It feels like so long since we’ve talked about Sam Neill, you guys!! Maybe it’s taken me longer to get through these because they were all just so angsty (here’s a definition of that from a reputable source, dad). I guess Sam Neill is as much a victim of the post-holiday blues as anyone. Cheer up, Sam; I’m pretty sure you get to be a vampire in the next one! And not some lame sparkly one either!

Little Fish (2005)

I too was upset that it wasn't the Australian Finding Nemo

The Movie: Cate Blanchett is a recovering heroin addict trying to pull her life together, which is tough when she can’t get any loans due to her past history, and both her brother, ex-boyfriend, and Hugo Weaving keep trying to pull her back in. Everyone spends a lot of time being sad and staring at things thinking about the hopelessness of it all. Also, Hugo Weaving is the ex-lover of an Australian mob boss and can’t get over it, leading to a climactic ending involving guns and drug overdoses and swimming at the beach in your underwear.

The Character: Sam Neill is the Australian mob boss which means he has to share an awkward kiss with this man:

Would've been hotter if he still looked like Elrond

He’s okay, as far as mob bosses go. He threatens people and he has a fancy gun. My main issue was the fact that he dresses like a middle-aged stockbroker on a yacht at all times.

It's like the least intimidating outfit I can imagine

What I Learned: Sydney apparently has a “little Saigon” district with the largest Vietnamese community in Australia! Judging from this movie it is also rife with drug dealers and ambitious video rental stores.

Would I Watch Again? No, I could barely handle it the first time.

Plenty (1985)

Three years before a dingo ate her baby, Meryl Streep played an even crazier character in a Sam Neill movie! Sting, Gandalf, and Charles Dance were also there.

Thankfully this movie has 100% fewer awkward shorts scenes

The Movie: This movie incorporates a lot of unexplained and unmarked time skips, so I’m going to write my summary in a similarly confusing way. It’s WWII and Meryl Streep is a spy in France! Sam Neill is a newly arrived spy, and she gives him advice, then cries, then sleeps with him. He leaves without saying goodbye. Then some guy is dead and Charles Dance is an ambassador who has to deal. The corpse’s wife is Meryl Streep! Except she’s not really his wife, just his mistress. Now Charles Dance and Meryl Streep are making out and they’ve been dating for months. Meryl Streep’s BFF is a bohemian and Charles Dance hates the way they talk and like jazz music. Meryl Streep asks Sting to father a child with her because she wants a kid and doesn’t want to get married. Sting visits her with flowers because it’s apparently a year later and she’s still not preggers? Then she tries to shoot Sting (we’ve all been there). Charles Dance answers a phone and then rushes to a hospital. Meryl Streep turns around dramatically! Now Charles Dance is at a dinner party and says his wife will be right down! Bohemian BFF is coming downstairs in a fancy dress! J/k his wife is Meryl Streep who freaks out about the Suez Canal and makes everyone uncomfortable. Now Bohemian BFF is visiting some desert place! Charles Dance and Meryl Streep are there, and Meryl Streep is heavily sedated. Meryl Streep visits Gandalf to ask why her husband hasn’t been getting good ambassador assignments. She threatens to kill herself, then goes home and tears up the wallpaper. Meryl Streep is sleeping with Sam Neill again! Then she falls asleep and Sam Neill leaves! Wait–no, he finds his cufflinks she’s kept in her purse all these years! Okay, he covers her with a blanket and then leaves. The End.

Meryl Streep convincing Charles Dance that her crazy is endearing

The Character: Sam Neill is barely in this movie. We see him at the beginning jumping out of a plane and sleeping with Meryl Streep, and then at the end, sleeping with Meryl Streep. But, throughout all the crazy parts in the middle, she keeps his cufflinks in her purse and talks nonstop about how she misses the war because “you could meet people even just for a night that would change your life forever”.

Can you blame her?

Thing I Learned: Sting isn’t a terrible actor! What Ian McKellan looks like with black hair!

Would I Watch Again? Yes, backwards, to see if it makes more sense.

Angel (2007)

Once again, Netflix tricked me into thinking this was a historical romance.

At least the costumes lived up to their promise

The Movie: This movie follows the life of Angel Deverell, who starts out as a petulant and angsty grocer’s daughter and rises to become a petulant and angsty rich and famous novelist by writing the turn of the century equivalent of Twilight. She spends pretty much all of the movie acting like your worst memories of middle schoolers, refusing to change any part of her books, even for factual accuracy. She marries a painter she doesn’t understand because he’s hot, and he likes the fact that she’s rich. Then he goes off to fight in WWI, eventually returning with one leg to commit suicide. Only then does Angel discover that he had a mistress and child. She angsts and eventually dies, almost alone and forgotten.

But the hair and costumes were superb

The Character: Sam Neill plays Angel’s publisher, who sticks by her despite how annoying and crazy she is.

Sam Neill, trying to manfully put up with stuff

Later his wife accuses him of being in love with her, since almost everyone in this movie is in love with her, despite her screechy, petulant selfishness.

Thing I Learned: This book/movie was based on the life of real author Marie Corelli who was apparently way more popular than all of her now-famous contemporaries like H.G. Wells. She was once criticized as being “a woman of deplorable talent who imagined that she was a genius, and was accepted as a genius by a public to whose commonplace sentimentalities and prejudices she gave a glamorous setting”.

Would I Watch Again? Maybe for costume ideas!

Next: Vampires! Guerrilla warfare!
Previously: Made for TV Movie Edition

You know Sam Neill loves his made for TV movies. Also, this project is now 60% complete!!!

