As the BBC brings the fourth series of Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures to an end this week, Dan and Sam Watts, who wrote the music for the show, accepted our invitation to list their choice of the ten finest television musical scores. And here's what they came up with...

Survivors – Edmund Butt

To be frank, anything Ed Butt does is fantastic, but Survivors really jumped out for me. The score varies so much. One minute it’s huge, as like in the opening titles, then it’s a moody, scary wash (like his work on the equally brilliant Life On Mars), and then beautiful solo piano.

It’s a movie score and a TV score all rolled into one, and done on what we're guessing is a shoestring budget. Anya’s piano theme is a stand out piece from the show. Beautiful, fragile and yet somehow filled with hope.

Invasion – Jason Derlatka and Jon Ehrlich

A huge score, and very Hollywood. The whole series was scored like a movie, with big, lush arrangements and a decent sized orchestra. Being American, it probably had a decent music budget, so it’s all real musicians, adding to the size and mood of the score.

So much TV music is done on a tiny budget with no money for real players. Fortunately, some American producers understand what real people add to a score – emotion, feeling and believability. This is a great example of how TV music should be done.

True Blood – Nathan Barr

This is again made with real musicians, albeit on a smaller scale. Comprising strings with a touch of piano and guitars (for that Southern feel) it’s very economical, yet always hits the spot. Lovely theme work too, but not in a John Williams lietmotif kind of way, rather more akin to Bear McCreary’s work on Battlestar Galactica (more on him later). It’s a small ensemble of players, but he really makes the most of it.

Firefly – Greg Edmondson

Why was Firefly cancelled? It was a fantastic show with an equally fantastic score. The Southern American civil war influence is matched in the score, giving it a real cowboys in space feel that never feels overused or tacky. It is, however, much more than that. Greg Edmondson manages to give the show real depth, and although there are many dangerous moments for Captain Mal and his crew, Edmondson manages to keep it light. That’s what we love about the score - it can be dark and dangerous, but just like the series, it never loses its sense of fun.

Alias – Michael Giacchino

Alias, Lost and Fringe are all great shows with brilliant scores, and we remember being hooked on Alias as soon as we watched the first episode. Not only was it a great TV show, but its techno-influenced music really knocked me off my feet. It was the first time we’d seen or heard anything like it used on a score.

As the show progressed, the electronica waned. In fact, jumping from season one to season two, you can tell Michael Giacchino is becoming more confident in his simple thematic approach to the score, as the beats and synths take a back seat. Again, this show was big on themes, but like True Blood and Battlestar Galactica. We’re not talking Luke staring into the twin sunsets here – they are simple and subtle. Trust us, they’re the hardest kind to write!

Band Of Brothers – Michael Kamen

It’s a TV score Jim, but not as we know it! The late Michael Kamen’s Die Hard score is one of our favourite film scores ever, and this is right up there with it. Simply put, the man was a genius.

The budget must have been huge on this. Each episode is like a film, and the score is equally expansive. There is an air of gentle nostalgia in the music which isn’t in the picture. It helps tell the story without softening the subject matter too much, and never undermines the story. The main titles are a thing of beauty, with a choir, horns and strings all working together beautifully. This is one of our favourite pieces of TV music ever.

The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes – Patrick Gowers

We have a childhood memory of Sunday evenings, sat eating crumpets by the fire watching Sherlock Holmes on the telly. It might not have been Sunday - we can’t quite remember - but it was bliss. The opening titles still fill us with warmth to this day, and the solo violin playing that clever melody is a joy to listen to.

In the episode The Twisted Lip, Patrick Gowers even dabbled with using the BBC’s computers and synthesisers, and it’s testament to the talent of the composer that upon listening now, none of it feels dated.
 
Battlestar Galactica – Bear McCreary

The drums. Everybody remembers the drums. However, it’s the simple and haunting two chord strings and gamelan melody used for Caprica 6 that sticks in our mind. Bear McCreary used themes but, again, was subtle about it. In fact, he was told not to use themes at all but snuck them in anyway.

There is a lot of drama in Battlestar Galactica, and it was all scored brilliantly. The huge taiko drums really helped define the action scenes, while strings and ethnic woodwind (especially the duduk, an Asian woodwind instrument) helped add another worldly air to the everyday trials of the fleet. As the seasons progress, the music becomes bigger and more complicated, and like Alias, it needed to develop with the show.

We also can’t think of another series that had the score become part of the show like it does in Battlestar Galactica seasons three and four. Plenty of composers talk about the music being like another character. Well, in Battlestar Galactica, it actually was.

And now for something completely different! All those shows were dramas. That being said, music is a broad church and can be used in many other contexts – here are a few of our favourite themes from the world of comedy...

Look Around You – Gelg (Peter Serafinowicz)

This needed a quick mention as it’s so clever. Part of what makes the show so funny and yet still feel like a 70s science show is its music. It’s the dated music that takes you right back to half-forgotten memories of elephants pooing on Blue Peter, or Kieran Prendiville spreading jam on a CD on Tomorrow’s World. The music is used as a trigger to help convey the 70s feel.

Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace – Andrew Hewitt

This does a similar job to Look Around You. The music helps sell the 80s lo-fi of the show. It’s the tackiness of it that really works, with over-the-top guitar and synth lines over tacky dated drumbeats. It puts a smile on my face every time.

Green Wing – Jonathan Whitehead

This show is totally off-the-wall, and the score matches it perfectly. It’s fun, funky and totally tongue-in-cheek, a high-concept score of electronics and beats. We loved Jam, which was also composed by Jonathan Whitehead (with Chris Morris). This is a slightly toned down version of that with a dance feel.

Agree? Disagree? Head to the comments!

The latest episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures season four airs tonight on CBBC.

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As Disney's Tron: Legacy prepares to take us back to the Grid this December, Propaganda is readying its videogame set in the same virtual universe, Tron: Evolution.

In a change from the usual cobbled-together movie tie-ins we've been subjected to since the dawn of time, Evolution acts as a prequel to the forthcoming Legacy, and therefore complements the film's events rather than attempting to slavishly replicate them on a console.

A third-person action game with RPG elements, Evolution plays a little like a blue-hued Assassin's Creed or Prince Of Persia - we were fortunate enough to have a little hands-on time with the 360 version of the game this year, and found its mixture of wall-running, platform-vaulting and combat both slick and gratifying.

Evolution's on-foot gameplay is broken up with vehicle sections (which we didn't get to try, sadly), which place you at the helm of a tank and, best of all, one of those iconic Light Cycles.

Developer Propaganda has clearly worked hard to capture the same luminous visual style already seen in Tron: Legacy's instantly recognisable trailers and posters, and looking at the stylish images we have for you here, they've done a sterling job.

To get a better look at the images, simply click the thumbnails to expand them.

Tron: Evolution is due for release on the Xbox 360, PS3 and PSP on 26 November, with a PC version following on in December.

If Sonic The Hedgehog were a fizzy drink, then he’d have started to go flat approximately 16 years ago. After three thrilling adventures on the Sega Megadrive, the blue blur headed off down a blind alley of dodgy spin-offs and abortive attempts at 3D, seemingly never to return.

Where Mario made the jump to the third dimension with aplomb, Sonic struggled. It’s ironic then, that after years of mediocre series entries, it’s taken Sonic’s old rival, Mario, to show him how to regain his fizz.

The debt Sonic Colours owes to the magnificent Super Mario Galaxy is obvious. The bite-sized levels. The constant shifts in perspective and styles of play. The luminous, shining environments. But by filtering Galaxy’s ideas through the filter of Sonic’s sugar-rush, ADD persona, developer Sonic Team has finally delivered something hedgehog fans have long been waiting for: a 3D Sonic game that actually works.

