300: Rise Of An Empire / Pompeii

It's double review time again, this time the tenuous link being swords, sandals, computer generated imagery and, er, history. Starting off with 300: Rise Of An Empire, director Noam Murro's (no me neither) film is the the follow up to Zack Snyder’s seriously over-rated 300, though it actually takes place around the same time of the battle depicted in that film. To go into plot, characters etc. would take forever, but it's basically 300 again, though this time mainly set at sea. There's clunky dialogue, male characters who all look alike (apart from one who looks like Zlatan Ibrahimović) and 99% special effects. So, as you were then basically. Though this time there's also a sex scene so bizarre it genuinely looks like it's been cut in from a soft porno. If you like hacking and slashing there’s plenty of red stuff on show (at one point someone's head meets a horses hoof with very squelchy results), but it does little to challenge the preconception that once you've seen one CGI slicing with a sword you've seen them all. On the plus side Eva Green is good fun as the main baddie and some of the battles at sea are genuinely ingenious with one including the most surprising appearance of a horse since Caesar climbed aboard one in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. In the end though there's nothing here to suggest that this was more than just a sequel for sequel's sake and the whole thing just lacks soul. Murro was slated to direct A Good Day To Die Hard, but dropped out to direct this. Looks like he would have lost either way. Anyway, moving on it’s Paul W. S. Anderson time! Settle down there at the back. Anderson easily makes the short list for worst director of the last twenty years but, much like a broken clock still showing the correct time twice a day, occasionally he gives us something that isn't actually all that bad. The anomaly this time is Pompeii which, despite appearances, just about sneaks into the guilty pleasure bracket. The basic storyline is as old as Pompeii itself, as a boy from the wrong side of the tracks (in this case a slave played by Kit Harington) catches the eye of a girl (Emily Browning as the daughter of a city ruler) from a social standing miles above him. Will true love prevail, not only over the social divide, but also over a volcano in a very bad mood indeed? The thing about disaster films is that you can’t just show a load of death and destruction without a human element to engage the audience and, though they're written pretty thinly, Anderson makes us care about the characters. Browning and Harington will probably only appeal to certain demographics of the audience, but for the rest of use we can enjoy Kiefer Sutherland (who at times sports an accent that is so bizarre it looks as if he’s attempting an impression of Anthony Hopkins whilst wearing a gum shield), clearly having great fun as a Roman Senator and his dry comment when watching a re-enactment of a slaughter during a gladiatorial smack down provides the film with a high moment of subtle laughter amongst all the mayhem. Though Anderson has received lots of praise for the historical accuracy of the Pompeii he's put on screen and the depiction of the eruption of Vesuvius itself (when the old girl finally erupts its an impressive moment and nicely pitched dramatically) you get the feeling that (though morally not really all that on), for once he isn't taking things too seriously himself either. 300 Rating: 5/10. Pompeii Rating: 7/10.