Parky at the Pictures (In Cinemas 18/6/2015)

When their father dies unexpectedly, siblings Antoine Laurent and Kévin Azaïs promise mother Brigitte Roüan that they will keep the family carpentry firm going in the south-western coastal commune of Lacanau. They begin as they mean to go on by debating the quality of the wood they should use on their father's coffin. But the diffident Azaïs starts to lose focus after an army recruitment truck parks next to the carousel on the seafront and his mates volunteer him for a self-defence demonstration that results in him being so badly beaten up by tomboy Adèle Haenel that he has to resort to biting to break out of her hold. Curiously smitten by his conqueror, Azaïs finds himself working for her affluent parents, Léa Pelletant and Pascal Bernagaud, when they hire the brothers to build a cabin beside their swimming pool.

As he spends time with the brash and initially abrasive Haenel, Azaïs learns that she abandoned a course in End of the World Studies because she became so convinced that the apocalypse was nigh that she felt compelled to devote herself to honing her survival skills. He looks on in awe as she consumes a raw sardine straight from the blender and jumps into the pool with a backpack full of roof tiles to practice strategies for an aquatic emergency. Thus, when she informs him that she has signed up for a two-week boot camp at the nearby army base, Azaïs has no hesitation in enrolling, simply to be close to her away from his scoffing pals and nagging brother, who feels betrayed at being left to run the business on his own.

Arriving at the paratrooper camp in the Landes forest, Haenel and Azaïs find themselves in a unit commanded by world-weary lieutenant Nicolas Wanczycki. Resenting the fact that his heart isn't entirely in the training, Haenel soon challenges his authority and Wanczycki is so dumbstruck by her endless queries and complaints that he sometimes sidles off for a smoke rather than respond. Taking Azaïs to one side before the rookies head into the woods for a war game, Wanczycki urges him take his girlfriend in hand and show her who wears the trousers. But Haenel takes offence at Azaïs's suggestion that she follows orders and he is so hurt by her rejection that he decides to go home.

Unwilling to remain alone, Haenel pursues Azaïs and they agree to spend a few days in the wilds to prove that they have the right stuff after all. They make love and an idyllic period follows, in which they fish, live off the land and sleep under the stars. But Haenel falls ill after eating roast fox and Azaïs has to carry her back to civilisation. Exhausted, he reaches the abandoned village of Langon and hopes to find help. However, they are cut off by a forest fire and are fortunate to be rescued. Azaïs makes up with Laurent in hospital. But he is far from finished with Haenel and they vow to be better prepared for any eventuality in the future.

Domestic critics insist that Cailley is the next big thing in French comedy. But, while he tells his tale with confidence and a certain stylistic panache, it is difficult to get excited about a story that feels formulaic one moment and contrived the next. The leads are outstanding, with Azaïs often recalling John Gordon Sinclair in Bill Forsyth's Gregory's Girl (1981), while Haenel builds on the excellent impression made in Céline Sciamma's Water Lilies (2007) and Katell Quillévére's Suzanne (2013). Cailley is also splendidly served by his brother David's cinematography, which not only conveys the sleepy ennui of the seaside backwater, but also the lurking dangers of the wondrously atmospheric forest. Yet, something about the comedy doesn't quite click (the microwaving chicks gag?), while a resistibly chauvinist undertone runs through the script co-written with actress Claude Le Pape.

Considering that Azaïs was attracted to Haenel because she was so different to all the other girls, it seems invidious that he should attempt to transform her into something closer to a conventional conception of feminine beauty. Cailley and Le Pape rather archly name Haenel's character after the Madeleine played by Kim Novak in Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo (1958) and Azaïs even tries to persuade Haenel to wear her hair in the same style when they visit the Shark nightclub, where he watches in dismay as she learns how to open beer bottles with her teeth. But what most sticks in the craw is the disappointing manner in which Haenel's shrew is steadily tamed after she sleeps with Azaïss for the first time. Indeed, she becomes so passive that her limp body has to be carried through the woods by the suddenly heroic milquetoast. Azaïs and Haenel undoubtedly benefit from becoming a team of equals, but her principles are compromised in the name of romance. There is nothing wrong with idealising true love, but the need for the male to assert himself in the relationship feels like a throwback to the classical screwball tactic of having the feisty female suppress her free spirit in order to make it to the altar.