At last, here’s a series entry that understands what a Sonic game should be: fast, bright, and most importantly, fun. Sonic Colours fuses the 3D platform hopping action of old with the sensibility of a racing game - its twisting, obstacle-filled stages hurtle by in a blur, requiring fleet fingers and a keen memory to complete.

At scripted points in each stage, the camera will switch from a traditional side-view perspective as Colours lurches between different modes of play. There are Sonic Adventure-style sequences, where the camera chases Sonic along circuits of chicanes and jumps, and 2.5D platforming sections, filled with all the bouncing pinball bumpers, loops and enemies that have been a series staple since the 16-bit era.

In a further nod to Sonic Adventure, spin-attacks now automatically lock on to the nearest enemy, allowing Sonic to crash his way through ranks of monsters with a few rapid taps of the jump button. As was the case with Sonic 4, pulling off a chain of attacks, and using enemies as a ladder to get to areas of the map otherwise out of reach, feels slick and keeps the hectic pace of the game at boiling point.

Sonic Colours rarely settles down to a simmer, and for the first time in years, it’s a series entry that feels like its creators had genuine confidence in what they’ve created - it simply ploughs on through each of its seven worlds, flinging colour at the screen with gleeful abandon. There are no annoying side quests and, best of all, no werehogs.

Sonic Colours’ big contribution to hedgehog lore is its Wisp mechanic. Collected as you traverse each of its stages, these eight multi-coloured power-ups give Sonic temporary powers. Pink Wisps turn Sonic into a spiked ball that can roll up walls and across ceilings, while orange ones turn him into a rocket.

The Wisps' effects are garish and varied, but all perform the same function - by using them at key (and frequently signposted) sections in the game, Sonic can reach otherwise hidden areas of the map to gain extra points. It may sound like yet another redundant gimmick, but Sonic Team has made sparing and tasteful use of this new mechanic, providing an added reason to revisit earlier levels multiple times - it’s only once all the Wisps have been collected that Sonic can access all the hidden areas in each act.

Sonic Team has got so much right with Colours, but that’s not to say the game isn’t entirely without fault. Most levels are well designed, but a few have some nasty, potentially frustrating spikes in difficulty, including a singularly irritating stage where Sonic has to bounce on a moving trampoline to get to the final checkpoint.

The game as a whole also lacks the polished gleam of the Super Mario Galaxy games - though I suspect Sonic Colours was made on a considerably smaller budget - with cluttered stage select screens and some occasionally grating theme music.

Nevertheless, Sonic Colours’ weaker moments are more than outweighed by its sense of fun and exuberance. As its name implies, Colours’ levels are a polychrome riot, an acid-infused rollercoaster of twists and traps. The Wii may lag way behind the current console generation technically, but Sonic Team has wrung some seriously pretty visuals from Nintendo’s machine, from lush aquatic worlds populated by giant jellyfish to curling race tracks among the stars.

For the first time in 16 long, long years, one of the most famous mammals in videogaming has finally regained his sparkle. Sonic, it’s great to have you back.

Sonic Colours is out now and available from the Den Of Geek Store.

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Warning: this article contains major spoilers. If you don’t want the ending to Skyline ruined, read no further!

Imagine you’re an extra-terrestrial. Your kind has created ships that can cross the vast oceans of space, that are advanced enough to repair themselves even after suffering catastrophic damage.

You have the intelligence to build a special glowing laser that hypnotises entire cities of humans, and construct a kind of colossal vacuum cleaner that is capable of stripping a sprawling metropolis of its population.

You have all this technology, and yet for some reason you use it to collect human brains.

Now imagine you’re the brothers Strause. Your reputation has taken a bit of a kicking after the debacle that was Aliens Vs Predator - Requiem, a film that succeeded in sullying two much-loved franchises at the same time, and enraged an entire planet’s worth of film-obsessed geeks.

Somehow, you manage to get the funds together to create an alien invasion movie outside the interference of the Hollywood system. It’s your opportunity to redeem yourself, to prove to the world that you can direct an effective, entertaining science fiction movie competently, and on a shoe-string budget.

These two disparate scenarios come together in Skyline, a film that, despite the cautious optimism its marketing invoked, proves to be one of the most strange, unintentionally funny films to appear this year.

Skyline is so bizarre, in fact, that I've taken the slightly odd step of writing about it twice. Since I wrote my review on Friday, which I deliberately kept as spoiler-free as I could, the film's been quietly percolating in my mind, like the image of Devils Tower that haunts Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encounters Of The Third Kind.

I've been moaning about Skyline to anyone who will listen ever since. I've sculpted a model of a human brain out of mashed potato. I've driven my girlfriend to distraction with my endless complaints about the film’s continuity errors and baffling logic.

What's so frustrating about Skyline is that it's not an irredeemably bad film. The aliens are quite fascinating, even if the influences of Independence Day, Cloverfield and numerous other sci-fi staples are all too obvious. Their ships are either vast and baroque, or small and squid-like, hurtling around with their eerie blue lights on full beam.

The effects are sometimes very good, particularly when one considers the film’s low-budget status. There are clouds of floating humans, an aerial dogfight, a nuclear bomb and a big monster that hates Ferraris.

Then there's everything else. The unsympathetic characters. The flat, perfunctory script that fritters away any feeling of tension with pointless arguments and the kind of relationship issues you'd turn off Hollyoaks to avoid. In fact, Skyline is essentially Hollyoaks with aliens. And Hoovers.

Then there's the plot, which literally goes nowhere. Skyline's characters spend hours hiding from the invasion under a coffee table in their flat. Then they pluck up the courage to go upstairs for a better look. They get scared, and scurry back to the apartment.

Later, they go downstairs. Frightened, they head back to the flat again. Then they go upstairs, where they’re finally captured in a blaze of light. The credits roll a few minutes thereafter.

It's fortunate that Skyline was made outside the Hollywood studio system, since most Tinsel Town producers would have read the script, held it up to the light, and then set fire to it. Or at least, ordered a second draft.

That a nuclear bomb can go off without even cracking a window of the apartment building in which Skyline is set is (just about) forgiveable. That Skyline's directors had to find creative ways of keeping the scope of the film small is understandable, given their lack of funds.

But to have such a dramatically static plot, where characters essentially run on the spot until they're killed, seemingly at random, is a serious flaw.

Then there are the bizarre motivations of the aliens mentioned earlier. So mysterious and unsettling early on (the question of what the aliens want with approximately 3.69 million Californians is a brilliantly provocative little mystery), it's revealed these highly evolved beings are only after one thing: juicy human brains.

Even now, I'm still at a loss to explain what they need them for. I thought at first that they simply ate them, but it later turns out that they use them as an energy source, as they did in The Matrix. The lack of logic behind this idea makes my eyes water (why would aliens need human brains for energy?), and seems to serve no purpose other than to justify Skyline's alarmingly left-field ending.

Ah yes, the ending. I still haven't worked out whether it's audacious or simply inept. In either case, it's hilarious, and hints at a sequel, or at least a spin-off videogame.

Skyline’s bickering couple, Jarrod and Elaine (Eric Balfour and Scotty Thompson, respectively), having spent an hour-and-a-half hidden from the aliens, are finally beamed aboard the invaders’ mothership. And as Elaine lies prone and gooey on the deck of the alien craft, Jarrod’s brain is unceremoniously torn from his skull, his body thrown onto a heap of other human corpses.

But wait! Just as it appears that all is lost, and that the pregnant Elaine is doomed to suffer a hideous fate at the hands of her captors, Jarrod’s brain is inserted into the cranium of a dormant xenomorph. Springing to life, the alien approaches Elaine, and lays a tender hand on her face. Jarrod’s consciousness has, remarkably, lived on in this other lifeform...

As the closing credits roll to the cacophony of rock guitar, the alien/Jarrod fusion is shown (in glorious freeze frame) pummelling the ship’s invaders into jelly, before carrying off Elaine in what is surely an homage to the Swamp Thing.

