Doomsday (Neil Marshall, 2008)

[Antoine Doinel]

Trailer.

[flyonthewall2983]

Best trailer of the year, only for the two second gratuitous ass-shot of the heroine (whatshername from Nip/Tuck and Boston Legal).

[domino harvey]

Did Malcolm McDowell learn nothing from Tank Girl

[miless]

Did Malcolm McDowell learn nothing from Tank Girl

all you need to do is rub two quarters together and he's there... it's a pavlovian thing.

[Cold Bishop]

Did Malcolm McDowell learn nothing from Tank Girl

all you need to do is rub two quarters together and he's there... it's a pavlovian thing.

Ouch... and Bob Hoskins too.

Not to mention shameless ripping off of 28 Days Later, Escape from New York, and Mad Max... And the Bentley product placement. Neil Marshall should be doing better stuff than this.

[Antoine Doinel]

And when did "cyberpunk" make a comeback? The inhabitants of the closed city are the most embarrassing things I've seen since The Matrix Reloaded rave scene.

[colinr0380]

I'm not sure what they are changing to make this futuristic world any different from modern Scotland! Just kidding!

I like the idea that the film seems to have reinstated Hadrian's Wall and can only pray for a cameo by Alex Salmond as a decadent tyrant driving through the streets of his city in an open top limo with lots of jewellery, tattoos and gorgeous women on his arm!

(If they go that route they really need it to become an all out Ken Livingstone/Alex Salmond face off!)

[Nothing]

Neil Marshall should be doing better stuff than this.

Surely you don't expect anything less.

[Faux Hulot]

And I was just wondering what Mick Travis was up to these days.

[Cold Bishop]

Neil Marshall should be doing better stuff than this.

Surely you don't expect anything less.

He's not Bela Tarr, but at least he's not Paul WS Anderson or Marcus Nispel either. His Pop B-Movies so far have at least felt like the genuine article.

[Nothing]

I reckon I'd take Paul WS Anderson given the choice. And... this is relevant to the Criterion forum how? ](*,) \:D/

[Cold Bishop]

Something about it being a New Film I would think...

And some people prefer there low-brow genre films bland and lifeless.

[MichaelB]

I've enjoyed both of Neil Marshall's films so far (I was in just the right mood for the scrappy but fun Dog Soldiers, and The Descent was one of the most effective horror films I've seen in years), and God knows Britain isn't exactly groaning under the weight of halfway interesting genre filmmakers.

So I'll certainly give this new one the benefit of the doubt for now.

[John Cope]

I didn't like The Descent at all, though why that was escapes me at the moment and I'm not interested in revisiting it to find out. For whatever it may be worth, I did like Nispel's Texas Chainsaw very much and perpetually recommend it for its truly extraordinary set decoration. If that sounds like faint praise it isn't meant to be. The attention to detail in that picture is overwhelming and puts that aspect of most other peoples' work to shame. I also liked it for the canny inversion of its scenario: establishing its cast as MTV models and then attempting to find a way back to the genuine fear and anguish of the original, more naturalistic version. Haven't seen his Pathfinder yet, though I'm told it's a lesser Apocalypto.

[ranaing83]

Haven't seen his Pathfinder yet, though I'm told it's a lesser Apocalypto.

I was curious to see Nispel's follow up as well, given its source material and premise, but from what I've heard from friends who have seen the film, calling Pathfinder a "lesser Apocalypto" is being very, very kind.

[Nothing]

The Descent was one of the most effective horror films I've seen in years

Don't worry, your comment doesn't surprise me. The Descent was practically treated AS the second-coming of Bela Tarr by the British establishment for deep-seated reasons that I can't be bothered to go into.

Even within mainstream genre filmmaking there's little to match the painful ineptitute of the 'character' scenes in the first 1/3rd of the film. And with this kind of setup, who cares about the string of special effects that follow. The lack of CGI combined with the technical accomplishment of the set building / model making is perhaps the only thing going for it.

[MichaelB]

The Descent was one of the most effective horror films I've seen in years

Don't worry, your comment doesn't surprise me. The Descent was practically treated AS the second-coming of Bela Tarr by the British establishment for deep-seated reasons that I can't be bothered to go into.

