Premier League XI 2012

The idea for this article came from a friend of mine who suggested doing a review of the season, but as I missed parts of the season due to other commitments, it seemed to wiser to do it as best eleven. No doubt some readers will disagree with my choices, but that goes with the territory.

Goalkeeper – Joe Hart

One of the two defensive towers that Manchester City’s has built upon, he rarely has a bad game or even makes mistakes. During some games when City weren’t performing, it would often be Hart that made the difference between the results, pulling off saves that he had no right to make. Commands his area with an authority that the great goalkeepers have. Bound to be City and England’s number one for many, many years.

Right Back - Tony Hibbert

Maybe a strange choice for some, but he offers a reliable and no nonsense style of defending. Always reliable and ever the professional, although sometimes sacrificing the offensive for the defensive, it allows the man in front of him to go forward freely and do the damage whilst knowing that he behind him, Hibbert is their offering him a safety net.

Centre Back – Vincent Kompany

The second defensive tower in City’s team, like Joe Hart rarely under performs, always giving true captains performances, which seem to inspire the rest of his team. Reads the game very well, like world class defenders can, seeing the danger early and cutting it out before the attack has the chance to gather any momentum or allow the ball into dangerous areas. Easily Manchester City’s best signing, and at around £6million, an absolute bargain.

Centre Back – Fabricio Coloccini

After an initial rough period early in his English career, Coloccini has come back as a true well rounded defender, capable in handling one on one encounters with attackers and of organizing his defence tightly. After this great season, Newcastle will no doubt field offers for him (and many of their other players) after he has finally reached his potential that showed many years ago with Boca Juniors.

Left Back – Ashley Cole

The most consistent left back, not just in the league, but probably the world in the last year, surpassing many of the other left backs that peaked for a few years before sliding back down into mediocrity. His pace is enough to get him out of bad situations, but with his solid defensive abilities and tactical knowledge, a mistake is often a rare occurrence. Offers as much going forward as he does defensively, making him an even rarer commodity, a well-rounded full back.

Right Wing – Antonio Valencia

One of the few consistent performers for Manchester United this season, sometimes criticised for his predictability, preferring to hug the touchline as opposed to following the lead of other wingers and drift inside, he offers his team something difficult and a problem that full backs don’t often come across in the modern day game. A traditional winger, with plenty of pace and good crossing ability, his intricate footwork may not be up to that of Cristiano Ronaldo, but Valencia’s game is all about isolating and defender and beating him with his pace, and getting to the goal line.

Centre Midfield – Yaya Toure

The player of the season. As capable going forward as his is at sitting back, and the man who makes Manchester City tick. Plays best in a more advanced role where he is offered, a frequently takes, the opportunity to run with the ball, often carrying it for long distances before laying it off to a team mate or having an effort on goal himself. Always seems to make the right decision, which shows an intelligent reading of the game, but also that he is willing to give it to the man in the better the position, playing for the team.

Centre Midfield – Luka Modric

The little magician, and probably rightly considered as the only man to be able to replace Paul Scholes, despite the likelihood of him moving to Manchester United diminishing with every passing season. Controls games with an effortless flair, collecting the ball deep and driving Tottenham forward, giving it to the more offensively focused members of the team, although Modric is perfectly capable of scoring and doing damage in the final third, making him one of the most well rounded midfielders in the league. Spurs did well to keep him last summer, fighting off the advances from Chelsea, and as a result constructed probably the most balanced midfield in the Premier League.

Left Wing – David Silva

Responsible for most of City’s early season dominance, tearing through teams with his ridiculously close control and eye for a pass that made even the most organized defence look like amateurs. Despite a slight dip in performance in the middle of the season, mainly due to injury and not being rested, came back strong to play a vital role in the run in. A player, along with Yaya Toure, that City must hold onto in order to realistically hope to retain their title next year.

Forward – Robin Van Persie

An injury free season, probably the first one that he has had since arriving in England, and he demonstrates what he is truly capable of. At times single handed kept Arsenals hope European football alive next season, amongst a team that suffered from injuries and poor performers equally for the first half of the season. The bad news for Arsenal though is that with just one year left on his contract, Van Persie will no doubt be in hot demand, and they will have to step up and offer assurances of investment and trophies in the near future.

Forward – Sergio Aguero

A great first season from a player that has promised so much from his years in Spain with Atletico Madrid, like Carlos Tevez before him, they share the same kind of build and ability, although Aguero seems to want to play football as opposed to Tevez, who seems hell bent on wasting his talent. Deadly with both feet and in the air, and willing to work hard for the team, he is possibly the complete forward, even capable of out muscling some of the bigger players in the league.

