Tag Archives: Emma Thompson

British Classics: Love Actually (2003)

24 Monday Dec 2018

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D: Richard Curtis / 135m

Cast: Rowan Atkinson, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Colin Firth, Gregor Fisher, Martin Freeman, Hugh Grant, Keira Knightley, Andrew Lincoln, Laura Linney, Heike Makatsch, Kris Marshall, Martine McCutcheon, Lúcia Moniz, Liam Neeson, Bill Nighy, Joanna Page, Alan Rickman, Rodrigo Santoro, Emma Thompson, Billy Bob Thornton

In the weeks leading up to Xmas, several friends and relatives who are all connected to each other find themselves dealing with love in (almost) all its various forms. David (Grant) is the newly elected Prime Minister who finds himself attracted to Natalie (McCutcheon), a junior member of the staff at 10 Downing Street. Mark (Lincoln) is the best friend of Peter (Ejiofor), who has just married Juliet (Knightley) – who Mark is secretly in love with. Writer Jamie (Firth), after being cheated on by his girlfriend, heads to Provence to write his latest novel, and falls in love with his housekeeper, Aurélia (Moniz). David’s sister, Karen (Thompson), begins to suspect that her husband, Harry (Rickman), is having an affair with someone at his work. Meanwhile, one of his other employees, Sarah (Linney), has feelings for her colleague, Karl (Santoro), but doesn’t know how to broach them. Daniel (Neeson), a friend of Karen’s, is a recent widower who’s stepson Sam (Brodie-Sangster) reveals his own life for a girl at his school. John (Freeman) and Judy (Page) are body doubles working on a movie, while Colin (Marshall) dreams of visiting the U.S. where he believes his being British will attract lots of women.

The glue that binds all these characters together, even more so than writer/director Richard Curtis’s excessive generosity in connecting them in the first place, is the character of Billy Mack (Nighy), an aging singer making a comeback with a cover version of The Troggs’ Love Is All Around, retitled Christmas Is All Around. Whenever the movie is spending time with the other characters, Billy is often there in the background, his cheesy monstrosity of a Xmas record and louche behaviour a much needed antidote to the surfeit of sentimentality and saccharine romanticism that peppers the narrative from start to finish. Even the less “happy” storylines – Harry and Karen, Sarah and Karl, Juliet and Mark – are bittersweet entries that are layered with poignancy and hopefulness. But that’s the point of the movie: it’s a positive message of love for everyone. Even if a marriage founders for a moment (Harry and Karen), or love is a case of wrong place, wrong time (Mark and Juliet), or even if it never gets off the ground at all (Sarah and Karl), all the clichés are in place: love will find a way, love is all you need, love conquers all… That Curtis holds it all together and still manages to make it work despite all the plot contrivances and rampant wish fulfillment that threaten to derail it several times over, is a testament to his confidence in the material.

Of course, he’s aided by an accomplished ensemble cast who rise to their individual challenges with gusto and no small amount of charm. Grant’s dance routine, Rickman’s hangdog expressions, Nighy’s inappropriate smirking – all of these character beats and more help to make the movie a feast of feelgood moments that linger like treasured memories long after it’s ended. Curtis may have laid on the romance with a trowel (sometimes it’s like being battered over the head with a dozen red roses), but this is a very, very funny movie with endlessly quotable lines (Colin: “Stateside I am Prince William without the weird family”), visual gags aplenty, and the ability to spring a number of clever narrative sleights of hand when you’re least expecting them. It’s an appealing, but unsophisticated slice of romantic fairy tale excess that’s bolstered by pin-sharp humour, terrific performances, and a refreshing awareness that it all takes place in a fantasy-based “reality” of Curtis’s devising (where else would the US President get such a public dressing down for his behaviour?). Fifteen years on, it remains a perennial favourite at Xmas, and despite an initial lack of enthusiasm on the part of critics, a movie that has transcended any criticism – deserved or otherwise – to become one of those rare movies that can be enjoyed over and over again, and which never seems to grow old or stale with repeated viewings.

Rating: 8/10 – a movie that tells nine separate stories and which does justice to all of them, Love Actually is a moving, thoughtful, and emotional look at love itself and what it means for a variety of people in a variety of situations and circumstances (though notably, not anyone who’s LGBT); comic and romantic in equal measure, it’s a movie you can fall in love with easily and unreservedly (and any movie that contains Jeanne Moreau in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo has got to be getting things more right than wrong).

