If you know the original Underworld you’ve a pretty good idea what you’re getting here: Vampires, Werewolves, action, a palette of blacks & blue, a certain amount of gore, a British character actor of a certain age, a gut shaking thump to the soundtrack and, of course, Kate Beckinsale in that outfit.

Yet for each of those characteristics they have in common each of the Underworld films is a slightly different beast.  The first is more political, Evolution is more of a chase and Rise of the Lycans is more historical.  So what of Awakening?  Humans have discovered the existence of Vampires and Lycans and set out to exterminate them.

After three films most people will already have some idea if this is a film for them or not.  The real question is does it deliver (and does it have Kate Beckinsale in that outfit)?  Personally I have to say it’s a definite yes.  It delivers.

I’m not going to over analyse it because, frankly, analysing this film too much would be silly.

I still think the first film is my favourite because the politics and mystery added a level of nuance to the story.  Underworld: Awakening is a new fairly close second place.

And it has Kate Beckinsale in that outfit.  With guns.

If you’ve ever stood on the side of a road and seen a car about to crash you’ll understand this film.  If you’ve ever sat in a car that is likely to crash you’ll understand what is staring the characters in the face in Margin Call.

Margin Call is the story of 48 hours in a bank as things go wrong.  Almost from the start there is a growing sense that things are falling apart.  It starts in a small way and grows as the crash looms more and more certain.  This is a story that could become bogged down in the detail of the financial dealings at the core of the story.  Instead it sketches them in the same way a science fiction film uses techno babble to explain how a space ship travels faster than light and don’t fall out of the sky despite having no wings.

There seems to have been a Mexican standoff amongst the actors.  There are lots of actors in this who are known for chewing scenery including Kevin Spacey, Paul Bettany, Jeremy Irons, Zachary Quinto and Stanley Tucci.  Yet the performances are measured without histrionics.  The drama is on the screen but it’s the car crash that’s about to happen.

This is a smart film with no gun fire, chases, explosions, fist fights or car crashes except a metaphorical one. If you want to see an interesting film go see this.

Due to my own stupidity and incompetence I never made it to the Open Eye Gallery before its new venue so I can’t compare it to the old space.  Its new home is almost on the waterfront in a small but perfectly formed gallery with three rooms and a small shop.

There is an impressive elegance to the design.  It’s a simple uncluttered space with simple wall geometry and sight lines used to incorporate the entrance, reception, retail and first gallery area into one room without the other elements impinging on the gallery space.  Cleverly though the reception desk can see the retail area, entrance and first exhibition area while also acting as the payment point for the shop area without resorting to an exit through the shop design.  It’s the sort of architectural design I can’t help admiring.

I read about the Painted Photographs exhibition of pictures collected by Martin Parr on the BBC website last week.  Some of the commenters on the site get tangled up in the idea that this is a modern art exhibition.  It’s nothing of the sort.  It’s a curious insight into the way things were done before Photoshop became the ubiquitous tool of photo retouching.  Its old school and fascinating for it.

There is a photograph of Mohammed Ali arriving in London with crop marks to just use his face, another of James Dean with legs painted in and one of John Lennon with just enough of Yoko painted out to make a square frame of his face.  The brush work is hurried and surprisingly basic.  These are pieces of work produced to illustrate a news story not pieces of art intended to be hung in a gallery.

If you’re interested in how things were done before digital stormed the world this exhibition is worth a visit.   It’s a perfect for a bite sized visit for lunch if you work in the city centre or an excellent aperitif for its larger neighbours if you’re coming from further afield.

They say football is a game of two halves: and so is my review of Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol.

Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol is an enjoyable movie.  It’s populated by beautiful people in exotic locations.  It has guns and gadgets.  It has explosions.  It has chases.  It has spectacular high places.  It has all the elements of a modern action spy thriller.

It is dominated by Tom Cruise but I don’t see that as a bad thing.  It’s his name above the title on the poster.  He’s the one at the front of the group on the poster.  He’s one of the film’s producers too.   If he’d not been the main player reviewers would be asking “where’s Tom?”