The Preston Sturges brand of screwball seems to have inspired Stephen Greene's Accidental Love. But there is very little to smile at in this adaptation of Kristin Gore's 2004 novel, Sammy's Hill, which has been patched up and pushed into cinemas in a cynical bid to make back some of the money that seemed to have been wasted when David O. Russell walked out on the project in 2010. Back then, the film was known as Nailed, and Russell quit after budgetary problems and a creative dispute with James Caan had caused the shoot to be closed down on nine separate occasions. This is, therefore, an Alan Smithee venture in all but name, as Russell has long since disowned it and so have the majority of the cast, who were conspicuous by their absence when the picture was rush-released to a unanimous chorus of disapproval Stateside.

Given that Obamacare has made a nonsense of the storyline, it's difficult to see why anyone would want to watch a political satire that is five years out of date - even if its source was penned by a Vice-President's daughter. Gore finds herself alongside Russell, Matthew Silverstein and Dave Jeser in the credits, but she can surely take little pleasure from seeing this clunky comedy being dusted down from the shelf. Russell will also be reluctant to recall this period of his career that saw him follow such acclaimed outings as Spanking the Monkey (1994), Flirting With Disaster (1996) and Three Kings (1999) with the risibly misfiring I Heart Huckabees (2004). However, given that he has since bounced back with The Fighter (2010), Silver Linings Playbook (2012) and American Hustle (2013) - which have amassed 25 Oscar nominations between them - he can be forgiven for merely shrugging and going back to post-production on Joy, a comic biopic of inventor and entrepreneur Joy Mangano that reunites him with Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper.

The story starts with state trooper James Marsden preparing to propose to Jessica Biel, a roller-skating waitress at the retro Fancy Gondola diner. However, a workman falls off his ladder and manages to embed a nail in Biel's skull and she is rushed to hospital. But, before surgeon Bill Hader can remove it, an administrator bursts into the operating theatre to announce that not only does Biel not have health insurance, but also that parents Beverly D'Angelo and Steve Boles can't afford the $150,000 for the procedure and aftercare. Dropping everything to go to lunch, Hader sympathises and warns Biel that she can expects to experience mood swings and a possible loss of sexual inhibition, providing the nail doesn't shift and reduce her to a drooling vegetable.

Having tried a little DIY surgery under the supervision of bibulous vet Kirstie Alley, Biel decides to go to Washington to lobby for a health service caters for the victims of bizarre accidents like her own. Despite breaking off their relationship because he feels intimidated by her increasingly unpredictable lustfulness, Marsden wishes Biel well and she joins forces with defrocked priest Kurt Fuller (who is unable to calm a raging pill-induced erection) and onetime bodybuilder Tracy Morgan, who is suffering from a collapsed anus. This troubled threesome head to Capitol Hill in the hope of persuading up-and-coming Congressman Jake Gyllenhaal to draft some legislation on their behalf. But, even though Gyllenhaal is very taken with Biel, he is in the back pocket of House Whip Catherine Keener, who is more interesting in fulfilling her ambition to fund a military base on the Moon.

The cookie choking death of Speaker James Brolin throws a spanner in the works and Gyllenhaal loses his nerve and goes into hiding, as Keener launches a smear campaign against him. But Marsden remains loyal to Biel and he tracks down the fugitive politician and brings about a reunion with Biel that inspires Gyllenhaal to press on with a bill to help the freakishly afflicted.

Even if it had been released before the reform of the American health service, it's hard to see this muddled farrago doing anything else but tank. Closer in tone to such Washington misfires as Jonathan Lynn's The Distinguished Gentleman (1992) and Barry Levinson's Man of the Year (2006) than masterpieces like Frank Capra's Mr Smith Goes to Washington (1939) or Sturges's The Great McGinty (1940), it has the semblance of a half-decent idea at its core. But the execution is excruciatingly awful and one wonders why so many talented artists were drawn to such a dismal plot.

In her defence, Jessica Biel works hard to make a fist of the impossible assignment of mining humour from brain damage, mood swings and nymphomania. But the majority of her co-stars either gnaw at the scenery or skulk around (after realising what they have let themselves in) the hope of not doing too much lasting damage to their reputation. At one point, Biel catches George A. Romero's zombie gem Night of the Living Dead (1968) on the television and one is supposed to chuckle at the satirical connection. But, given how this feature has been pieced together from disparate parts, it surely comes closer to Frankenstein. It could have been worse, though - imagine how terrifying this might have been if Drew Barrymore and Adam Sandler had been paired instead of Biel and Gyllenhaal.

