World War Z

Perhaps World War Zzzzzzzz... would have been a better title.

After countless re-writes (and even re-shoots), this lumbering, re-animated corpse of a film has finally shuffled onto our cinema screens. And what an odd beast it is. Ostensibly based on Max Brook’s acclaimed novel about a zombie apocalypse, it’s a sprawling mess.

As often happens in Hollywood, the film’s producers paid a fortune for the book rights then ripped the innards out of the story. In place of the novel’s interesting reportage approach, they put soupy tosh in which ‘ex UN worker’ Brad Pitt travels the world to find the source of a global zombie pandemic. Then cures it. Single-handedly.

The film kicks off with downtown Philadelphia being over-run by a rapid zombie onslaught. It’s all impressively hectic, and the zombies themselves are super-fast and scarcely seen as individuals. More often, there’s just a sudden blur across the screen as some punter is whacked to the ground.

The director’s signature shot, though, is of a swirling mass of zombies climbing over each other either to push over a bus or summit a giant wall. It’s a bold idea, but the obvious downside is that the zombies couldn’t look more CGI if they had ‘Industrial Light and Magic’ stamped on their foreheads.

Brad narrowly escapes with his straight-from-central-casting family – the weepy wife, older asthmatic kid who needs an inhaler and, yes, even ‘cute’ younger kid who refuses to leave a zombie-marauded flat without her soft toy. Unquestionably, the film would have been more bearable if they’d all been chewed up in the first scene. Useless as characters, they might have at least made a decent meal.

As it is, they stick around like mould for the first half of the film, eating up scenes and adding nothing. It’s just one of many mistakes.

Traditionally, zombies make a variety of moaning noises, but so piss-poor is the script of World War Z that most of the pained groaning comes from the auditorium. Lazy writing prevails. So Brad, supposedly a veteran of war zones, leaves his mobile on while creeping through zombie territory. Do you think it goes off? Well, d’uh.

And when our buff hero enters a locked glass room, there’s a special cut-shot showing him leave his weapon outside. Cripes, maybe now he’ll get trapped inside when the zombie shows up. Even the most knuckle-dragging viewer is beyond such flabby plot-manoeuvring these days, and even the zombies look embarrassed.

The boy Pitt also suffers rather too obviously from leading-man-jinx syndrome. He drives through Philly and it’s suddenly over-run by zombies. He jets off to South Korea and actually causes an attack. (That pesky mobile.) Then he arrives in Israel where, yippee, they’ve built a big wall and everyone’s safe. But no sooner has he done some leonine pouting than here come the zombies and virtually everyone else dies. It’s tempting to think that had they just locked him in a cupboard at the outset, none of this might have happened.

Just over eighty minutes in – and there’s no delicate way to put this – the movie pretty much drops off a cliff. Having hitherto spanned the globe with hugely expensive, thousand extras-featuring setpieces, the ‘action’ suddenly moves to a single, internal ‘medical laboratory’ set – and stays there.

The reason for this sudden stomping on the budget brakes has been exhaustively documented across the internet. In a nutshell, the film’s producers had to scrap the entire original third act (a zombie showdown in Moscow that cost £100 million) after disastrous preview screenings. The snag was, by that time they only had about 33 quid left. And thus the final act.

Here’s what happens. Brad escapes from Jerusalem in a passenger plane and gets a radio message ordering him to head for the one place on earth where mankind can still be saved: Wales. Yes, you did just read that. And don’t worry if you laughed, because so did most of the audience.

Inevitably, zombies have clambered aboard in club class so the plane crash lands in the middle of nowhere, in Wales. (Sorry, that’s a tautology.) Natch, everyone dies in the crash except Brad and a saucy Israeli soldier. Impressively, given that their brief – literally – is to locate ‘a medical facility outside Cardiff’, they find it in no time.

From then on, all you have is Brad and half a dozen British thesps in a Seventies-looking studio set – the sort where the walls wobble if you bang against them. It’s like Doctor Who and Casualty had a one-night stand, and this is the ugly baby. The Brits all look a bit dazed to be in the presence of Hollywood royalty. Brad himself looks like he wants to cry.

The ‘plot’ for this strand is that a potential cure lies in a cut-off wing of the lab populated by a dozen extras-I-mean-zombies. But guess what? These ones don’t move at the speed of sound. That would obviously mean more cameras, snappy editing – more cost, basically – so these ones just loll about in the traditional manner. ‘They’re dormant,’ explains one of the Brits, looking every bit as confused as the audience.

And so follows a Scooby Doo-style mission to reach the cure, with every cliché crammed in – squeaky doors, crawling under windows, ‘almost’ dropping things – all patently calculated to just while away the minutes. And when these zombies do finally start chasing our heroes, there’s no blur-across-the-screen swiftness, just the laboured jogging of forty-something extras trying to run with their arms stretched out without falling over.

The whole segment is a disaster and, in Exploding Helicopter’s experience, literally unprecedented. For context, imagine the final third of Man of Steel taking place in a library; or Lord of the Rings’ climactic battle based entirely in a hobbit hut. It’s all so giddily wrong that the cinema audience were howling with laughter.

In a final twist of the budget knife, the last scene shows Brad reuniting with his family in ‘Nova Scotia’, which couldn’t look more obviously like Wales if there’d been a male choir singing ‘How green is my valley’ in the background. Holding daffodils.

