Thursday, July 12, 2007 THE AGE 33 GREEN GUIDE Preview Movie of the Week Scott Murray Carrying a torch for the Doctor DIE HARD 2 (1990) where is set, sits on a Channel Seven, Saturday, 8.35pm Spotlight rift in time and space, and all sorts of oogly-boogly business John McClane (Bruce Willis) is at Dallas airport, Richard falls through the rift into the in Washington, awaiting the arrival of his wife middle of town, which is not (Bonnie Bedelia). Ever alert, he notices some unlike the town of Sunnydale in suspicious packages being passed across the floor of USED to think Buffy the Vampire Slayer, built on a crowded cafe. In the blink of an eye, McClane is was gay. My people, the top of something known as The on the trail of a renegade military hell-bent on Ihomosexual community, will Hellmouth. The investigation into freeing General Ramon Esperanza (Franco Nero) frequently claim people to be gay matters unknown harks back to from custody. Like many good South American for the most spurious of reasons, ’90s Zeitgeist series The X-Files, anti-Communists, Esperanza finances his activities but I thought I had the Doctor except they’ve taken the sexual through drug trafficking. Pitting one individual pegged (so to speak). Despite the tension between Scully and against a group of very bad guys within the parade of scantily clad ladies Mulder and consummated it five confines of a snowbound airport is a fine idea and traipsing around his Tardis, he ways. makes for tense action. But for McClane to never leaned in for a kiss. Also, I Don’t go into Torchwood maintain his iconic outsider reputation, the other distinctly remember an episode expecting ‘‘grown-up Doctor cops and soldiers have to be stupid or corrupt. In in which the Brigadier got quite Who’’. In some respects it is, but this case, arrogance and dumb-headedness are flustered watching a belly dancer, not grown-up enough. Torchwood beautifully personified by the head of airport while the Doctor rolled his eyes is only on the cusp of adulthood. security, Captain Lorenzo (Dennis Franz), who in contempt. Proof enough, I Like a 17-year-old, it’s capable of seems willing to risk the lives of thousands simply thought, that Doctor Who was inflicting pain and eliciting pleas- to preserve his big-fish-in-a-small-pond status. As in batting for my team. Well, until ure; it’s just not exactly sure how. John McTiernan’s Die Hard, made two years he went ga-ga over Billie Piper As the series trundled along, earlier, McClane is aided by a few freethinking and pashed Madame de Pompa- the characters annoyed me, con- individuals, usually African-Americans. Both films dour last year. Next you’ll be fused me and then began to can be read as condemnations of American telling me Darth Vader isn’t a charm me. By the end of 13 epi- complacency and conformism in the face of a transvestite. I was sure all that sodes, I was dreading their rotteness within. Many of the situations McClane leather and cape-wearing meant departure. I started the show in finds himself in have a pleasurable sense of deja vu. his helmet was hiding eyelashes lust with the cheesy Captain Jack, McClane even jokes: ‘‘How can the same shit and lipstick. but within weeks my attention happen to the same guy twice?’’ But critics were When Doctor Who returned in turned to the brooding Owen. less thrilled, claiming the film was a simplistic 2005, Billie Piper eyelash flutter- (How I became infatuated with rehash, made too quickly and with too keen an eye ing aside, alternative sexuality the grotesque Mr Guppy from on the easy dollar. Seventeen years ago, Die Hard managed to creep aboard the Bleak House, I’ll never know.) 2 looked wildly excessive and director Renny Harlin Tardis in the form of Captain Torchwood is a bit of spooky was dammed for it. Today, it feels relatively (John Barrow- sexy sci-fi fun. Like all British restrained and at least most of the stunts are real, man), an omnisexual rogue time drama, it still has a bit of tongue not computer-generated. McClane is at his agent. Now Captain Jack’s lodged in its cheek, so it’s not as wisecracking, insouciant best, scurrying like a character has been spun-off into overwrought as Supernatural or hyperactive rat through the labyrinthine bowels of his own series, kind of like Billie Piper’s eyelash fluttering has the Doctor, David Tennant, off Team Homosexual. Lost. Plus it features scads of girl- the airport. There are still a few punters out there action-Frasier, and he reappears on-girl action for the boys, boy- who refuse to face reality about Mr Willis. The fact in the new sci-fi/horror/fantasy They are all, in some way, gory, violent horror to be a shock on-boy action for the girls and is, no one does this stuff better than Bruce. series, Torchwood. sexy. The show tries desperately at first because nobody bleeds in boy-on-girl-on-purple-smoke- Torchwood begins by following to be sexy. It’s populated with Doctor Who. Having said that, creature action for the