Here we go then; another fun-filled frolic in the field of film. Alex Rider: Stormbreaker. Enjoy, dear readers!
Right. And, dear readers, we return. Phyllis is heavily sedated and duct taped to her chair, so that no – unfortunate – incident can occur.
Seriously, if you think I'm joking, you should have see how close she got to beheading me with that pen knife.
I shall bear the scars always.
Luckily, the bruises I gave her are far worse. I feel better. Being murdered by a moron with exactly one and a half brain cells would be so degrading.
And, moving on.
We left you with Sabina admiring the cut of Alex's jib – or possibly just his hair – before Alex took to the podium – we'd like to take the podium to him, and beat him with it – and, god forbid, the little runt, I mean, brilliant actor, starts talking.
Now, dear friends, and possible shared inmates, we are about to reach that unhappy point.
If you weren't in an asylum before you read this, we guarantee you will be by the end.
Or, alternatively, if you watched the film and liked it, maybe you SHOULD be in an asylum.
I liked it.
Yes, Phyllis, and where are you now?
The Priory Home for the Handicapped.
Point proven.
Right. And, onwards.
My, my, my, they have an ENORMOUS classroom. For so few people! I think 'enormous' is a theme which may recur throughout the film. It started with Alex's watch, and… well, if you'll forgive the term – it grew.
Not the watch, you understand. The theme. Otherwise Alex would be wandering round with Big Ben on his wrist.
What is the Sabina girl (whore) wearing?
I don't entirely know. But her shirt appears to be made out of a material bearing a remarkable similarity to my grandmother's curtains.
Enough said.
Anyway, Phyllis, you distracted me. What I mean to say, is – was the overly obvious check-out really necessary? I know she's a fourteen year old, and hence can be forgiven for overdosing on eyeliner, and wearing enough lipgloss to sink a small ship, but the eye flick is…urgh.
A moment of blessed silence.
He's speaking! 'There's not much I can say about my family'.
Then, please, don't.
I think we're off to a good start.
The teacher just gave him the same eye-flick as Sabina. I foresee arm wrestling in the playground. Or, possibly Rock Paper Scissors? Hmm. Maybe they could be ultra-mature about it, and the teacher – urgh – could just give Sabina detention for the rest of her life. Or, possibly Alex, so as to have unlimited access.
And, back on track.
"I didn't know my parents. They died when I was small." I think someone must have banned emotion from this film altogether. Though, it was accompanied by some rather stunning eyebrow over-acting.
"I live with my uncle."
Argh! Said uncle just appeared on screen.
Ewan McGregor has never looked uglier. Well, possibly in 'Trainspotting', but that's because they gave him some of the worst clothes known to man. Then again, it was the 1980s. They didn't have fashion then – just accidents with unfortunate materials.
Though, that handlebar moustache they saddled McGregor with in Miss Potter really didn't do anything for him either…
It's a toss up.
Anywho, with orc-like efficiency, he revs his motorbike. It's invisible – somewhat like a certain Harry Potter car which shall remain nameless – we haven't seen it yet, but it has made its presence known.
Mind you, he doesn't seem to be doing much. Also, it's interesting to note that, with a stunning lack of subtlety – despite being MI6's uber-ultra-spy – he actually revved the bike up – hence making large amounts of noise and drawing attention to himself –before he put his helmet on.
Safety is important, kids!
Screw the fact that he's going to motor-bike out of a ball of flame, let's just make sure we're observing all the safety points.
And, here comes the helmet. Alex's voice overrides this little safety warning with the depressing maxim 'he's never around, so I can't tell you much about him, either'.
He keeps telling us he hasn't got much to say, and, oh, how we wish it were true. For someone who has nothing to say, he's taking a hell of a long time to say it. And, my, but he knows how to enunciate his words! I wish whoever spent their money improving his diction had shelled out for a few acting lessons, too. LAMDA lessons are particularly cheap, I hear.
Ahah! A revelation about home life. 'I have a sort of housekeeper, because he's always away on business'. Oh, I bet that delighted Jack 'I'm just an American housekeeper-slave' Starbright. In a stunning piece of acting – his one and only for this film – he manages to give a wealth of meaning to the words 'she's an American', and ends up implying that not only is she a second class citizen, but she is also in some way deformed.
Right. "My uncle's never going to set the world on fire," Alex simpers, in a voice over, as Ian Rider tosses a stick of dynamite casually over one shoulder.
Ooh, a little unsubtle irony! Nothing better to brighten up your afternoon.
Ian Rider does a very snazzy little forty nine point turn on his motor bike. To show that spies are cool, really!
'His work means a lot to him, but, er… he never talks about it'. Alex looks down, mournfully – I think he learnt the expression from his Spaniel – though, having said that, he might just be constipated, it's hard to tell.
I think it's the latter.
Yes, Phyllis.
We watch as Ian Rider – I presume this is Ian Rider, we never actually find out his name from Alex's little speech; fascinating that, isn't it? I mean, the way they mucked around with the book, we're going to find out that actually, Ewan McGregor has been playing a transvestite MI6 agent called Ethel, and Alex's uncle was actually killed on a golfing green in Southern Kansas – zooms along a coast road somewhere far too sunny to be England, and the teacher's voice overlays the whole, asking, with stunning tact,
"So, where's your uncle now?" he couldn't have sounded more bored if he'd been given an instruction manual for it.
The dramatic irony is back for another bow! "He mentioned something about a conference in Cornwall – life in the slow lane." Alex opines, his expression flashing back up on screen for a couple of seconds; I think he may have been trying for earnest, but he actually managed something between bored and stoned.
On screen, Ian Rider zooms a little more. Just to prove that, not only is his nephew unfairly dismissive and stupidly unobservant, he's also just. Plain. Wrong.