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The Children Act (2017)

28 Tuesday Aug 2018

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D: Richard Eyre / 105m

Cast: Emma Thompson, Stanley Tucci, Fionn Whitehead, Ben Chaplin, Jason Watkins, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Anthony Calf, Rosie Cavaliero, Rupert Vansittart, Nicholas Jones

Fiona Maye (Thompson) is a High Court judge who specialises in cases involving the Children Act 1989, cases that often involve a strict interpretation of the law and which require a consideration of what is best for the child, even if it’s at odds with the wishes of the parents. Fiona is married to Jack (Tucci), a classics professor, but in the wake of a particularly difficult case, Jack announces that he plans to have an affair; he’s unhappy with the lack of intimacy in their marriage. Fiona is upset by this but remains reticent until a call from her chambers advises of an emergency case that needs her attention. Jack leaves, while Fiona prepares to deal with the case of Adam Henry (Whitehead), a seventeen year old Jehovah’s Witness who will die from leukaemia unless he is given a blood transfusion. Adam is refusing to have the transfusion, and so the hospital is seeking a ruling to overturn his refusal. Against a background of religious determination and legal necessity, Fiona meets Adam before making her judgment. It’s a meeting that proves to have a profound effect on both of them…

Sometimes a movie has no choice but to rely heavily, if not completely, on the merits of a particular performance. Without that performance, the movie loses its central focus, or becomes less of an accomplished piece, or worst of all, lacks any appreciable impact. Such is the case with The Children Act, an adaptation of Ian McEwan’s 2014 novel, and with a screenplay by McEwan himself. Without Emma Thompson, this would be a hollow movie with little to recommend it (though that’s not to say that another actress couldn’t have carried off the role to the same degree). What comes across, and  very early on, is that Fiona is the whole show, and without her the storyline and the movie as a whole would amount to very little indeed. McEwan is a terrific novelist, but he’s not necessarily a terrific screenwriter, because in translating his novel to the big screen, he’s forgotten to make the elements around Fiona as interesting or intriguing as those that directly concern her. This leaves the movie dependent entirely on Thompson’s performance throughout, and in the process, relegates everyone else to the second tier.

The decision Fiona makes in regard to Adam’s case won’t surprise anyone, but once she makes it, the movie jettisons its legal drama set up and becomes something entirely expected and dramatically demoralising: Fiona finds herself “pursued” by an overly enamoured Adam. Up until now, the story has played out with a keen awareness of the legal, religious and emotional undercurrents of Adam’s case – in the witness box, Adam’s father (Chaplin) is a passionate advocate for his faith in God – but with the verdict in and Adam’s life saved, it becomes an unwieldy drama of misspent longing and unwanted attention that turns Adam from a fierce proponent of religious and personal choice into a drippy, Yeats-quoting stalker whose intelligence and wit seems to have been drained out of him along with his own blood. This sudden change hurts the movie tremendously, and makes the final half an hour something of a struggle in terms of credibility. At the same time, the sub-plot with Jack is allowed to resolve itself with a minimum of effort. With so much initial momentum overturned, it’s again thanks to Thompson’s subtle yet deeply emotive portrayal that the viewer is able to carry on until the end, but with the certain (and unavoidable) awareness that, whatever the outcome, it won’t be as insightful or impactful as what happens before Fiona reveals her decision.

Rating: 7/10 – Thompson’s magnificent performance is the real deal here, and the only deal as well, making The Children Act something of a lop-sided endeavour that’s compelling when focused on Fiona’s emotional confusion, but merely adequate at all other times; Eyre’s direction is solid, but Tucci is wasted in a thankless role, and the whole thing unfolds against a backdrop of repressed emotions that the script seems uninterested in revealing.

The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected) (2017)

19 Sunday Nov 2017

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D: Noah Baumbach / 112m

Cast: Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Thompson, Elizabeth Marvel, Grace Van Patten, Judd Hirsch, Rebecca Miller, Candice Bergen, Adam Driver, Matthew Shear, Sakina Jaffrey, Gayle Rankin, Michael Chernus

Harold Meyerowitz (Hoffman) is a semi-famous sculptor who hasn’t had a show in years, and who has become somewhat marginalised within the New York art world. His work is admired by those that know of it, but his contemporaries, such as L.J. Shapiro (Hirsch), are still exhibiting and still getting the recognition that Harold thinks they don’t deserve. Harold is on his fourth marriage – to Maureen (Thompson) – and has two children from his first, Danny (Sandler) and Jean (Marvel). Danny is in the midst of separating from his wife, and has a precocious teenage daughter, Eliza (Van Patten), who is about to leave for college. Jean is a spinster but leads an otherwise happy life. Harold has another child from his third marriage, Matthew (Stiller), but he lives in LA, and works as a financial consultant. He’s successful, and has a young son he would like to spend more time with. This is the family Meyerowitz, and despite outward appearances, many of which they foster themselves, they all need help (oh boy, do they need help).