Snow White: A Tale of Terror (tv 1997)

The Movie: This is the story of Snow White but creepier and with better costumes! The dwarves are now an outlaw band of renegade miners (including one hot guy). Snow White’s name is Lilli, and the guy sent to kill her doesn’t so much take pity as gets tired of chasing her pathetically quickly. Also, the handsome prince is a handsome doctor! Steven and I debated the whole movie about whether Sigourney Weaver, the Evil Stepmom, was evil from the beginning or if Young Snow White drove her to it by being terrible. Either way, her creepy possessed mirror definitely commits at least one murder before she is even really married to Sam Neill so there’s that. But she seems to go really nuts after the stillbirth of her child, the heir Sam Neill wants so badly. A lot of her actions seem to be motivated by magically bringing it back to life.

As always, great choice in women, Sam Neill

The Character: Sam Neill plays Snow White’s dad. Unlike the fairy tale, he doesn’t die, but does suffer a bad accident which hurts his leg. Then Sigourney Weaver goes full on crazy, poisons(?) everyone in the castle, and hangs him upside down in the chapel to bleed him for some kind of dead-raising black sabbath. Luckily Snow White and her hot new outlaw miner BF arrive in time to save him! I was expecting his character to be somewhat bumbling and oblivious, but he was actually pretty normal.

Well, apart from his taste in clothing

What I Learned: Hot outlaw miners know way more about how to tell if people are really dead than hot doctors!

Would I Watch Again?: Probably not, unless it was to study the costumes, which were pretty awesome!

Forgotten Silver (TV 1995)

Netflix basically tricked me into watching this

The Movie: So this is actually a mockumentary, back when those were less common and Peter Jackson was way less famous. Apparently when it was first aired on TV people were pissed when they found out it was hoax. It was less over the top than other mockumentaries I’ve seen, so I get why they might have been confused. It follows the life of Colin McKenzie, a “forgotten” New Zealand filmmaker at the very birth of filmmaking in the early 20th century. It was actually pretty funny and interesting, tying the fake story in with real historical events and people.

The Character: Sam Neill actually plays himself, which is why this movie wasn’t originally on my spreadsheet. Netflix, which has finally seemed to detect the pattern underlying all of my recent movie selections, suggested it to me. Sam Neill is one of many real famous people who are interviewed to talk about their own experiences with Colin McKenzie’s work and what they think his affect has been on the film industry.

What I Learned: Richard Pearse, famous New Zealand aviator, may have beaten the Wright brothers into the air, although there is little proof besides some witness accounts. It’s easy to forget that lots of people all over the world were working on how to fly at the same time!

Would I watch again?: I think so. The fake black and white footage was pretty entertaining and the story it told, though fiction, was still interesting. Plus, it’s funny to imagine the hundreds of people totally believing all of it.

The Incredible Journey of Mary Bryant (TV 2005)

I couldn't go a whole post without watching something based on a true story

The Movie: Mary is a young, pregnant, starving thief who is sentenced to transportation to Australia at the very start of the New South Wales penal colony. Both the journey and conditions when they get there are looking pretty grim. Luckily Mary finds love with a hot smuggler, Will Bryant, and they get prison married! Jack Davenport is a young lieutenant virtually identical to his character in Pirates of the Caribbean in that he sticks to his ideals and then loses the girl of his dreams to someone who is hotter and looser in the moral department. Mary decides that this is no place to raise her children and organizes a crazy escape attempt, making it all the way to the Dutch Indies before being caught and sent back to England for trial. Luckily everyone loves her so she gets off!! Yay!!

Sam Neill mostly wears a lot of wigs

The Character: Sam Neill plays Arthur Phillip, the governor of the penal colony! He’s kind of a jerk in that when a massive night of rape breaks out, he says “Just let it run its course” and orders his men to protect the food. Another time, when confronted with violent natives, he commands one of his men to take his pants off “so that they can see we’re men, same as them. Otherwise they might think us women.”

It's the hair, Sam. And the shiny gold decorations

Previously: Space Edition!
Next: Angst Edition!

SuperCroc (2001 TV)
Not to be confused with the monster movie of the same name, this is a National Geographic documentary narrated by Sam Neill!

It didn't walk with dinosaurs... IT ATE THEM!!!

The Movie: The documentary follows a paleontologist and a crocodile expert traveling the world to study modern day crocodiles in an attempt to make educated guesses about what the ancient supercroc (or Sarcosuchus, if you want to get technical) was like. The documentary began with digging up some Sarcosuchus bones in the Sahara, including a massive skull, but without more of the body they needed measurements and ratios from modern versions to guess at how big supercroc was (answer: about 40 feet long, 8.75 tons). Interspersed with capturing and measuring the world’s different crocodile and alligator species is kind of bad computer animation about what we imagine prehistoric supercroc was like. And it chomping down on dinosaurs.

Also I learned that this exists

The Character: Since this was a documentary he was narrating, I never actually got to see Sam Neill, which, as you can guess, was a bit of a blow since you know I love making fun of his clothes. He was really good at narrating, though, providing some ironic detachment from the alligator expert, who was annoyingly excitable. I think he would do really well recording audiobooks! I still enjoyed this more than A Cry in the Dark; thanks for teaching me something, Sam Neill!

Best Sam Neill Quote: (after annoying alligator guy has captured a big crocodile and tied it down in the back of his pick up, asking can you IMAGINE what supercroc would be like?) “You’d need a bigger truck”.

Thing I Learned From This Movie: Alligators have medicine in their blood that heals their wounds from the inside!

Would I Have Watched This Without the Lure of Sam Neill?: Yes, but only while doing something else, like cooking

Skin (2008)

This movie was based on a true story, so, once again, I learned something! You’ve just spent this week educating me, Sam Neill!