Dark Shadows

This is the second in the series of reviews on 2012's summer blockbusters. As a note of warning, whilst I have tried to avoid spoilers, there is always the risk of something I don't consider to be a spoiler, potentially ruining a film for someone else. So be warned.

Quite simply this is one of the strangest films I have seen in a long time, and this was my reaction after going into the cinema knowing that this was a Tim Burton film, and based off a 1970’s supernatural soap opera. The film tells the story of the Collins family, and primarily Barnabus Collins (played by Johnny Depp), a family that moved to America 200 years before and built the family’s business and wealth on fishing. But when Barnabus becomes intimate with maid, Angelique (Eva Green), a witch, he sets in motion a series of events that will cause the deaths of the people he loves the most, and ultimately is transformed into a vampire by Angelique’s curse.

As with most Burton films, there is a unique look to it that can only be identified as belonging to Tim Burton, some people often find his worlds and characters somewhat over the top and overtly gothic, despite it being an important and trademark part of his filmmaking style. Yet with this film it seems to suit Dark Shadows, and suit it’s 1970’s setting, emphasising certain characters looks, especially the colour that is associated with each character, Barnabus’ character is almost black, while Hoffman (Helena Botham Carter) is mostly dull coloured but for her bright orange hair, Angelique the witch stands out in her bright coloured clothes and almost white hair. The villain of the films, is the most brightly coloured character in the film, a typical turn on conventions by Burton.

Despite being based on TV series (one I haven’t seen), the plot of the film is thin. The main story seems to focus on Barnabus restoring his family business to its former glory whilst dealing with Angelique’s rival firm. This seems like an albeit but fairly standard story, but would have given the film as a whole a solid direction in which to drive in, but instead numerous other storylines are thrown in throughout the film, none of them truly fleshed out. Perhaps it was an attempt to distil the essence of the show into the film, but the very nature of a film prevents that, especially with Dark Shadows run time of 113 minutes.

However erratic the plot, there is always a new fun scene or sequence just around the corner. Some of them ranging from the amusing bizarre to the brutally shocking and the cold blooded. Burtons mixes comic moments backed by seventies classics with brutal actions, mostly performed by Barnabus Collins, shot calmly and with a sharp eye for the final moments between the predator and his prey.

The cast Burton has assembled, helps the film significantly. With lesser performers, the film could have descended into a gothic farce.  For the most, each actor/actress brings their character to life in a realistic way, the outstanding performer is probably Eva Green who mixes Angelique’s vengeful side, and her longing to be loved by Barnabus. David Collins, played by the young Gulliver McGrath is criminally underused, his is one of the stories that is introduced, but never fully developed before it is closed in the climax of the film.

Johnny Depp, a Burton mainstay (this is their eight or ninth collaboration) constructs another memorable character in a way that is uniquely him. He skirts the edges of being the loveable hero, a cold blooded killer and comic relief (a lot of the humour of the film comes from him adapting to a world unlike anything he knows) brilliantly, giving us an interesting new character, a new take on a vampire that differs from that currently seen in modern mainstream films.

It’s often easy to judge how much you enjoyed a film by how long you discuss it with the person you went with to see it. I discussed Dark Shadows with my fiancée for about five minutes, roughly the point at which we reached the car, for the rest of the journey we discussed the trailer for Prometheus, that screened before the film, till we got home. Whether that means the film is not worth thinking about, which I don’t believe is the case, or if simply it didn’t connect with me, as it isn’t the kind of story or film that I normally go and see (this is only the third Burton I have seen since Planet of the Apes (2001), or if I simply found Burtons style of filmmaking and design taking me out of the film, but I have enjoyed many of Burtons early films, which share much of the same artistic vision as this, and his other films.  I would say that is simply a case of the story not being strong enough to hold the audiences attention, or encourage discussion of the ideas and memorable moments in the film.

Finally, a lot of people seem to be saying that Burton should try and cast someone else as his leading man other than Depp. But perhaps it would be more of an idea to embrace more narrative-focused projects. No one has ever doubted , or should Depp’s ability, nor should they doubt Burton’s talent and vision.  So maybe it would be better to experiment with story, rather than cast for Burton.