It’s undoubtedly the strangest and most abrupt ending of the year. Quite apart from its dream-like absence of logic, the film ends just as you’re expecting some sort of huge fight scene. If you can imagine James Cameron’s Aliens concluding with Ripley jumping in her Loader and shouting “Get away from her, you bitch!”, you’ll perhaps understand what I mean.

In the pub over the weekend, I began formulating my own alternate endings for Skyline. It could have transpired that the aliens were anthropologists, collecting human specimens for some sort of planet-wide biological survey. Or the aliens could have been truffle hunters, who collect and sell human brains for restaurants at the end of the universe.

Or maybe the whole movie could have been an extended advert for co-director Greg Strause’s flat (which served as the location for the entire film), with its expansive views and electronic blinds. As Skyline's final two characters were taken aboard the alien craft, the film could have ended on a final lingering shot of the empty, suspiciously unmarked apartment, together with the words, "Luxurious LA penthouse. Spectacular views. $5 million or near offer."

Any of these endings would have made more sense than the one I saw at the cinema.

As bile filled as all this sounds, I didn’t hate Skyline. Unlike, say, Resident Evil: Afterlife, or The Last Airbender, I'd happily watch Skyline again, if only to enjoy the creature designs and moments of unintended humour. There are parts of it that are quite memorable, including a gloriously icky alien versus fire axe scene, a woman shrieking “He’s alive!", and the ending really sticks on the mind, though perhaps not for the reasons Skyline’s creators meant.

In fact, I almost hope the brothers Strause get to make the sequel that Skyline’s ending so obviously sets up. So far as I can work out, it would entail the Jarrod/alien thing single-handedly repelling the invasion with his gigantic fists. If it turns out like Skyline, it’ll be hilarious.

I write this, then, out of bemusement rather than hatred. Somewhere in Skyline's broken script and lifeless characters, there's a quite interesting movie trapped under the rubble. It's a film of occasionally startling images and neat ideas - the big glowing ships that self repair, the giant man Hoovers - and with a rewritten script and a decent director who could let the brothers Strause concentrate on making cool effects, it could have been a brilliant little film.

Instead, it’s brilliantly awful. And like the aliens themselves, in desperate need of a brain.

See Also:

• Skyline review

• Colin Strause and Liam O'Donnell Interview

• A brief history of the alien invasion movie

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Well, it seems like it’s full steam ahead on the upcoming sequel to X-Men Origins: Wolverine. While we don’t recall seeing an official announcement of the news, it’s now clear that Darren Aronofsky will indeed be helming the film, and it’s heading before the cameras early next year.

And now, Aronofsky himself has given an update on the project.

Firstly, he’s confirmed, the new film won’t actually be a sequel to X-Men Origins: Wolverine at all. Instead, the plan is to treat this new adventure as a one-off, as the film “isn’t a sequel in any conventional sense” (although we assume, given the content of the film, that it will chronologically follow the events of the first Wolverine spin-off film).

Secondly, there’s therefore going to be no Roman numeral in the title. Instead, the new film is going by the title of The Wolverine. Which means we can write it in italics. Yes.

This news, italics aside, could all be really quite interesting. The fact that Aronofsky is on board already gives the film a distinction, of course, but it does appear, on the surface anyway, that he’s being given a bit of creative freedom here (certainly more than Gavin Hood seemed to get on the previous Wolverine adventure). Here’s hoping, anyway.

Will this really, therefore, be an entirely standalone adventure in the X-Men franchise? We’ll find out for certain in 2012. But early signs certainly look promising…

HitFix

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This review contains spoilers.

6.8 All Dogs Go To Heaven

Again, another busy episode. This time, the demon Crowley instructs Sam and Dean to investigate a mysterious animal attack in the hope of catching an Alpha Werewolf. Realising that they have no alternative, the brothers reluctantly do Crowley’s bidding, but as they pursue the case, they find that the attacker isn’t quite what they thought.

Personally, I really enjoyed this episode, especially the reveal of the attacker. When the episode started, obviously it was a set up so that you, the viewer, were expecting a werewolf and that wouldn’t have been a bad thing. After all, it’s a classic monster for a reason. But at the same time, it would be another werewolf story, so you would expect the usual things.

This episode handles these preconceptions greatly, and when the actual attacker shows themselves for what they are, you could almost hear the Supernatural team saying ‘You didn’t expect that, did you?’

And that is what I felt this episode was really about. It was widely acknowledged before this season started that the show was heading back to the monster-of-the-week format, and that is what this episode essentially is. But the rules have changed.

Being on Crowley’s leash certainly adds tension for Sam and Dean. Obviously, Sam being soulless, he doesn’t really care as long as he’s doing something. But his speech at the end of the episode does feel very heartfelt and genuine, and I found myself feeling a lot more sorry for him than I previously had.

Up until that point in, it’s been easy to write him off as not really Sam, so why should you care about him? Which, with regards to Dean, would almost be the easy option. If he could get rid of Soulless Sam, Crowley would have no hold over him, and he could do what he wanted. And once Sam had revealed he wasn’t quite right, it gave Dean the justification for not treating Sam like his brother. With Sam’s cry for help it firmly puts one of Supernatural’s strongest elements back at it’s core: Dean looking after his baby brother.

The bigger plan of the monsters is trying to turn many all at once, and the rules changing about werewolves also add questions. Are the monsters becoming more powerful? Do they know of Crowley’s plans for Purgatory, and is this spurring them into action? With Crowley calling the shots, it does seem too much of a coincidence not to have something to do with him.

I also think having Crowley as the big bad is great. Mark Sheppard seems to take real delight in the role, and the scenes where Crowley plays off against Dean are becoming more and more of a highlight to each show.

The vicious streak Crowley shows this episode also does well to remind the viewer just what he is and how great it will be to see him get what he deserves...
 

Read our review of episode 7, Family Matters, here.

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Chilling news. Universal has given director Matthijs van Heijningen the cold shoulder, and put his forthcoming movie The Thing on ice (sorry).

According to Shock Till You Drop, van Heijningen’s prequel to John Carpenter’s classic Antarctic sci-fi horror, originally set for release on 29 April next year, has been put on hold.

A representative from Universal has since revealed to the LA Times that The Thing isn’t yet finished, and has been replaced on its release schedule by Fast Five, the latest sequel in the Fast And Furious franchise of modified cars and muscle-bound men. Fast Five had been due for release slightly later in the year, but it's been brought forward to plug the gap in Universal's schedule.

This currently leaves The Thing without a release date. It's a scenario that sounds worryingly similar to The Wolfman, a film that was delayed multiple times for re-shoots and re-edits, before finally appearing to middling reviews earlier this year.

Are there similar production difficulties behind The Thing, or does director van Heijningen merely need more time to perfect his frosty sci-fi horror?

When a new release date for The Thing appears, we’ll be sure to let you know.

Shock Till You Drop

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A very soggy red carpet in Leicester Square squelched underfoot last Thursday, as British acting royalty and young stars who now have the bank balances and empty schedules of actual royalty made their way into the world premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1.

The cast and creators of the film were dowsed with intermittent rain and continuous praise during the evening, which was compered by Edith Bowman and Rick Edwards against a soundtrack of five hours of unrelenting screaming.

Proposals of marriage, offers to bear children and shouts of “who are you wearing?” (surely a question that should only rightfully be asked to psychos of the Buffalo Bill variety…) abounded, and as must be the case with every event of this kind, at points it all got a little bit Hyperbole and the Deathly Hallows.

First to greet the fans and form the vanguard of the Potter cast was a platoon of fully-costumed Death Eaters, who preceded to menace the crowd as much as is possible for grown men waving small sticks. Then everything lost a bit of context as the cast of The X Factor tipped up.