Also, Sam Neill's Afrikaner accent is crazy!

The Movie: Sandra Laing looks black (is black? This terminology is a major issue in the movie too) but both of her parents are white Afrikaners in apartheid-era South Africa. Obvs this causes all kinds of problems, such as is she allowed to attend a white school? And how to stop everyone from being terrible to her there? Who can she marry? Can she legally even live with her parents? At one point a professor explains that she is probably the result of African/European intermarrying at some point far back in her parents’ ancestral past, something he claims most Afrikaners have in their genes at some point. Sandra takes a lot of crap, even from her own family, and eventually runs away with a black man, whom she can’t even legally marry since she is technically classified as white. Their relationship can’t survive their differences in background–he gets really pissed when she keeps trying to contact her mother–and she eventually runs away from him, starting a new life with their two children. Eventually she reunites with her mom, but her dad dies, leaving her money but never speaking to her again. The part I remember the most is just a simple scene without any dialog, showing Sandra and her mother going shopping for a new dress. Because Sandra isn’t allowed inside the store, her mother and a saleslady stand in the window with the mannequins, holding up various choices while Sandra stands outside, pointing to ones she likes and pantomime pleading with her mother for the one she wants.

Sam Neill, as always, at the height of fashion

The Character: Of course Sam Neill is Abraham Laing, her stubborn, domineering father. He is pretty much ace at playing troubled dad characters at this point. He pushes the government continually until they finally decide to determine race based on ancestry, not appearance, and just as stubbornly tries to force Sandra to have a “normal” life, even going so far as to not care when some guy sexually assaults her since at least he’s white. He delivers an ultimatum after she runs off with her black boyfriend: return home now or never see your family again. He then spends most of the rest of the film burning her letters and trying to prevent his wife from seeing her through creepily serious death threats. “If I ever see her here again, I’ll kill them. And then myself.” Towards the end of the movie, when Sam Neill is dying of cancer, he tries to leave the house to find Sandra and apologize to her, but his wife won’t let him, claiming that they don’t deserve her forgiveness. Which is a nice sentiment, but, you know, Sandra is pretty much homeless and starving so maybe put your high horse away, mom. Sam Neill’s Abraham Laing is believably terrible to his family, sticking with the government-sanctioned racism that would definitely have been the status quo at the time this movie is set. I still end up feeling bad for him at the end when he realizes what a dick he’s been. Oh, Sam Neill, it’s so hard to hate you for realsies.

Thing I Learned From This Movie: Sandra Laing is a real person and most of the events in this movie really happened!

Would I Watch This Without Sam Neill?: From reading the description, no, but if I started it I would end up liking it.

Perfect Strangers (2003)

Pretty sure Sam Neill agreed to this movie because he got to spend a lot of it pretending to be dead inside a freezer.

The description made it sound like a romcom, and it is, if you like CRAZY

The Movie: Melanie lives a pretty boring life, until one night she decides to go home with a mysterious hot guy she meets at a bar. Except when she wakes up the next morning she is on his boat, since his home is on a remote deserted island! Plus, he seems to know a lot about her, and keeps saying things like “I would do ANYTHING for you!” Then he cooks them a romantic dinner, burns her old clothes, and insists that they can’t sleep together until she loves him. In her attempts to escape the next morning–since she is apparently too dumb to realize there are two locks on the door hotel room style–she ends up accidentally stabbing The Man (that’s how he’s listed in the credits–we never know his name), and then trying to nurse him back to health. Of course, he ends up dying, but that’s cool, she just stashes his body in the freezer and starts hallucinating him, imagining an elaborate and romantic relationship between them. Eventually some guy she used to know arrives, and apparently it’s really his house but The Man just rents it? And she tries to kill him too? But then he’s cool with it? And they get married? The last scene is her dancing with her hallucination at her own wedding to the other guy! Yeah, supper sweet.

I assume they chose Sam Neill because he makes a great corpse

The Character: Sam Neill plays The Man, and he acts the hell out of it! The Man doesn’t have too many lines, preferring silent mystery/being dead, but in the beginning of the kidnapping I was really unsure if I was creeped out by him or wanted to date him. Then Melanie revealed herself to be crazy to the power of twelve, so Sam Neill definitely now appears to be the most sane, attractive character in this film. It’s like she waited to get Stockholm syndrome until he was already dead, so she just had to fall in love with his corpse/hallucination. My favorite part is when she has a gun out, trying to shoot the Island Owner, and she asks Sam Neill’s specter if you can kill someone twice. Sam Neill shrugs and suggests that she just better try it to see. Then she throws a little pity party about how she never meant to kill him, which is weird since she did stick a knife in his stomach.

Thing I Learned: Pro tip: When the girl you’ve kidnapped locks you out of your own house, the best thing to do is start a smile fire under it and smoke her out!

Would I Watch This Without Sam Neill?: Yes, thinking it was a romantic comedy! Then I’d end up finishing it despite mounting unease out of a morbid curiosity.

Previously: Merlin (again), Erotic Artist, Tragic Dingo Victim
Next: Total Player, Overbearing Dad, Crackpot!

I’ve decided one of my favorite things about Sam Neill is how his accent can change pretty dramatically with each movie!

Merlin’s Apprentice (TV Movie) (2006)
For full disclosure: I got this DVD from Netflix and it whimped out on me about 20 minutes in to “Part 2″ of this 2-part TV movie. However, Sam Neill’s character died at the end of Part 1, so you can’t make me feel guilty about not even trying to restart. At that point it was pretty much any excuse to stop watching the terribleness. However, I did read a summary of Part 2 on wikipedia, and unfortunately it makes even less sense than I predicted.