Once upon a time, fresh-faced youngsters like Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney demonstrated their burgeoning maturity by putting on a show. Now, streetwise inner-city kids host parties and the debuting duo of Davie Fairbanks and Marc Small show how five friends seek to make the transition from geek to cool by organising London's biggest bash in Legacy. Despite its loathsome misogyny, this is a fitfully amusing study of marginalised teenagers striving for legitimacy that bears the unmistakable fingerprints of co-producers Noel Clarke and Jason Maza. The messages about saying no to drugs and refusing to kow-tow to bullies are laudable. But Fairbanks and Small have little new to offer here and, moreover, they have singularly failed to learn the lesson taught by Justin Kerrigan's Human Traffic (1999) that no matter how many coloured lights you use to give dance floor action some atmosphere and no matter how intricately you shred the montage, the results will always look like the warmed-up leftovers of someone else's good time.

East End classmates Franz Drameh, Amy Tyger, McKell David, Jacob Chapman and Akshay Kumar can scarcely contain their excitement as the local radio station builds up to the next big party at the Chrome venue owned by Scotsman Steven Cree. As he is first seen inviting two topless teenagers to fellate him in return for tickets, it's immediately clear that he is eminently resistible and so he proves when he denies the friends admission because he once had a run-in with Drameh's brother, Alex Lanipekun.

The gang try to make the best of what remains of their evening by attending a party being thrown for a school nerd. The portly Chapman unexpectedly scores with the birthday boy's buxom auntie, Victoria Broom, while Drameh looks longingly at the tomboyish Tyger as she dances with some ageing relatives. But they are forced to beat a hasty retreat when David offers a joint to eager grandmother Beryl Nesbitt and one puff seems to send her into a coma.

The following day, the quintet bypass a snooty receptionist and storm into Lanipekun's accountancy office to demand answers. He explains that he and Cree used to be partners in a party business until he objected to the rise in drug dealing at the events. Furious at being crossed, the ruthless Scot had Lanipekun framed and he served a six-month sentence before trying to rebuild his life as a respectable professional. It seems odd that Drameh knew nothing about his sibling's plight, but he vows to succeed where he failed and throw the hippest happening the capital has ever witnessed in direct competition to the next Chrome gig.

Naturally, his pals offer their unconditional support and, when Drameh finds a disused warehouse that would make a suitable venue, they muck in to help raise the £6000 needed for the deposit. David sells his cherished porn collection, Champan does odd jobs (for cunnilingually desirious housewives) and Tyger pitches in her savings, as she refuses to follow the pole-dancing example of perpetually naked sister Olivia Chenery and her dumb blonde friend Kelsey Hardwick. Meanwhile, Kumar has broken off chatting to his online girlfriend long enough to create a trendy logo and Drameh starts to feel like an entrepreneur.

The inevitable tidying up montage follows, complete with an hilarious paint splashing interlude. But, as the website goes live and tickets start to sell, Cree gets wind of the opposition and sends his goons to investigate. He takes delight in watching them smash up the decorations and steal the booze. But he has made the fatal mistake of annoying Lanipekun, who rallies to his brother's cause, along with mummy's boy bruiser Tom Davis and his crew of knuckle-scraping bouncers. Thus, by the time the doors open, Legacy is ready for all eventualities.

It's at this point that the picture ceases to be a breezy rite of passage and turns into a tiresome charade played out to the accompaniment of blaring turntable anthems and identikit live acts. Cinematographer Aaron Reid whirls his camera around the dance floor and editor Adrian Murray mashes up the resulting images in a desperate bid to convey the kinetic energy of the party. But not even the introduction of some lap and pole dancers and a squadron of beefcake strippers can ignite proceedings that will look nightmarish to anyone over the age of 18. Indeed, the fact that their arrival prompts almost every girl in attendance to peel off her top confirms the inescapable element of adolescent masturbatory fantasy that pervades the entire picture. Where else do but in the mind of an immature male do obese white boys turn out to be gifted oral lovers, Asian geeks appear to have the chatroom gab gifts to pull hot chicks like Montana Manning and pixie tomboys suddenly attain the wisdom to listen to their naughty older sister's advice that it pays to advertise and don some slap and a figure-hugging dress in time to snog the hero before the closing blooper reel?

