthetic and hit all the right buttons, it had something of a 1980’s action movie vibe to it and I mean that in a good Robocop or Hardware kinda way, and of course the South African production also reminds one of the recent favourite District Nine. They could have spent a few quid to give everyone some crazy kneepads though…
Karl Urban – a good name for the role – simply nails Dredd as a character, it’s not the most challenging task to emote through your chin but he walks the line of cartoon fascist and indestructible hard-man, I’m amusingly surprised that they actually managed to get away with ‘classic’ lines such as this which provoked gales of feedback when Stallone muttered them fifteen or so years ago. Judge Anderson I was much more suspicious of from the trailer, she’s always been more of a Scarlett Johansen type woman in my mentally criminal way, but to be fair Thirlby also convinces as a naive yet committed young officer who is quickly blooded in her baptism of fire, including one brutally shocking moment that still makes me giggle like a psych-cube punk. I also loved the stripped down designs of the weapons and costumes, the city blocks and vehicles, they were all kinda of low-key and as such contributed to the smaller scale and ambitions of the film. Taking a day in the life approach was an ideal manner to set up the world and hopefully establish a franchise, all played through the amateur eyes of Anderson, and thankfully completely absent is any entertaining of even the notion of a of love interest or comedy sidekick, although the proximity of The Raid with its similar plot of battling through a parade of criminals up through the levels to a final boss has caused some concerns I don’t think it really matters, as anyone planning on seeing this isn’t going to have their mind changed by its alleged similarities to another of this years action based successes. It was also kinda amusing to see Avon Barksdale on the big screen, a little in-joke treat for any of you The Wire out there….
So finally the 3D and extensive use of slooooo-mooooo as an aesthetic design, it’s really the films USP, its secret weapon which isn’t too overwrought, as a fan of 3D when used correctly this deployment of visual alignments works quite well, suggesting the gaseous distortions engendered by the central narcotic at the heart of the case, it was certainly more effective and appropriate a deployment of resources than bringing on the chain guns at one moment which I thought was a bit stupid and briefly kicked me out of the picture. So, as a one-off prog director Pete Travis exonerates his record after the crime of Vantage Point, and self-confessed thrill power addict scribble droid Alex Garland have surprised us all with this initial foray into this darkly brazen future, they’ve done the comics justice (oh c’mon I had too) and with a modest apprehension of franchise building I hope it’s a modest hit so we can get the rumoured second and third installments in a potential trilogy, with part 2 foraging into the radioactive wasteland of the Cursed Earth and dark talk of bringing the Dark Judges to the screen for part 3, a prospect that might just blow my thrill power circuits – zarjaz;
Judge Dredd (2012) Trailer
DROKK!! Leg Gone, Detect Intent, etc. So after years of indifferent waiting the new Judge Dredd movie trailer finally arrives. Like many viewing the production photos that have leaked from the set over the past dozen or so months this gave me the vibe of one of the those 1990’s porno ‘remakes’ of big budget films of that era, movies with titles such as A Clockwork Orgy, The Night Of The Giving Head, Howard’s End and Waterworld. See what you think;
I didn’t realise that this was gonna be in 3D, and I’ll bet the producers went ‘Gaze Into The Face of Fear‘ pale when they heard about the plot of The Raid as this project descended into its scrappy and difficult post production phase. The thing is on paper this always sounded like it could be OK, but that trailer is not promising nor are the tales of executive meddling, and the ‘Sssslllloooo-mmmmmoooo’ element activates all manner of menagerie warning Klaxons. Still, you never know, I’ll be there on opening weekend despite the distinct lack of thrill power, although if the movie ‘tracks’ to numerous episodes, aping the current Marvel® model, then I’ll heartily await the 2019 installment of ultimate Zarjaz;
A Strontium Dog and more importantly Nemesis series would also be awesome, thanks…..
Gaze Into The Fist Of Mint….
