Working Girl (1988)

Tess McGill (Melanie Griffith) is a working-class woman from New York on a run of misfortune. Despite all her efforts she hasn’t managed to climb up the corporate ladder higher than being an executive’s secretary, she discovers her boyfriend Mick (Alec Baldwin) has been cheating on her, and after her boss Katherine Parker (Sigourney Weaver) suffers a broken leg on a skiing holiday Tess discovers that Katherine has stolen one of her ideas – a corporate buyout of a radio network - and is planning to claim it as her own. While Katherine is out of the city recuperating, Tess secretly steals her office and professional contacts, hooks up with executive Jack Trainor (Harrison Ford) and attempts to set up the lucrative deal by herself.

My immediate reactions after seeing the film were almost all about the cast. For one thing, it's clear that Harrison Ford is a very underrated actor, particularly in regards to comedy. Even in otherwise average movies like Six Days Seven Nights and Hollywood Homicide he manages to not only be funny, but make it look like it was effortless at the same time. He's great here, and performs the funniest drinking of a cocktail I think I've seen in a film.

It's Always Fair Weather (1955)

Three GIs, just returned from World War II, share one last drink together in a New York bar. They promise to meet up again at the same bar in ten years. A decade later they do reunite, but discover to their mutual horror that they don't like each other any more, and that their lives since the war have fallen far short of where they expected to be. For one of them in particular, Ted, the meeting makes him realise he's actually a bit of an asshole.

Oh, and it's a dance-filled musical.

It's Always Fair Weather is an outstanding musical feature, starring Gene Kelly and directed by Kelly and Stanley Donen, whose collaboration on Singin' in the Rain three years earlier had resulted in what is arguably the best feature film of all time. At the time of its release Fair Weather flopped: it was too dark, too cynical, just a bit too off-kilter to engage a mainstream audience at the time. Six decades later, and it's very close to topping Singin' in the Rain as my favourite film musical.

Judging the New 52: Batman: The Dark Knight

I have slowly been catching up with some of the New 52 titles that I didn't bother picking up when they were launched. Most recently, I've finally had a chance to look at Batman: The Dark Knight by artist and co-plotter David Finch. This book is basically David Finch's baby - it was launched in December 2010 to accomodate the newly signed artist, and basically exists solely so that one of DC's most popular artists can work on their most valuable property. (Marvel is doing a similar thing at the moment with Frank Cho's Savage Wolverine comic.)

Based on the first story arc, which is available in a hardcover collection, it's terrible stuff. While Finch is an accomplished artist with a keen visual style, his plotting (and Paul Jenkins' scripts) is absolutely dreadful. Like Jim Lee's terribly overrated Hush storyline some years ago, this book exists solely to let Finch draw as many of Batman's villains as possible. He even manages to use Clayface in disguise to squeeze in a Joker guest appearance, since the Joker himself was off-limits to creative teams at the time.

Babylon 5: "There All the Honor Lies"

Captain Sheridan is framed for the murder of a Minbari warrior, setting him on a collision course with Ambassador Delenn and putting his career at risk. Meanwhile, a reluctant Ivanova is placed in charge of the station's new merchandise store.

'This isn't some kind of Deep Space franchise, this place is about something,' says Ivanova, in what I hope was a knowing wink and not an actual highly hypocritical dig at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. It's becoming very clear that the manner in which Babylon 5 handles comedy - wholly comedic subplots rather than light-hearted touches or funny dialogue - is not one I particularly enjoy. For one thing this episode spends a lot of time making essentially the same joke: that merchandise is silly and vaguely tacky. It could have made it once, if it really needed to, but it doesn't need over-egging.

Babble On #37: "Hunter, Prey"

Dr Everett Jacobs, the personal physician to President Morgan Clark, escapes to Babylon 5 as a fugitive from the Earth Alliance. While the Alliance's investigator (Bernie Casey) leads the hunt, Sheridan and his crew secretly race to find the Doctor first - as he holds crucial evidence of previous President Luis Santiago's assassination.

"Hunter, Prey" is a solidly entertaining hour of Babylon 5, and pushes the series' story arc along in two directions. The central plot confirms once and for all that Santiago was indeed assassinated, and that his replacement Morgan Clark is almost certainly involved in the conspiracy. While there is nothing exceptional in this storyline, it moves along at a brisk pace and allows Garibaldi and Franklin to engage in a little action while rescuing Dr Jacobs.

Who50: "The Curse of Peladon"

Who50 counts down to the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who by reviewing my favourite episodes and serials over the history of the programme, counting down from #50 to #1. Today, #36: "The Curse of Peladon", a four-part 1972 serial written by Brian Hayles and directed by Lenny Mayne.

The Doctor and Jo travel in the TARDIS to the planet Peladon, where delegates of the Galactic Federation have assembled to discuss the planet's admission into their government. There is evil afoot, and the spirit of the great Peladonian beast Aggedor has awakened. The Doctor, however, thinks there's a different culprit working behind the scenes.

With "The Curse of Peladon" Brian Hayles created not a simple location for an adventure but an entire world. His characters have traditions, religion, politics and personality. They have an entire culture and a history. It may not be the most original or fully developed culture, but in the context of 1970s childrens television it's pretty exceptional stuff.

The Last Stand (2013)

Back in the 1980s and 1990s, Arnold Schwarzenegger was the biggest name in cinema. He was one of the most iconic figures in American film, guaranteed to draw in an audience with his over-the-top muscular screen presence, thick Austrian accent and canny choice of populist action thrillers and comedies in which to star. Through The Terminator, Predator, Twins, True Lies, Kindergarten Cop and a string of other films, he firmly cemented his place as one of cinema's most recognizable - if not always most appreciated - actors.

Then he shifted into politics and - a few cameos aside - quit acting altogether. Now, to use a phrase that Schwarzenegger himself is fond of using, he's back, starring in his own action film again. He is 65 years old. He hasn't starred in his own action film in ten years; not since Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines in 2003. So how did he fare?

Krull (1983)

Krull is a weird movie. It was original going to be titled Dragons of Krull, but then Disney and Paramount's Dragonslayer flopped, so a risk-averse Columbia Pictures retitled it to just Krull and added in some laser beams. They didn't add any actual science fiction per se, they just gave the monstrous Stalkers some laser rifles and set them on our heroes - who all use axes and swords.

So there's a kingdom, and a prince about to marry a princess, only the princess is captured by a Beast (capital letter intended - he doesn't seem to have a name or a real purpose, he's just "the Beast"). The Prince sets off to rescue her, accompanied by a Ben Kenobi analogue, a blind wise man, a wizard with the power to turn himself into a duck, a cyclops who blinks precisely once after every line (it's hypnotic), a gang of mercenaries, and a young Liam Neeson.