But Fairbanks and Small aren't quite finished yet, as Cree has to receive his comeuppance not once, but twice. Having failed to prevent Legacy from being a triumph, he returns with his oppos on Sunday morning, only for Lanipekun and Davis to be in the mood for a ruck. It's a fitting denouement for what is essentially an anti-capitalist parable. But one is left wondering who exactly this earnest slice of feelgood is aimed at.

On the acting front, Tyger, David and Chapman emerge with most credit from the principals, while Cree makes a hissable villain. But there is no excuse for the amount of time that Chenery (and several other nubile cast members) spends disrobed and her `flash some flesh' mantra is a deeply disturbing message to be pushing to any impressionable young girls in the audience. It's all very well for film-makers to try to be down with the kids. But they also have responsibilities and it is disappointing to see someone as talented and clued-in as Noel Clarke peddling such shoddy sentiments.

But for George Harrison and his HandMade Films company few would be batting an eyelid that John Mackenzie's The Long Good Friday (1979) was returning to cinemas this week for a limited engagement. If the Henley-based ex-Beatle had not come up with £200,000 to acquire the rights, this seminal British crime picture would have been screened in a much-truncated form on ITV and then been instantly forgotten. Instead, it regularly features in surveys of the best British movies and is even cited in learned tomes for the picture it paints of a pre-Thatcherite country that seemed to have lost its sense of identity and direction. Viewed 35 years after its initial release, it is amusing to note how prescient Barry Keeffe's screenplay turned out to be. But what made this a hit and what makes it so compelling now is the commanding performance by the late, great Bob Hoskins.

Although he has plans to go legit, London gangster Bob Hoskins still needs backing from the American mobs if he is to realise his dream to redevelop the abandoned docklands district as part of a bid to bring the Olympic Games back to the city for the first time since 1948. Such is his status that Hoskins lives in a luxury penthouse and has his own yacht. But he still requires go-between Eddie Constantine to help him convince the big New York families to share his vision. He hopes to impress his future partners by closing a real estate deal that is worth billions of pounds. But Constantine warns Hoskins not to count his chickens, as a hat left on his yacht bunk is a portent of ill fortune.

On Good Friday morning, Hoskins learns that his gay sidekick Paul Freeman has been stabbed to death at a swimming pool. While he tries to discover who was behind the assault, a bomb destroys his Rolls Royce and kills driver Charles Cork, while a second explosion rips through Hoskins's lovingly restored boozer. Another is discovered and defused at the Corporation's Mayfair casino and he orders his henchmen to abduct his main rivals and incarcerate them in an abandoned abattoir while he conducts his inquiries. Despite employing brutal interrogation methods (including hanging the suspects upside down by meat hooks) and priming moll Helen Mirren and bent copper Dave King to tap their contacts, Hoskins is no closer to working out who is trying to sabotage his deal.

Eventually, however, he starts looking closer to home and discovers that trusted aides Bryan Marshall and Derek Thompson had conspired with Freeman to invest in a strike-proof workforce controlled by the IRA. But it is only when he learns that three provos were killed during a cash handover that he realises that the Irish blame him for the loss of their soldiers and are seeking pitiless revenge. Hoskins contacts the local cell and offers to pay back the money owed. However, his intention was less than honourable, as he uses the drop to lure his foes into the open and they are dispatched as they count their loot. Hoskins thinks he is home and hosed. But Constantine is disturbed by his inability to keep control over his patch and heads for the airport. In fury, Hoskins climbs into a car outside the hotel, but realises too late that his chauffeur has been replaced by a couple of IRA gunman.

Playing out to Francis Monkman's pulsating score, the closing sequence, in which a range of emotions register on the face of the silently seething Hoskins is one of the greatest in modern British cinema. It has acquired additional cachet by dint of the fact that one of the Irishmen is a young Pierce Brosnan.

There is something bulldogish about the refusal to show fear or resignation, even though Hoskins knows he has been outfoxed and is being driving to what will almost certainly be his place of execution. But this is also a tragic denouement of Shakespearean proportions as this latterday Macbeth understands that he has been undone not by the Forest of Dunsinane, but by the Fields of Athenry.