Let’s step outside the Lynchiverse for a quick and well deserved breather, as I have to wish a very happy birthday to 2000AD who turns 35 today. Man, I loved this comic as a kid and fair play to it still running three and a half decades later, quite why no British producers haven’t mined its stories and iconic characters for low-budget, cheap thrill (shock) fare is still a distressing mystery to me. You’d think the producers of the new Dredd film would have rushed out a trailer to exploit the modicum of interest amongst the fan-boy community but no, another sign of how clueless that film is going to be – it looks terrible. Still, this is a fun blast from the past;
In other news here is a list of 85 must see movies that Scorsese referenced in a long chat / interview with Fast Company magazine, here is a fun little video, have you read film critic The Hulk yet and if not why not? You don’t want to make him angry now do you? Since The Raid just got its UK premiere at Glasgow’s Frightfest here is the Americanized trailer;
Compare and contrast eh? Of course it’s the Oscars tonight so I’ve updated my predictions that you can revisit here, I thought I might fold and continue my tradition of a very late night viewing but alas I now have a series of meetings on Monday so I can’t afford to take the day off. I want to go on the record as stating that The Artist will probably sweep much of the awards and good luck to it, I await with eager fascination the avalanche of silent movie projects that won’t follow in its wake. I’m mostly keeping the same choices in most categories as it would be far more interesting if things spread out a little but here we are, sticking to my guns on Moneyball for best picture is probably madness but you never know…. I’m still seething that Gary was overlooked at the stupid Bafta’s in favour of Jean Dujardin – I mean he was fine and everything but his performance just wasn’t in the same league as Oldman’s measured, internal portrayal – if he (Dujardin) does win I hope he mouths his speech in silence as that could be amusing. Here is an illuminating breakdown of the demographics of the secretive Academy, it’s a unsurprising litany of a bygone century, thus it’s not difficult to see why the likes of Dances With Wolves or Driving Miss Daisy can receive such undeserved kudos….finally, speaking of Dredd, what the fuck is this;
London Fields II
After six weeks of freedom the guilt pangs have finally reached critical mass at not doing much constructive with my time off – that is unless you consider watching movies and full TV seasons (‘Carnivale‘, ‘The US Office‘, ‘Homicide‘ Season 3 & 4) as constructive. Well, gentle reader even I can get bored of such distractions so I have recently made a concerted effort to exploit some of the facilities that bless my fair city. Last week I visited this exhibition at the British Museum in Holborn which was good, I was prompted to make the effort due to the inclusion of prints by my favourite artist, Edward Hopper. It wasn’t a huge exhibition and in fact only contained about three Hopper prints but the quality of some of others made up for any shortfall. I also popped up to the permanent Japanese exhibition on the top floor of the museum which I also recommend if you are in the area.
Yesterday I made a real day out of it. I had an appointment at Waterloo in the morning with a consultant regarding my CV which went well (she called me back with a job interview an hour after I left her which is encouraging) and since I was already in town as it were and had an evening event planned at the NFT I thought I’d see what I could cram in – more fun than going home and twiddling my thumbs until 6pm. Having seen this documentary the night before I thought I’d pop over to the National History Museum and have a look at some of the dinosaurs – not great timing as it’s school holidays season thus the place was infested with hordes of those annoying mini-adults but worth the journey nonetheless. I am really, genuinely interested to hear the creationists excuses/rationales are for dinosaurs given the overwhelming, heck, you know physical fucking evidence from around the world that seems to somewhat deflate their dark age reasoning. Such musing always bring this routine to mind….
I wandered up to the Serpentine Gallery to have a look at the Frank Gehry exhibit that has recently been installed, quite interesting although given that it was a drizzily day it didn’t offer much protection from the elements. Hey, just call me pragmatic OK? Cutting across Hyde Park to Piccadilly I arrived in time to catch this movie at the Apollo. Why this? Well, pickings have been slim this pick for cinema visits but this was a) only 70 minutes long, b) was a comedy and quite easy going and c) I’ve had a bit of a crush on Sarah Silverman ever since she cropped up on the Larry Sanders show in the 90’s. The film is a live concert performance interspersed with some sketches and songs so it passed the time easily enough with a few big laughs. Her humor is certainly too scatological for my taste but some of her (cliche alert) risky or edgy material on race, religion, ethnicity, the holocaust, HIV and well just about everything else vaguely offensive can be superb. If you don’t find the following quote funny then you probably should avoid her – ‘So, I was raped by a doctor when I was a teenager….which…..which as a Jewish girl is very bittersweet….’ just remember it’s an act, she’s not being serious, they’re jokes and she’s having a pop at that PC mentality which at heart can be pretty damn insulting, inhibiting and damaging.
So, then it was off to the NFT for this event, talk about nerdsville. Actually, that’s not fair – as expected it was mostly populated by young guys of my generation but <gasp, shock, horror> there were even girls in attendance. Sorry, I mean women. The real reason I went was to see the great Pat Mills in action as he has always been one of my favourite comic writers and whilst I was a big fan of 2000AD back in my youth I haven’t actually read it for years and years, a wise choice as I’m told it sucks these days. During the discussion it emerged that rather than tailor the weekly to kids they now in fact only market the title to the people who grew up with the publication, a demographic which is responsible for 85-90% of sales. That just seems an absurdly short sighted and parochial attitude considering the fertile atmosphere that currently exists for fantasy, SF and horror material these days.
The event was part of the BFI’s Comic film season and the purpose of the discussion was to enquire how and why hasn’t the last remaining and longest surviving comic in the UK exploited its talents and 30 years of material, of characters and stories to other media be it cinema, anime, TV or even straight to DVD. Once again an astonishing lack of ambition was expressed, quite rightly during the Q&A someone asked about the BBC to which the response was ‘well, yes we’d welcome them to come and talk to us’. What? Hello, you’re the editor in chief – you go and talk to them you twat, it’s your publication with, as I said, 30 bloody years of material and dozens of great characters – is this truly the attitude of the mighty Tharg? I think not, talk about a lack of thrill power <a-hem, composes self..> OK, I concede that the absolutely terrible, terrible Judge Dredd film no doubt put them back a few years but I’d argue its ripe for a big screen rethink a la, ‘Batman Begins’ and ‘The Dark Knight’. Given that the BBC’s ‘Torchwood’ and ‘Dr Who’ are the biggest exports to America ever, I’d say there is a fertile audience there. Oh well, quite an enjoyable discussion on the history of the comic occurred anyway which was fun with some entertaining insights and tales from the institutions history. Something different.
Minty's Menagerie 
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