The Avengers

This summer sees the release of a number of highly anticipated blockbusters, three of which are based on comic book characters, one a debateable prequel (I am sure some people will disagree with me on this point, to varying degrees) to a science fiction classic, another is based on a 1960s TV show that aired on the ABC network in America. There are others, I am sure, but these will be the five that I will, in all likely go and see during this summer. Some would look at this and see it as more evidence that Hollywood, especially when it comes to it’s tent pole films is running out of imagination, but only time will tell with that, and which will ultimately come with the release and reception to these films.

The first of these films was The Avengers, but with different titles in certain countries, having seen the previous films that have set up this film, ranging from the tedious in Captain America to the surprisingly good (I went in expecting very little, despite the cast and director) in Thor, I was interested in seeing how they would attack the possibilities for this story.

Co-written and Directed by Joss Whedon, whose Buffy the Vampire Slayer series I was a huge fan of when I was younger, he didn’t seem like the kind of choice that Marvel would have gone for, having made his name almost entirely in television, there were no doubt more conservative choices they could have gone with, especially related to directorial duties.

The cast of the film is largely made up of the actors from the previous films but with a few new additions and one recasting, Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner/Hulk, the majority bring the exact same character to this film, as they had in the others. For some this isn’t a problem, Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston continue on with their superbly complex brotherly relationship, and Ruffalo constructs probably the most human and likeable version of Banner. The others characters just seem to be going through the paces when it comes to their scenes and others simply carry on with the same version, not bringing anything new to their performance.

There will be spoilers from this point, so please don’t carry on if you haven’t seen it, or don’t want to know any details.

The plot, is simple to say they least, Loki (Hiddleston) returns to Earth, to find an object called the Tesseract, a source of seemingly limitless power, in his bid to take over the Earth, with the help of an alien race, the Chitauri, with the Avengers being the only thing possible of standing in the way. During the first two acts we have to go through two or three giant action set pieces as the team work out their differences, until they finally realise that perhaps they should stop Loki before he brings an army of aliens to Earth.

Now this may seem as though, from how I have talked about it so far, that the film isn’t very strong when it comes to story, and it probably isn’t. But where it makes up for it, and this is plainly down to Whedon’s knack for dialogue is in the more subdued moments between the characters, more often than not a simple one to one conversation. Most of these moments feature Hiddleston’s Loki, the first of these moments is soon after Thor arrives (probably the best entrance of the film), another later on with Scarlett Johansson, even some of the less snappy conversations he has are elevated above what they could have been thanks to his portrayal of the character. As mentioned before Hemsworth brings Thor to life in a realistic way (for a demi-god), in a role that in either film could have, in the lesser hands, been nothing more than cocky meathead.

I saw this film in 2D, as I had heard that parts of the film, especially those set in space are very hard to make out, due to 3D making the screen darker (I don’t know the technical details of 3D, I apologize), so can only speak about this version of the film. The photography of the film is good, none of it is bad, but also none of it pops out as being instantly memorable, there is one long shot in the finale that swoops through New York following the different characters, which is fun but doesn’t linger for two long. The visual highlight is probably the first time Thor arrives to capture an already captured Loki around the end of the first act, and the battle between him, Captain America and Iron Man that follows.

One of the biggest let downs of the film is that none of the characters seem to have an emotional journey or arc throughout the film, maybe this is because of the very nature of “team-up” film, you have to spread out the screen time around the cast, making sure that everyone had their moment. But as a result here, no one really goes through any change, or has sort of epiphany or realization that will alter them (this could also be due to the no doubt already written, or in the process of being written sequels to the individual films), and this is a shame when compared to the other comic book team films, most noticeably the X-Men films, although I must admit they chose to focus on certain characters more than others, primarily Wolverine. However, would have pushing one character to the fore, and others into glorified supporting roles worked for the this film, possibly, but also it could have led to it being received as more of Thor 1.5, which in some ways this could have been seen to be, due to Loki serving as the lead villain.

This is unmistakeable a popcorn film, it doesn’t ask you to deal with too many ideas or to think about how it is a reflection of our world or is even as well made as some of the top echelon of the genre, such as both Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, Spiderman 1 and 2, Superman: The Movie or one of it’s predecessors Thor. This could obviously be the film, and Whedon knowing what this film as sticking to it, but with a film that everyone knew was going to make money, and it already has, it’s a shame that it didn’t take more risks, in terms of story, the characters (some of them) or the ideas and messages that would have elevated this beyond what it is.

Ultimately, I enjoyed it for what it was. If you go and see it, don’t go in expecting great things, and you may enjoy yourself, and even be surprised at what you see. But what do I know; I’m a DC guy.