A former film critic has chucked it in and now reviews movies before either of you have seen them.

LONDON FILM FESTIVAL 1995

So LFF is here once again and I hear you say 'so what?' (asuming anyone is actually reading this). PR fuckfest or philistines' beanfeast? That is the question. This year, 180 films are on show and as in previous years, most are unwatchable for reasons of cost (West End Cinema prices), exclusivity (tickets snapped up by media freeloaders or sad NFT trainspotter types) or because...well, because they're foreign. There's nothing wrong with a foreign film forum per sae and certainly there is a case to be made for events which showcase work from all over the world.

But it does make on feel quite queasy to see all the bullshit and backslapping, the hullabaloo and all the noise made over the 'great' British film industry - which like the nation itself is a pathetic and feeble shadow of its former glory (whatever that was). Most of the best film-makers from Britain have scarpered to where the money is, leaving behing decrepit studios, unemployed actors, underworked technicians and a phalanx of jumped-up pop video directors.

And of course, adverts that are trying to be films.

The only succesful films in recent times have been those sent in theme-park Britain (quaint, class-ridden and white), the exception being Shallow Grave - but that in any case was overrated, derivative cack. Enough already, back to LFF and the films worth watching:


Or so I've been told. Don't take my word for it. Wait 'til the video comes out.
10 out of 10 (on average)

JADE

The poster shows a hand about to grope a woman's bottom from behind 'Some fantasies go too far' it says. Yeah, right. The image obviosly alludes to rear entry. Well, no it doesn't, but I really can't think of anything remotely interesting to say about the dismal film. The director, William Friedkin made The Exorcist and The French Connection - two splendid movies but afterwards his career went on the slide, reaching an all-time low with The Guardian, a celluloid travesty in which Jenny seagrove cavorts naked (though not often enough to redeem this tawdry little film). Unfortuantely, this low point was followed by many equally low points and Friedkin currently resides at the bottom of the Hollywood shit barrel. The same cannot be said however of Joe Eszterhas, scriptwriter/Chewbacca lookalike, who has made a very good living out of one storyline: dumb but likeable person loves cold calculating person who may or may not be a crazed psychpath killer. (He sold the idea first in Jagged Edge, then in Basic Instinct, so you might have seen elements of this film before -Ed) Yawn. Oh, and make sure you include a few shots of tits and bums for god measure. What on earth are Linda Fiorentino and David Caruso (he charismatic ginger nut from NYPD Blue) doing in this film? This is the sort of crap Michael Dougls rejects. Avoid at all costs.
9 out of 10

FRENCH KISS

Zut alors! French toast, French letters, frogs' legs, toad in the hole. what is it about France in general and Paris in particular that akes Americans behave so stupidly? The Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, coissants and coffee by the Seine. Ah oui! Non. Je ne sais pas. How about rude and arrogant xenophobes who never wash and an ndergound system which smells of piss? Gerard Depardieu is the french equivalent of Arthur Mullard but Americans still thnk of Gene Kelly and Piaf and romantic evening s by the Sacre Couer. Balls I say. The film and equally execrable Forget Paris are no better than Elvis Presley's interminable 'travelogues'; sickly sweet delayed-fuck movies with picture postcard scenery and moronic natives. No, I take that back. At least Elvis was The King.

OK. Meg Ryan is very pretty and I do believe that Kevin Klein tickles the ivories with great aplomb, but Lawrence Kasdan is a lousy director and all his films have a distinctive whiff of cheese about them. Or in this case, I should say, camembert. It's a sad fact, you know, that Americans love France so much that they repeatedly have simpple yet stylish French movies and convert them into easily digested trash starring Ted danson, Tom Selleck, or some other useless TV has-ben, to be served up to a nation of bumtious cineplex vulgarians. Nope. French Kiss is Love Story-by-numbers. Formula film making at its worst, the formula on this occasion being: Kasdan plus Kline equals Krap movie. In a word merde.
0 out of 10

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