This movie has to be a front for something else, right? Sam, what are you doing?

The Movie: So, this is sort of a sequel to Merlin (1998), except it doesn’t follow any of the same story or have any of the same characters, except that Sam Neill is Merlin and Miranda Richardson is the Lady of the Lake, but a different Merlin and Lady of the Lake. I don’t really understand why, but probably because no one else would agree to sign on for this since the plot is ridic. Check it: Merlin is super sleepy after doing all this work to make a perfect Camelot so he finds some cave and goes to sleep. But, whoops, he wakes up 50 years later! Everyone he knows is dead and Camelot has gone to shit. The Holy Grail has disappeared because Camelot is no longer pure, and vaguely-Viking-like barbarian hordes are sweeping ever closer to destroy it. The Lady of the Lake is on their side and helping them with her magic because Camelot has “polluted her waters”. Luckily Merlin finds Jack, a young thief with magical talent and takes him on as an apprentice! Jack has a pig sidekick who may be magical too? Inconclusive. Other characters include: Sir Gawain’s granddaughter, the blacksmith she is secretly in love with, and a girl pretending to be a boy, but not very well. Seriously, she is trying to earn her place as a knight a la Alanna the Lioness, but she is obviously, obviously a girl the entire time. The other characters address her constantly as “Boy!” as if the director knew it was the only way to tell the audience that she’s supposed to be pretending and it’s a huge secret.

Everyone else just thought his voice hadn't broken yet, whatever

The Character: This version of Merlin is a little more serious than in the original TV movie that this is sort of but not really a sequel to. Since Jack is really the main character, Merlin spends a lot of time making seriously melodramatic pronouncements of doom or grumbling about how stupid Jack is. The most ridiculous part is at the end of Part 1 when the Lady of the Lake reveals to Merlin that Jack is HER son. And that he’s a baby daddy. Yeah, Merlin was sleep-raped by the Lady of the Lake. Because she was lonely. Luckily Merlin dies after heroically sacrificing himself to save the people of Camelot pretty soon after that so I didn’t have to watch any more. I thought the pig would definitely turn out to be the Holy Grail in disguise (which would explain why it is kind of magical?) but alas, it’s just a magical pig named Sir Snout. Of course. Of course Gawain’s granddaughter (?maybe) and her illicit “we’re from two different worlds!” love get together in the end as Camelot’s new rulers and Jack gets with the pretend-boy after discovering her secret.

Sam Neill was probably happy to escape after just half of it

Best Sam Neill Quote: (after Jack suggests they could work together) “I’d sooner mate with a dung beetle!”
Or the Lady of the Lake, in your sleep? Ooohhhh.

Sirens (1993)

This week I watched two movies where Sam Neill played an Australian, and he’s pretty good at it! This one also had Hugh Grant. And nudity!

I prefer this cover to the one that's just Hugh Grant's face, trying to look like he can still feel shame

The Movie: Hugh Grant is a stodgy C of E reverend sent to Australia with his wife. The bishop asks him to visit a crazy artist on their way, since he keeps painting erotic pictures with religious themes and won’t stop. Of course, their stay at his villa is a sexual awakening for both husband and wife. Plus, I learn that Australians are totally nonchalant about all the deadly, deadly things that surround them daily.

Like Portia de Rossi

The Character: Sam Neill plays the artist, Norman Lindsey, who apparently was a real guy and also completely awesome. From what I can tell on Wikipedia, Sam Neill captures him well, portraying him as forthright with what we would call a modern attitude about sexuality. Plus he gives off this air of just not caring what you think because, whatever, I’m Norman Lindsey. I get up early, paint some naked girls, and then quietly laugh at Hugh Grant’s puritanical values.

Best Quote: This one is from the real-life Norman Lindsey, after learning that 16 crates full of his art were burned in the US as pornography in 1940: “Don’t worry, I’ll do more.”

Real Life Norman Lindsey: Total Art Badass

A Cry in the Dark (1988)

So this movie, and the true story it’s based on, are both super famous, but I only heard about them in 7th grade when the boy that sat behind me in Life Science kept repeating “Maybe the dingo ate your baby!” in a ridiculous accent whenever the room was quiet. It took me awhile to figure out this was a movie reference (it was 1999, we didn’t just Google everything), but I hadn’t seen the movie he was referencing until this week! So exciting!

Almost every picture you can find of this movie is them hugging dramatically

The Movie: In case, like middle school Patricia, you don’t know this story: Meryl Streep is Lindy Chamberlain, wife of a Seventh-Day Adventist pastor. While on a family vacation to Ayers Rock, her baby daughter Azaria is attacked and eaten by dingoes! Except Lindy is the only witness, and it’s kind of dark, and they never find her body, so people get kind of suspicious and Lindy gets accused of murder. It doesn’t help that she keeps trying to talk to the press and explain her side (it was 1988, before the Internet taught us that saying anything at all just made things worse) or that Seventh-Day Adventism was seen as kind of a freaky cult. Eventually, after she has been in prison for four years, the baby’s jacket is found in a dingo den and she is released!

This was the only picture I could find of Sam Neill's ridiculous shorts. Just know that they were omnipresent.

The Character: Sam Neill plays Michael Chamberlain, Lindy’s husband. He spends a lot of the movie struggling with his faith, and all of it having stupid hair. Meryl Streep is clearly the strong one in their relationship; he seems easily rattled and has a difficult time hiding his emotions. This may be the first character Sam Neill has played that I don’t really like! Even when he’s a psychopathic space murderer I still find him hilarious and endearing, so this was kind of a big deal! Obviously he was playing someone real, which must be more difficult, and I completely understood why he had to be sort of a weepy walrus for most of it–I mean, his daughter WAS eaten by dingoes and then his wife was put in jail. I’ve only watched about 28% of the available Sam Neill movies and TV shows on Netflix (14/50), but so far this is the Sam Neill I’ve liked the least!

