Model Airplanes

We have another movie with special effects created by having a foreground object or actor imposed on a background scene that was shot separately. As kc pointed out, this was rather charming in “The Lavender Hill Mob”. But do you think it works here?

The interior of their B-52 was realistic, and I liked the background view of flying when it was out the window. But I think they should have skipped all the exterior shots of the plane since it just looked like the small model that it was and didn’t move in conjunction with the background. Getting damaged by the missile blast wasn’t impressive either. I think it would have been more intense and tightly focused to have done only interior shots. This might be true even if the U.S. Air force had allowed the use of a B-52 which they never would for a critical movie like this.

Has anyone seen ... ?

Before we leave the subject of British films, has anyone seen any movies by director Shane Meadows? I actually wanted to pick "This is England" from him, but I noticed it wasn't on Netflix, and then "Lavender Hill Mob" caught my eye. Meadows sounds really interesting, particularly the "This is England" film, which is about a little kid who is befriended by some skinheads. He also did "A Room for Romeo Brass" (about the friendship of two young boys) and "Dead Man's Shoes" (about a soldier seeking revenge on some guys who brutalized his brother). He has other films, but those are the ones I've heard of. Has anyone seen? If so, what did you think?

How effective?

I found the motion effects really charming, because they were so amateur by our standards: running down the Eiffel tower (they just looked like they were running in place), the nausea at the end, the car chases with people bouncing up and down while scenery moved around them, the unspectacular, Keystone-coplike crashes. I wonder if that was considered well done in its time. I saw part of "Jaws" recently and was shocked to see how fake it all looked. And that was from the '70s. It makes me wonder whether motion effects that we consider really realistic today are going to be laughable in 20 years. Or do you think big-budget filmdom has pretty much mastered the special effect?

Does anyone have a guess on what the first film was to use the device of newspaper headlines?

Merry men

One thing I find really enchanting about heist movies, as opposed to other crime movies, is that the audience is almost always intended to thoroughly identify with and root for the thieves (I suppose there is a British tradition of this way back to Robin Hood), who are generally good-natured and well-meaning in their own ways. We hope they succeed and get away with the crime. Part of the impulse is that they have to be really smart to succeed, and audiences always appreciate and want to identify with a smart "anti-hero." The cops in these movies are usually sort of bumbling and not really well-matched to their foes, although they sometimes get their man. And there's usually some unforeseen glitch (like the gold statuettes falling into the hands of a recalcitrant British brat).

Do you have any thoughts on this as a heist film, particularly a comic heist film?

Interesting ranking

On the British Film Institute Web site (a selection of the favourite British films of the 20th century), LHM comes in at No. 17. While I enjoyed the movie and I am dubious of all ranking systems, I found it puzzling that this film would crack the Top 20. I need to read more about it to get more context, to see what is so special about it, but in the meantime, do you have any thoughts on that ranking? Do you have a favorite British film?

Kim's pick

This is a British classic that I've heard about forever but have never seen — with the great Alec Guinness (plus a cameo by a very young Audrey Hepburn).