It made for a strange combination: on the one hand you’re confronted by the personification of evil, the foot soldiers of the most powerful dark wizard who ever lived, a leather-clad horde of dead-eyed soulless destroyers of heterogeneity concealed behind shiny immobile masks and on the other… well, I’m sure you see where I’m going with this.

This strange brew of excitement and banality was on the menu for the rest of the evening. It swung from the sublime to the ridiculous by welcoming an extraordinary roster of British acting talent including John Hurt, Timothy Spall, Ralph Fiennes, Imelda Staunton, David Morrissey, Jason Isaacs and Helena Bonham-Carter, as well as a bunch of slebs so pedestrian that their sole achievement of the evening must have been avoiding the congestion charge.

Jason Isaacs

But stars there were, and very nice they were too. Den of Geek chatted to a few about their roles in the films, and one theme very quickly made itself apparent: actors love being bad.

When asked how to go about playing an evil character, Jason Isaacs grinned widely and expressed something of a Lord of the Flies perspective on humankind:

“You just relish it. Let out that side of yourself that we all have inside. As soon as you let go of caring what anyone else thinks, you’d be surprised what savagery we’re all capable of.”

It’s a line you could imagine being delivered by his character Lucius Malfoy, though with more strangulated sibilants than the actor’s easy North London charm.

Isaacs moves from suggesting that we’re all just a super-ego away from daubing ourselves in blood and dancing around an impaled pig’s head to another key Freudian idea, the phallic symbol, as he explained to Den of Geek why wizards are so attached to their wands:
“He’s castrated at the table you know, Voldemort takes my wand and snaps it in front of the death eaters, he can’t even be arsed to kill me, that’s how beneath contempt I am.”

Lucius doesn’t only suffer at the hands of Voldemort in Deathly Hallows. Isaacs went on to tell Den of Geek that his character in the last two films is a “pathetic, dishevelled alcoholic wreck.” Not only emasculated at the hands of Lord Voldemort, but beaten down by his time behind bars in Azkaban and disappointed by his only son:
“Prison has broken him badly. All I can hope is that maybe Draco will restore the family name and he continually lets me down.”

So did Isaacs feel any sympathy for the direction Lucius’ fates have turned? Don’t be silly. “It was great fun playing it and it’s great watching Lucius get his comeuppance.”

Warwick Davis

Similar relish in tackling the mwah-ha-ha side of things was expressed by Warwick Davis. Known widely for his good guy roles in Willow, Star Wars and the previous Potter films, Davis told Den of Geek “It’s always fun to play a villainous character, and Griphook you know is very much that. He’s a very dark character and there were a lot of levels to him. My character in this story is a little bit more central so it was really exciting.”

Despite admitting lighter, sillier characters are closer to his own personality, Davis told us evil roles win over good every time for him as “there’s more to get your thespian teeth into”, a view that presumably explains his decision to chew up the role of the titular baddy in a decade’s worth of Leprechaun movies…

Timothy Spall

Timothy Spall is the man behind Peter Pettigrew, or Wormtail, a rat both in the figurative and literal sense and the Judas Iscariot of the Potter films. Betraying his friends James and Lily Potter to Voldemort, Wormtail plays a key part in both the death of Harry’s parents and the resurrection of Lord Voldemort, a scene Spall told Den of Geek was his fondest filming memory.

“Favourite memory? Carrying around a baby Lord Voldemort, throwing him in a pot of stew, chopping my hand off, cutting Harry’s blood and then boiling it into a lovely little Bouillabaisse…”

Showing more personality in a few words than the sum total of every X Factor interview ever, Timothy Spall joked that since the Potter films were now over, so was his acting career, and went on to make what had to be the most bizarre statement of the night. Even stranger than the bit-players’ earnest conviction that yes, multi-millionaires Dan, Emma and J.K had promised they were definitely all going to stay in touch, was Spall’s announcement that he was now a chiropodist and a Portuguese man of war.

Yes, those were his words, and you know what? I’m not going to argue with him.

Showing obvious enjoyment at having played a villainous traitor doomed to rot in the ninth circle of hell, Spall told us he wanted to be remembered in the films as “one of the most disgusting, ugly, vile, naughty little rats you’ve ever met”. That and a foot-care specialist jellyfish.

Evanna Lynch, Emma Watson, Matt Lewis, The Phelps brothers, Chloe Moretz

So did Den of Geek learn anything from talking to the kids?

Well, it seems as if the Potter films have been an amazing journey for all involved: Evanna Lynch (Luna Lovegood) thinks the film is exciting, premieres are exciting, and meeting J K Rowling was, you know, exciting, Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) says her new haircut doesn’t really make her ears cold. Matt Lewis (Neville Longbottom) fell over filming one of the action scenes but then got back up again. And James and Oliver Phelps (Fred and George Weasley) think the Weasley twins are the best brother characters of any film ever (they must have been a bit busy filming to catch up with The Godfather box set).

Oh, and Chloe Moretz from Kick-Ass and Let Me In absolutely loves comic books, but she doesn’t know which ones and only really likes looking at the pictures.

Steffan Rhodri

As for the white hats, a very friendly Steffan Rhodri (best known as moustachioed Dave from Gavin & Stacey) talked to Den of Geek about his appreciation of Doctor Who and Torchwood, saying he’d love a role in either. “It’s become so popular and really good for Cardiff that it’s made there so I’d love to do something. The creator who originally brought it back, Russell T Davies, is an old friend of mine from our youth theatre days so I’m hoping one day he’ll remember me and give me something.”

Come on then Steven, ditch Pond and give Dave Coaches a go on the Tardis.

But no Rickman...

All in all, it was a very enjoyable and exhilarating event, even with the presence of rain and absence of Alan Rickman. And it proved something important to me: if I can do four hours stood in a press pit then I can definitely handle 146 minutes in a cinema seat.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 is on general UK release on Friday 19th November. Our review is here.

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There were stories emanating from Hollywood a few weeks ago about the possibility of Colin Farrell starring in Len Wiseman’s forthcoming Total Recall remake, and according to a story published by Variety this weekend, he’s now been formally offered the role previously filled by the mountainous bulk of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Paul Verhoeven’s Total Recall was an early-90s classic, of course, and it’s encouraging that an actor so markedly different from Schwarzenegger has been chosen.

It’s evidence that Wiseman’s production won’t be a mere rehash of Verhoeven’s ultra-violent movie, but perhaps a more accurate retelling of Philip K. Dick’s source story, We Can Remember It For You Wholesale.

That story’s protagonist was, like most of Dick’s central characters, an ordinary, unassuming everyman. Farrell would therefore be perfectly suited to the role if Wiseman and scriptwriter Kurt Wimmer are planning to adhere more closely to Dick’s tale, with the acting ability to convey an ordinary man with a hidden, extraordinary past on Mars.

More news on the Total Recall remake as we get it.

Variety

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If we've got this right, Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides is still filming in the UK right now. Under the eye of new director Rob Marshall, the film - which sees Johnny Depp reprising the role of Captain Jack Sparrow - is due out on 20th May next year.

Which must mean that it's time for a teaser poster, you might be thinking. And you'd be correct.

Thus, the first poster for the film has just been issued, and you can see it on the left over there. It doesn't tell you a fat lot, granted, but then it is the early tease, and it's job is to let people who didn't know that the film existed that it does. And it does that. Which is good.

A teaser trailer somewhere around Christmas, then? We wouldn't rule it out...

IMPAwards

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The review contains spoilers.

3. Tell It To The Frogs

After last week's narrow escape from the confines of the zombie-overrun department store in the middle of zombie-overrun Atlanta, Rick, Glenn, and the rest of the gang have successfully escapes from danger, minus one crazy drugged-up white supremacist. Of course, nobody would miss that dangerous lunatic, right? Of course not, except for one person. Namely Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus), Merle's brother and the group's most accomplished squirrel hunter.