It has a stand out performance for me was Simon Pegg: Benji  is a great foil to Ethan Hunt.  Benji is both competent at the technical parts of the job but Pegg manages to infuse him with enough comedy to  lighten the films atmosphere.  William Brandt  (Jeremy Renner) and Jane Carter (Paula Patton) round out the team yet despite being given more back story than Benji  get less to do.

It’s Not a lot of effort goes into developing the villains whose actions drive the plot with little more justification than they’re a bit mad or are working for cash.

It is overall an enjoyable action movie – not a classic but good fun.

But is it a Mission Impossible film?

On the surface it has the trappings of a film based on the 1960′s TV show: the famous theme music runs over credits that feature glimpses of the action to come while a fuse burns down; there are face masks; there are missions that are impossible; the stakes are high; the secretary will disavow all knowledge etc etc etc.

The problem is these are elements borrowed from the series not what made it unique.  Week in week out they used to select a team of talented individuals, have a little fun as they showed the gear they’d use, then the stone cold operatives would go into action, overcome some unexpected happenings before Mission: Accomplished they’d ride into the distance.  I’ve not kept count but if the current IMF pull off more than 50% of their jobs then I’d be surprised.  At least in Ghost Protocol despite hints there aren’t any traitors in the IMF.

Oddly one of the elements of the movie I liked the most annoys me as being not MI.  Benji is good as the tech guy but he isn’t a Barney.  Barney would crack a joke in prep for a mission but on the job?  Speaking English, talking about how cool it is to be a spy while walking through the Kremlin?  Mission Impossible isn’t about characters who need to wise crack all the time.  Leave the one liners to Bond movies.   I’d actually like to see if Simon Pegg can play a straight role because I have a feeling he’d be pretty good at it.

Jane Carter is another case of not quite getting the original series.  I’m glad she can hold her own in a fight like her three male companions.  We’ve come a long way from heroines who couldn’t do anything in a fight via Buffy and Alias.  Carter shows us that she can fight in Dubai.  Yet if I was picking an MI squad I’d take Barbara Bain’s Cinnamon Carter.  Why?  Because in Mumbai she’d have tricked the guy into giving up the code for the satellite and done it with a ton of style.

Frankly I’d like to see the MIF showing a bit more brain and a little less brawn.   Not so much running around.  Fewer guns.  Fewer car chases.   By now the IMF should be getting disavowed.  And handed their P45s too and looking for jobs as MFI.

On the plus side the theme sounds like it’s in the correct time signature.  The infiltration of the Kremlin is pretty good till it goes wrong.  There are some nice references to elements of the original series dropped in.  This is also a smaller, lighter weight IMF at least after Ghost Protocol is invoked who can’t call tech support or the marines.  And they don’t throw a traitor in the MIF into the story.

So if you’re a fan of the original Mission Impossible series and were hoping for more than a bit of surface ephemera on an OK action film you may be disappointed.

One critic I saw pretty much said it was more of the same as Sherlock Holmes from 2010 as though that was almost a bad thing.  I’d say it’s a very smart move.  Its equal parts modern panto, action film and Sherlock Holmes redefined.  On a grander scale than Sherlock Holmes but without going to far over the top.

Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law keep the repartee going and both carry the action brilliantly too.  It appears such an effortless relationship that it gives space for the Moriarty / Holmes dynamic that drives the film’s plot.

Moriarty is delicious – a truly worthy performance to complement Robert Downey Jr as a villain to equal Holmes.  He’s not at all a moustache twirler but a subtle and balanced villain.  Stephen Fry’s Mycroft Holmes is used sparingly but brilliantly especially his nude scene.   He could probably carry a Quite Interesting film all of his own.

Rachel McAdams, Noomi Rapace, Paul Anderson, Kelly Reilly, Geraldine James, Eddie Marsan and every other character down to extras playing minor villains, street life and gypsies do a great job of supporting the core cast while in many cases bringing characters only briefly on-screen to life as more than punch bags for the leads.

The sound track is excellent and uses a fiddle to add pace.  There is just enough steam punk without going too far over the top.  The visuals are excellent and the use of camera focus on expansive visual effects shots of historic cities to draw the eye is beautifully used.  The slow motion style from the first film is reused to great effect in the action sequences.