What’s impressive about Noah Baumbach’s latest feature is that he takes a stereotypical dysfunctional family, and spins that stereotype ever so slightly off its axis, so that each nugget of information about any of the characters seems fresh and unexpected, even though a closer inspection reveals tropes and metaphors that we’ve seen countless times before. This is due to Baumbach’s very eloquent and very astute screenplay, a piece of writing that manages to include a number of complex and yet succinct observations on the nature of father-son relationships and the effect that an inwardly scared parent can have on their children. It’s no surprise that Baumbach has chosen to examine the issue of what children need from their parents as this has formed the basis of much of his work in the past, from The Squid and the Whale (2005) to While We’re Young (2014). But this is easily his most impressive and most fully realised project, and it has a smoothness and an ease about it that makes it all the more enjoyable to watch.

The main focus is, at first, on Danny. With his marriage coming to an end and Eliza going off to college, Danny has to reassess what he’s going to do with his life (he’s been a house husband up until now, having chosen that as his “career” instead of being a musician). He and Jean get involved in arranging a retrospective of Harold’s career, but Baumbach is quick to make the viewer realise that this isn’t being done out of love or affection, and not even necessarily out of respect for their father’s work. Like so many other things connected to Harold that they do, it’s done because they view it as the right thing to do; it’s a familial obligation. But Harold is obsessed with how his work is perceived, because his work is the only thing that, to him, makes him stand out from the crowd. He’s constantly seeking approbation from everyone around him, and insists he receives it from his kids. But if they don’t, then he’s oblivious to both them and their needs. Such is their lives as adults, such was their lives as children.

Harold’s narcissistic expressions about himself, and his short-fuse dismissal of anyone he deems unimportant, has had an unpleasant effect on all three of his children. Danny has spent an enormous amount of time and energy in raising Eliza so that they’re more like friends instead of father and daughter. As a result he’s a better father than Harold was to him, but the irony is that in its own way, it’s as unhealthy as the relationship Danny had with him as a child. Baumbach makes the point well: too little attention or love can be just as bad as too much. But while that may seem obvious (and it is), it’s the way in which Danny tries to strike a balance between the two, and without necessarily being aware that he’s doing it, that makes all the difference. Jean has her own reasons for keeping her life separate, and though it seems that she’s perhaps the most “adjusted” of the three, this later proves to be incorrect. And then there’s Matthew, who professes to be “over” his father’s ability to make him angry for having a successful life (Harold is almost as obsessed by money as he is by maintaining his reputation). Matthew, like Danny, is trying to be a better father than Harold was, but he can’t seem to connect with his son, despite his best efforts.

Watching these four people struggle to communicate with each other, and struggle to find the answers that are often in front of them, should be frustrating for the viewer,  but Baumbach, and the sharpness of his script, helps avoid all that. The family dynamic is entirely credible and perfectly judged, with superb performances from all concerned. Sandler has only been better once before, in Punch-Drunk Love (2002), and here he proves that he can be a fine dramatic actor when he wants to be (which isn’t often enough). Sandler displays a warmth and a heartfelt sincerity as Danny that allows the viewer a way in to the Meyerowitz family and its myriad issues. He’s a sweet, caring guy trying to do his best, and he has enough self-awareness to know that he doesn’t always get it right. Stiller is equally as good, channelling Matthew’s anger at being unfairly singled out for Harold’s praise as a child when the praise, and what it related to, wasn’t important to Matthew at all. In support, Marvel, Thompson and Van Patten offer touching performances, while there are a clutch of more minor roles that allow for a few scene-stealing moments (Chernus as a snippy nurse is a treat). But this, perhaps expectedly, is Hoffman’s movie, his portrayal of Harold as a manipulative, emotionally remote artist one of the best things he’s done in years.