The introduction of Norman Reedus's character is a really positive addition to the show. Yes, I know the show is already chock full of survivors and their families, but Reedus's performance tonight was really a stand-out. It was like a great combination of Andrew Lincoln's emotional distress in the first episode with Michael Rooker's unbalanced, dangerous redneck persona from the second episode, but with more justification since, you know, the happy band of survivors left his brother handcuffed on the roof of a building full of hungry geeks.

Another great addition is Dale (Jeffrey DeMunn), one of my favorite characters from the comic books and another voice of reason and sense in an otherwise strange group of random people. It's great that the core group is starting to flesh out a little bit, and we're starting to actually get some personalities to people other than Rick and Glenn, even if the show did get another token abusive Southern stereotype.

The part of the show that worried me before it even was cast was the role of Carl Grimes. Any time you're dealing with kids, you're looking at trouble. Kids are so tough to cast, and so tough to write, that Carl could have been an anchor around the neck of the whole show (see also John Connor from Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles).

Fortunately, judging from how Chandler Riggs handled his reunion scene and how well he's handled himself in his limited action so far, my worries seemed unfounded. Of course, there's a lot more show to go and a lot more will be demanded of Carl in the future, so it remains to be seen if my confidence is misplaced.

However, one thing I'm confident of is in the show's ability to find good writers and directors and use them on a week-in, week-out basis. Gwyneth Horder-Payton is another accomplished TV director (The Shield, Sons of Anarchy) who has done some very good work in the kind of violent adult dramas that have paved the way for The Walking Dead, and her skilled hand behind the camera shows in this week's episode, which is a bit smoother than last week's affair. There's aren't as many action sequences as last week. Instead, the tension is more interpersonal, spoken in looks and glances between a jealous Shane and the object of his affections, Lori. (Hopefully the brief, angry discussions between the two characters will snuff all the talk of Lori the slut amongst fans.)

The writing is also an improvement, ranking somewhere between episodes 1 and 2 in terms of quality. This week's script was the brainchild of Darabont, Jack LoGuidice (Sons of Anarchy), and Charles H. Eglee (Dexter, The Shield, NYPD Blue). It's a bit more even in terms of quality. Rooker gets some scenery to chew on in an episode-opening rant that firmly established that Merle's spent too much time out in the sun. Daryl's given a few great scenes to emote over his missing brother. And the triangle between Rick, Shane, and Lori is shaping up to make for some very good television (when the three are not running for their lives, that is).

For what it's worth, Rick's television characterization is pretty much exactly what he's like in the comic book, which ought to please fans. I also like that Shane is getting to be more than just the good-guy leader or the bad-guy sleaze bag who manipulates Lori. He's actually getting to be a three-dimensional person, with flaws and weaknesses and strong points, unlike Ed (Adam Minarovich).

There's only one problem with The Walking Dead so far. Just when it seems like the show is really starting to get interesting, that's when it ends! I guess that's great for keeping the viewers hooked and coming back for more every week, but I'd love it if the show as 90 minutes every week, rather than 60. Granted, there can be too much of a good thing, but it's pretty rare I groan out loud when a show is over because I want more.

Last week's episode had more violence and action, yet this week's episode seemed to be the one that flew by faster, and the pilot was over in no time. That's a tribute to the quality of this week's episode, both from a writing standpoint and a general pacing standpoint. Even the scenes around the campfire or washing clothes had a point, and there was something driving them forward that gave the show momentum via forces other than the undead.

Still, I expect next week's episode to be more action-oriented. That seems to be a pattern the show is falling into early, but it's a rewarding pattern of character and emotion for those that like drama and blood and guts for those that like horror and violence. Just call it something for everyone!

Read our review of the last episode, Guts, here.

US correspondent Ron Hogan was saddened by the death of Glenn's Dodge Challenger. Find more by Ron at his blog, Subtle Bluntness, and daily at Shaktronics and PopFi.

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3.8 Evil Plans

Although the title of this episode is Evil Plans, it could have just as easily been called Party Plans, as everyone's favourite astromech and protocol droids are called in to duty. For they're helping cater an event for Padme Amidala.

No, really!

At first, this installment of The Clone Wars is quite the sitcom, as See Threepio and Artoo Detoo peruse the underbelly of Coruscant looking for rare fruit (for the party, you see). These scenes are very reminiscent of their to-ing and fro-ing in the earlier moments in A New Hope (though some of us still call that one simply Star Wars).

It's quite a delight, to be utterly honest. Very often, the Star Wars animated spin-off is very serious in tone (as it should be), with little humour. So this sideline of laughs, as Threepio and Artoo go for a robotic massage and oil-down, is much appreciated. Anthony Daniels stoutly performs his role, delivering laughs with every haughty line spoken.

But, there is another element to the episode: the titular element of "evil". And who better to portray this sin than returning bad guy, the bounty hunter Cad Bane. Well, actually (and technically), he is not "returning" for this is another episode which takes place before a previous story.

In fact this one takes place before the season one finale (when we first met Bane) resulting in an odd ending for this story if you were unaware of its already broadcast 'sequel' (confused yet?).

The bounty hunter has been hired by the Hutts to acquire the plans for the senate, so that he may free Ziro the Hutt, and tracks them down to Threepio and Artoo, leading to their little party being abruptly ended. From the laughter of their friendship comes some genuinely unpleasant, but compellingly portrayed, torture scenes (seeing the return of a familiar bad droid from Jabba's Palace).

I have to say that despite the jumps in tone (and chronology), Evil Plans is certainly one of the most memorable and fun episodes of The Clone Wars. The return of Cad Bane is most welcome (as is the introduction of the ganglord Hutts), and the cartoon buffoonery of the droids is pleasing in the extreme.

Read our review of the last episode, Assassin, right here.

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This review contains spoilers.

3.6 6955 kHz

I've seen a few people complaining that Fringe is now so focused on the bigger plot that it's actually missing out on the quirky and odd stories that were at one point its trademark.

Up till now I haven't accepted this, because I've been enjoying the larger narrative, but 6955 kHz has made me consider that the sand piling exercise they've got very deep into now isn't delivering on some levels.

I've noticed that peripheral characters have almost entirely disappeared, like Olivia's bowling guru, and Walter's character has become much less involved in general.

In this story, they set out a rather thin idea, number stations, and then became quickly distracted by the big plot imperative.

For those not versed in all things unexplained, number stations are radio transmissions that allegedly first appeared in World War I, where a voice reads a stream of numbers or letters. It's always been assumed these are coded transmissions to international spies, and they have been used for this, but the origin of them has always been clouded in mystery.

This might seem an ideal, if slightly tired, subject for Fringe, but the story ultimately has very little to do with number stations, or even the people who have their minds wiped by listening to sounds on a 6955 kHz frequency.

That was one of the disappointments, because the case isn't really solved in respect of revealing the number stations, but it's purely a mechanism that Walternate is using to prod the Fringe team in the direction he wants.

As one of his minions achieving this, Kevin Weisman (Marshall from Alias) turns up very briefly as Gemini, a shapechanger with a specialist interest in gravity-defying electronics. He was in it so briefly that I'd only worked out that they'd given his character different coloured eyes (which all geeks know is called Heterochromia iridium) about five seconds before Altivia dispensed with his services from a high building.

I was left wondering why they even signed up someone so recognisable, only to kill them off after a couple of lines of dialogue?

I'd have been more worried by this if I'd felt that the whole number station aspect was ultimately important, but it wasn't, really. It was just a means to get Astrid involved in solving the puzzle, and Peter another piece of his doomsday machine puzzle.

A more relevant part of proceedings was the conversation that Peter and Altivia have towards the end, where she reveals that she's looking for a degree of reinforcement from him for what she's doing. The snag for her is that she can't tell him what she's doing, so he's hardly likely to see her perspective and give that support.