In many ways, this iconic picture has a lot to answer for, as it inspired Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998), which was responsible for launching the BritCrime cycle that shows no signs of slowing down, in spite of its ever-diminishing returns. But it also serves to show how far standards have dropped and if it prompts the odd wideboy producer to shake his head in shame and walk away from the genre then this reissue will have served its purpose. Of course, it also stands as a fine tribute to the much-lamented Bob Hoskins, whose Harold Shand is rivalled only by Michael Caine's Jack Carter in the modern annals of British screen villains. The rabid rage that erupts when he realises that someone as close as Marshall is capable of avaricious treachery is as chilling as the intimate moments with the ruthlessly protective Mirren are touching. No one in the current Mockney claque could get close to such emotive honesty and that is why this cruel, bleak, sardonic comeuppance saga is a classic and the rest are pathetic imitations.

Around the time this rough diamond first unspooled, the domain of action cinema was ruled by Israeli cousins Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus. Few had anything positive to say about the ersatz Hollywood thick ears that they churned out during the 1980s, while those who frequented the Cannon cinemas in George Street and Magdalen Street during this period will have mixed memories of the brief passing of the ABC brand. But it soon becomes apparent while watching Mark Hartley's documentary, Electric Boogaloo: The Wild Untold Story of Cannon Films, that Golan and Globus did more for those on the margins of the mainstream than they are usually give credit for. Moreover, they helped change the way in which movie business was conducted. They were anything but the paragons presented in Hila Medalia's officially sanctioned actuality, The Go-Go Boys: The Inside Story of Cannon Films. But they deserve better than some of the more distastefully dismissive kvetching to which they are subjected here by some of their former rivals, partners and employees.

According to Sam Firstenberg, Menahen Golan was the founder of Israeli cinema. He began making films with his younger cousin Yoram Globus in the mid-1960s and with Tevye and the Seven Daughters (1968) hit upon the formula of cashing in on popular successes in order to make a quick buck. Willing to exploit the political situation in the Middle East, Golan recreated the raid on Entebbe Airport in Operation Thunderbolt (1977) and encouraged Boaz Davidson to include as much nudity and gross-out comedy as he could squeeze into Lemon Popsicle (1978), a rite-of-passage farce that bore a marked similarity to John Landis's National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) and remains one of the most profitable Israeli pictures of all time.

The success of these crude crowd-pleasers convinced Golan and Globus that they were ready to take a tilt at Hollywood and set their sights on Cannon Films, which had enjoyed a few minor hits under founders Dennis Friedland and Christopher Dewey. Several were dubbed European imports, but John G. Avildsen's Joe (1970) was much admired for its insights into contemporary America. But Nicholas Sgarro's ambitious take on Xaviera Hollander's The Happy Hooker (1975) emptied the coffers and the Go-Gos took over the reins in time to star Klaus Kinski in David Paulsen's Schizoid (1980) and team Martine Beswick and Phil Silvers in Alan Roberts's The Happy Hooker Goes to Hollywood (1980).

Beswick felt they were shysters and resented the amount of nudity they requested. But Davidson was happy to come to Hollywood to make X-Ray (1982) and Avi Lerner suggests that they helped transform the way in which mid-budget movies were made in America by raising funds on the strength of titles, straplines and posters. Actor Robert Forster remembers them huckstering at festivals, but the established companies regarded them as carpetbaggers and they were always denied access to the studio inner circle. Catherine Mary Stewart suggests that they never quite acclimatised to the American way of doing things and recalls Golan ignoring all advice against including a bedroom song entitled `I'm Coming' in his 1980 musical, The Apple, which he hoped would outdo Ken Russell's Tommy (1975). Tobe Hooper regrets that their enthusiasm for movies wasn't matched by their taste or attention to detail, while Sybil Danning praises them for being proactive and getting pictures made. But Lucinda Dickey is less complimentary and makes a couple of crass Jabba the Hutt jokes at his expense.

British horror director Pete Walker had a reasonable experience of collaborating with Cannon on House of the Long Shadows (1983), although he smiles at the fact that, in spite of starring Vincent Price, Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee and John Carradine, it was branded a `family horror movie' and received a PG certificate. Not everyone had such a pleasant time, however, as Sylvia Kristel was drunk and doped out her mind when Just Jaeckin directed her in Lady Chatterley's Lover (1981) and Mata Hari (1985) and co-star Oliver Tobias regrets that Golan exploited her condition to ensure she was topless in as many scenes as possible. Diane Franklin similarly questions the duo's judgement in cross-cutting between an abortion and a pizza being sliced in Davidson's Lemon Popsicle remake, The Last American Virgin (1982), and Charles Matthau wonders whether Golan and Globus often made a rod for their own backs by bringing Israelis to California to make American movies when they dozens of indigenous directors who could have done a better job were kicking their heels.

