Ian Payn

The user comment "With a flick of the magic wand" by one JHClues from Salem, Oregon is such an obvious plant it's pathetic.

It's not even done up to look like anything other than a press release. How insecure are these cretins that even for a surefire hit like this they have to...well, I can't think of a better word than cheat.

I think whoever reviews User Comments at IMDB should be more careful, unless the IMDB have some sort of deal going. If they have, that's fine, but can we at least be told that User Comments are likely to be planted and partisan if this is the case?

I tell you one thing, though: I work for a film company (they specialise in libraries of older films, not new release), and if I went through their back catalogue of (frankly, ghastly) films putting comments up for them on the IMDB, I wouldn't be as stupid as whoever posted the Potter drivel...

Kansas Raiders is a neat little film, with, one suspects, a higher budget than most Audie Murphy westerns. An interesting cast (I didn't realise Kit Dalton was from Da Bronx) and an ambitious and ambiguous premise make this a worthwhile way of passing the time.

I saw this film with a cerebral friend. He complained that the outer space scenes lacked authenticity. I had to point out that if you go to see a film about four seventy year old men going into space you sort of had to suspend your disbelief somewhat. Generally enjoyable, totally disbelievable.

Lew Grade was determined to make it as a movie mogul in the mid 1970s. George Pan Cosmatos had a cv that didn't particularly suggest that he was the man to helm a disaster movie about a doomed train hurtling across Europe, but here he was, nonetheless. A lot of the characterizations and dialogue in this movie are risible, as are some of the effects shots - watch for when Martin Sheen gets on top of the train - but the piece is mildly entertaining for all that. What made it interesting for me was the bizarre casting. Everyone, and I mean everyone, was just off kilter for their part. Richard Harris and Sophia Loren had lost their box office power, Burt Lancaster tried to bring gravitas to the Heston role, and as for Lionel Stander (as the conductor!), Ingrid Thulin and Lee Strasberg - what on earth was going on in the mind of the casting director? What was going on in their minds is all too clear. Whatever his faults, Lew Grade paid well... See his Voyage of the Damned for another example of an 'all-star' cast of respected actors who weren't at the time box-office draws (Starring Oskar Werner, anyone?)

When The Midnight Man was first released it received a very patchy distribution. Catching up with it on TV I was surprised how effective it is, although it is definitely over-long. It's not the greatest mystery ever, but it is long on atmosphere, and has an interesting cast (Cameron Mitchell, Robert Quarry etc). If this comes your way, give it a shot. It may not be to everyone's tastes, but then nor's peanut butter.

A vanity project gone mad. Rupert Everett never had much credibility to begin with, but whatever he had, it's gone now, as he plays the buffed-up but sensitive gay gardener. Madonna is just as bad - did she insist on script changes ("You're smart, you're beautiful" etc.), or were the writers fawning over her as much as she fawns over herself? What was truly mind-blowing was that this tosh was directed by the once great John Schlesinger (compare and contrast with Sunday,Bloody Sunday). Is it the money, John? Just say so, and we'll have a cash collection. Worst moment? Probably when a mourner says that the deceased would like "Don McClean's American Pie" played at the graveside. As opposed to what? "Bartok's American Pie?" "Noel Coward's American Pie"? Then everyone starts singing it. Pass the sick-bag, Alice.