Steven and I debated the Sam Neill we liked the most in between comparing the Australian vs. US legal system while watching this movie (one has more wigs!), and decided on probably King Charles II Sam Neill from Restoration. Gotta love a monarch whose not embarrassed to play the “Got your nose!” game with anyone.

Next: Super Croc, Apartheid, and Boat Kidnapping!
Previously: Spaceships, Helena Bonham Carter, Charles II

I have been hard at work watching Sam Neill movies to complete my goal! I’m a fifth of the way there!

Event Horizon (1997)
I am not really that into horror movies, having a terrible fear of jump scares, but my brother once easily cajoled me into watching this one by simply pointing out that Sam Neill was in it. My Sam Neill obsession has apparently infected him, albeit a lesser case, so you should maybe watch out.

Yes, this movie is trying to make you fear black holes

The Movie: In the year 2047 Earth receives a signal from the experimental space ship Event Horizon which disappeared mysteriously seven years ago. A crew of plucky space adventurers plus the ship’s original designer are sent out to Neptune to investigate. The ship was created to move faster than light by creating an artificial black hole inside its core, but of course something went wrong and it ended up in a freakish hell dimension, killing all of the crew, whose creepy frozen remains we get jump scared by while exploring the ship. Plus, the ship has either become evil-sentient or there’s some kind of creepy hell-dimension demon thing hiding out in it, because it eventually starts torturing the new crew with creepy visions before possessing one of them in an attempt to bring them back “home” to creepy hell dimension. Jump scares and gross death scenes abound.

Also, this happens

The Character: Sam Neill plays Dr. Weir, the ship’s original creator and the character the unexplained evil force decides to possess. He spends most of the movie insisting that the ship is perfectly safe, despite evidence, and gruesomely killing the other characters. This movie taught me that it’s pretty much impossible for me to not like Sam Neill, even when he’s being a murdering psychopath. Before he gets all possessed and cuts out his own eyes, he has angsty dreams about his wife who either left him or killed herself, something he hasn’t gotten over. See, Sam Neill’s not evil, he’s just sad, you guys. Is it his fault that the evil hell dimension’s spokesdemon decided to possess him? Maybe, but at least he does it with a smile on his face and general badassery in his heart.

Best Sam Neill Quote: “Where we’re going… we won’t need eyes to see.”

The Revengers’ Comedies/Sweet Revenge (1998)
This is the second time I’ve seen Sam Neill and Helena Bonham Carter together (the other being Merlin) and they’re a pretty great combination! At first I was shocked that Helena Bonham Carter’s character did not seem totally, totally nuts as per her usual, but thankfully you just have to wait a little longer for her to reveal her true crazy.

There's lots of reasons this movie made me happy; that outfit is #2

The Movie: Sam Neill’s wife has left him and he’s just been fired; Helena Bonham Carter’s friend-with-benefits has just gone back to his wife. They meet while attempting to jump off London’s Tower Bridge and decide to get revenge on the people who’ve made them miserable. Helena Bonham Carter gets a secretary job at Sam Neill’s old office to torture his smarmy replacement/job stealer, leaving Sam Neill to hang out in her huge country house to somehow ruin the life of her next-door-neighbor/ex-BF’s wife. Unfortunately, Sam Neill ends up falling in love with the wife instead, which pisses off HBC when she goes to all the trouble to make sure smarmy-boss ends up disgraced and dead. Sam Neill DOES accidentally kill the boorish ex-bf in a ridiculous duel scene, and HBC turns out to be a chronic arsonist who supposedly dies when lighting her own house on fire at the end, though in the final scene we see she is just pretending and still out for revenge OMG LOOK OUT SAM NEILL

This is #1; I had to pause the movie I was laughing so much

The Character: Sam Neill is pretty much the straight man in this movie, spending most of his time somewhat befuddled, especially by Helena Bonham Carter. He does show a little bit of initiative in figuring out the truth about how HBC’s parents died (“mysterious fire”) and does try to stand up to his new love interest’s terrible husband. Unlike HBC and every other character, he doesn’t take death lightly, protesting the duel he’s been coerced into even while his opponent is pointing a gun at his head.

Best Sam Neill quote: Sam Neill protests that dueling with shot guns is far too barbaric and he’s not going to take part, dramatically flinging his gun to the ground. It goes off, shooting his opponent through the heart. HBC’s younger brother, happily: “Good shot!!!”

Restoration (1995)
When I saw this period piece on my list of things to watch, I thought “Okay, some made-for-TV Masterpiece Theater kind of thing with a series of bad accents”. I was so wrong! This movie is full of famous people!

Though sadly not Helena Bonham Carter

The Movie: The opening scenes of this movie made me think it was going to be a classic 1663 doctor buddy-cop type movie. David Thewlis plays the by-the-book conservative while Robert Downey Jr. is more interested in drinking and the ladies, but his disregard for “the rules” marks him for brilliance. We only see this “brilliance” one time: when he dares to touch a live human heart with his grubby, plague-covered 17th century hands. I think I’m with Prof. Lupin on this one. Anyway, his heart-grabbing means that King Charles II takes notice of him and hires him to nurse his most precious pet dog back to health. Robert Downey Jr. gets drunk, but somehow the dog is saved anyway! Huzzah! Everything goes good for awhile until King Charles gives RDJ an estate and makes him marry one of the many royal mistresses in a sham marriage so that the other royal mistresses don’t get jealous. Despite the expert advice of Sir Ian McKellan, his butler, and the conniving of Hugh Grant who appears to be hanging out there for no reason, RDJ falls in love with his fake wife, and so the king banishes him to hang out at David Thewlis’ mental hospital where Meg Ryan is an attractive yet crazy Irish woman. Of course RDJ wastes no time in hitting that and David Thewlis dies of the plague (or werewolfism??). Meg Ryan dies giving birth to their daughter and the rest of the movie involves RDJ finding meaning in his life again through a plague outbreak and the Great Fire of 1666.

