Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa - Review

I didn't enjoy Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa and I'm not entirely sure why not. I guess just because I wasn't in the mood for it, following a downer of a day, which, surprisingly, didn't make me feel more in need of a good laugh. All reviews are subjective up to a point but, with my mood in mind, my review of a film that is doing very well critically and commercially - it's topped the UK box office and went down well with pretty much everybody else I saw it with - is a little too subjective. That said, however objectively one tries to review a comedy, the main criterion is whether it is funny or not and, in the case of Alpha Papa, for me, it was, yet it wasn't.

It wasn't really the fault of the film itself. It was well made, with uniformly good performances by a raft of familiar faces from British comedy, loads of jokes, a well-chosen soundtrack (John Farnham and Example being my highlights), good use of Norfolk locations and a storyline worthy and believable of Alan Partridge. Even his hair looks the best it ever has. I have always found Steve Coogan's most enduring character somewhat funny but rarely hilarious. I enjoyed Knowing Me, Knowing You - With Alan Partridge in the '90's and used to reenact scenes and catchphrases with friends (Alan's defining chant, 'Ah-haaaaa!!' is oddly absent from the film) Yet, I didn't find it as funny as they did. I recall finding it too believable and awkward to really make me laugh. I watched a couple of I'm Alan Partridge episodes but I've more recently enjoyed The Day Today, where the character first appeared on TV, albeit in a short Sports desk sketch. So, the fact that I am only a fairweather Partridge fan no doubt contributed to my feelings toward Alpha Papa.

I had looked forward to seeing Alpha Papa as a work outing but not even that or the fact that my six other colleagues immensely enjoyed it was enough to help me get into it more. Two of them had just attended a funeral and so were more in need of having their spirits lightened than me. In the barely half-full Screen 1 of Norwich's Cinema City, most of the audience sounded like they enjoyed the film but our group (apart from me) showed it the loudest. And why not? Apart from the gales of laughter, my workmates 'awwed' Partidge's assistant Lynne during her makeover and sad moments; cheering when Norwich exteriors were onscreen, including St Peter Mancroft, the location of the aforementioned funeral. I was more excited by the appearance of the nearby Television and Movie Store, having been a regular visitor there over the years. The sort of films which that store sells merchandise for, e.g. Star Trek Into Darkness or Man Of Steel, are more my thing than Alpha Papa but aren't really my workmates' favourite sort of film.

I did genuinely chuckle during some scenes and tried joining in with the laughter at the start of the film in order to feel part of the occasion, as if afraid I would be judged for not being amused like the others but soon decided that was silly. What did anyone else care if I laughed or not? No one was paying attention to me. Why pay £7 to fake-laugh at a film? If it wasn't funny to me, then it wasn't funny. That said, I felt like a total nerdy-nerd-nerd with no sense of humour but that's just my self-consciousness. Afterwards, one colleague said something to the effect of 'You know how other people set you off laughing?...' in reference to how hard she had laughed with the others during the film, implying that maybe she wouldn't have laughed as much had she not seen it with them. Laughter is contagious, apparently but with this film, I guess I was immune. (Is that a Patridgeism?)

I got the jokes in Alpha Papa; they were well-written (by seasoned Partridge scribes Peter Baynham and Armando Ianucci, etc) and performed but I just didn't get into it. I wasn't bored but I felt disconnected from the film throughout. Wierdly, I found myself laughing at certain gags a few hours after seeing it, such as when Alan has to face an armed policeman butt naked from the waist down. Perhaps my mood had just generally improved by then? Even though I enjoy toilet humour, the scene where Alan hides in the septic tank of a portaloo, only made titter a bit, where I would have wet myself laughing another time (pun intended). Neither of these things featured heavily in Alpha Papa, although Alan's seductive purr of 'yes, that is my damn todger' to a new ladyfriend kept me amused after watching the film. 

Comedy's a funny thing. I don't often see humourous films at the cinema, or in general. I prefer TV shows like Family Guy that play to my base sense of humour. Filmwise, I ideally, I prefer really surreal, daft comedy. Zoolander is one of my favourite funny films, as is The Magic Christian - a bonkers '60's film with Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr, co-written by some of the Monty Python team. Austin Powers is a favourite, particularly the first one. I even enjoyed parts of Myers' derided The Love Guru ('BALLGAZER!') I am usually quite conservative in my humour in everyday life, depending on who I'm with. I dislike hearing dirty jokes in church or about Christianity (Family Guy has lots of these, though), which got a fair treatment in Alpha Papa.  Contrarily, I watched atheist comedian Richard Herring's stand-up show Christ On A Bike a few years back, plus, I can be dirtier in thought than word, which is probably something to do with my Id battling my Superego...and such. Although I enjoy some edgy comedy, I'm not generally a fan of Frankie Boyle or Jimmy Carr-type humour. Alpha Papa wasn't dark like them, or Four Lions (Directed by Chris Morris, a fellow alumnus of Coogan's from The Day Today), another film I didn't laugh with very much but more so than with Alpha Papa.

Four Lions takes schadenfreude - something else I find funny - to an explosive extreme in making a lot of its jokes revolve around people blowing themselves up, not a usual subject for comedy. This sort of humour (although on a much lighter level) is an essential element to Partridge; watching him make an absolute tool of himself. This happens intermittently in the film but, of course, being his film, he has to become the hero and save the day, which is nice to watch but not very funny. Even schadenfreude has its limits, though. When it becomes about practically bullying others, such as the extent to which Gervais and Stephen Merchant pick on Karl Pilkington in The Ricky Gervais Show, it gets uncomfortable.