Foreshadows wonderfully used.  Too often films foreshadow one thing with a lingering shot. This one plays with it wonderfully by layering foreshadowing with the obvious foreshadowing of some elements to distract from other foreshadowing more subtly set up for later.

The climatic chess game is a cliché setting up to a twist on Holmes working out a fight before it happens.

Twice they don’t show us the body.  The first time we hear her fall and Moriarty tells us Irene Adler is dead but all we see is a slightly bloody handkerchief.  When Holmes sniffs it could he have detected something that will be revealed in a sequel?   And of course there is the other  body we don’t see.

The only bad thing I could say about Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is that the title is a bit of a cliché.  I mean A Game of Shadows?  Try harder.  Sorry just kidding

So overall I really enjoyed this in fact I can’t think of anything bad to say about Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.  Great fun.

In the winter a slightly odd phenomenon sometimes happens when I do the rather mundane task of doing the washing up. When its cold outside and I fill the bowl with hot water steam produces tiny water drops all over the bar of soap on my window sill. I’ve normally only seen this at night but a few times I’ve found its happened late in the day. Tonight it was light enough to get a few photographs before the drops succumbed to gravity and ran into the soap dish.

Just back from seeing the prequel come remake of The Thing.  Not a bad film with some pretty landscape shots.  Unfortunately far too keen to show off the alien, the alien human hybrids and the space ship.  Also suffered from too many clichés.   Most of the “shocks” were very effectively spoilt by an overly obvious pre-shock – man in nervous situation, someone shouts boo at him then after a slow count to five the alien bursts out of its icy home.  Similarly lazy dialogue.  A shame because the potential for horror by building paranoia in a small group cut off from outside help lurks through the film.

Can someone explain why a geological expedition to Antarctica in 1982 has two flamethrowers, a box of grenades and at least one assault rifle?  Were they afraid some polar bears might migrate from the Artic?

Also suffered from the makers having watched Alien one too many time and wanting their very own Ripley to play with in a sequel to their prequel they left open in the first of their two endings.  The second ending cut into the credits pretty much sets up the original film.

The Thing is not a bad film overall but not one I’ll be planning to see again.

The other day my old clockwork kitchen timer broke so I went to buy a new one.  Now in our topsy-turvy post Woolworths age the simple mechanical timer seems to have become an expensive , luxury item so I ended up with a Heston Blumenthal battery powered model that also doubles as a clock.  I picked it because I liked the look and it was the cheapest one I’d found.  On opening it I found a tiny sheet of instructions and a large sheet that makes me think someone is still running the Heston Blumenthal joke.  The guarantee makes it clear that the timer is for “Domestic Use Only”.  Yet the other sheet is headed “Electromagnetic Compatibility” and provides detailed warnings about factors that electromagnetic instruments may influence the timer or cause it to temporarily malfunction.  Which could obviously be a serious risk if trying to precisely boil your egg for the 416 seconds required for the perfect firmer, more creamy yolk with a completely set white.

Johnny English Reborn is mildly amusing throughout occasionally managing to actually be funny.  More polished than the first Johnny English film and with far less reliance, thankfully, on toilet humour.

The supporting cast do a good job of being the straight guy to Rowan Atkinson’s English.  Only the characters played by Tim McInnerny, Daniel Kaluuya’s and a few extras don’t always play their parts straight.

There are some ok pastiches of Bond in the score, title sequence, plot, Q branch sequence and look.  There is a training sequence sends up You Only Live Twice’s ninja school with its ninja’s who are immune to a kick to the privates and every other training sequence made up of randomly cut together exercises showing a character going from wimp to hero.

The biggest problem is the inconsistency in Johnny English.  One minute Johnny is a highly competent spy and then suddenly he is an incompetent klutz.  Inspector Clouseau worked because he was always incompetent and accident prone but somehow that ended up played in his favour.  Blackadder worked because he was competent and sharp but surrounded by incompetents.  Johnny English sadly doesn’t achieve

It’s a shame because both flavours of English have their moments.  Incompetent English, the English of the adverts, who flies a helicopter along a road at street level is fun.  The competent English who outsmarts the free running villain is also fun.

So, sadly, Johnny English Reborn is more Johnny English Run Aground.