Baumbach approaches the material and the characters with a great deal of care and attention, and it’s this that makes the movie so effortlessly dramatic, and so effortlessly funny. Nobody behaves in a manner that might seem odd or inappropriate because that’s how they’ve always behaved. With some questions there’s an answer provided, but many’s the time when Baumbach keeps the viewer in the dark, as if to say, “these characters still need time to figure things out, and it’s not going to happen before the movie’s over”. It all adds up to a remarkably humane and sympathetic look at expectations between the generations, and how personal legacies can hamper the growth of those who are raised in the shadow of them. Thoughtful and considerate of its characters’ foibles and muted aspirations, Baumbach’s latest is a sprightly mix of drama and comedy that succeeds on both fronts, and is his best work yet.

Rating: 9/10 – that rarity: a comedy-drama with heart as well as intelligence, The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected) is a cautionary tale that never once feels forced or that it’s struggling to find its own voice; the characters linger in the memory, along with Baumbach’s clever script and fluid direction, and a number of quality performances, making this a movie that everyone should try and see, and especially as an alternative to more mainstream, big-budget moviemaking.

Mini-Review: The Legend of Barney Thomson (2015)

29 Friday Jul 2016

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The Legend of Barney Thomson

aka Barney Thomson

D: Robert Carlyle / 92m

Cast: Robert Carlyle, Emma Thompson, Ray Winstone, Ashley Jensen, Martin Compston, Tom Courtenay, James Cosmo, Brian Pettifer, Kevin Guthrie, Stephen McCole

Barney Thomson (Carlyle) lives a sad, awkward life as a Glaswegian barber who doesn’t talk to his customers (or even likes them), has few friends, and lives on his own in a drab flat; in short, he leads a life of quiet desperation. With his attitude at work causing too many problems, his boss, Wullie (McCole), gives him a month’s notice. Barney isn’t too good at accepting this, and pleads with Wullie to keep him on. But Wullie won’t change his mind. Barney’s bad luck gets worse: while trying to convince him, Barney causes Wullie’s death. Panicked, Barney endeavours to get rid of the body, but ends up confessing his “crime” to his mother, Cemolina (Thompson). To Barney’s surprise, his mother helps him by cutting up the body and, at first, putting the pieces in her freezer.

At the same time, the Glasgow police are trying to track down a serial killer who posts body parts to his victims’ families. In charge of the investigation is relocated London policeman, Detective Holdall (Winstone). He’s also tasked with looking into Wullie’s “disappearance”, which brings him into contact with Barney. To offset Barney’s paranoid suspicion that Holdall thinks he’s responsible for Wullie’s “disappearance”, Barney attempts to pin the blame on his colleague, Chris (Compston). But Barney’s plan takes an unexpected turn, and soon matters become even more complicated, leading him to have to count on his mother once more – but in a way that he couldn’t possibly have foreseen.

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Robert Carlyle’s first venture into big screen directing – he previously directed an episode of SGU Stargate Universe in 2010 – The Legend of Barney Thomson is an enjoyable if sometimes over-reaching movie that works best as farce, but less so as a straightforward black comedy. Adapted from the novel The Long Midnight of Barney Thomson by David Lindsay, the movie paints a vivid world of meandering lives, muddled relationships and the aforementioned quiet desperation. Barney is the eternal loser, always taking second place in his own life, and too reliant on others to make any serious decisions that would change his life for the better. Carlyle is terrific as Barney: put upon, afraid, going through the motions, and then on edge, anxious and terrified. He’s matched by Thompson, who makes Cemolina a cruel figure in Barney’s life, and whose brassy, couldn’t-care-less behaviour is the antithesis of Barney and his constant worrying. (Winstone and Jensen are less successful, their continual haranguing of each other feeling like it’s been drafted in from another, weaker movie.)

There’s humour aplenty, but too much of it is signposted in advance, and as a result it lacks the kind of impact to have audiences laughing out loud very often. Despite this, the movie moves at a good pace, and Carlyle directs with confidence, even though the material could have been straightened out here and there, and the ending a little less contrived. The Bridgend, Glasgow locations add flavour to the storyline, and there’s solid, suitably dour cinematography courtesy of Fabian Wagner that adds to the often astringent feel of the movie as a whole.

Rating: 6/10 – though not entirely successful, The Legend of Barney Thomson has much to recommend it, from Thompson’s harridan of a mother, to Winstone’s transplanted copper moaning about living and working in Scotland; it’s not a movie that will linger long in the memory after you’ve seen it, but it’s definitely worth watching, and does have an instant classic in the line (directed at Barney), “You look like a haunted tree.”