Fortunately, the helicopter crash scene was filmed before the money ran out – otherwise, it may well have featured a Fisher Price toy on a string. What actually happens is this: as literally hundreds of CGI zombies scale a high wall, one military chopper decides that – rather than just shoot from a distance – it’d be better to swoop down really low so they can all hop aboard. The undead hordes obligingly clamber on, and the weighed-down machine first spins then drops to the ground, exploding.

Artistic merit

Nil. What remains is only the memory of how chunkily yet another ‘calamity’ has been constructed from nothing.

Exploding helicopter innovation

The idea – having a chopper weighed down by marauding zombies – is pretty good, but this scene loses massive points for blatantly manufacturing unnecessary danger. Also, the whole episode comes across as a flash-edited barrage of soupy-looking CGI figures. It never remotely feels like you’re watching actual zombies on an actual helicopter.

Do passengers survive?

Given that all those hanging on to the outside are already dead, this is largely an academic point. Presumably the crew die in the explosion or face the horrifying alternative of being eaten alive by an unconvincing special effect. Oh, the shame.

Positives

The most terrifying moment of the entire movie occurs in the first few seconds, when – among the faux news footage clips – Piers Morgan makes a cameo as himself, The sight of his bloated, self-satisfied features in widescreen is truly horrible to behold.

Negatives

This may well be the first bloodless zombie film. So desperate was the studio to secure a PG-13 rating that nothing remotely nasty is allowed to happen onscreen. Which is something of an achievement, when you consider it’s a film about almost the entire population of the Earth rending each other limb from limb with their teeth.

So when Brad brings down a wrench on a fallen zombie, you see nothing but Brad’s head and shoulders. And when he chops off a woman's hand to stop a bite infection spreading, all you see is her worried face. George Romero, this isn’t.

Favourite quote

“We’ve lost the east coast. China is dark.”
No global disaster movie would be complete without a grizzled general gravely muttering this sort of cod-military nonsense.

Interesting fact

The film – with its powerless director, unrealistic schedule and hacked-to-pieces script – has become a symbol of how Hollywood messes up movies. The huge volume of online journalism about the botched job of making the film is far more entertaining than the finished product.

Review by: Chopper

Still want more? Then listen to the Exploding Helicopter podcast review of World War Z. Listen via iTunes, Acast, Stitcher, Podomatic or YourListen.

Samurai Commando Mission 1549

Time travel, a sophisticated modern day army, and the warring Samurai hordes of 16th century Japan. With these golden ingredients, Samurai Commando Mission 1549 (2005) doesn’t have any difficulty keeping your attention.

What's more, the film wastes no time in getting to the action immediately and we’re straight into the thick of things before the titles even appear.

We start with a helicopter flying in to join up with a small military force of tanks and soldiers that are engaged in a mysterious experiment. Something goes awry, and the troops are enveloped in a shimmering cloud and disappear from the 21st century.

After re-materialising in some lovely unspoilt greenery, a couple of unsuspecting soldiers decide to get a bit of fresh air top-side from their tanks. They’ve barely had a moment to get a lungful of air before their chests are pierced with arrows. Roll credits.

Back in the present day, the authorities work out what went wrong with their experiment. They were attempting to create a solar radiation shield to prevent it interfering with the electronics on all their high-tech weaponry. Basically, factor 50 sun block for military vehicles. Unfortunately, the experiment was only a partial success. True the force were shielded from the harmful effects of the Sun, but only by being sent over 500 years into the past.

Anyway, the army decide it might be quite a good idea to go and retrieve the soldiers and their well-respected Colonel, Matoba, from the 16th century. And with good reason - present day Japan is slowly disappearing, they presume due to the ‘butterfly effect’ of the Colonel‘s sudden presence in the past.

To do this, they enlist the help of a samurai warrior who’s been accidentally brought forward in time (Shichibei), and a reluctant former soldier (Kashima), who is enjoying a moderately successful career running a restaurant. By happy coincidence Kashima happens to know the Colonel, and is the only person to have ever bested his military tactics. I wonder if that might become useful...

Under strict orders to rescue the Colonel’s troops, the experiment is recreated and the rescue force is sent back in time. On arrival they use a helicopter to scout out the area and it quickly becomes the first of two chopper fireballs to grace the 16th century skies.

Spotting the rogue Colonel’s castle base, the helicopter flies in for a closer look. Unfortunately, the vintage castle’s defences been given a 21st century upgrade in the shape of surface-to-air missiles. The chopper evades the first but the second hits it sweetly, instantly engulfing the chopper in fire. The rest of the would-be rescuers are quickly captured by the combined forces of the Colonel's soldiers and the army of samurai warriors he‘s enlisted.

After so much breathless action it’s time for some exposition, so Colonel Matoba provides a handy précis for confused viewers. Having unexpectedly arrived in 1549 Matoba had briefly considered the ‘butterfly effect’. But like a jittery lepidopterophobic trapped in a butterfly farm, he decided to hell with that and deployed his army's full array of weaponry to swat the hordes of samurai surrounding his men.

Naturally, this taste of power was enough to send Matoba into full megalomaniac Bond villain mode. He‘s now plotting to use a nuclear device to erupt Mt Fuji, wiping out Japan so that he can rebuild it from scratch using his advanced technology. And, of course, telling everyone about how he can't be stopped.

The rescue mission is now a race against time so, with the fate of Japan hanging in the balance, our heroes escape from the castle to set up a final confrontation. Happily, this includes another chopper fireball.

