GIRLS VS BOYS PART TWO

SquareOne Entertainment

by Katie Smyth

Katie’s Lads’ Film Reviews

Popcorn? Check. Pringles? Check. Kingsize box of tissues? Check. For years now I’ve been adept at putting together the perfect combination for a girlie night in. From the age of ten me and my girls have laughed and cried our way through about every rom-com released more and more with Bridget. So imagine my dismay when my fellow SquareOne monkey Hammond challenged me to a trilogy of macho, gore-filled DVDs. Having grown up the only girl with a pile of boy cousins I’ve seen my fair share of lads’ films but it’s been quite an achievement to reach my 23rd year without seeing the Alien trilogy. So without further ado here’s my female trip through the cannon of blokes’ tinsel-town.

Aliens

Starring: Sigourney Weaver and Michael Behn

Ellen Ripley wakens up after a 57 year hypersleep to discover she has to foot the bill for the last space ship she blew up. Trouble is no one’s willing to accept it was all done in the name of saving mankind from an unknown life-form and in the meantime have colonised the rock where the original hoo-ha kicked off. So when it all hits the fan and contact is lost with the colonials Ripley’s called back to kick some alien butt. In a film where the men are butch and women butcher this outstanding piece of 80s third-wave feminism will have you desperate to burn your bra, don a hideous jumpsuit and grab the closest flamethrower to hand. Brilliant, but couldn’t Ripley and Hicks please just get it together?!

Beerfest

Starring: Jay Chandrasekhar, Kevin Heffernan, Steve Lemme and Paul Soter

Described in the blurb as “coarse, crass and crude,” Beerfest is a truly revolting insight into male binge drinking at its worst. Two American brothers rock up at Oktoberfest to scatter the ashes of their Bavarian grandfather, and in the ensuing chaos manage to expose every breast in sight and majorly piss off “ze Germans.” Vowing to return next year to drink the krauts under the table they recruit a Jewish nerd, fat hick and troubled rent boy, and belch their way through the next twelve months. Employing every racial stereotype in the book this two hour package of filth highlights everything that’s wrong with giving an American a keg.

Master and Commander

Starring: Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany

If there’s one thing Russell Crowe can do it’s testosterone-fuelled action hero but minus the leather “Gladiator” body armour and nippy crew cut he disappoints in this Napoleonic romp. Chasing a French man-of-war around Cape Horn in 1815 Captain Crowe drags his motley crew through battle, tempest and weevil-infested biscuits until they finally find port in the Galapagos. Though packed with cannon fire and amputations a-plenty Master and Commander never loses the niggling feeling that this is just second-rate Hornblower with a craggier, less pretty protagonist than Ioan Gruffadd. Though Bettany plays a convincingly sensitive foil to Crowe’s alpha male as the ship’s doctor the overall impression is undercut by wooden acting, poor plot and overly ambitious graphics.

GIRLS VS BOYS PART ONE

SquareOne Entertainment

by Chris Hammond

Hammond's Chick Flick Reviews

Chick flicks, the very thought of them brings back long suppressed memories of ex-girlfriends, Sunday night television before digital arrived and cinemas smelling like The Body Shop. Eager to see if my opinion had mellowed in my old age, I perhaps unwisely, challenged Katie to a lads vs ladies DVD duel. Selecting for her a historical war epic, gory sci-fi and depressingly crass comedy, I thought I had the upper had . . . till I saw what was in store for me!

Bridget Jones’s Diary

Starring: Renee Zellweger, Hugh Grant and Colin Firth

Zellweger plays a frumpy blonde who for some reason is romantically torn between uber-cad Grant and creepy, permanently morose Firth. Mishap follows mishap, occasionally raising a smile or chuckle. There’s a fight, not a very good one but a scrap nevertheless, some decent one liners and the occasional surprise cameo. And then it ends! Too soon? Not really .

For the record she should go for Hugh Grant every time . . .

The Devil Wears Prada

Starring: Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt and Meryl Streep

Ostensibly nothing more than an advert for impractical clothing and bad acting, The Devil Wears Prada is also duller than a week in the jail. For starters it’s pretty difficult to comprehend any film that requires sex on legs Anne Hathaway to say “I am not skinny or glamorous” in the first five minutes. The ‘story’ then revolves around Hathaways attempts to please her lukewarm employer Streep whilst trying to ‘keep it real’. If I’d been directing, the final scene would have involved a lorry ploughing into the tedious lot of them. But of course as a fish out of water feel good drama everything ends well for everyone. Utter s_t.

Footloose

Starring: Kevin Bacon, Lori singer and John Lithgow

Veering from camp to serious and back again this all dancing tale of religious repression, violence against women and bad hair is the ultimate in racy 80’s trash teen cinema. Kevin Bacon plays a brooding, hip, city hoodlum trying to boogie the night away with the local skirt. Things don’t go to plan though because first he must un-ban dancing. One thing that can be said in favour of Footloose is that it confirms to the world that if you wanna get the girl you’ve gotta be able to jive like a prat, kick the crap out of rival alpha males and generally act like a total prick. Profound.