The way she kills Gemini so he wouldn't harm any more innocent people definitely suggests that Altivia is going rogue. It's been hinted before, but it's now definitely on the cards, and an interesting prospect. That and the brief glimpse of the other dimension, where Peter's apparition tells Olivia that she needs to get back to her own dimension before Walternate decides to tie off the experiment she was part of by killing her. How long before we have two Olivias running around in the same dimension? Quite soon, I'd suggest.

This is all a good foundation for future stories, but it made this one seem like more like a narrative structural support than an actual self-contained story.

If they did achieve anything, for me it was that at the start of the episode Walter seems overly paranoid, but by the end it appears that his worst fears are well founded. I guess in this world of shifting allegiances, the audience is also being pulled from one point of view to another.

By the end of this, are we going to feel that the other dimension is a more worthy candidate to survive than our own? Possibly.

I think Fringe needs a solid self-contained story to get back on track and reunite us with the craziness of Walter, but I'm not sure what they've crafted for this year allows for that possibility.

Next week's story is focused on the alternative dimension, which I'm looking forward to, as so far this season, those ones have been by far the strongest. Hopefully it will have a more effective story to tell than this one managed to squeeze in between all the forward planning.

Read our review of episode 5, Amber 31422, here.

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It's a scene that could only have been written in the 80s. In truth, there have been many great bathroom-based sequences put to celluloid, but if there is a better one than the standout scene in Lethal Weapon 2, I haven't seen it yet.

The sequence in which Sergeant Murtaugh is trapped on a booby-trapped loo, trading jokes and sentiments with Riggs, is the one that Lethal Weapon 2 will always be remembered for, and rightly so. For in that one moment, the film's over-the-top, hyperreal sensibility is laid bare for the viewer, and it's a master class in suspense, entertainment and emotion.

For here is one of the series' many touching buddy moments between its two leads, and it works a treat, juxtaposing the ridiculousness of the scene with the obvious heartfelt bond the partners have developed during their time together. And then, one gloriously silly explosion later, it's all over.

This scene is indicative of a screenplay which had the involvement of Shane Black, the last time he would be on board the Lethal Weapon series before other writers took over for future instalments. Black's wicked sense of humour and bravado lend the film a self-knowing bluster that is simply too hard to ignore. You might prefer the first outing, but you can't deny that this one aims high and, in the main, hits its marks.

This is partly, once more, down to the core duo at the film's heart, who are arguably better here than at any other time in the series. They have clearly learned to love the roles they play, and the relationship is so strong that you get swept up in it easily. Interestingly, Gibson had starred in just one film of any note between this and the first Lethal Weapon – Tequila Sunrise – coming out as it did just two years after the first film.

Jumping on the crest of a wave the first had whipped up serves the film well, and Gibson truly begins his golden movie era here, later going on to star in a succession of so-so movies that nevertheless would help make his name over in the States (Air America, Bird On A Wire, Forever Young).

Glover? Well, Glover is just brilliant in pretty much every scene, here. Is it fair to call this a career highlight for him? Certainly in box office terms, and this was a huge boost for his profile.

Aside from the two leads, this sequel also saw the introduction of another character who would become a series regular: Leo Getz. Played with gusto by Joe Pesci, it's fair, and true, to say that he's really very annoying in this film, grating on audiences before settling into the role for movies three and four. I can see why he was brought in all the same, even if it doesn't work for me here.

Then there's Joss Ackland. For a guy who was born in South Africa, it's astounding to hear just how poor his accent is on screen. It's not the worst – there are countless examples of dreadful accents on show in Lethal Weapon 2, mainly from the associated henchmen that make up the bad guys of the piece – but it's not good.

He's saved, though, by a truly atrocious all-round performance from Patsy Kensit as Riggs' love interest Rika van den Haas. Transcending all boundaries of taste, Kensit manages to render entire scenes almost unwatchable thanks to her gutless lack of acting chops.

Fortunately, despite the poor level of acting on display from the film's bad bunch, it manages to keep its head well above water by virtue of that brilliant, fast-paced and witty script, the return of director Richard Donner, who keeps things ticking on tightly, and a swathe of action sequences that leave you screaming with laughter and giddy with excitement.

It's quite possible that Lethal Weapon 2 is one of Hollywood's finest ever sequels. It's definitely the best featuring a toilet-based bomb.

You can read our look back at Lethal Weapon, here. We’ll be revisiting Lethal Weapon 3 tomorrow.

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In fishing terminology, it’s the hook. In literature, the prologue. In teacher lingo, the ‘mental set.’ Call it what you will, movies also have methods to lure in audiences within the first several minutes.

Some of these set pieces are so meticulously orchestrated and satisfying in and of themselves that they even threaten to outweigh the rest of their respective flicks. Here are ten classic opening sequences you shouldn’t be without.

Did we miss one? Then add your own in the comments below!

Raiders Of The Lost Ark

The Indy series is more or less Steven Spielberg’s attempt to one-up James Bond (directorially speaking), with each of the movies aping 007’s opening set pieces, while not being explicitly tied to the main narrative.

Temple Of Doom probably wins the award for most ridiculously excessive, but Raiders is the best of the bunch, establishing iconic imagery for the rest of the series. The dissolve from the Paramount logo to the real deal in Peru. The slow reveal of our hero through images of whip, hat, and jacket. Michael D Ford’s gorgeous, Oscar-winning ‘Temple of Warriors’ set. John Williams’ nervy music, which culminates in a heroic burst of the main march. All brilliantly cut together by Michael Kahn.

The sequence crams the best dangers of the series into one dense nugget of cinema: the Chachapoyan fertility idol, tarantulas galore, a bottomless pit, flying arrows, and everybody’s favourite giant spherical boulder.

Manhattan

The first three minutes and change of Woody Allen’s Manhattan open with such a bang that the following movie, great as it is, feels anticlimactic. Sure, those opening minutes are nothing more than a montage of New York cityscapes, alternately vast and intimate, but it’s rendered beautifully by photographer Gordon Willis. It’s put to Woody Allen’s amusing voice-over narration and Gershwin’s Rhapsody In Blue.

A similar (and equally effective) trick was done to open Sidney Lumet’s Dog Day Afternoon. This time, the song is Elton John’s bluesy Amoreena, and the random smattering of New York summer street life serves to give a sense of place and time to a movie that is otherwise claustrophobic in its setting.

Persona

What to make of the pre-title sequence from Ingmar Bergman’s perplexing Persona? Roger Ebert tried, suggesting that it “is starting at the beginning, with the birth of cinema,” whatever that means.

The sequence commences with a lamp warming up, and an explosion of light and sound as film gallops through a projector. A series of seemingly disconnected images follows: an upturned piece of animation, a child’s hands, a silent film with a ghoulish skeleton, a tarantula, the slaughter of a sheep, a hand being nailed into a table. And then it gets really weird.

Although it seems like the sort of esoteric thing to delight pretentious intellectuals and film students, there’s something undeniably potent about this influential collage of sound and image, and thankfully, no definitive interpretation.

Saving Private Ryan

Steven Spielberg could have stuck some end credits right after the D-Day sequence that opens the movie and it still would have been one of the director’s best works. The use of various film stocks and speeds to create the illusion of a historical event captured in its 'reality' has been copied in a multitude of lesser flicks. That being said, the yin to this yang is the bookending sequence in the present day, which just doesn’t work.

Dramatically, we don’t relate to the older man coming to the cemetery, and his final question – whether he’s earned his life – is yet another example of Spielberg going into such overzealous overdrive to pluck heartstrings and wring tears from his audience that it nearly threatens to demean the preceding film. 