Guess who Sam Neill is.

OF COURSE King Charles II!

The Character: Sam Neill is AMAZING as King Charles II! Even if you discount the awesomeness of his wig and clothes, he pretty much goes everywhere with an adorable pack of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. Plus he’s the perfect blend of silliness and deadly seriousness at the same time, which makes you think “Here is a guy who knows how to have a good time… but also someone I don’t want to cross.”

That mustache alone is someone you wouldn't want to cross

Best Sam Neill Quote: While leaving RDJ to work on his poor sick dog, Sam Neill makes a ridiculous dog howling noise impossible to portray in print. Then he looks at the dog, sighs, and says “There was a time when she would’ve responded to that”.

Previously: Cardinal, Colonel, Madman
Next: Merlin (again), Erotic Artist, Tragic Dingo Victim

So since we last talked I have made great progress on my Sam Neill project! Mostly by making a spreadsheet and discovering that of his 100ish movie/TV movie/miniseries appearances, Netflix has a little less than half available in some format! Luckily, I have already seen around 10 of them (I know, I thought that number would be larger too). Here is a rundown of some of the favorites that didn’t get mentioned last time:

The Tudors TV series (2007)
I know this show is pretty recent, but I’m just now getting around to watching it on Netflix Instant. I’m not finished yet, but I’ve gotten past the part where Sam Neill’s character dies, so I figure I can check it off my list.

The point seems to be that history is ironically all about both sex AND clothes

The Show: Henry VIII has vaguely historically accurate affairs, while the rest of his court does the same, with a side of scheming. People argue about religion a lot and everyone generally dresses like it’s their job. When it’s clear that their real job is keeping Henry from killing them for reasons like “didn’t get me sex fast enough” and “would rather party with the Pope”.

"Dude, our hats!!!" "I know!!!!"

The Character: Sam Neill plays Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, which, if the picture on wikipedia can be believed, he has way too few chins to ever portray accurately. His main role in the first part of the series is to run things so King Henry can have more time with his mistresses, but later he falls out of favor when he can’t manage to get Henry a divorce from his first wife. He ends up banished, eventually killing himself rather than face a probable execution. He’s not really a “good” character, especially for what we might of expect of a churchmen. He’s devious and spends a lot of time scheming with various people, but instead of sleeping around like every other person on the show he seems fairly happy with his not-wife, Joan, which was apparently sort-of-okay for a churchman in England at the time. In the end, I ended up feeling really sorry for him, and not just because I hate to see Sam Neill cry.

Best Sam Neill Quote: “I don’t think anything, but I imagine everything.”
You don’t have to tell me, Sam Neill, I saw In the Mouth of Madness.

The Jungle Book (1994)
No, not the animated version. This one:

The Movie: Unlike the unsettlingly racist Disney movie of the same name, this movie spends a lot more time concentrating on Mowgli’s interactions with people instead of singing animals. We still get lots of shots of him palling around with bears and wolves and winning a monkey king’s affection by battling a giant snake, but most of the plot centers around his attempts to blend in to the society of colonial India. John Cleese and the Love Interest try to teach him English and manners, while an evil Westley jealously tries to kill him.

"Damn it, Love Interest is MINE!"

Eventually, Mowgli is forced to lead Evil Captain Robin Hood into the jungle after the monkey king’s treasure, but prevails in the end because Evil Cary Elwes doesn’t respect the jungle.

The Character: Sam Neill plays Colonel Brydon, Love Interest’s well-meaning but kind of ineffectual dad. Most of the movie he is either telling Love Interest to act like a lady or pushing her to marry the obviously Evil Captain Cary Elwes.

"My dear, all I ask is that you find someone with sufficient mustache to keep you happy"

I know I’m supposed to find Colonel Sam Neill completely tiresome, but I actually agree with him wholeheartedly. The jungle is clearly full of gross bugs and giant snakes, and Cary Elwes was ADORABLE in 1994. I mean, true, he’s also evil, but nobody’s perfect. Anyway, Colonel Sam Neill finally gets with the program but it’s TOO LATE and he ends up dangerously wounded and transported through the jungle on the back of an elephant. Luckily he maintains a respectable Stiff Upper Lip through the whole experience and learns to respect the jungle law, presumably later blessing his daughter’s shocking jungle union.

Best Sam Neill Quote: (to his elephant when it is freaking out about a tiger) “Damnit, pull yourself together!!!”
Sam Neill fears no jungle cat!

In the Mouth of Madness (also 1994)
I saw this movie kind of by accident in high school when I was looking for a horror movie at Blockbuster. This one seemed to be about a writer who fell into his own book or something, which seemed like a good premise. Only after starting it did I realize that, of course, Sam Neill is the main character.

This picture pretty much sums it up

The Movie: John Trent is some kind of insurance fact checker/private investigator/skeptical chainsmoker who is sent to find the missing horror novelist Stephen King Sutter Cane. He ends up in the fictional(?) town where all of Cane’s books take place and everything is exactly as Cane described, with people gradually going crazy, killing each other, and turning into creepy monsters. Trent thinks it is all a publicity stunt for a ridiculously long amount of the movie.