Each force has one cobra chopper remaining. And if the first was a bit understated, the second is more of a CGI treat. With his castle under siege, Matoba's chopper reappears into the action. But Kashima's lot are well-prepared and use their own missile to shoot the chopper down as it approaches.

The helicopter lurches out-of-control and collides with an oil refinery that Matoba built at his base. This triggers a cascade of explosions which signal that the end of the film is has arrived.

Despite a highly dubious plot, the film just about hangs together and is mercifully under 90 minutes.

Artistic merit 

The first explosion, zero. The second though sees the explosion engulf the anachronistic Japanese military base, with catastrophic effects.

Number of exploding helicopters

Two out of a possible three is an impressive strike rate.

Exploding helicopter innovation

It's unusual to see one exploding helicopter in the 16th century, let alone two.

Positives

It certainly isn't slow paced. Prior to this film, director Masaaki Tezuka had mainly been involved on Godzilla films, and he wastes no time getting into the action. The film also looks the part and Takeshi Shimizu was named Best Art Director at the 2005 Asia-Pacific Film Festival. The big scene in which "The Castle" is comprehensively obliterated is a highlight - a case of no winners this week on Takeshi's Castle.

Negatives

It seemed a quite obvious error that the rescue team sent back didn't significantly outnumber the party that had 'gone rogue'. What sort of thinking suggested that one helicopter would be fine against two? No wonder Colonel Matoba wanted to create a new future if this was the quality of strategic thinking from the Japanese military's best and brightest.

Favourite quote

"Over-confidence leads Japan into WW2 only to suffer a cruel defeat...I will change all that. I will build a nation that 21st century citizens can be truly proud of. I do not intend on dying for a people who have long forgotten how to defend themselves!"

Interesting fact 

The film was based on a 1979 Japanese film, GI Samurai, and also resulted in a 4-episode mini series with a similar storyline.

In 2013, we are apparently approaching a solar maximum. No word on whether the UK military is going to send the SAS back to compete in the War of the Roses.

Review by: Joseph Clift

Man Of Steel

It’s perhaps fitting that a movie about a man made of steel should also feature a leaden script, tinny direction and mechanical acting. But that doesn’t make it any easier to watch.

Sad to report, Man of Steel (2013) follows the template of many recent hero movies: fairly bright opening section, dull second act weighed down by exposition and wind-baggery, then a seemingly endless parade of CGI bollocks for the climactic battle.

It’s a pity, because things do start well. The opening sequence on Krypton looks fabulous. Russell Crowe, playing Superman’s Dad, shows why – despite his appalling, mobile-flinging habits – they keep on writing the cheques. Wisely eschewing the freaky ‘Yorksh-Irish’ accent he attempted for Robin Hood, he successfully adopts a vintage, plummy English and brings a certain gravitas to the role.

Once we reach Earth, there are some cute scenes as young Clark’s powers (X-ray vision, laser eyes) make themselves suddenly apparent at school. But predictably, since we all now live in a post-Twilight world, tweenie Kent sees having superpowers through a prism of adolescent angst and largely sulks like Kristen Stewart with a heavy period.

When Henry Cavill is finally established as the main man, it’s like director Zack Snyder has hung out a banner saying: all characterisation ends here. Our hero is a big, blank wall. And things take a further dip when Lois Lane (Amy Adams) hits the scene.

As any fule kno, the playful chemistry between Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder pretty much made the original two Superman movies, but here there’s just a vacuum. Every 15 minutes or so, the odd couple are implausibly plonked next to each other so they can go a bit puppy-eyed, but there’s no context, no sense of spark, in fact no actual time for them to make any connection. No sooner do they start mumbling than BOOM…here comes another setpiece!

Their inevitable locking of lips at the end is the least successful cinematic kiss since Andie MacDowell – the Helen Keller of modern acting – had her rain-soaked smooch with Hugh Grant at the end of Four Weddings and a Funeral. (“Is it raining? I hadn’t noticed.” she chirruped. Well, you wouldn’t. You’re basically made of wood.)

Kevin Costner: Man Of Stolid

Director Zack Snyder throws a few big names into the mix in a vain attempt to add substance. Kevin Costner (look under ‘stolid’ in the dictionary and you’ll see him) puts in a stolid performance as Pa Kent. Big Lol Fishburne gamely cameos as the Daily Planet editor, both acting up and breathing in. But neither of them make much of an impression.

Michael Shannon (playing General Zod) has little to do but scowl and spit like a panto dame. And given he’s usually picking up a truck or punching through a building when he speaks, for a good 50 per cent of the time that’s not actually him you’re looking at. Only Snyder would hire one of America’s finest character actors then use a crap CGI version for half his lines.

In fact, Snyder’s boundless fascination with CGI is a big part of why this movie stinks so badly. It was fine for stuff like 300 and Sucker Punch, which were essentially computer games that somehow found their way into a cinema.

But now that he’s finally got the huge budget, the real actors, the opportunity to make a truly memorable film, what does he do? Piss CGI all over everything. He’s like the ugly single bloke who, finally finding a girlfriend, still keeps running home to dry-hump his trusty blow-up doll. It’s all he knows.

And talking of solitary pleasures that we’re all a little ashamed of, there is at least the helicopter scene to enjoy. Superman is in a small, desert town fighting Zod’s hench-baddies – the woman and the big thug. Big thug throws a truck that bashes the back rotors off a chopper, but Super Henry catches the falling pilot as it explodes. Then a second chopper gets hit. Things look potentially explosive for a moment! But, no. This one is carrying a senior army guy who has quite a few lines, so it naturally hits the floor with a soft bump with just a few rotor blades snapping off.