Their most notorious import, however, was Michael Winner, who consistently set out to shock the censor and the public. He reunited with Charles Bronson for Death Wish II (1982) and screenwriter David Engelbach was appalled by the way in which he made the rape scene so graphic. Robin Sherwood describes the humiliation she endured while shooting the action and Marina Sirtis levels similar accusations about the sequence in which she was whipped while naked by Faye Dunaway in The Wicked Lady (1983). Actor-director Alex Winter calls Winner a psycho and Tobias concurs that he had a genius for making people feel used and uncomfortable.

Always on the lookout for the next box-office trend, Golan moved into the martial arts arena with Enter the Ninja (1981) after they bumped into Franco Nero at the Manila Film Festival. Golan also handled the sequel, Revenge of the Ninja (1983), but was running out of ideas when he decided to mix The Exorcist (1973) and Flashdance (1983) to make Ninja 3: The Domination (1984), which starred Lucinda Dickey as an aerobics instructor who is possessed by the spirit of a deceased male ninja and becomes a killing machine until the curse is lifted. Unsurprisingly, this flopped calamitously, but Golan blamed the audience for being unable to accept the notion of a female ninja.

The Go-Go Boys were not alone in being ready to let someone else carry the can. Given the chequered nature of his career at MGM, Frank Yablans has a cheek scoring cheap shots by ridiculing the quality of Cannon's output during the time it had a distribution deal with the once glamorous studio. Andrew McLaglen's Sahara (1983) may not have succeeded in its bid to combine Lawrence of Arabia (1962), The Great Race (1965) and The Blue Lagoon (1980), but Yablans and Winter mock their brand of `Frankenstein' movies with a relish that suggests their opinion is less than purely objective. Ambition often exceeded resources and sometimes even technology, as Luigi Cozzi had great plans for Hercules (1983) with Lou Ferrigno, but the special effects simply looked cheap and the spectacle was compromised. Yablans concedes it was better than most Cannon offerings, but dismisses it as a flop, while Cozzi protests it was a hit.

The company did have commercial success, though. Joel Silberg's Breakin' (1984) showed Cannon with its finger on the pulse of urban youth and star Michael Chambers (aka Boogaloo Shrimp) proclaims it the Enter the Dragon of hip-hop movies. Adolfo Quinones (aka Shabba-Doo) jokes that he was the Dean Martin to Chambers's Jerry Lewis. But, even though there were tensions with Dickey, a gymnast with jazz dance experience who felt like an outsider on the set, Quinones avers that the film succeeded where the United Nations failed in showing how to bring about racial tolerance. Typically, Golan and Globus rushed into production on the sequel, Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo (1984), in the hope of scooping another $56 million gross. But, while Chambers got to dance on the ceiling like Fred Astaire in Stanley Donen's Royal Wedding (1953), the picture was short on street grit and wound up feeling like a cartoonish rainbow.

Keen to impress the critics with a weighty drama, Golan hired Elliott Gould for Over the Brooklyn Bridge (1984), only for them to fall out over their interpretation of a love scene with Margot Hemingway. Bo Derek also raises their penchant for female nudity in recalling the making of Bolero (1985). Yet, in lambasting him for ruining a beautiful film, she conveniently forgets to mention that this update of Rouben Mamoulian's Blood and Sand (1941) was directed by her husband, John Derek. Co-star Olivia D'Abo looks back on the shoot with embarrassed amusement, but Yablans can't resist another opportunity to put the boot in, as he declares them vulgarians. Interestingly, at this point, Hartley mentions that the Go-Gos had to put up with such nicknames as Mayhem and Urine and The Bad News Jews and Mark Rosenthal states that anti-Semitism underpinned much of the hostility towards the pair. But Davidson prefers to think that they were rule-breakers who ruffled feathers and failed to fit in because they insisted on doing things the Israeli way.