Maybe I just am Alan Partridge? He reminds me a little too much of myself in his ineptitude, awkwardness and self-delusion. Not that I'm all of these all the time, no one is (even him) but, still...seeing believable, realistic comedic characters like Partridge and David Brent make me squirm and remind me of when I've been the butt of the joke but found it hard to laugh at myself. That's meant to be part of their overall appeal, I know - the fact that they reflect the ridiculousness of certain traits displayed by most people at some point. Plus, both Alan and I hail from Norwich (or at least, he's based his career there). Maybe, though, after a crap day and despite the fact that the fool becomes the hero, I would have been better served by a more outlandish comedy that helped me escape Reality, rather than one that was, literally and metaphorically. a little too close to home.

Merry Christmas, Mr Logan | The Wolverine - Review

SPOILERS AHEAD!

This is the sixth film in which Hugh Jackman has played the titular Mutant hero - including his X-Men: First Class cameo - and, although a fan of the X-Men films, the Wolverine character in particular, as well as someone who didn't think X-Men Origins: Wolverine - the character's first solo film - was all that bad, I felt reticent about yet another story about the tortured soul that the original X-Men trilogy featured as the main hero amongst the ensemble, even if they didn't delve as fully into the dark past of Wolverine, aka Logan, aka James Howlett.

In The Wolverine, it's mostly Logan's dark future we're treated to, as we find him roughing it in the Canadian wilderness, with shaggy hair and beard to match the fur of the grizzly bear with whom he keeps company. It's not long, though, before trouble comes a-knockin' and our hirsute hero is whisked off to Japan to resume his acquaintance with a man whose life Logan once saved during his last visit to Japan, in Nagasaki, 1945.

Initially under the impression that he was summoned merely to say goodbye to Yashida (Ken Yamamura/Hal Yamanouchi); formerly a POW camp soldier, now a wealthy tycoon whose name is peppered all over Tokyo as Toshiba is in the real world. Logan discovers that the old codger also wants to give him the 'gift' of a normal mortal life by removing his mutative ability to heal from any wound that helped him save Yashida's life in WWII but which has also cursed Logan to immortality. Having been dragged away from his comfy forest patch to suffer the indignities of a fifteen hour plane flight, a nude bath involving a violent scrubbing from broom-wielding ancient Japanese women, just to exchange parting words with a man he only knew briefly over half a century ago is bad enough but his wanting to nick Logan's mutant power just adds insult to injury. Fortunately, Logan heals fast from this dishonourable slight and, managing to restrain his infamous rage, bids Yashida goodbye, telling him that, 'you don't want what I got.' He leaves the old git on his pin point impression bed, left with his annoyance at the considerable effort made to find Logan and bring him to Japan, only to be rejected. Of course, this is only the beginning.

Things then get complicated in a plot involving Yashida's granddaughter, Mariko (Tao Okamoto) and a power struggle with the rest of her family, from whose assassins Logan forsakes a return to his nice forest to protect her from, confident he can also see off his competition for her affections in the form of an ex-boyfriend and the fiance of an arranged marriage. This, rather excitingly, involves him taking on the entire spectrum of the Japanese warrior caste, including Yakuza, Samurai and ninjas. The highlight of these myriad battles is surely one aboard and on top of a speeding bullet train, which easily beats Skyfall's train fight. Here, an injured and mysteriously unhealing Logan must use his claws to stay attached to the speeding vehicle, whilst seeing off Mariko's would-be murderers. That said, some of the action is cut too choppily to be truly satisfying, such as the preceding funeral fight, possibly to subdue the violence for a 12A rating. A later sword vs. claw fight takes place almost completely in the dark, At least there's no climactic duel between Wolverine and the femme fatale - Svetlana Khodchenkova's Viper in this case - as became the norm with the X-Men films. One of those femme fatales, now just a mere femme, returns here in Logan's dreams, providing an interesting subplot and a nice link to X-Men III: The Last Stand, from which this new chapter follows on.

The Wolverine is one of the better films of the X-Men series. Although, whilst an improvement on Last Stand and Origins, it doesn't match X-Men 2 or First Class. Like those films - and most comic book/action movies - it follows a fairly safe formula, which is especially apparent in the final act, when Logan must rescue the damsel in distress from the villain's lair, wherein he finds it is Logan himself whom the villain really wants. Quite why, then, he has to wade through a hundred ninjas to get there, rather than be allowed all the way inside before capture, I didn't understand. Also perplexing was how Logan's claws didn't leave bloody wounds in his hands during the scenes where he couldn't heal, as well as how, when Yashida was extracting Logan's blood and thereby his healing ability, the old man reverted to the exact age he was when he met the Wolverine. Maybe I'm taking a comic book film too seriously - only as seriously as it takes itself, although it's no Dark Knight - but its internal logic is weird; most of the non-Mutant supporting characters don't make enough of an impact early on for them or their motives to be interesting enough later on. 

The script is better than Origins, despite the slight plot similarities with previous films toward the end. At least there's no dialogue clangers like 'Coocoo-catchoo got screwed.' There are some intentional good laughs, too, as well as a self-surgery scene that was almost as intense - more so, in a way - than the one in Prometheus.

The sound effects, particularly when Logan and Yukio (Rila Fukushima) first arrive in Japan, were also impressive. The noise of the cars, birds, etc is very immersive. The special effects are well handled, although the grizzly bear at the start was a little unconvincing, yet Jackman's performance helped here.

The Wolverine is an enjoyable addition to Marvel's most profitable franchise but I know enough of the character's history to not need another standalone film about him. An end credits coda reveals that he'll be back on the team for the next X-Men film, Days Of Future Past.