Burnt (2015)

01 Friday Jan 2016

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Burnt

D: John Wells / 101m

Cast: Bradley Cooper, Sienna Miller, Daniel Brühl, Riccardo Scamarcio, Omar Sy, Sam Keeley, Henry Goodman, Matthew Rhys, Stephen Campbell Moore, Emma Thompson, Uma Thurman, Lexie Benbow-Hart, Alicia Vikander, Sarah Greene

Adam Jones (Cooper) is a bit of a cause célèbre in the culinary world, having crashed and burned at the Paris restaurant where he worked thanks to his diva-like behaviour and propensity for drugs and booze. Now clean for two years, he turns up in London at the restaurant run by his friend and colleague from his time in Paris, Tony (Brühl). Adam tells an unimpressed and disbelieving Tony that he’s there to make up for Paris, run the kitchen in a top restaurant, and gain three Michelin stars. Naturally, Tony refuses to help him, but Adam isn’t about to give up. He bullies his way into Tony’s restaurant, shows Tony (and his clientele) what he can do, and eyes up the sous chef, Helene (Miller), with a view to poaching her for his own place.

Which, of course, he does, but not before Helene puts up a (semi-)spirited defence, and Tony has to be dragged away from his own job as a maître d’. Having assembled his kitchen staff, Adam’s opening night doesn’t go as smoothly or successfully as he’d hoped, and the abrasive side of his personality comes out, leading to a tirade of abuse directed at his staff and Helene walking out. But Tony persuades her to come back, and soon she and Adam are starting out on the rocky road to a relationship – of sorts. Back in the kitchen, the apparent arrival of two Michelin Guide inspectors sees Adam go all out to get his three stars, but an unforeseen setback destroys his dream.

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Adam goes off the deep end (albeit for one night) and winds up at the restaurant of a rival chef, Reece (Rhys). There he learns a couple of valuable lessons, reconnects with Tony and Helene, is given a second chance at gaining the three Michelin stars, and begins – again – to put his life back together.

Burnt features a screenplay by Steven Knight, a British screenwriter who’s also responsible for Eastern Promises (2007) and Locke (2013). But he’s also written the likes of Hummingbird (2013) and Seventh Son (2014), so his track record is a little uneven… and Burnt falls firmly into the latter category. There’s very little here that makes sense, and a lot of it happens for no particular reason at all, leaving the drama feeling undercooked and the romance warmed over. For example, we don’t know why Adam chooses London to make his return. It’s never explained how he manages to stay clean without attending any meetings (“I’m not good in groups,” he keeps saying). And his backers have insisted he have weekly blood tests to ensure he’s not using again; if he does they’ll withdraw their backing. (This is where Emma Thompson comes in, as the therapist who takes his blood. Why not the hospital or a doctors’ surgery? It’s a strange arrangement, and one that just sits there like a fait accompli.)

Elsewhere there are subplots and other subplots that have their own subplots, like the money Adam owes to some unsavoury types in Paris, and who have traced him to London (having failed to learn he was in the US for two years while getting and staying sober). On the back of that we’re introduced – very briefly – to an old flame (played by Vikander) who drifts in and out of the movie and provides no threat whatsoever to the relationship Adam has with Helene (it might have been predictable but it would also have raised the movie out of the dramatic doldrums it rolls around in for an hour and a half).

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And when the script decides to throw in the notion that Tony is in love with Adam, it comes literally out of nowhere and then is left hanging there to dwindle away to nothing. Maybe these moments are meant to add depth or meaning to the various relationships in the movie, but all they do is confirm the notion that Knight hasn’t really got to grips with what the movie is meant to be saying. Adam rants unconvincingly at his staff, and thanks to the movie’s PG-13 approach, sounds less like Gordon Ramsay and more like someone having a good whinge. There’s the awkward use of his rival, Reece, as well. One minute Reece is disparaging of Adam’s talent and attempt at redemption, the next he’s stuck with lines like “You’re better than me. But the rest of us need you to lead us to places we wouldn’t otherwise go.” (Really?)

There’s more, too much more, and things aren’t helped by Wells’ direction, which remains staunchly flavourless throughout, and a cast who struggle continually to do their best but remain hamstrung by Knight’s script. Cooper, normally a very capable actor, doesn’t seem to know what to do with his character, and goes with the flow of each individual scene, so that he’s angry one moment, happy the next, confused after that, and then determined, but it’s like he’s acted in each scene with no intention of linking them with any other scenes, or the picture as a whole.