exhaust plucky Welsh police constable sexy aliens that suck the life out nothing on-screen is any more or fans that might be watching. Pick of the Week (Eve Myles) as she of you; a purple smoke alien that less confronting than the splatter ■ While Adam Richard is an investigates the investigators of makes you have sex until you in Heroes. The graphic violence is employee of Channel Ten, he in no INSIDE AUSTRALIA: FOOTY — the paranormal and extra- explode; a sexy woman from the not all that differentiates Torch- way feels compelled to be nice about THE LA PEROUSE WAY terrestrial. Through her, we meet past who wants to have sex; and wood from its progenitor, it. He will tell you, until your eyes Wednesday, 8pm on SBS the mysterious Torchwood team, a who seems not to however; it’s the sex. Nobody ever bleed, no doubt, how much he is who lay claim to being ‘‘outside have finished getting dressed had sex in the Tardis, but every- loathing this year’s ham-fisted the government, beyond the before going on a killing spree. body has sex in Torchwood, attempt at Big Brother, and that This sporting spectacular is police’’. Headed by Captain Jack, On top of all this alien sex, all the almost all the time. It’s a wonder no matter how pretty the boys on complete with colourful who has developed a fetish for main characters experience at they ever get around to investigat- Supernatural are, he just can’t dressing in World War II army least one same-sex encounter ing anything paranormal or bring himself to care about their language and biffs. You gear, the team consists of the before the end of the first series. extraterrestrial. Even with all the allegedly scary plight. might even learn sulky ugly/sexy Owen (Bleak (Oh yeah, nerdy pants here has sex and violence, Torchwood is a House’s Burn Gorman), the seen them all). lot of fun, if only because it is Torchwood screens on Mondays at something about rugby. nerdy/sexy Toshiko (Ab Fab’s Having discovered Torchwood borrowing from some very fun 9.40pm on Ten. Doctor Who NATALIE CRAIG, page 44 ) and the blandly sexy through my love of Doctor Who,I sources, and not just Doctor Who. screens on Saturdays at 7.30pm Ianto (Gareth David-Lloyd). found the visceral depiction of The city of Cardiff in Wales, on the ABC. Mass hiss-teria as obnoxious evictee gets a boo job HE ejection of loud-mouthed consider the feelings of others was: house agreement. She even tried to aside, however, she easily ranks as suburban mum Michelle from ‘‘Tough titties. I’ll never change.’’ No defy Big Brother, who managed to one of the most repulsive Big Brother Tthe household was not only the surprise, then, that everyone, includ- shut her up by stating: ‘‘When Big housemates on record. most predictable eviction from the ing good-natured truckie Travis, Brother talks, you do not.’’ Proof of this came on Sunday Big Brother house so far this year, it turned against her. But the tipping point came with night when she was booed by the was also the most welcome. So obnoxious was she that Big her unforgivable personal attack on audience. This was in stark contrast Simply put, the central tenet of Watching Brother even changed the rules to Aleisha. This crossed the line from to the rapturous reception most evic- Big Brother is for housemates to get allow the viewing public to nominate obnoxious to downright cruel. Fully tees receive and it provided a salient along with each other — to appreci- Big Brother housemates for eviction. As aware of how much it would hurt lesson about the perils of fame in ate other points of view, to reach expected, Michelle’s disapproval rat- her, Michelle deliberately belittled the modern media age. understandings, to learn and respect ing almost went off the chart. the suffering Aleisha had endured in You simply do not go onto a differences, to make accommo- interest in acknowledging or respect- The week was replete with her life, reducing her to tears and show such as Big Brother, behave in dations and adjust behaviour. This, ing the feelings of others. In her examples of Michelle’s arrogance putting her in a state of deep dis- such a callous manner, and then of course, leads to conflict but it is mercifully short time in the house, and pig-headedness. She abused tress. Yet Michelle refused to relent. expect the public to like you. The the effort by housemates that makes she proved herself the very antithesis people, berated Travis behind his Michelle has provided many only pity about Michelle’s eviction the show entertaining and, on of the model Big Brother housemate. back — forcing him into a rare bout moments of humour on the show was that it did not occur sooner and occasion, valuable. Her standard response to repeated, of confrontation — and took food and it is always amusing to watch a that she was still entitled to all those Michelle, however, showed no politely worded pleas for her to without asking, in open defiance of a buffoon on TV. Her comic value prizes. JIM SCHEMBRI NAA F33