Artistic merit

Precious little. The whole scene is heavy with Snyder’s usual rat-a-tat editing style, and blurred images flash before the viewer at fit-inducing speed. This is clearly meant to convey a sense of frenzied excitement but, as always with such scenes, it’s merely trying to disguise the fact that most CGI still isn’t very convincing.

Exploding helicopter innovation

Having an artfully thrown truck ripping the arse-end off a chopper isn’t a bad idea, but the second crash is just dull. Perhaps it’s time to call a moratorium on the whole damaged-helicopter-teetering-slowly-to-the-ground-and-remaining-intact device (which only ever happens when named characters are on board). It’s getting sorely overplayed now.

Positives

Amy Adams: arriving again for no good reason

One of the chief joys of any Snyder movie is always the unintentional laugh. In Man of Steel, it chiefly comes from the growing improbability of Superman’s encounters with Lois. Having constructed a movie that is basically a series of huge action set pieces (no Superman Returns-style navel-gazing here), there are few natural-looking ways for Superman to bump into his lady. But hey, who needs natural?

Snyder simply plonks Lois bang in the middle of successive scenes with an admirable disregard for continuity or verisimilitude. (For example, when Supes finds the Fortress of Solitude, who do you think also happens to have popped by?)

Still, the best is saved till last. After the climactic Superman-Zod slamdown, which totals most of an entire city (we’re talking collapsing skyscrapers and square miles of battle-blasted wasteland here) she just pops up out of nowhere in time for a snog. How? From where? A strong suspicion has to be that Snyder had reasoned (correctly) that, by this point, no-one would much care.

Negatives

Hollywood rule #1: Cute dogs don't die

Kevin Costner’s death scene is so hackneyed and abysmal, it prompted a horrible sound in the auditorium as three hundred people spontaneously heaved and then had to swallow a little bit of sick. A huge twister is approaching, so the Kent family leave their car and race for cover under a bridge. But oh, no – they’ve forgotten the dog!

Despite the fact that Clark – even without his powers – is much younger and faster, Big Kev insists on lumbering back over to successfully free the dog (Hollywood Rule Number One: Cute dogs don’t die). But then, d’oh! He gets his foot stuck in the car, in a manner that only ever occurs in movies when danger is approaching. (Seriously, how does one get a foot ‘trapped’ in a space that can comfortably accommodate three people?)

What a dilemma! Clark can save Pops, but only by revealing his powers. As Clark ‘emotes’ helplessly, Dad looks at him with what can only be called a stolid earnestness and somberly shakes his head. Then is consumed by the raging twister.

Don’t you see? Dad had to die to preserve Clark’s secret. Or perhaps Clark could have just jogged over to the car much earlier and freed the dog without wrapping his leg up in a seat belt, while there was still plenty of time. What utter cock.

Interesting fact

Yards of press coverage has focussed on Henry Cavill’s punishing exercise regime for the role, but poor Henry here shows the thin line between incredibly buff and bodybuilder freakish. Put simply, he has actual muscle tits. In one early scene, when – wearing a scruffy beard – he bounds topless across the screen, breasts heaving, he looks like no-one more than Kenny Everett playing Cupid Stunt. Though obviously, it’s all done in the best possible taste.

Review by: Chopper

Munich

Munich (2005) can be summarised in just two words: everyone dies.

Steven Spielberg’s film tells the story of how Israel took revenge for the murder of its athletes at the 1972 Olympics. And bodies start piling up from the start.

We open with a graphic replay of the Munich massacre, as both hostages and terrorists are bloodily killed during the siege and a bungled police ambush.

Thereafter, the death toll rises inexorably. The Palestinians who masterminded the attack are hunted down and killed by a team of Israeli hitmen (led by Eric Bana), who are then in turn slowly killed off by the Palestinians in retaliation. Any resemblance in this endless cycle of violence to the ongoing Middle East situation is of course coincidental.

Suffice to say, by the end of the film, pretty much every character has either been shot, stabbed or blown up. (And sometimes, more than one of those things.) Still, it does save the trouble of having to remember everyone’s name.

For such a daunting mission, you might imagine Mossad would select a group of conscience-free, stone cold killers. After all, what’s needed here is a band of reptilian-blooded assassins who can maintain a laser-like focus on their job.

This, though, is a Steven Spielberg film. So, rather than a glamorised exercise in revenge-porn what we actually get is an earnest study in the morality of vengeance. Unfortunately, this requires Bana’s hit squad to be made up of quibbling aesthetes who quarrel endlessly about the ethics of their mission.

And boy, can they argue. There’s barely a scene without a bout of tetchy bickering as they tie each other up in existential knots, even while they’re supposed to be booby-trapping the hotel room of their next victim. In parts, it’s more Hollyoaks than Holy War.

The assassins bicker about ethics over a spot of lunch

As our dysfunctional team of stroppy assassins grimly continue their squabbling, I began to wonder what this mission might have looked like had it been given to Larry David, Woody Allen and Dustin Hoffman. Sure, there’d have been the same quotient of arguments and neurotic self-doubt, but at least there’d have been a few laughs.

All this intellectual self-flagellation makes Munich seem like a bizarre edition of The Moral Maze, only one where the panel punctuate their philosophical musings with an occasional car bombing.

Miraculously, despite the maelstrom of death around him, Eric Bana makes it through to the end of the film. That’s no mean feat for an actor who’s made a career out of playing characters who meet with a sticky end (Star Trek, Troy, The Time Traveller’s Wife, Hanna, et al).

