Break dancing on the ceiling

So, what's been going on in TV land over the last two weeks. the answer is, of course, not a right lot. During the close season I watch virtually no TV at all. I have detected a bit of a theme to what I have seen though, and it worries me slightly.

Oceans of TV analysis has already been devoted to the shared Channel 4/Channel 5 phenomenon of the medical shock show. You know the ones, "The Man/Boy/Woman/Girl/Dog who's arms/legs/breasts/stomach/spleen exploded/fell off/turned green/" etc etc etc. I'd been blissfully unaware of these shows until the last couple of weeks, but have now been fortunate enough to catch a few. As with all unscientific studies, results vary. Firstly, on a rare night in at home, my flatmate and I sat down with great excitement to watch Cheel 4's "The Man who's Arms Exploded". We like things that explode you see. Particularly things that aren't really supposed to, such as arms. Imagine our disappointment then to end up watching an hour long lecture on the dangers of taking steroids. Guess what folks? Taking drugs to boost your muscalature can fuck you up. This was news to us, as the steroids went straight in the bin. The eponymous man was obviously very fucked up, and yes, had problems with his exceedingly large arms. However, did they explode? Did they fuck. They bled a bit, he had an operation, and now has a bit of a scar. I call foul Channel 4. the trades descriptions act should apply to TV programmes. I feel robbed, and I want my hour back. I can only imagine how I might feel if I'd watched 10,000 hours of Big Brother and then realised it was utter wank.

Having careened down the trough of medical reality TV, I was fairly surprised to find myself a few days ago unexpectedly riding a crest. By complete accident I ended up watching "Too Ugly for Love" on BBC3. I'd expected it to be a documentary featuring a good number of my friends, but it was actually about something called "Body Dismorphia". The poor unfortunates with this condition are utterly convinced they are physically hideous to the point where they become recluses, and can't look at themselves in a mirror. One chap, who is certainly no uglier than, for example, you, had been wearing opaque sunglasses for years under the false belief he had massive bags under his eyes. Another featured spacker was a girl who was so convinced her teeth were ugly that she'd filed them down to stumps at the age of 14. As we looked on, she made preparations for her 7th nose job (on a proboscis with which there was little wrong to begin with). Every medical professional she consulted told her she ran the risk of fucking up her nose for good, but so convinced was she that this could finally turn her life around ahe determined to plow on regardless. The making of the show was the disbelief of the documentary maker. He echoed the feelings of the viewer perfectly, astounded at the completely deluded self image of the sufferers, but attempting sympathy while clearly resisting the urge to shake them very hard. I don't think I'd have been as restrained. The solution would clearly be to take them to any student club in the country and show hem what really ugly people look like. Still, I found myself fairly drawn into the featured individuals stories, and my usually unsympathetic air disolved in a sense of genuine tragedy at lives wasted for no good reason other than a lack of good available treatment for this bizarre condition.

Away from the UK medical documentary scene, the shining light of my last two weeks has been the continuing second season of Prison Break. The promise of the season premier has been spectacularly fulfilled, and episodes two and three have taken the series to previously uncharted heights. I mock myself now for complaining how the format would never work outside the walls of Fox River. In the outside world the writer's penchant for ludicrous contrivances and unbelieveable conincidence is allowed to develop unfettered. Any situation the characters find themselves in, the writers can simply reverse engineer a solution by inventing something Michael did before he got himself locked up. Being followed closely by the FBI? No problem. Just blow up your car with some raw animal meat in it to make it look like you're dead. Of course, the meat was stashed in the spare wheel compartment and the radio rigged as a timed explosive device at least six months ago. As predicted, Bellech is now out on his own, pissed up to fuck and hunting down the brothers on his own revenge mission. This is genius escapist television. It gets better every minute, and I never want it to stop.

STOP PRESS: KUTCHER NOT WASTE OF ATOMS.

No, I didn't quite believe it either. If ever I was totally convinced that someone brought nothing but yet more carbon dioxide to the human race it was this muppet mouthed tit. Apart from slurping up Bruce willis's sloppy seconds and swinging on Demi's bingo wings, his "career" seem to consist of annoying the piss out of other "celebrities" on TV. I've never actually seen this though, as that kind of show gets switched off faster than the BBC 3 "news".

Imagine my surprise then when, half way through The Butterfly Effect, I was not only still watching it but rather enjoying it. Of course, it was mostly to do with the rest of the cast, the fairly original story, the dark tone of it, and the fact you get to see Kutcher as a cripple that made it for me. BUT! He didn't ruin it. He easily could have done, if he'd brought his dopey slacker act and irritating shit-eating grin to every scene. he did it a few times, and it made me grind my teeth slightly, but it was always over before it got bad enough for me to reach for the remote.

This film never made much impact, either here or in the states as far I'm aware, and it's faily hard to see why. Kutcher surely appeals to some kind of young demographic, or he'd have been yanked off US telly years ago regardless of who he was boffing. You might get a part in a movie off the back of who you're shagging, but cut-throat US TV is a different story. That in mind, the fact the film has a pacey story and an engaging young cast (with particular credit going to Amy Smart) would have led me to believe this would have been a winner. Mind you, in a world where Finding Nemo takes more cash than Superman returns and The Fountain gets booed at the Venice film festival I'm clearly so far out of touch as to not want to be placing any cash bets on such things. The Butterfly Effect is ancient now, and therefore available on the "5 for £25" deal at Blockbuster and similar, as well as the usual sources.

Other things I've seen recently have been pretty uniformly wank. Snakes on a Plane is so breathtakingly bad I'm not even going to dignify it with a review. The internet seems divided on the subject, but internet is bunk. Wank on a Plane is in cinemas now. You're better off getting a shitty cam version from the usual sources though, as one CGI snake looks much the same as the next, and you won't be missing anything during the dark bits. Everyone who feted this film so much in the run-up to its release should take a good look at themselves, and learn the lesson that it is never wise to make all your assumptions about how good a film will be based purely on the title and how excited Samuel L Jackson is about it. The man has been in about 18,000 films, and despite being occasionally one of movieland's best lead male actors, is also undoubtably the biggest whore in the business. Don't pay money to see this, ever.Wank on a Plane is in cinemas now. You're better off getting a shitty cam version from the usual sources though, as one CGI snake looks much the same as the next, and you won't be missing anything during the dark bits.

The only other recommendation I can come up with this week is another fairly old flick, but one that alot of people seem to have missed. Primer is a belting low-key sci-fi thriller, of the rare cerebral type that doesn't come along too often. Think Pi in colour without the Aronofsky weirdities and you might be half-way there. Actually, that's a terrible description, but the best one I could think of in the last 9 seconds. It's a time travel paradox headfuck, so don't watch it when you're tired or have a short attention span, and expect to watch the second half at least twice to be sure exactly what's just happened. I won't give it the full treatment, but it's very highly recommended, so go to it. Out on DVD and from usual sources.

And now, trailers. Clicky away. Nothing that looks shit, promise.

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Shoddiness Creeping

No, it's not the new Wes Craven film, it's me and my 2 weeks of no updates. Tragic I know. Hopefully I'll be back on the ball now, although I'm making no promises. Plenty has been happening while I've been playing Civ 4, drinking beer, going to work, and seeing the Mrs in sunny Bradford, so there'll probably be a veritable spurt of posts in the next hour or so now that I'm in to it and sod ll else for a week afterwards. Let's try some logical structure for once, and go films, telly, comics, possibly even in that order.

Ho!