Sam Neill, no one would pay the money for this set up to publicize a BOOK you silly

Eventually it turns out that the insanity/bloodlust/monsterfication is contagious and you can get it just by reading the book! Cane turns out to just be a puppet of an “elder race” and his books are all some sort of master plan to release Cthulhu. Then everything becomes really meta and confusing.

The Character: Sam Neill is our man, John Trent, who Cane insists is just a fictional character in his book and therefore has no freewill. Sam Neill tries repeatedly to NOT follow Cane’s instructions, destroying the manuscript of the evil hellbook repeatedly, but each time it reappears. He tries just not delivering it to the publishers, explaining to them that he’s failed his task, but they act really confused and tell him he delivered it months ago. Then Sam Neil pretty much goes insane, kills some people, and gets locked in an asylum, which is the scene the movie begins with, the rest being an extended flashback. Eventually society ends, Sam Neill wanders out of the asylum to watch the movie version of In the Mouth of Madness, which is also the movie we have just seen.

Realizing you're a fictional pawn in humanity's extinction has a lighter side, apparently

So, yeah, John Trent spends most of the movie either calling everyone else crazy or laugh-crying hysterically. It’s pretty awesome.

Best Sam Neill Quote: (to his creator, Cane) “Your books SUCK!”

So Cardinal Wolsey, an elephant-riding Imperial English Colonel, and a horror movie hero/fictional character/villain/crazy person! Three great additions to Sam Neill’s resume and further proof that he can pretty much do anything!

Next time: Spaceships, Helena Bonham Carter (again), and Charles II

For me, the deal always, always is that Sam Neill is in it. You guys, I think I might be a little obsessed. In fact, much as I have vowed to read every Tamora Pierce book ever, I realized this week that I have made a more informal vow to see every movie Sam Neill has been in. It’s the only explanation for my Netflix queue, and I decided I might as well make it official. Look, I’ve made a banner and everything:

Here’s a little history of how we’ve gotten to this point:

Merlin (1998) (mini-series)
Remember a few weeks ago when I claimed that, rather than wanting to be a princess, middle school Patricia was obsessed with the magical old guy archetype? Yeah, I was in 6th grade when this mini-series came out about Merlin, the most magical of all magical old guys. And he wasn’t even that old!

Still too old for Middle School Patricia, but what are you gonna do?

Plus, he has kind of silly looking hair so I’m sure 6th Grade Patricia swooned immediately.

The Movie: This movie generally follows the stories found in Arthurian legend, obvs with the focus on Merlin. You got your classic underground dragon fight, Uther Pendragon being the ultimate creepster, sword in the stone, Guinevere being kind of a slut, Arthur one-upping her (with incest!), and Mordred being a Sour McEmoPants. This version of the story also shows a lot of Merlin’s relationship with Nimue, whom he falls in love with as a young man, rather than a lecherous old guy as in most other versions. Plus, Nimue totally loves him back instead of just using him to gain knowledge of his magical powers! Also, instead of being trapped in a cave forever, Merlin is sentenced to the possibly more tragic fate of having to hang out with Martin Short.

And Helena Bonham Carter was also there

The Character: Clearly Merlin is a great addition to anyone’s resume, and Sam Neill’s Merlin even avoids most of the classic Merlin-downsides, like being a bit of a lech and ending up rotting to death in some cave. Unfortunately, he still helps out Uther in weird magical-rape because he knows the resulting illegitimate kid will be Arthur. Not even Middle School Patricia thought that was a good excuse, Merlin, so I’m deducting points. Still, overall Merlin is smart, kind of badass, and wore awesome feather coats, so maybe my favorite Sam Neill role? We’ll see!

Jurassic Park I/III (1993/2001)
So the first Jurassic Park movie came out before Merlin but Young Patricia was way too busy being TERRIFIED of dinosaurs to notice Sam Neill the first time she saw it.

This movie taught me to fear both ripples in water and Jeff Goldblum

It was only upon rewatching it sometime later that I realized “Hey! It’s that guy!!!” I don’t remember much about Jurassic Park III besides watching it solely because I heard Sam Neill was back.

The Movie: is so amazing you don’t need me to describe it at all; you’re already reliving Muldoon’s love/hate raptor relationship or possibly picturing that annoying girl claiming to be “a hacker”.

The Character: Dr. Alan Grant, like Merlin, is both smart and badass. Plus, he hates children and specifically tries to traumatize them in the first scene:

"This is nothing like The Land Before Time, you little halfwit, this is real life dinosaur science!"

Plus, he spends most of both movies in awesome hats.

The Omen III: The Final Conflict (1981)
This movie pretty much cemented my obsession with Sam Neill. I remember thinking: “This guy’s resume is AMAZING. All-powerful wizard… two-time dinosaur fighting scientist… the anti-Christ. There is like NO JOB he can’t get”. I became convinced that every role Sam Neill could play would be JUST AS AWESOME and informally vowed to see each one. From this point onward, seeing that Sam Neill was in a movie automatically meant that I would watch it, no matter what. Which was unfortunate, because the Internet agrees that The Omen III completely sucks. However:

The Movie: Full disclosure, I saw this movie at a Halloween “The Omen” marathon sleepover in highschool, and I fell asleep about halfway through. I can’t really tell you anything about it besides that Sam Neill is the anti-Christ. A cursory google search reveals that at some point he goes fox hunting.

The Character: He’s the anti-Christ!! Assuming he’s similar to his younger self in The Omen (1976) which I do remember, he has demonic powers and has no qualms getting rid of ANYONE IN HIS WAY in the most gruesome way possible.

And at some point he becomes Harry Potter! Or maybe that's a knife?