Ultimately, this is good news both for Bana and for exploding helicopter fans, since he plays a pivotal role in one of the most bizarre chopper fireball scenes ever committed to celluloid.

So what happens?

After completing his mission, Bana returns home to the loving embrace of his wife but is haunted by his murderous actions. This being the Seventies – an age before psychotherapy and counselling – our Eric attempts to exorcise his demons in time-honoured male fashion by having some rumpy-pumpy with his wife.

While engaged in conjugal congress, a grim-faced Bana has a flashback to the bloody massacre at the airport during the 1972 Olympics. We see the hostages and the terrorists aboard a helicopter they’ve been given to fly out of the city. Unfortunately, the inept German police force choose this moment to start shooting at the terrorists, causing a gun battle to break out.

Bana: about to enjoy the 'helicopter explosion'

As the sequence develops, the action cuts between Bana’s increasingly sweaty thrashings and the unfolding disaster at the airport. Literally, it’s non-stop chopper action. As Bana pulls his best Eric-Clapton-playing-a-guitar-solo sexy face, the camera cuts to one of the terrorists pulling a pin from a grenade and rolling it underneath the chopper.

At this point, the scene reaches its (ahem) climax. As an impressively gurning Bana glories in his moment of orgasmic ecstasy, doubtless so do legions of exploding helicopter fans, writhing on their single men’s bedsit sofas as the aforementioned grenade blows up and destroys the chopper.

Spent, both Bana - and indeed chopper fireball fans - slump back in post-coital bliss.

Artistic merit

A giddy cocktail of sex, death and exploding helicopter - this is possibly the finest moment in Spielberg’s much lauded career as a director.

I’ve often wondered what I prefer most: sex or exploding helicopters. And now I know. I prefer my sex with exploding helicopters.

Exploding helicopter innovation

Totally unique. This is the first, and indeed only, time a helicopter explosion has been combined with a sex scene. More please.

Positives

In a film that’s a near three-hour murder-fest some light relief is provided by the cast who serve up an indigestible dog’s breakfast of accents.

The primary offenders are a curiously bewigged Daniel Craig, who jack-knifes violently between Afrikans and a dulcet northern brogue, and Eric Bana whose efforts at a Germanic lilt sound like he’s modelled it on Gruber, the camp as knickers Nazi from Allo Allo.

Surrounded by such linguistic butchery, Geoffrey Rush obviously concludes that the safest course is not to be pinned down by anything identifiable, and instead opts for an accent that can only be described as ‘foreign’.

Negatives

Revenge may be a dish best served cold, but unfortunately in Munich it makes for a chilly and remote film. While the filmmaking is stately and elegant, it is ultimately a cold, hollow exercise which fails to deliver either an emotional or intellectual punch.

Interesting fact

The fact Munich doesn’t quite work may in part be a result of its hectic production schedule. Filming and editing took place simultaneously in order to get the film out in time for Oscar consideration. Perhaps fittingly, given the subject matter, it bombed.

Review by: Jafo

Listen to the Exploding Helicopter podcast episode on Munich on iTunes, Stitcher, Podomatic or YourListen. Or listen here and now on the embedded player. 

Zero Dark Thirty

After a 12-year manhunt – which involved a pain-staking sift through thousands of leads, countless hours of interrogation and no small amount of brutal torture – it turns out the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks was the old beardy guy living quietly in a small house who no-one suspected.

If, like me, you’ve grown up watching Scooby Doo, you’d have known this was precisely the culprit and spent the entire film pointing at the screen shouting, “Him! It’s him!”

In fact, this is just one of many uncanny parallels Zero Dark Thirty (2013) has with the children’s TV cartoon. As the film’s hero, ball-busting CIA agent Maya (Jessica Chastain) combines the willowy, flame-haired looks of Daphne with the intimidating intelligence of the chunky knitwear-loving Velma.

The ‘mystery van’ in this instance turns out to be a jeep, which eventually leads the CIA to Bin Laden’s hideout, the sort of scary darkened house that Scooby and the gang timidly skulked around on a regular basis. Indeed, such is the overwhelming sense of déjà vu, that when the soldiers finally confront Osama I fully expected him to lament how he’d have gotten away with it were it not for those pesky Special Forces death squads.

Jessica Chastain: Daphne's hair and Velma's brains

Still, for all that, there are some notable differences. Unless I’m mistaken, Fred, Shaggy and the rest of the gang never actually resorted to torture to solve the mystery. (Of course, I here exclude any episodes featuring Scrappy Doo, each one of which represented a particularly base form of psychological torment. Had the US military only had the sense to play Scrappy episodes on a loop at Guantanamo, they’d have had the whole thing wrapped up in a fortnight.)

On the film’s release, there was much media discussion about the film’s depiction of what is euphemistically known in the intelligence world as ‘enhanced interrogation’. Famously, the movies trumpets a proud ‘Torture works!’ message, whereas the guy the fictional torture victim is based on in fact told them nothing more useful than: ‘This is very painful. Please stop stamping on my testicles and pretend-drowning me.’

Equally unconvincing is the black wig that Maya uses to disguise her flame-haired tresses and sneak inside a CIA ‘black site’. For a moment, I thought Morticia Addams had joined the war effort.

In fact, Kathryn Bigelow seems to have a special affinity for dodgy weaves in general. At the Agency’s own Langley headquarters, senior spooks Mark Strong and James Gandolfini both seem happy to sport the most unconvincing hairpieces seen in public since Sean Connery donned a steel brillo pad in The Hunt For Red October.

