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Toff Tips |
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FILM: September 2011
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This is ape month! First the fictional RISE
OF THE PLANET OF THE APES (cert.12A 1hr. 45mins.), a prequel
to the Planet of the Apes films. With the new technology available
to film makers, director Rupert Wyatt uses motion-capture to turn
actor Andy Serkis into the leading ape. Will (James Franco) is a
scientist trying to develop a cure for Alzheimer's disease. While
doing his job, he wants to help his father (John Lithgow) who is
suffering from dementia. Testing the drug on apes goes awry and
the programme is terminated.
In the confusion a baby chimp (who is later named Caesar) is given
to Will who takes it home. Will and his father look after Caesar.
Will continues to administer the drug to the ape and also gives
it to his father who makes a rapid but temporary improvement. Caesar
and Will meet up with a vet, Caroline (Freida Pinto), who becomes
keen on both of them. However, when Caesar shows signs of aggression
he is taken away and put into a Primate Sanctuary which is more
like a prison. He develops into a leader and we see the story beginning
to lead to the Planet of the Apes. All the apes are well portrayed
and the film is engrossing as well as being technically extraordinary.
Very different in structure and yet with similarities of story
is the documentary PROJECT NIM (cert.12A 1hr. 39mins.),
directed by James Marsh, who made the gripping Man on Wire. |
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The film begins in 1993 when baby Nim is taken from his mother
to become an experiment run by a psychology professor at Columbia
University who aims to show how a chimpanzee could learn to communicate
in sign language if nurtured and raised like a human child.
He is given to his new mother, who breast feeds him as that is
what she has done with her own children. It goes well until Nim
is deemed too large and aggressive to live alone and taken to live
with other chimps. Sometimes saying more about the sexual behaviour
of humans, it is worth seeing for its insight not only into the
behaviour of a real ape, but also into how the humans around him
live and inter-act. |
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Finally one to take your grand children to: the unusual
thing about THE SMURFS IN 3D (cer.U 1hr. 33mins.),
directed by Raja Gosnell, is that it is a real mixture of animation
and live action. Although this is difficult to achieve, it is managed
extremely well here. The animated characters are the Smurfs, tiny
people "just three apples high" who live in their own village, which
is entered through a magic portal. They are a happy people except
for the one threat, Gargamel, who has been unable to find them.
But one day he follows one of the little Smurfs and destroys whole
sections of their village, finally forcing them out. They land in
our world, in fact in the middle of New York's Central Park. The
Smurfs are desperate to get back through the portal to their homeland
and need to do this before Gargamel finds them. |
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They find themselves in the home of Patrick and Grace Winslow.
Patrick (Neil Patrick Harris) is a marketing executive for a New
York City based cosmetics firm. He is about to be promoted if he
can come up with a new advertising idea. The young couple are expecting
their first baby and while Grace (Jayma Mays) is optimistic about
their future, Patrick is a bag of nerves. His life is not made easier
by the lively group of Smurfs which invades his house, his office
and even travel around with him! |
A very obvious villain is another real person, the
wicked wizard Gargamel (Hank Azaria), who, aided by his cat (non-speaking
and sometimes played by a real cat, and at other times, animated),
is obsessed about finding and destroying the tiny Smurfs.
The Smurfs are a varied set of little creatures, with names based
on their characteristics. So we have Papa Smurf (voiced by Jonathan
Winters) the leader of the group. Smurfette (voiced by Katy Perry)
is the only female and, as can be expected, has many admirers. As
in any set of people, there is always one who causes trouble - inadvertently
in the case of Clumsy (Anton Yelchin). He has a good heart and,
given the chance, might just occasionally become a hero. Another
distinctive character is the Scottish Smurf (Alan Cumming) who introduces
some Scottish slang into the dialogue.