Actually, this little motorbike chase – I think they were just a little too obsessed with not having a car chase in this film; we had motorbike chase, boy-on-bike chase and horse chase, but no car chase! Because that would be cliché, boys and girls – looks a lot like an advert for a particularly upmarket car. Any minute now, I'm expecting them all to stop, Ewan McGregor to get off his bike, take the helmet off, shake out his hair – heh, what there is of it – and say something along the lines of,
"The new Citroen motorbike. Va va vroom!"
In all honesty, I think I would have preferred that, at times. At least it would have had the benefit of brevity.
Oh my god! They're now on a beach – a beach which has NO SUN, and where the sea is grey and evil, and therefore it may actually be somewhere in England – riding through the sea, and kicking up spray, and oh Lord, I think they may actually have been trying to make this some throw-back to Baywatch on wheels. Like a Disney movie on ice, except infinitely more painful.
Also – just a quick aside here – how did the inhabitants of this quiet little seaside town not notice any of this?! How?! There is a big ominous black boat, which is doing everything except broadcasting 'mwahaha! Look at us, we're evil' SHOOTING at some random motorcyclists, and this entire town is just going 'meh, whatever'. DID I MISS SOMETHING?!
Maybe they all just really hate bikers.
Except, for god's sake, they're launching missiles at them. I mean, Lord, that is some serious hatred.
And those old people watching the Punch and Judy show? Yeah, they must be well deaf.
"Woops-a-daisy! That's the way to do it!" Punch and Judy titter, to the backdrop of MISSILES GOING OFF in the background – y'know, as they do in England's small seaside towns; think what you've all been missing, down in your warm, sunny climes! (OH, and, side note? Yeah, Mr. and Mrs. Deaf-and-Ugly STILL haven't noticed. Just thought you should know) – and, I'm sorry, but really, what the fuck?
Oh, I'm sorry, Punch and Judy noticed the evol men on motorbikes BEFORE THE OLD PEOPLE. HOW? That's really quite amazing. It means that stuffed hand puppets are more perceptive than people.
Well, then again, there is Phyllis.
Hah! With a cry of 'Oh, what a pity', Punch and Judy go sky high. Pity? I think not! My faith in Nemesis and a higher Being has been restored. But – what about the guy inside the Punch and Judy show? – what about the two old people?
Nah, who are we kidding? They probably didn't notice, the deaf prats.
I wouldn't notice.
Of course you wouldn't, Phyllis. You're stupid.
Oh, sentient gulls! I mean, yes they're normally sentient, but it's not usual for them to be more perceptive than the average human. God, I'm glad I don't live in this village. I'd have to be really, really thick.
Phyllis would get on really well there. Wouldn't you Phyll?
What?
Point proven.
So, Ian Rider – we can tell it's him because, somehow, he managed to 'borrow' the only red motorbike – does a snazzy little slide on the bike (incidentally leaving half the flesh of his leg on the tarmac; nice), and thus, presumably, escapes the villains. Niftily. How quaint.
What IS Alex doing at the moment? There's been quite a lapse of time since he last spoke – Thank the Lo-o-o-ord! – but really, what is he doing instead? A strip tease?
Ew.
Oh, oh, oh! Perhaps he's dancing!
Yes. With a pole and some scanty underwear. For his teacher, perhaps? Dance, monkey boy, dance!!
Ew: The Sequel.
Are you sure he's not his catamite? I mean…
Phyllis. We have covered this. And this is a Disney film. Kinda. There will be no scanty underwear or catamiting in this film. Or if there is, it's all firmly off camera!
Oh! Ian Rider just got shot! Maybe we can get them to shoot Alex too? A kind of 'two for the price of one' deal? Two birds with one stone – two morons with one bullet. My, I should have been writing speeches for Churchill. 'We shall shoot them on the beaches (check!); we shall shoot them in the skies (nearly. Kinda. Does 'attempt to shoot them sky high' count?); we shall shoot them in the fields. (we're working on it.)"
See? Much more rousing.
Anyway, back to the filmlet.
A towns person just ran away! Finally, a sentient being! (The one and only for this film?)
ALEX SPEAKS!! And, yes, he has that camp voice down.
Phyllis, your catamite dream may yet live.
'I wish I knew a bit more about my uncle," Alex simpers "But he's not an easy man to pin down." Holy Jesus god, he's gayer than a maypole on May Day.
God, dramatic irony is milking it for all it's worth, and Ian Rider isn't dead, more's the pity.
The screech of tires, and Ian Rider BURSTS out of a fisherman's shack – because it's SO easy to hide a several-thousand-pound car under a tarpaulin, folks.
Oh. My. God. He has 'R1D3R' on his number plate. Dear god, subtlety got lynched on this film, didn't it?
May I throttle him now?
No, Phyllis. The nice people will do it for us.
Ian Rider is undressing in the front seat of his car! While driving! So men can multi-task – maybe he caught his nephew's pole-dancing urge? – though judging by the way his mouth is hanging open in concentrating, it's obviously a very. Difficult. Thing. To do.
We flick back to Alex – thankfully fully clothed – as he whimpers, "And that's about it. The end."
Is anyone else sensing the over-drive of dramatic irony? I think so…
I think something is going to come to an end. Phyllis would agree if she ever, y'know, thought.
I do think though. Ooh, shiny…
Um?
She's off.
Well, I know one thing that's about to come to an end. This latest instalment of the madness that is Alex Rider: The calamity.
Sorry. I mean, the film.
See you next time, folks! I have to go and save Phyllis from herself…
Phyllis and Dorothea will return shortly. In the meantime, please take advantage of this short interval, and don't forget to tip the waiter on your way out.
Thank you!