But of course, all this casual water-boarding and tonsorial tomfoolery would be as nothing if it weren’t for our primary interest – the helicopter explosion. For that we have to go back to the raid on Bin Laden’s compound.

Mark Strong disguised as a man with a full head of hair

The Navy Seal team are sent in to terminate Bin Laden with some good old fashioned extreme prejudice. As the mission involves surreptitiously sneaking into Pakistan they’re given a couple of prototype ‘stealth’ helicopters which officially don’t exist (but demonstrably do given their use here).

As they’re about to start the raid, one of the helicopters develops an unspecified technical fault and crash lands. However, the soldiers are not to be diverted from their task and the attack continues as planned.

After killing ‘the Big O’ the special ops team now have to make a speedy escape. But before making their evacuation, they need to cover their tracks and plant explosives on the wrecked aircraft – presumably to stop its secret technology falling into foreign hands (although given the chopper’s lamentable safety record it‘s hard to think they‘d want it).

However, further quibbling about aviation safety is abruptly ended when the explosives are detonated and the helicopter is consumed in lovely yellow flame.

Artistic merit

You don’t win an Oscar without knowing how to blow up a helicopter, and director Kathryn Bigelow ensures a suitably fitting conflagration for the downed chopper.

Exploding helicopter innovation

First known destruction of a helicopter which “officially doesn’t exist”. And, after the explosion, one that actually doesn’t exist either.

Do passengers survive?

Yes, the crew of the helicopter survive the crash landing and escape in the other chopper.

Positives

I have to give some credit to Mark Boal for writing a script that is, at times, an impenetrable litany of acronyms, short-hand, and military slang.

A regularly gripe of mine is the great mouthfuls of lumpen exposition that screenwriters feel compelled to put into the mouths of characters simply because they don’t believe the audience has the intelligence to follow the story.

It was thus refreshing to see Zero Dark Thirty making no such concessions to the viewer. It simply trusts you to either understand what’s happening or work out the answer for yourself.

Negatives

The film is easier to admire than love. With an aspiration to document the hunt for Bin Laden rather than moralise, and with Jessica Chastain’s character an impenetrable void at the centre of the film, there’s actually very little to enjoy. There’s equally little to learn if you bother read the news.

As is well known, the film was originally conceived before Bin Laden was discovered and killed and had to be hastily rewritten. I can’t help but wonder how the politics of the film would have been interpreted had Bin Laden never been found and the film made as it was first conceived. I can’t help but suspect it would have given the depicted events an existential power. Instead, they’re just grinding towards the inevitable conclusion.

Favourite quote

Despite the combined efforts of the CIA’s brightest minds, the latest in high-tech spy satellites, and cutting edge communication intercepts, I loved how the manhunt ultimately boiled down to a Delta Force soldier creeping around the spooky compound whispering, “Osama..? Osama..?”

I can only assume it was his years of elite military training which stopped him from adding: “…come out, come out, wherever you are.”

Interesting fact

Apparently James Cameron was at one time mentioned as a possible director for the film, but instead chose to make two sequels to Avatar. Well, he probably needs a few extra quid.

Review by: Jafo

The Delta Force

That’s Delta Force: the elite of America’s armed forces.

Trained killers. Experts with guns, knives, and their bare hands. Specialists in covert operations, hostage situations, and clandestine missions of testicle shrivelling dangerousness.

So, when I sat down to watch this movie, I was ready. Ready to be shocked and awed by the military prowess on display. Ready to be wowed by the cold, calculating, precision with which this team of highly-trained special forces would execute their mission.

I certainly wasn’t prepared for a display of military bungling so inept that, had there been a scene where Barbara Windsor’s bra unexpectedly whizzed off as Sid James ha-ha-ha-ed in the background, I’d have happily believed I was watching a particularly flaccid entry in the Carry On series: Carry On Commando, if you like.

But before we embark on an unexpurgated post-mortem, let’s briefly deal with the cookie-cutter plot.

A group of Middle East terrorists from Central Casting (a little known disputed territory near the West Bank) hijack an airplane full of American disaster movie clichés. You know the ones – pregnant lady, nuns, gung-ho jocks, stoic pensioner and an implausibly happy married couple celebrating, with ill-timed misfortune, their silver wedding anniversary. (Perhaps they didn’t have the budget for a plucky dog who you think has died but turns up at the end unscathed.)

So, with the hostages facing death at the hands of the stereotypically swarthy Arabs, it falls to the titular Delta Force led by Chuck Norris (for it is he) to kick rag-head butt and rescue the unfortunate airline passengers.

Chuck Norris wearing a pubic wig

As we’ve remarked before, our Chuck is one of the most singularly odd-looking men ever to enjoy a Hollywood career. Not least because his trademark beard – an unkempt thicket of wiry, straggly hair – makes him look he has a pubic wig attached to his chin.

And given this movie was made in the Eighties, Norris’ own physical oddity is naturally accentuated by some truly horrific wardrobe choices. Having previously rocked an ill-advised ‘double denim’ outfit in VHS classic Invasion USA, Norris here throws any last vestiges of restraint to the winds and boldly goes where no style icon or fashionista has gone before: triple denim.

Yes, TRIPLE denim. In one remarkable scene we get to witness Charles in denim jeans, denim shirt AND a denim jacket. Had Chuck at this precise moment dropped his trousers, I’ve no doubt we’d have found him resplendent in a pair of stonewashed denim budgie-smugglers.