In 1986, screenwriter David Engelbach turned director with America 3000, which imagined a world in which women ruled a civilisation of men and mutants. He insists it was an empowering topic, but Laurene Landon is so ashamed at being its female star that she tries to set light to a DVD copy and, in recalling how poorly the crew were paid, she asserts that Golan and Globus had a cash register where a heart should have been. Yet, they were prepared to sign Charles Bronson and Chuck Norris to long-term contracts, with the latter becoming a major action star after the unexpected success of Joseph Zito's Missing in Action (1984) and Lance Hool's Missing in Action: The Beginning (1985). Indeed, they became so influential within the company that script reader David Van Velle recalls that they were considered for every project, even if it was Wuthering Heights.

Norris could be difficult, however, and he refused to do Sam Firstenberg's American Ninja (1985) because his face would be covered. The role passed to Michael Dudikoff, who was announced as the new James Dean and plans were made to star him in a new version of Spider-Man. But, as he reflects wistfully, they bungled his big break and he became just another nearly man. Indeed, Cannon had the misfortune to hold the rights to Spidey, Superman and Captain America at a time when comic-book superheroes were considered naff. Ah, the good old days!

But every project was a potential gold mine as far as the Go-Gos were concerned. Richard Kraft recalls how they used to base themselves in the Carlton Hotel and spend the entire Cannes fortnight trying to flog shares in pictures that existed solely as titles, posters and plot pitches. Del Velle muses that they would have starred Charles Bronson in The Golem if they could have secured pre-sale funding. But, even though the odd effort could seem eerily prophetic, like Joseph Zito's Chuck Norris outing, Invasion USA (1985), Cannon had a habit of cobbling stories around action set-pieces, with the result that a lot of their movies made little or no sense. Mark Goldblatt and Mark Helfrich acknowledge that Golan was a workaholic, but complain bitterly about his philistinic editing approach. Director Stephen Tolkin agrees that they loved cinema in the abstract, but failed to pay close enough attention to detail, while Rosenthal claims that a monkey could pick 70 scripts from 500 and not do a worse job than Golan and Globus.

Tobe Hooper hoped Lifeforce (1985) would be his Ben-Hur (1959). It starred Mathilda May as a mostly naked alien and boasted the biggest budget and most sophisticated SFX of the Cannon era. But the production was allowed to spiral out of control, with Golan contributing a non-stop stream of ideas. He saw himself as a latterday David O. Selznick, but he often came across more like Samuel Goldwyn, most notably when he insisted on personally pitching Davidson's Ben, Bonzo and Big Bad Joe (which was originally released as Going Bananas, 1987) to Manis, the orangutan who played Clyde in Clint Eastwood's Every Which Way comedies. Ultimately, they made the movie with a midget in a monkey suit and Davidson winces as he recalls his embarrassment at shooting such tripe in Africa.

As Winner took offensiveness to new levels with Death Wish 3 (1985) and Death Wish 4: The Crackdown (1987), Bronson begged to be given better assignments, as he still saw himself as a serious actor. Yet director John Frankenheimer insists that Golan and Globus were much more than schlockmeisters and sought projects that would bring them respectability. Franco Zeffirelli praises them for allowing him to make Otello (1985) without interference and Barbet Schroeder is equally effusive about his supervision of Barfly (1987). However, Golan wanted to cut 50 minutes from John Cassavetes's masterly Love Streams (1984) and, having signed the contract on a napkin, persuaded Jean-Luc Godard to make King Lear (1987) with Molly Ringwald, Burgess Meredith, Norman Mailer and Woody Allen. Critic Quentin Falk rightly points out that they tried to make significant pictures, but even genuine gems like Andrei Konchalovsky's Oscar-nominated Runaway Train (1985) were derided by Hollywood competitors and they largely sank without trace.

In a bid to tilt the table in their own favour, Golan and Globus came to Britain to acquire Thorn-EMI, Pathé Film Library, Elstree Studios and the ABC cinema chain. They also had assets in Italy and the Netherlands and could raise $300 million in bond trading to maintain production levels the other studios could only dream of, as they struggled to release six or seven titles a year. But, while they were undeniably shrewd business operators, their creative instincts often let them down. Richard Chamberlain and Cassandra Patterson ruefully reminisce about J. Lee Thompson's King Solomon's Mines (1985), which they had been promised would be a Raiders of the Lost Ark-like adventure. Instead, it and Gary Nelson's Allan Quatermain and the Lost City of Gold (1986) proved deeply unpleasant experiences because co-star Sharon Stone insisted on being such a diva. Chamberlain recalls how the South Africans on the set used to pee in her bath water and reveals that she had only been cast because Golan had meant Romancing the Stone's Kathleen Turner when he ordered an underling to `get that Stone woman'.