The 3D does not add a great deal to the film, which is pretty to
look at, but does not necessarily require the special effects that
can be produced with 3D. There are some nice lines where the word
"smurf" is used to replace words in speech, for example, "What the
smurf is this" and "Oh my smurf!" This is a movie very obviously
aimed at small children who should enjoy the lives of the little
people and their fight against the villainous Gargamel. I think
that the adult story about the advertising world will appeal to
them less. The invasion of Patrick's office space is, however, funny
and the melding of the two worlds - human and animated creatures
- is appealing. |
THEATRE TIP
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THE GLOBE MYSTERIES (which runs
at the Globe Theatre until 2 October) is a non-Shakespearean play
which continues this season's theme of The Word of God. In a new
version by Tony Harrison, based on the well-known English mystery
plays (the name coming from the different trades guilds of craftsmen:
each play in the cycle being assigned to a different craft or 'mystery'),
are presented in an audience friendly manner. |
It begins with the creation of earth, then Adam and Eve and so
on. While we are presented with a lot of humour which involves winking
at the audience and bringing them into the Biblical stories with
a nod at their absurdities, there are also some straight forward
presented episodes like Abraham preparing to sacrifice his son Isaac
and Mary speaking to Jesus on the cross, which are genuinely moving. |
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Director Deborah Bruce gives us some exciting images
such as the last supper when the actors suddenly group themselves
into the image we know from Da Vinci's Last Supper painting. Tony
Harrison's poetic rhyming couplets with pronunciation, delivered
with northern British accents, has a nice touch of local colour,
"When I'm dead bury me back in Gateshead," and serve his adaptation
well.
A cast of 14 perform over 60 parts and manage to convey their differences
in a number of quick changes. Williiam Ash gives us an innocent,
honest Jesus, particularly when he is raised on the cross (see picture
above). I liked God (played by David Hargreaves) sitting up high
on an armchair and holding a cup of tea. However, it does come across
as somewhat silly to have Adam and Eve wearing white underwear.
When they are then made aware of their nakedness and cover themselves
with fig leaves, the whole point is lost.
As usual at the Globe, the music is first class and there are some
good effects, such as blue material being raised to represent the
sea in the flood sequence. Not all the elaborate staging works,
though, and after Jesus has risen, the audience is divided, by a
barrier in the 'groundlings'area into two halves - "the saved" and
"the damned" - but the audience didn't do anything except snigger
as Jesus addressed one side and then the other before the barriers
were removed. The plays are performed in three hours, which is long
enough for the audience, especially for the standing 'groundlings'
but rather a rush for the amount of material to be covered. The
evening ended, of course, in the usual Globe all-cast dance. |
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If you want an exciting theatrical experience, head for the glorious
production of CRAZY FOR YOU at the Open Air Theatre,
Regent's Park (until 10 September). Timothy Sheader has once again
done an excellent job of directing a musical which not only has
verve but also some of the best dancing to be seen on the London
stage.
The story shows how the banker, Bobby (Sean Palmer), who really
wants to be a dancer, travels on the orders of his over-powering
mother (Harriet Thorpe) from New York to Deadlock, Nevada to foreclose
the little theatre on his mother's behalf. |
He falls in love with the owner's daughter, Polly (Clare Foster) and stays to put on a show to save the theatre. Bobby pretends to be the impressario, Bela Zangler, and imports the New York chorus girls and boys. All goes well until the real Bela (David Burt) turns up. There is much fun when Bobby impersonating Bela comes face to face with the real Bela in Nevada.
There are good performances from all the cast - some can sing better than others, but they make up for it with their footwork, which is really superb. On opening night there was a downpour - always a posibility with performances in the open air - but men came on stage and swept the wooden flooring, which was then ready for the dancers once the rain stopped.
This revival of George and Ira Gershwin's musical, with book by Ken Ludwig, gives us some lovely performances. Some of the musicals on in London at the moment are better sung, but none have better dancing with a whole variety of styles for tap dancing to balletic. Added to all this is the wonderful music, played well here under the leadership of Gareth Valentine, with well-known songs such as Someone to Watch Over Me, I Got Rhythm and Nice Work If You Can Get It sung with real musicality and enhanced by the always inventive choreography of Stephen Mear along with the magical lighting which gives us stars in the trees at the end. |
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Carlie Newman |
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