Sadly for any stylists in the viewing audience, Norris soon switches into combat fatigues (regrettably non-denim) to get on with the urgent business of rescuing the hostages. And it’s at this point that the Delta Force’s elite military expertise is revealed to be nothing more than a thin veneer hiding a distinctly shabby amateurism.

This is strikingly demonstrated during Chuck’s first attempt to free the hostages. Neglecting to check how many terrorists they’re up against the raid ends in an unmitigated fiasco. In reprisal, the terrorists unceremoniously shoot one of the hostages in the head. Well, at least now we know they’ve got guns too.

Still, this is minor bungling when compared to Chuck’s big rescue plan after the hostages are moved from the jumbo jet to a fortified compound. To ensure the enemy will be taken completely by surprise, he plots a clandestine raid to be carried out in the dead of night.

All hostage situations must include a nun and a priest

Unfortunately, this sneak attack involves staging the biggest beach landing since D-Day. Trucks, jeeps and motorbikes clank noisily ashore, before rattling with an awful din through the streets of the Lebanon. Short of hiring Fatboy Slim to do a set of ‘bangin’ tunes’ from the back of one of the trucks (‘Make some noise, Beirut!’), it’s hard to see how they could have been less discreet.

But, I hear you cry, what about the exploding helicopter scene? Well, my chopper conflagration-fancying friends, I have shocking news to impart: it is, incredibly, the very first event in the film.

It’s true. Delta Force opens with a shot of a stationary helicopter in an empty barren desert. For a few seconds, nothing happens. Then the helicopter suddenly explodes. No exposition, no explanation, no introduction. One minute it’s there, the next it’s been blown to smithereens.

It’s a hell of a way to start a film. And as an attention grabbing statement of intent for a film, it’s as ballsy as any red-blooded exploding helicopter fan could wish for…

 Artistic merit

…but, having said that, I’ve mixed feelings about this helicopter explosion. On one level it’s the single greatest opening to a film I’ve ever seen. The chopper fireball is the very first thing to happen and I wouldn’t be running this website if the idea of helicopters exploding immediately at the start of a film didn’t thrill me in ways which would probably disturb you if I elaborated on them.

But on another level, it’s an unsatisfying experience. Like many of my own first teenage forays with girls, it’s all climax and no foreplay. And it’s so very brief. (Yes, the teen analogy till applies.) Ultimately the whole scene doesn’t really work.

Exploding helicopter innovation

At just five seconds into the film, Delta Force holds the record for the earliest exploding helicopter.

Do passengers survive?

Yes. Norris heroically runs back to the exploding helicopter to save a soldier who’s trapped onboard. There’s a conspicuous absence of camaraderie from the rest of the Delta Force troops though, who seem completely content to let their colleague burn to death. Maybe they just didn’t like him very much.

Positives

Smart suit + moustache + urbane manners = terrorist

In recent years any thriller with a Middle Eastern setting has seemed duty bound to have a hideously baffling plot as anyone who’s struggled through Syriana and Green Zone can attest.

Refreshingly, Delta Force makes commendably few intellectual demands on the viewer. Two thousand years of bloody and complex religious, national and political disputes are distilled to a simple message: Chuck Norris good, terrorists bad.

Delta Force aspires to nothing more than uncomplicated, patriotic tub-thumping fun best evidenced by the jingoistic ending which sees all the now rescued hostages singing the star spangled banner while drinking Budweisers. Not wanting to be left out I started chanting “U-S-A, U-S-A” at the screen.

Negatives

Clueless as they are, Delta Force by no means hold a monopoly on ineptness in this film. No, credit where it’s due – the terrorists also display a finely-curdled crapness as they prepare to hijack the plane.

Hilariously, one of the criminal hijacking masterminds turns out to only have a standby ticket. Since the flight’s full, he’s not allowed to board and is left stranded in the airport terminal. Don’t worry lads, I’ll hijack the next one.

Favourite quote

One plucky hostage manages to find the brighter side of being caught up in a hijacking: “Whatever happens, we’ll always remember our silver wedding anniversary.”

Interesting fact

Oddly, Delta Force is a significant film for a number of actors. Eagle-eyed viewers will spot future Hollywood stars Kevin Dillon and Liam Neeson in uncredited roles as fresh faced Delta Force soldiers.

While they were at the start of their careers, Delta Force proved to be the end of Lee Marvin’s. Possessed of a lean, gaunt look in his heyday, here Marvin exudes all the health of an animated corpse. Which isn’t far from the truth, as the great man died shortly after making this film.

Review by: Jafo

Still want more? Then listen to the Exploding Helicopter podcast episode on The Delta Force. Listen via iTunes, Podomatic, Stitcher, Acast and YourListen. Or even right here.

Iron Man 3

Let's face facts, once they hang up their cape most superheroes are as dull as ditchwater. Clark Kent is a socially inept wet blanket, Bruce Wayne a reclusive misery guts and Peter Parker a dweeby geek. Put it this way, they'd be deadly dull company if you ever invited them out for a few beers.

Tony Stark on the other hand would be a riot. Loaded, charismatic, with more one liners than Tommy Cooper, he'd be the life and soul of the party.

The success of the character is due in no small part to Robert Downey Jr's suave, sardonic portrayal of the millionaire playboy. You don't feel he's acting, so much as portraying a slightly exaggerated version of himself.