Actually, I watched The Descent a good couple of years after its release with no particular expectations other than it would be the same jokey nonsense as Dog Soldiers. Hence my pleasant surprise.

But I'd be intrigued to see a review that explicitly compared it to Béla Tarr's work, or indeed anything that treated it as any kind of art movie. Can you provide a link?

[Nothing]

I'm not saying that anyone literally compared it to Tarr. But it was widely given rave reviews and column space at the expense of more serious and arresting work.

ad infinitum.

[MichaelB]

Well, this is what opened in London that week. Which unsung masterpiece suffered from the attention given Neil Marshall's film?

In fact, looking at that rather dispiriting line-up (whose only other interesting entry was a single-screen revival of Punishment Park), I can quite see why most critics chose to lead with The Descent!

Not that it made any difference, since it was a total disaster on its British theatrical run - not because of any problems with the actual film (with generally positive reviews, it should have done pretty well), but because it opened on the day after 7 July 2005, when the last thing people wanted to watch was a fictional account of people being trapped underground and possibly not making it out alive, after every TV news bulletin was screening mobile phone footage of the real-life equivalent.

A year or so later, I interviewed (another) Neil Marshall, deputy head of the UK branch of the film's distributor Pathé, and he said that under any other circumstances, getting to see your ad inadvertently plastered on the front pages of newspapers around the world would be a PR triumph - except when the ad in question is on the side of a bombed-out bus, and the strapline promises "unparalleled terror" or something equally tactless. He said that there was a brief meeting later that day, and a unanimous decision to just let the film quietly die in cinemas and hope to recoup any losses on DVD (which they did, handsomely) - it's just one of those things that you can't possibly prepare (or be blamed) for.

[Nothing]

Well, this is what opened in London that week. Which unsung masterpiece suffered from the attention given Neil Marshall's film?

Why shouldn't they lead with Punishment Park? Besides, your parent publication is a monthy...

[Marcel Gioberti]

I thought The Descent was brilliant. Marshall is a very smart filmmaker.

[Nothing]

True, turning a lack of talent and originality into a giant-sized paycheck is pretty smart.

[Marcel Gioberti]

[MichaelB]

Why shouldn't they lead with Punishment Park?

Because their editors would almost certainly veto such a suggestion from the outset. Believe me, I speak from long and bitter experience of spending years trying to persuade national critics to do just that!

My biggest triumph was when Philip French led his Observer column with a review of Samuel Beckett's Film, which wasn't merely playing in just one screen, it was also a supporting short - but that was so rare as to be almost unique.

In most cases, critics are expected to lead on something that their readers might actually get a realistic chance of seeing - not necessarily mainstream multiplex fodder (The Guardian recently led on 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days), but certainly not a one-print revival.

Obviously, the latter shouldn't be ignored, and it wasn't - but it's not realistic to expect much more than a relatively brief acknowledgement towards the end of the film section. Then again, even that is worth several hundred pounds in terms of free advertising, which is why I spent so much of my time lobbying for that kind of coverage.

Besides, your parent publication is a monthy...

I honestly don't recall how much attention Sight & Sound paid to The Descent, and a quick rummage around the June, July, August and September 2005 issues (I can't do direct links, but you can check out the relevant contents pages for yourself here) suggests it wasn't much, aside from the mandatory standard review of 800 words or so.

And even that wasn't published until about a month after the film opened.

[colinr0380]

Well, this is what opened in London that week. Which unsung masterpiece suffered from the attention given Neil Marshall's film?

Ah, Overnight! To go off topic briefly this was one of those fascinating films in which it was obvious the filmmakers wanted me to feel one way and I ended up feeling quite the opposite! Troy Duffy might have been arrogant and a pain to be around but the more Montana and Smith took obvious glee in destroying him in their film the more I felt the lesson to be learnt from Overnight was not to 'treat people better' but more that you should choose your friends wisely and make sure you never piss off the crew making a behind the scenes documentary of your film!

Their punishment of releasing a documentary rubbishing a person far outweighed Duffy's crime by the end (especially when his faults of arrogance, selfishness and a single minded obsession to the exclusion of all else are not exactly unknown in filmmaking!) It would perhaps have been more tactful if they had just left The Boondock Saints to speak for itself about Duffy's filmmaking abilities.

I'm glad The Descent was chosen for coverage over that piece of *work* at least!