Film Flare's Film Diary 2013/23

22/07/2013

Film Flare's Film Diary 2013/23

Considering I'm usually flinging out one solitary entry a week in the shape of FFFD, I'm happy to report that the last week or two has been what I would consider hyper-productive.

I've literally been eroding the keys on my keyboard bringing you fine folk film reviews, FFFD entries, Tenuous Links (work in progress) and random nuggets of text. Of course, if anyone has any ideas about what to write about or if any particular reviews or entries resonated, please let me know and I'll try to accommodate them more into my work.

But for now. FFFD.

And it's a pretty naff film which for some inexplicable reason I really enjoy. Like eating Sainsbury's own brand pork pies. You know it's rubbish and probably bad for your health, but dammit, you just don't care.

Product placement!

Hard Rain (1998)

This bizarre little film stars Morgan Freeman in one of his more unlikable roles, animated puppet Christian Slater and The Most Irritating Woman Alive (tm) Minnie Driver.

It's a film that was produced by so many companies (BBC, Marubeni, Mutual Film Company, Nordisk Film, Paramount Pictures, Polygram Filmed Entertainment, Toho-Towa and Union Generale Cinematographique) that it's any wonder that the film's run time isn't spent entirely on the opening credits.

But it doesn't and the plot of the film soon leaps into action.

Christian Slater is Tom (just Tom), an armoured drunk driver carrying a bumload of cash gets caught up in the worst flood in recorded history. That's why the film is called Hard Rain, because it rains hard. Anyway, Morgan Freeman has plans to rob the truck but it all goes wrong and Tom wades away with the money and hides it. We get introduced to the sheriff, Randy Quaid quite early on too. I can only imagine he must have been given scuba diving gear whilst shooting because the whole town is quickly submerged but he STILL manages to chew scenery so much you expect him to fall into a diabetic coma.

So the film is a really odd mix of crime/action/disaster film. The action is pretty well done and the disaster part is pretty well done too, with lots of collateral damage. Director Mikael Salomon manages to keep everything running pretty fast and the effects are certainly impressive.

It's just a real pity that the script is SO bad. Literally, terrible. Actors who have been in some of the finest roles I've seen (Slater: True Romance, Freeman: Se7en) are left floundering in inconsistent narrative, bad scripting and plot holes. The film is almost on the 'so bad it's good' scale but the sense of humour is forced and falls so flat on it's face.

So why do I like the film?

I'll be honest. I don't know.

Even in terms of pointless action film, it isn't really great. The flooded town provides a novel setting and the idea of driving speedboats through stained glass windows for a gunfight in church is so WTF that it just is funny.

The film is simple, the characters have no time to be complex. It's like pantomime. You may as well screech 'Look Out! He's Behind You!' every time Randy Quaid slithers onto the screen.

I think it's because I caught it long, long ago on the BBC late one night and it was one of the first times I was up late enough to watch something like this the whole way through. I've watched it several times on DVD and always found it enjoyable. But everyone I've ever shown it to, saying 'It's rubbish, but fun.' have clawed their own eyes out and used the optic nerve to scribe their last will and testament on the carpet.

I don't know why.

Trailer:

Posted at 07:17 PM in 2013, Diary, Film, People, Review, Trailers, Weblogs | Permalink

Tags: 1998, 2013, Christian Slater, diary, Film Flare, Hard Rain, Mikael Salomon, Minnie Driver, Morgan Freeman, Mutual Film Company, news, Nordisk Film, Paramount Pictures, Polygram Filmed Entertainment, Randy Quaid, reviews, trailers, Union Generale Cinematographique

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