Coming after recent po-faced excursions into the comic book universe (we're looking at you Christopher Nolan) Downey's perpetually cocked eyebrow performance made the first film feel like a breath of fresh air.

Sequels though rarely improve on their predecessors and Iron Man 2 is a case in point. Foregoing the knockabout fun of the original, it’s really just a convoluted excuse to set up Stark's appearance in franchise crossover Avengers Assemble.

And it’s from the end of that film that the action in Iron Man 3 (2013) picks up. Having successfully battled an alien invasion alongside his superhero buddies, a shell-shocked, burnt-out Stark is recuperating in his Malibu mansion - which mostly consists of him tinkering with an army of Iron Mans suits and arguing with Gwyneth Paltrow.

As Stark licks his wounds, a string of terrorist bombings are perpetrated by The Mandarin - a flamboyant Osama-like character played by Ben Kingsley - causing chaos across the US and injuring Stark‘s head of security (Jon Favreau).

Agitated, Stark misguidedly goads the terrorist into taking him on personally and The Mandarin is only too happy to oblige. He sends a trio of heavily laden attack choppers to Stark's hillside hideaway to, let’s say, "redesign" Stark's premises through the medium of air-to-ground missiles.

The lead chopper flies in over the sea and fires off a couple of rockets, blowing a huge hole in the property's art deco frontage. Stark quickly dons his suit and returns fire by launching a huge chunk of masonry at the helicopter. Disappointingly, despite hitting his target, the chopper does not explode and flies out of shot.

A second helicopter swoops in, but this time Stark hits the jackpot. He hurls one of the explosives from his Iron Man suit at the helicopter. Then just as it reaches the chopper Stark uses a blast from one of the jets on his suit to ignite triggering an explosion. The damaged helicopter spins in classic dying whirly-bird fashion. Unfortunately, the stricken chopper crashes straight into the mansion causing the entire building to collapse.

Only a miracle now saves Stark from being crushed in the carnage and the last chopper pilot, thinking his work is done, pootles off for a well-earned pint.

Artistic merit

It’s a juicy set piece, nicely shot with plenty of destruction. But the helicopter explosion is delivered with a reddish glow which betrays its CGI origins. Though the sight of the cliff top mansion tumbling into he sea after succumbing to the helicopter wreckage is a nice touch.

Exploding helicopter innovation

Whilst the destruction of the chopper is pretty routine it’s not often you see a helicopter reduce a mansion to rumble.

Do passengers survive?

Unusually the first chopper pilot, despite being hit by a massive slab of concrete, looks like he may have been able to make an emergency landing. The second chopper pilot would have definitely came a cropper though.

Positives  

As to be expected with a Marvel adaptation, action fans will feel as satisfied as Lindsay Lohan holidaying in Colombia with the Green Bay Packers for company. All the set pieces are executed with aplomb (I particularly enjoyed the skydiving sequence) and there is more shiny CGI than you shake a stick at.

The producers have also managed to corral an ensemble of great acting talent together so Downey isn’t left to prop up the picture on his own. Guy Pearce delivers another convincing performance as evil mastermind Aldrich Killian that continues to make his time as Mike Pearce in Neighbours seems like a cheese induced dream.

Ben Kingsley, as always, is a delight and delivers an unexpected character twist that is usually absent in this genre. Topping it off we get ultimate movie asshole Miguel Ferrer, of Robocop fame, popping up as the crooked Vice President Rodriguez.

Negatives

Despite the acting chops on display not everything is rosy in the Iron Man universe. Director Shane Black may be responsible for writing the classic Lethal Weapon series, but its wise-cracking buddy formula doesn't work so well here.

Stark befriends a precocious brat (Ty Simkins) whilst investigating the dubious explosions that maybe linked to the accident that befalls his head of security. Their "banter" during these scenes feels forced and not a little ridiculous.

The pacing of the film is also questionable, lurching as it does between knockabout one-liners and gruesome deaths with nary a gap in between. Whilst the original film had its moments of levity rooted in Downey's louche portrayal of Stark, here the comedy is overdone giving the film a schizophrenic character.
 
Also, the technology in the original movie felt like it was grounded in reality. But here the audience is required to take a greater leap of faith. Stark's new remote control Iron Man suits and Killian's DNA regeneration programme feel like one step too far and possibly a case of jumping the shark.

Overall the film is more enjoyable than Iron Man 2, but fails to capture the magic of the original. I wouldn't go out of your way to see it.

Favourite quote 

Brandt: “Is that all you've got? A cheap trick and a cheesy one-liner?”
Tony Stark: “Sweetheart, that could be the name of my autobiography.

Interesting fact

Shane Black is a bit of a jack of all trades. Not content with being a mere screenwriter or director he has also dipped a toe in the acting world. Keen eyed exploding helicopter fans might recognise him as the bespectacled radio operator Hawkins from the action classic Predator. This bit of trivia is just an excuse for me me to quote the following lame joke:

Hawkins: Billy. Billy! The other day, I was going down on my girlfriend, I said to her, "Jeez you got a big pussy. Jeez you got a big pussy." She said, "Why did you say that twice?" I said, "I didn't."
[Billy stares blankly]
Hawkins: See, cuz of the echo.

Bonus fact

Hang about till the end of the credits to see Stark on the psychiatrist couch with Dr David Banner. Worth waiting for.

Review by: Neon Messiah

Listen to the Exploding Helicopter podcast episode on Iron Man 3. Find the show on YourListen, iTunes, Podomatic and Stitcher.