the mean machine

martino · Post by **martino** » Mon Sep 23, 2002 3:37 pm

i was at the cinema, late of course because my car is giving me troubles, and i asked the guy: what film hasn't yet started?, and he said 'the mean machine', so i said okay, without knowing what the movie was about -- i thought it was some kind of car chase flick.

it turned out that the movie was really, really good: almost great, but certainly watchable, and actually a must, if you can answer 'yes' to any of the following questions:

- do you think vinny jones is the coolest white guy since steve mcqueen?
- do you like british working-class-vs.-lower-middle-class humor?
- do you like movies that show what a wonderful game soccer is?

vinny plays a world-class soccer player (jimmy meehan -- thus, 'mean machine') who has ruined his life through drink and corruption and is sent to a filthy horrible english jail. everybody hates him there, because he was "everything anybody dreamt of being, but then needlessly threw it away".

over time, he wins the hearts of his prison friends -- the small-time criminals, the crazies, the lunatic mass murderers, the mafia boss. soon enough, the prison governer, a totally unsympathetic guy played by the unrecognizably aged david hemmings (remember him from 'blow up'?), forces him to organize a big soccer match: the best of the criminals against the warders. for meehan, it's mafia money against pressure from the prison administration.

so the movie is about redemption, about the inhumanity of the prison system, about how there is humanity in the lowest characters and corruption in the highest places. and it is very, very funny to boot.

the only thing i disliked about 'mean machine' is that there were too few women in it, and too little sex, and that i couldn't for the life of me figure out what some of the northern-england blokes were saying. still abso-fucking-lutely good, though, to use the movie's parlance.

Post by **mccutcheon** » Mon Sep 23, 2002 6:45 pm

This is the first time I have ever disagreed with you ( but we can still be friends) Mean Machine sucks. It's a remake of the longest yard staring Burt Renyolds. And sports movies of this type are always very bad. The football (soccer was unreal of course- the only glimpe of skill was when Vinnie was kicking a little ball himself in solitary. For GOOD sports movies see Breaking Away, The Best of Times, or okay british prison movies see Green Fingers, basically the same plot as Mean Machine but with flowers and tommatoes, except the one woman in this film that goes for the hero is actually from Rushmore and so hot.

martino · Post by **martino** » Tue Sep 24, 2002 7:28 am

well, there's a first time to everything, i guess. spice of life

Post by **mccutcheon** » Tue Sep 24, 2002 4:43 pm

salt and pepper of life.