XIII Oceans

It’s been a bit lean for a couple of weeks on the terrestrial film listings.  As per usual Film 4 is full of mediocre mainstream American junk or films that we’ve seen ten times before so it’s time to look at films that deserve a second look.  This isn’t to say that there aren’t good films on this week, of course there are, most of which, though,  we’ve seen before.

Steering away from a couple of obvious choices this week, I’ve picked three films that aren’t world beaters by any stretch of the imagination but they’re interesting enough to have a look at.  On Thursday night at 11.25pm on FiveUS is Oliver Stone’s Talk Radio, a film about a radio phone-in ‘shock jock’ that takes some of its inspiration from the case of real life host, Alan Berg.  Sandwiched between Wall Street and Born Of The Fourth Of July, Talk Radio is a compact piece of work based on a Pulitzer nominated play co-written by Eric Bogosian, who also plays the lead in the film.  Bogosian can be annoying, so he’s perfect for this role and it is pretty much his film.  This is more a study of the character than the issues that arise from abrasive broadcasters so it’s less brash than some other Stone efforts.

Friday night on BBC2, just after midnight at 12.35am sees the third instalment of George A Romero’s zombie films, Day Of The Dead and it is clearly weaker than its predecessors although there are still some redeeming factors here.  It’s in this film that the evolution of the zombies is discussed in a bit more depth, sort of explaining how they’ve changed from being grotty mannequins to the sentient life-forms that appear in the poor sequel, Land Of The Dead thanks to Bub the zombie.  Sounds comical and there’s certainly humour in this mixed with a subtext that isn’t as good as the previous two films but is still better than most horror films and Romero has previously rated the film as his best.  Can’t say I’d agree with that but it’s entertaining nevertheless.

Headlining Film4’s Saturday night schedule at 9pm is Bring It On, which is basically an exploitation film if Disney had done it.  Whilst there’s plenty of criticism you can throw in the film’s direction, it’s funny, well shot with some good dance sequences, contains locker scenes and a bikini car wash .  Bring It On is a pleasant comedy, references Bob Fosse, blaxploitation and manages to do a film about cheerleaders that doesn’t completely patronise these oft undervalued lynchpins of society.  A chick flick that had crossover appeal.