The Conversation

Coppola’s often-overlooked masterpiece (sandwiched between the first two Godfather movies) has Gene Hackman at his best in a deeply unsettling character piece, complete with a creepily flat cameo from Harrison Ford. Hackman plays Harry Caul, a sound recordist and professional eavesdropper.

The movie opens with a slow zoom into a San Francisco park, lazily tracking various people and conversations. It’s a pièce de résistance for editor and sound designer Walter Murch, who distorts the sound as we gradually reveal that this is a piece of aural espionage. Hackman and his cohorts are secretly recording a conversation for a client from several different angles. But the point-of-view remains ambiguous as even the surveillance team is unsure of the content of the conversation they’ve recorded, patched together from several sources.

Citizen Kane

It’s not just the series of dissolves up to the haunting Xanadu, or even the snow globe and Kane’s dying 'Rosebud' that merit inclusion, but the whole ‘News on the March’ sequence that puts Kane’s life (and, essentially, the rest of the movie) into chronological order. Welles faithfully replicates the style of newsreels of the day, and viewers who might have been thrown by the leaps in narrative are treated to a concise overview of the film to come.

Groundbreaking in its day, it’s the stuff that film school lectures are made of.

Suspiria

“The Only Thing More Terrifying Than The Last 12 Minutes Of This Film Are The First 92,” is the verbose and awkward tagline. Or, perhaps better put, “The best part of this movie is the first fifteen minutes.”

Suspiria never had the world’s strongest plot, and the details of the opening are sketchy at best. Jessica Harper arrives in stormy Germany to attend a ballet school. She gets there only to find another student running away to a friend’s apartment – both are later disposed of in a sequence that involves the extreme close-up of a heart being stabbed, one girl being hung, and large pieces of broken glass killing her friend.

Depending on how you look at the opening sequence, it might also classify as the best music video ever made. Goblin’s incessant, off-the-wall score of screaming, pounding drums, and the recurring 'witch'motif, along with Dario Argento’s hyperbolic use of color and wild composition, completely saturates the audience.

Gory as it is, Argento demonstrates a knack for creatively killing off characters. And for once, the lack of narrative clarity actually enhances the experience.

Touch Of Evil

The brilliantly executed opening sequence, one long take dipping in and out of city streets as we follow a car (with bomb planted) across the US/Mexican border to an explosive conclusion, is the stuff ‘pure’ cinema is made of. Welles’ original intent is lost in the original cut, which was topped up with Henry Mancini’s pulsing music and superimposed titles (it would have made a list of Top 10 Title Sequences – dibs on that one, by the way).

Walter Murch, who years later re-edited the movie to Welles’s specifications, comments extensively on this in his book-length interview with Michael Ondaatje, The Conversations: Walter Murch And The Art of Editing Film. “Welles…wanted a different soundtrack, something composed of snatches of source music – from brothels, cantinas, car radios, tourist traps – that shift and blend into each other as the camera drifts through the streets of this border down. The aural equivalent of the camerawork, in other words.”

Once Upon A Time In The West

The antithesis of a Michael Bay action montage that moves too quickly to comprehend, Once Upon A Time In The West’s opening sequence clearly defines a sense of space and sets a controlled, menacing rhythm. It recalls the opening of High Noon, but extends it into the realm of hyperbole, with results that are poetic.

This, the crown jewel of the Sergio Leone canon begins with barely any dialogue over fifteen or so minutes as three bad dudes (Jack Elam, Woody Strode, and Al Mulock) wait for the arrival of a train so they can knock off Charles Bronson’s ‘Man with a Harmonica.’ We know they’re bad because they look bad. Leone allows these men to move with an eerie purpose, and gives us lingering close-ups of their eyes and faces flecked with grizzly stubble.

Completely absent is Ennio Morricone’s magnificent score. In its place is an array of sounds that accentuate the sparse landscape and menacing antagonists: buzzing flies, the crackle of knuckles, the patter of water drops against a wide brimmed hat, and boots clunking against a sea of wooden beams. There’s a veritable textbook of exemplary widescreen composition (almost painterly in quality), angles, editing, and sound effects at work here.

The James Bond Series

The franchise that brought the opening sequence to new heights of action and kitsch. Part and parcel of the sequence is the infamous ‘gun barrel’ signature, but which of the Bonds to choose from? Moonraker features a thrilling dive from an airplane and struggle for a parachute that ends with Richard Kiel’s seemingly unkillable Jaws crash-landing on a circus tent. From Russia With Love opens with Bond’s seeming assassination. For Your Eyes Only sees Bond getting kidnapped in a helicopter, and ends with an unnamed Ernst Blofeld being dumped down a factory silo.

The recent reboot of Casino Royale also merits praise for the shift in tone away from camp to a gritty black-and-white backstory. Heap on any of Maurice Binder’s series of sultry title sequences, and what more could you ask for? A new Bond film, perhaps.

Also Worthy…

Halloween’s pioneering use of killer POV. Vertigo’s slam-bang opening sequence that climaxes with Hitchcock’s oft-imitated track-in/zoom-out effect. Conan The Barbarian’s first, nearly wordless twenty minutes, carried by John Milius’ potent imagery and Basil Poledouris’ ballsy score.

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A prominent feature of the recent Iconic Movie Themes article we ran on this site a while back, John Williams is one of the most respected and prolific composers working today. He has also received more Oscar nominations than any other individual, with over 40 nominations and five wins.

With that kind of back catalogue, it would do the man a great disservice to try to condense his work into a single article. So this is one of several planned pieces celebrating his work, and will be the first part of my look at his long working relationship with Steven Spielberg, and the feature films they have collaborated on.

The Sugarland Express

This is the score that marked the start of Williams’ long collaboration with Spielberg, and set the foundations for his career as one of the most respected composers of all time. It calls back to some of the great scores that have accompanied western films over the years, despite the film’s 60s setting. The highlight is the main theme, an area that Williams has established himself as something of a master of, so it comes as little surprise that proves to be the case here.

Jaws

Iconic theme aside, this is a highly accomplished score from start to finish. And whilst it’s not the most complex score he would compose over the years, it’s certainly one of his most effective. A master class in tension and action, the music heard here is for me more iconic than any of the images in the brilliant film.

A near-perfect score that announced both the director and composer’s emergence on the blockbuster stage.

Close Encounters Of The Third Kind

Williams’ work herein really is quite beautiful. Much praise quite rightly goes to the five note main theme, but the score is packed with emotive pieces of music. Early releases of this score failed to do the amazing scene-setting music Williams created justice, but the album that’s now widely available really is excellent, making this a must-own for all Williams fans. Williams earned an Oscar nomination for his work here, but lost out to another one of his own compositions - his score for Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.

1941

At the time of this film’s release, Williams’ score was regarded as one of the most forward-thinking of his career. There are the grand militaristic marches and rousing numbers in there, but there’s an underlying playfulness to the piece as a whole, as he sets out to subvert the traditional scores of some of Hollywood’s great war films by highlighting the ridiculousness of some of their over-the-top patriotism.

Spielberg’s film set out to achieve the same thing, but was far less successful than Williams’ score. Even with this bordering on parody at times, it’s still an incredible piece of work, featuring one of Williams’ finest pieces of music in the title march.

Raiders Of The Lost Ark

Taking inspiration from 30s and 40s matinee films, Williams presented Spielberg with ideas for two different title themes. But when asked why they couldn’t use both, Williams reworked them to fit together, and created one of the most instantly recognisable themes in cinema history.

To perform the score, Williams called upon the talents of the London Symphony Orchestra, whom he had previously worked with on his Oscar-winning score for Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. Their collaboration here earned another Oscar nomination, but would lose out to Vangelis’ score for Chariots Of Fire.

E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial

One of the more subtle and restrained pieces in Williams’ back catalogue, but one that earned him an Oscar win for best original score. Not great as a standalone listen, but incredibly effective when accompanying the film, it conveys a childlike sense of wonder, as well as handling more dramatic moments with great skill also. There are incredibly beautiful moments here that more than justify the Oscar win.

Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom

Like the film itself, Williams’ score for the second instalment in the Indiana Jones franchise moves into darker territory while keeping its iconic theme. There’s a heightened sense of threat and adventure as Williams really ramps up his efforts here to create one of the most engaging and, most importantly, exciting action scores of the 80s.

Empire Of The Sun

A mixture of classical standards and Williams’ score make up the soundtrack to Spielberg’s adaptation of J.G. Ballard’s novel. The score is an incredibly dramatic and moving piece of work that saw Williams receive another Oscar nod. Whilst the accompanying soundtrack release would never include the entire score, it’s still a great addition to any record collection.

Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade

For the closing instalment of the 80s’ greatest action franchise, Williams favours the playfulness and sense of adventure of his first score in the series over the darkness and threat heard in his work for the second, and it’s another classic he puts together. Sure, there are moments of suspense, but there are also more comedic moments heard here than in the previous instalment. Obviously comfortable with the characters and his theme, Williams recycles motifs heard previously, but gives them an interesting twist, making this an essential purchase for fans of his work.

Always

Not a strong Spielberg film by any means, Always is a little too overly-sentimental for my tastes, and the same complaint can be directed at the score, which is one of the weaker compositions to accompany a Spielberg film. Like the film, it was a little dated, even for its time.

Hook

Williams’ soundtrack for Spielberg’s film about Peter Pan returning to Neverland far exceeds the quality of the film itself. In fact, it ranks among the finest scores of his career, whereas the film itself is one of the director’s weaker efforts. It’s a masterpiece of film scoring, full of layers to discover on repeat listens, and also features differing themes for each of the characters.

Jurassic Park

Many don’t regard this as being among Williams’ best work, but this score holds an incredibly special place in my heart. Jurassic Park is a film that blew me away when I was taken to see it as a child, and only being able to convince people to take me to see it a certain number of times, I had to settle with listening to the score to conjure up the imagery instead. For the summer of ‘93, this was very much my soundtrack.

Even hearing the film now, it still makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. There’s a sense of wistfulness about two of the three main themes that are used to make up much of the score, but the third that accompanies scenes where characters are under threat is incredibly effective and creepy, recalling similar emotions elicited from his work in Jaws.

Look out for the second part of our look back at Spielberg and Williams’ collaborations in the coming weeks..

• See all the Music in the movies

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This review contains spoilers.

3.10 Queen Of Hearts

Finally, some much needed progress in the development of the relationship between Arthur and Gwen, two characters who’ve danced around one another over the last three years without either actually doing anything about it. This week sees the two finally admit their feelings for each other, and they’ve Morgana to thank for it.

Of course, Morgana, being a seer and privy to events that have not yet happened, consults Morgause after dreaming that Gwen will one day rule as queen by Arthur’s side. Morgause, certain that this is a prophecy, tells Morgana that she must do what she can to destroy their burgeoning relationship.

Morgana orchestrates a picnic so Gwen and Arthur can spend some time alone outside The Citadel. Morgana, being rotten to the core, asks Uther to join her on an outing, and leads him right to the pair. Initially, Uther dismisses the romance as nothing more than a prince getting acquainted with a serving girl, but when Arthur tells his father his feelings are genuine, Uther is furious and decides to banish Gwen from his kingdom.

It is this which propels events outside of Arthur’s control, and we finally see Uther at his most monstrous. When Morgana plants evidence of an enchantment in Arthur’s chambers, Gwen must face the King’s wrath. A defiant Gwen is assaulted when she stands up to the tyrant, who then orders her execution. Gwen is to be burned the following day. A satisfied Morgana smiles as the distraught girl is dragged away.

In a nod to the Merlin of Arthurian legend, our boy wizard uses an aging potion to disguise himself as an elderly man and exonerate Gwen. This is where what began as a promising episode really fell short of what it could’ve been.

I suspect the creators where pandering to a younger audience in the direction they took the episode in. For the remainder of the episode, Gwen and Arthur barely have any more screen-time, and that infuriating reset button is pushed at the episode’s conclusion, with everything returning to just the way it was before after the fake sorcerer is unveiled.

We have Morgana sinisterly stalking corridors and offering her wicked smile, and I wasn’t entirely convinced she would stand by and watch a former friend die a gruesome death, yet she went out of her way to make sure the prophecy she dreamt of wasn’t fulfilled, and to hell with the consequences. Uther is a hateful monster of a character and I can only hope he does finally get his comeuppance after his actions during this episode.

The creators did have something to say about class and the divisions between those in power and those who aren’t, in a subtle, non-preachy way. They also explore just how easily a person can be persecuted for all the wrong reasons.

Merlin’s Dragoon was irritating and Colin Morgan ended the episode covered in cow dung again. Another thing which annoyed me: why hasn’t Morgana figured out that Merlin is the person constantly thwarting her? Does she even have a master plan?

An episode which had one or two moments of brilliance, sadly overshadowed by nonsensical farce.

Read our review of episode 9, Love In The Time Of Dragons, here.

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Melancholy and shrouded in mystery, it’s no surprise that the life of US author Edgar Allan Poe should attract almost as much interest as his enduring, macabre short stories. He died suddenly in 1849 aged just 40, and the exact cause of his death is still a subject of keen debate.

Director James McTeigue’s forthcoming movie, The Raven, tells a fictionalised version of Poe’s last days, and sees writer on the trail of a ruthless serial killer. Taking his inspiration from Poe’s grim tales, the murderer has kidnapped the writer’s fiancée, played by Alice Eve.

John Cusack stars as Poe, and the image you see here is the first to show the actor in character. While he lacks the writer’s trademark lofty forehead, Cusack really looks the part (he has the air of gloomy resignation down to a tee), though the black trainers are a bit of an anachronism.

Still in production, The Raven is tentatively scheduled for release in 2011.

Shock Till You Drop

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Depicting a vibrant digital world that exists only on a server, the premise of Tron has always been the perfect setting for a videogame – indeed, the 1982 original took its inspiration from the burgeoning electronics and games industries of the day.

Thanks to the mighty power of 21st century computers and consoles, the world of Tron now looks more detailed and ethereal than ever, and Tron: Evolution, the forthcoming videogame that will act as a prequel to Joe Kosinski’s movie Tron: Legacy out in December, is the best-looking Tron game so far by a considerable margin.

And while many of the stills and preview footage we’ve seen of Tron: Evolution so far have been predominantly blue, the latest gameplay trailer hints at a broader colour palette, with its athletic protagonist, Anon, leaping, flipping and slapping his way around an environment of acid greens and searing ambers.

The combat has a fast, free-flowing look to it, and the ‘de-rezzing’ effect, where an opponent explodes in a shower of cubes when defeated, looks almost as good as it does in the movie itself.

Tron: Evolution is due for release on the Xbox 360, PS3 and PSP on 26 November, with a PC version following on in December.

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It’s been noted by better than ourselves that the summer of 2011 for movies is one of the busiest until, well, at least 2012. Certainly there’s a fair stack of blockbuster movies vying for attention, yet we’d suggest that many of us are looking for Cowboys & Aliens to bubble to the top.

It’s a risky venture, certainly, but that's arguably part of the appeal here. It’s not a sequel, or a massively-known property. It stars Daniel Craig and Harrison Ford, a pair of actors who, right now, struggle to generate hits outside of their own key franchises. And also, it’s going out the week after The First Avenger: Captain America, on 29th July.

So no pressure there, then.

Which means it’s probably wise to get some kind of awareness campaign going for the new movie. Hence, we’ve got this first poster for the film, with the promise of a trailer later in the week.

When said trailer appears, we’ll give you a shout. Or, more likely, put it up on the site.

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