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Miller is poorly used – again – and the other female roles don’t even amount to a whole one. Thompson does just enough, Vikander isn’t allowed to do even that, and Thurman pops up as a food critic who can’t even do bitchy properly (honestly, Anton Ego from Ratatouille (2007) was more caustic). On the male side, Sy is kept firmly in the background until the script needs him (only twice), Brühl struggles with a character who gives new meaning to the word “bland”, and Scamarcio is virtually a passer-by as one of the two French thugs. The Doors once sang, “No one here gets out alive”, but in terms of Burnt, the line should be “No one here gets to act alive”.

Rating: 4/10 – with the food on display looking bright and vibrant and good enough to eat, a plate is the only place you’ll find anything that’s vibrant in Burnt; tedious, muddled and poorly constructed, this is a movie that should be sent back for being completely inedible.

A Walk in the Woods (2015)

18 Friday Dec 2015

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A Walk in the Woods

D: Ken Kwapis / 104m

Cast: Robert Redford, Nick Nolte, Emma Thompson, Mary Steenburgen, Kristen Schaal, Nick Offerman, R. Keith Harris, Susan McPhail

It all starts with a verbal chastisement-cum-ambush on TV: celebrated author Bill Bryson (Redford) is being interviewed and distinctly not feeling the love. When asked if he has retired, Bryson responds by saying, “Writers don’t retire. We either drink ourselves to death or blow our brains out.” The interviewer is unimpressed: “What will it be for you?” Bryson is resigned: “After this interview, probably both.” But the interviewer has found the nub of Bryson’s dilemma as an author, namely what to write about next.

He’s no nearer finding an answer while attending a funeral. While taking a break from the rest of the mourners, he finds himself on part of the Appalachian Trail, a hiking trail that runs 2,200 miles from Springer Mountain in Georgia all the way to Mount Katahdin in Maine. Suddenly inspired, Bryson tells his wife, Catherine (Thompson), that he’s going to hike the entire trail, despite being unfit and too old. Catherine is horrified by the idea, and takes to leaving newspaper and internet clippings around for him to see, with headlines such as “Decomposed body found on trail” in an effort to dissuade him. Eventually she gets him to agree to hike with a companion. Bryson reaches out to several of his male friends but they all turn him down. It’s only when an old friend he hasn’t seen in years, Stephen Katz (Nolte) gets in touch and volunteers to go with him that the trip becomes a go.

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There are reservations though (how could there not be?). Bryson and Katz always used to rub each other up the wrong way, and back when they were friends, Katz was an habitual womaniser and alcoholic. But he tells Bryson he’s in good shape and ready to go on the hike. When Bryson and Catherine meet him at the airport, Katz’s physical condition raises cause for concern but he assures them he’ll be fine. They set out on the trail from Springer Mountain and soon find it hard going, much more so than they expected. Along the way they meet a variety of people, including the ever-talkative, ever-opinionated Mary Ellen (Schaal), a woman named Beulah (McPhail) who Katz hits up for a date (unaware that she’s married), and motel owner Jeannie (Steenburgn), who develops a crush on Bryson. They have an encounter with bears, hike through heavy snow drifts, and manage to fall down onto a ledge that they can’t get back up from (until two other hikers come along and rescue them).

And… that’s about it. For most of its running time, A Walk in the Woods proves to be a light-hearted, lightweight walk on the wild side, as Bryson and Katz tramp their way along the trail like two men at the head of the hip transplant list. They reminisce, they argue, they bicker, they explore notions of personal regret, and they remain “nice” throughout. Even when they have the expected and entirely predictable falling out, the movie has made it to that point with so little drama attached to it that you could be forgiven for thinking it had all been written out of the story. And it serves to highlight the story’s one major problem: once they’re on the trail, all the excitement is given little or no attention, and any potential for drama is wasted.

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Once on the trail, Bryson and Katz are amiable enough companions, amiable to suit their own needs, and amiable enough for the time to pass without undue hardship or hazards to slow them down (even when they do fall down onto that ledge). It’s a hike that has its fair share of incidents but none of them are dramatic enough to warrant more than a passing interest. There’s also a distinct lack of personal growth for both Bryson and Katz, even though the script by Michael Arndt and Bill Holderman tries hard to include this idea. What we’re left with is a series of mildly amusing anecdotes peppered with isolated, random musings on the fate of the surrounding wilderness (one of the few thematic aspects of the novel retained by the movie). It wouldn’t be so bad if it weren’t so anodyne and disturbingly bland in its execution.

