Thursday 5 October 2006

The Last Samurai, McDonalds & Starsky & Hutch - GG

How does an American, during Civil War times, become the hero in a Japanese samurai movie ? My question wasn’t really answered either after I watched The Last Samurai (Fri 9 830P) a year ago. Suffice to say that it is a competently choreographed action pic. that more or less succeeds at what it sets out to do; there is a sense of honour, the apologetic retrospection on colonialism is set up as the baddy and Tom Cruise survives.
Two years ago Morgan Spurlock made headlines with the latest doco. on the evils of McDonalds in Super Size Me (Sun 10 9P). By eating nothing but McDonalds food three times a day for one month he seriously compromised his health and captured all the effects in this film. McDonalds, never ones to miss capitalising on any publicity good or bad, have since introduced their “healthy options” menu items and McDonalds Australia were very quickly out, at the time, campaigning how they were different to their American parents by not offering super sizes to each of their product lines – I guess what plans they had to introduce that concept to Australian consumers has been shelved for a little while.
And if you were ever a fan of Starsky and Hutch in the 70s, then you will enjoy the modern remake with Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson in the titular roles (Sun 7 830P). For mine, Snoop Dogg as their ‘too cool for school’ underground informant, Huggy Bear, steals every scene he is in and the cameos of the original S&H at the end a good laugh for the fans. This 2004 movie is followed by the 1975 Starsky & Hutch – The Original Movie (Sun 7 1030P) which is no doubt an extension of their 1 hour TV show.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Starsky and Hutch is pretty lame by Ben Stiller standards. It's not particularly good, but then again, not particularly bad. I didn't think much of Snoop Dogg, actually I thought he wasn't particularly funny, cool or schooled. I also don't think much of Owen Wilson's comedy skills so that doesn't really help matters. The cameo was so pathetic and due to the "HEY LOOK, IT'S A CAMEO BY THE ORIGINAL GUYS" obviousness the entire joke was wasted.

Starsky and Hutch is Stiller on auto-pilot. Funny, but not particularly memorable. Indeed I have forgotten most of it and most of the jokes. Not a good sign.

Still, you could do worse, just watch an Adam Sandler flick.