Anyway, I’ll keep you posted on my Sam Neill watching progress!

Next Time: Cardinal Wolsey, British Imperialism, and Madness!

I have never been so glad (and shocked) that something made the jump from VHS! Here is the sitch, if, for some reason, you’ve never seen this masterpiece:

Calvin, that guy from American Pie, needs to learn a valuable lesson about standing up for himself and courage and all that. Then an earthquake/half-dead wizard’s spell transports him to an extremely loose adaptation of King Arthur’s Court!! Unfortunately, the aging King Arthur is being bamboozled by Lord Belasco, he of the enormous forehead, and Merlin tells Calvin from where he is astrally projected onto well water that if Calvin saves Camelot, Merlin will help him find a way home. So Calvin trains to be a knight with Daniel Craig, the Master at Arms, and Arthur’s youngest daughter, Katie, while his eldest daughter, Kate Winslet, is being CRUELLY SOLD OFF as the prize in a tournament all the while cross dressing as the mysterious Black Knight to Robin Hood the shit out of Camelot’s surrounding towns.

The best part about this movie is the fact that everyone finds Calvin’s odd speech, clothes, and backpack full of 1990s tricks charming instead of demonic. Instead of being burned as a witch, he is able to introduce Camelot to: CD players, rollerskates, bubble gum, super glue, bicycles, 90s slang, and hamburgers. He also seems to know a lot about how to smelt things?

My favorite scene is where Calvin makes Princess Katie a hamburger with tomatoes, which she calls “poisonous love apples”, which, I swear, Steven and I have debated the historical accuracy of on at least two separate occasions. She tries the hamburger for the first time and says, “Good! I mean… BAD!” since Calvin has previously explained that “If something’s good than it’s bad, if it’s cool than it’s hot!” I sometimes still feel the urge to say things are “Good… I mean BAD!” after tasting things Steven cooks for the first time.

“Tis not heart burn… tis heart ache! You are in love, little one!” As you might expect, Calvin is totes crushing on Princess Katie, and Kate Winslet ends up getting together with Daniel Craig, even though he is only a lowly Master at Arms! Yay! I’m glad Camelot’s only aggressor in Arthur’s twilight years is an vaguely Mediterranean Lord with a huge forehead, instead of, you know, that whole Mordred thing or the Guinevere/Lancelot adultery fiasco.

However, the second I saw a giant–nay, MEGA shark attacking a plane while it was FLYING IN THE AIR, I knew this movie would not only be a masterpiece of artistic subtlety, but also an eyeopening account of important global events that the media and Hollywood often ignore. Namely, when prehistoric, giantass sea creatures are unleashed on a totally unprepared modern society. Oh, the Valuable Life Lessons I learned!

1. God will punish us for global warming with GIANTASS SEA CREATURES

The completely believable premise of this movie is that a megalodon and a giant octopus were frozen in ice in the midst of an epic battle for supremacy (since giant icebergs form INSTANTANEOUSLY they were, naturally, caught unawares). When their ice shelf cracks apart, they run rampant again, destroying oil platforms, battleships, and, yes, airplanes. The government’s response is, naturally, to deny and destroy all evidence “to avoid global panic” and the crack team of scientists’ response is, mostly, to pour neon liquids into different beakers and hang out drinking out of paper bags on the beach (I’m not kidding). They do have time for a little philosophizing, however: “The polar ice caps are melting because of our thoughtlessness. Maybe this is our comeuppance”. Jeremy Caves should totally start using this movie to promote his environmentalist schemes. Recycle, OR MEGA SHARK AND GIANT OCTOPUS WILL FUCKING KILL YOU. And your 747.

2. Sharks and Airplanes are natural enemies

Another example of how ground breaking this film is! Before viewing this, I had no idea how sharks felt about airplanes, simply because normal sized sharks have no way of expressing their inner rage towards the flying metal tubes hurtling at top speed thousands of feet above their heads. They have to content themselves with looking at the sky and thinking “Damn you, airplanes! If only you were flying lower and I were somehow ten times bigger! Then I could take you down, you smug bastards.” And that is EXACTLY what megashark does here. You’ll also notice that just before the strike an inexplicable, and oddly purple, thunderstorm starts to erupt. From these clues, we can piece together the subtle message of emotional turmoil within the megashark that the filmmaker is trying to portray: should he strike down the plane with his weather-changing powers, or should he follow his baser shark instinct and simply snatch the plane out of the air?

Another theory about this endlessly debatable clip is that megashark was simply trying to punish what is clearly a plane full of negligent–dare I say, idiotic?–airline passengers. How many of those losers did the stewardess have to remind to put their seat backs up? And when she told “Nervous Passenger” to sit down, he inexplicably told her that “we’re getting married in two days”. This line, mere seconds before Mega Shark chomps them to their doom, could be seen as a subtle attempt by the filmmaker to critique traditional and outdated family values.

3. An all out brawl to the death is ALWAYS the answer

The crack team of scientists is composed of an Irish guy, an Asian guy, and a blonde girl. The viewer picks up on the fact that they are possibly the world’s best scientists because they say things like “Indeed! The laws of physics apply!” and can come up with formulas for prehistoric shark pheromones after hooking up in a broom closet. At first they insist that they will only aid the military if Mega Shark and Giant Octopus can be contained, rather than simply destroyed. However, as multiple close-ups of the Giant Octopus’ eyes show us, the monsters are PURE EVIL and will never stop. After an abortive attempt to contain Mega Shark in the San Fransisco Bay (without anyone noticing?), the scientists realize the error of their ways when Mega Shark bites through the Golden Gate bridge:

A subtle critique on the liberal west coast lifestyle?