If the movie has anything going for it, it’s the scenery, beautifully lensed by DoP John Bailey. Parts of the trail are absolutely stunning, and the cinematography picks them out and, occasionally, makes them seem hyperreal, as with the McAfee Knob overlook, a jutting piece of rock that allows for a panoramic view of Virginia’s Catawba Valley. Against this splendid backdrop, Bryson and Katz’s mythologising of their younger days pales into insignificance, and the longer the hike goes on, the less involving it becomes, until the viewer is left with the same level of interest as someone having to sit through an extended slideshow of the same journey.

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As the OAP’s who can survive a serious fall without so much as a scratch between them, Redford and Nolte make for a comfortable double act, but there’s little that allows them to spark against each other. Thompson makes more of an impression in her limited supporting role than either actor does across the whole movie, while Steenburgen, Schaal and Offerman all make temporary forays into the limelight before being quickly forgotten. Overseeing all this is Kwapis, a director best known for his work on US TV shows such as The Office and Malcolm in the Middle. In actuality he doesn’t so much direct the movie as guide it by the arm from scene to scene so that no harm comes to it.

Rating: 5/10 – with Bryson’s trademark acerbic wit toned down, and his love of knowledge for knowledge’s sake given few occasions to shine, A Walk in the Woods is a passion-free project that ambles along like its two aging stars, and like them, doesn’t take too many risks; with as little ambition employed as possible, it’s still a pleasant enough movie to watch, but it’s not one that will encourage anyone to take up the same challenge that Bryson did.

Mini-Review: The Love Punch (2013)

22 Friday Aug 2014

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Love Punch, The

D: Joel Hopkins / 94m

Cast: Pierce Brosnan, Emma Thompson, Timothy Spall, Celia Imrie, Louise Bourgoin, Laurent Lafitte, Tuppence Middleton, Jack Wilkinson, Olivier Chantreau, Marisa Berenson

When divorced couple Richard (Brosnan) and Kate (Thompson) discover that their pensions are worthless thanks to a company takeover orchestrated by French businessman Vincent (Lafitte), they put aside their differences and set out to steal a diamond worth $10.8 million that he has just purchased.  Their plan sees them travel to the Cap d’Antibes where Vincent is due to marry supermodel Manon (Bourgoin), and for whom he has had the diamond made into a necklace for their wedding day.

Aided by their friends, Jerry (Spall) and Penelope (Imrie), the still-sparring couple plan to attend the wedding disguised as Texans (there to cement a deal with Vincent), steal the diamond and replace it with a fake, and then head back to the UK to sell the diamond and disperse the money from the sale to everyone who’s lost their pension.  But not everything goes to plan…

Love Punch, The - scene

Look through most actors’ filmographies and you’ll see one or two movies that look like they were made a) for the money, b) because of the location, or c) both.  Well, for Messrs. Brosnan, Thompson, Spall, and Imrie, this is that movie, a dreadfully unfunny romantic comedy/caper hybrid that boasts beautiful locations but little else.  It’s a measure of writer/director Hopkins’ script that belief has to be suspended time and time again, from Kate’s unconvincing faint that gets them into Vincent’s building, to the idea of four Fifty-somethings even planning a diamond robbery.  And when they decide the only way to physically attend the wedding is by climbing a nearby cliff face, then you know rampant absurdity is the order of the day.

The performances are hampered accordingly, though Thompson does her best with what she has.  Brosnan tries too hard, Spall is given a military background that no one knows about, and Imrie revisits the sex-hungry character she’s played so many times before (but without bringing anything new to the idea).  The rest of the cast do what they can but it’s an uphill struggle.

The Love Punch was obviously intended as a bit of a light-hearted romp featuring two of Britain’s most popular actors, but instead it’s a stodgy, lumpen mess that never gets off the ground.  Definitely not one for the promo reel.

Rating: 3/10 – awkward and terrible, The Love Punch should be approached with caution; hampered by a dire script and with too many moments where the audience will be wondering if they’re really seeing what they’re seeing, this is one for fans of the principal cast only.