Blundering on regardless, Golan ripped The Delta Force (1987) from the headlines and teamed Chuck Norris and Lee Marvin in a reconstruction of the TWA hostage crisis at Beirut Airport. Robert Forster declares himself happy with a film that saw Golan feuding on a daily basis with Shelley Winters. But its anti-Arab sentiments were distasteful in the extreme and it remains the darkest blot on the Cannon copybook. Ledgers of another sort were being examined by the American Securities and Exchange Commission, as Golan fell out with Tobe Hooper on Invaders From Mars (1986). This was supposed to be an hommage to 1950s sci-fi, but Hooper wanted to incorporate some of the bleak humour he had brought to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) and Golan berated him for playing down the schlock in favour of the yuks.

Fellow director Albert Pyun says they were old-fashioned conservatives who weren't on the same wavelength as the new generation of film-makers or their audience. Consequently, they offered Sylvester Stallone an eye-watering fee (between $12-25 million depending on who Hartley asks) to make Golan's misguided arm-wrestling saga, Over the Top (1987). Charles Matthau and Jerry Schatzberg agree that the Go-Gos simply didn't know how to connect with the kids now making up the bulk of the cinema audience. Hence, they allowed Christopher Reeve to choose a plot about the eradication of nuclear weapons for Sidney J. Furie's Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987). However, facing losses of $90 million for 1985-86, Globus was forced to slash the budget from $30 to $17 million and the picture suffered as a consequence and merely added to their problems.

Cutting corners proved even more ruinous on Gary Goddard's Masters of the Universe (1987), which was supposed to be a shoo-in hit because of the popularity of the Mattel toy franchise. Golan once said he would rather make 30 films than spend $30 million on one, but his over-vaunting ambition got the better of him. Robert Thompson insists they failed to learn from their mistakes and kept making poor pictures in the hope of tapping into the ever-changing public taste. Albert Pyun recalls how he was asked to complete Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1988) after Rusty Lemorande's departure when there was no money left for effects work. Similarly, he saw Jean-Claude Van Damme take over the cutting of Cyborg (1989) and convince Golan that he was the next big thing when the film made an unanticipated profit.

But the cousins were starting to disagree over how to cope with Cannon's mounting debts. They had hoped that Giancarlo Parretti and Credit Lyonnais would bale them out. But he proved not to be the white knight they needed and Golan struck out on his own by forming 21st Century. As Parretti acquired MGM and merged it with Cannon to create MGM-Pathé Communications, Golan and Globus made competing lambada movies - Graydon Clark's The Forbidden Dance and Joel Silberg's Lambada (both 1990) - and proceeded to split the market for a dance craze that never happened.

It was a sorry way for a bold enterprise to end. Tolkin suggests they fell victim to the snobbery of the Hollywood establishment as much as their own shortcomings, with Golan being dismissed as a director who used his heart more than his head. But they shook up Tinseltown with their can-do attitude and changed the way in which the studios operated with their pre-sale template. Ultimately, Golan and Globus were dreamers who exceeded their initial expectations, but they didn't have the artistic refinement or business nous to respond to the changes they had wrought upon an industry in transition.

As in Not Quite Hollywood (2008) and Machete Maidens Unleashed! (2010), which respectively covered Ozploitation and Filipino action movies, Mark Hartley tells his tale with considerable panache and insight. His scattershot approach forces the viewer to pay attention to follow his lines of argument. But he and co-editors Jamie Blanks and Sara Edwards make fine use of clips from the Cannon canon and Hartley should be commended for amassing over 80 talking heads to offer their opinions on the cousins who are conspicuous by their disapproving absence. He might have been advised to have included a couple of fanboy critics to balance the carping of the detractors, but it is clear that few have little love or respect for Golan and Globus, who sought to storm Hollywood and reinvent it in their own image rather than become part of the furniture.

Hartley rather rushes the conclusion and more might have been made of Parretti's role in proceedings. He might also have said more about the post-Cannon relationship between the Go-Gos, as Golan racked up 210 producorial credits before his death in 2014. But this probably tells the casual viewer more than they will ever need to know about the twosome who paved the way for such maverick combines as Carolco, Miramax and Millennium Films, while those wishing to know more should check out Andrew Yule's well-researched 1987 tome, Hollywood a Go-Go.