Film
A film set in a prisoner of war camp, starring Bruce Willis: let's face it, the omens aren't that of a subtle and thought-provoking drama. MGM haven't helped by putting out a trailer featuring several explosions set against a heroic soundtrack, though at least this allowed me to enter the cinema anticipating an evening of harmless entertainment. Unfortunately, even this did not materialise as Hart's War turns out to be something even more terrible and trite than a gung-ho propaganda tool - a courtroom drama.
The central character of the film is not Willis' tough Colonel McNamara, but Colin Farrell's Tommy Hart, a wimpy Yale law undergraduate, cruelly forced to share quarters with the lower ranks. The US army is portrayed not as pure and idealistic, but with soldiers every bit as racist as the Nazis, and for a brief and enticing period, you're allowed to think that McNamara may be one of them: Hart's War contains the tantalising potential for a departure from cliche.
Unfortunately, the film also features the educated yet cruel, jazz-playing Nazi Commandant, the noble black Lieutenant court-martialled for a crime he did not commit, and finally and most ridiculously of all: the escape tunnel for which said court-martial was all just a big distraction.
None of these are the real crimes of the film, however: that honour is left to the painstakingly slow plotting and sluggish direction. The action of Hart's War does not so much plod along, as move in real-time, every plot 'twist' signalled five minutes in advance and each shot following Farrell's facial expressions as he wanders around the camp, pathetically unaware of what's going on.
In the final scenes even the lingering sense of moral ambiguity is lost. Bruce is a hero after all, Hart reflects on his real-world education, and the final words are "honour, nobility and duty". I rest my case.
Sunday 19 May marked the tenth anniversary of Croatian self-determination. During the ten years which have followed, and the numerous wars and peace deals which punctuated them, the former Yugoslavia was prostituted by film-makers. Welcome To Sarajevo, while purporting to chart the devastating siege of Bosnia's capital, in fact only used it as a backdrop for the heart-warming Hollywood story of a British reporter adopting a Bosnian child. Nevertheless, at the same time Yugoslavs made moving and challenging films which were seen by few outside the Balkans.
No Man's Land is a satisfying union of the two genres; the 2002 Oscar-winning film is written and directed by a Bosnian, Danis Tanovic, but screened world-wide. Tanovic's portrayal of the French UN commanders and British war reporters is honest and uncompromising. The UN soldiers are shown not as masters of situation, but rather as men who do not understand the language the Bosnians and Serbs speak and have no grasp of the politics of the conflict.
The action of the film takes place in a ditch between the Bosnian Muslim and Serbian lines. A Bosnian Muslim soldier, Ciki (Branko Djuric) is trapped with a Serb, Nino (Rene Bitorajac) in the ditch within range of snipers. They discover that a Muslim soldier they assume is dead, Cera (Filip Sovagovic), is in fact only unconscious and his body is booby trapped so that if he moves they will all die. The claustrophobia of the ditch and the understanding which develops between the two soldiers contrasts strongly with the confusion and noise of the UN and the media, who inevitably arrive to provide a solution to the situation. Although Katrin Cartlidge has won much praise for her portrayal of war reporter Jane Livingstone, the really superb performances are from Djuric and Bitorajac, who go from talking about mutual friends from their college days to attacking each other in seconds.
This is a brave film, which occasionally resorts to clunking analogies: Colonel Soft (Simon Callow), when he hears the news of the stand-off at the UN High Command in Zagreb, is playing a game of chess, and it ultimately falls back on the old theme of the horror of war. Still, gaining unusual recognition by the traditionally diffident Academy, No Man's Land is the first successful realist film about the disintegration of Yugoslavia.
Erotic and melancholy, this explores a love triangle between sex-obsessed waitress Lucia, her novelist lover Lorenzo, and sex itself.
The teen mother of all movies takes a knowing wink at the teen-film genre in this 'hilarious' spoof which even features 'ironic' cameos from Mr.T, Melissa Joan Hart and Molly Ringwald.
A new take on Anglo-American relations as flatulent British schoolboy saves American astronauts at the height of a national crisis by 'blowing ass' to power a rescue-spaceship.
6th Jun 2002