Saving Mr. Banks (2013)

13 Friday Dec 2013

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Saving Mr. Banks

D: John Lee Hancock / 125m

Cast: Emma Thompson, Tom Hanks, Annie Rose Buckley, Colin Farrell, Paul Giamatti, Ruth Wilson, Bradley Whitford, Jason Schwartzman, B.J. Novak, Rachel Griffiths, Kathy Baker, Ronan Vibert

Based on the true story of Walt Disney’s attempts to secure the film rights to P.L. Travers’ Mary Poppins, Saving Mr. Banks opens with the financially compromised author (Thompson) telling her agent she has absolutely no intention of flying to Los Angeles and letting Disney (Hanks) ruin her creation.  One quick turnaround later and we see Travers arriving in La La Land and being met by her driver for the duration of her stay, Ralph (Giamatti).  One dispiriting car journey (for her) later and she is introduced to the charming and sincere Disney.  Her doubts assuaged for the time being, she agrees to work with the proposed movie’s writers (Whitford, Schwartzman and Novak).  As they work through the script and songs we’ve all come to know – and perhaps love – Travers’ objections remain largely in place, but gradually her resistance is worn down by a combination of the writers’ enthusiasm, Disney’s determination not to renege on a promise made to his daughters twenty years before, and memories of her childhood that resurface during the visit.

It’s these flashbacks that add meat to the otherwise thin story of “a writer taking on the system”.  As portrayed by Thompson – and superbly, I might add – Travers is presented as a bit of an old dragon: scathing, contemptuous of her American “cousins”, rude, condescending and almost completely out of her depth.  Hancock and writers Kelly Marcel and Sue Smith, instead of making the movie a “fish out of water” story where the fish wins out by virtue of personal fortitude and stubbornness, have wisely chosen to look at the reasons for Travers’ animosity towards Disney, and why the character of Mr Banks was so important to her.  As Travers’ back story unfolds through the depiction of her childhood, so we come to learn the fundamental truth behind the characters of Mr Banks and of Mary Poppins herself, and the long-term effect Travers’ childhood has had on her.  These scenes give a much-needed depth to the movie, and allows Thompson to provide a richer, more psychological approach to P.L. Travers than may have been expected.  Thompson dominates the movie, reducing even Tom Hanks to the level of humble onlooker in their scenes together, and gives a masterclass in screen acting, her voice and mannerisms and facial expressions all perfectly pitched to leave the audience in no doubt as to her thoughts and feelings at any time.

Saving Mr. Banks - scene

Matching Thompson in terms of screen performance, and presence, is her younger counterpart, Annie Rose Buckley.  With only an episode of Aussie soap Home and Away back in 2010 under her belt, Buckley’s performance as Ginty is intuitive, mesmerising and a minor revelation.  As her scenes transform from pastoral idyllic to domestic unstable, Buckley displays a maturity and command of the material that few actresses her age would be capable of achieving, let alone maintaining, over the course of a two hour movie.  She’s a remarkable find, and all credit to the casting director Ronna Kress for picking her out.

As Disney, Tom Hanks gives a comfortable performance but the script often sidelines him, so that he pops up only now and again to urge on Travers and perform a little light damage control when required.  It’s effectively a supporting role, and one that doesn’t stretch him in any way.  In other roles, Farrell as the inspiration for Mr Banks plays against type for the first half of the movie, while Wilson is given little to do as his wife other than look disappointed or, in one scene, have a five minute breakdown.  Giamatti is good as Travers’ driver, and he provides several deft comic ripostes to Thompson’s sarcastic jibes.  And in perhaps the most sublime casting decision of all, Rachel Griffiths messes with our acceptance of Julie Andrews as Mary Poppins by portraying the “real” Mary.

Saving Mr. Banks is lovely to watch, courtesy of bright, colourful photography by John Schwartzman (half-brother of Jason), and a pleasing recreation both of turn-of-the-20th-century Australia and 60’s Los Angeles.  Disneyland is given an effective retro makeover, and the music by Thomas Newman – incorporating several of the songs from Mary Poppins (1964) – adds extra emotional elements to both storylines.  If there is a lightness of touch, a slight distancing from the more dramatic aspects of Ginty’s childhood, then it should be remembered that this is still a Disney movie, and the studio that works hard to sanitise almost all of its family-oriented movies – and at heart this is still one of them, make no mistake – isn’t about to let people leave the cinema feeling saddened or depressed.  Fortunately, Saving Mr. Banks carries enough emotional heft to offset its more calculated hilarity, and if there are moments where you wonder just how much of it all is true or not, the fact that Disney were banking on a much-loved “product” in Mary Poppins, also informs this movie as well.

Rating: 8/10 – enjoyable, handsomely mounted movie that avoids being as original as say, “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”; and without Thompson in the lead role providing a strong point of reference for the audience, would have struggled to stand out from the crowd of other “true stories” set in Hollywood.