The Tip of the Iceberg (2016)

14 Monday Nov 2016

Tags

Bárbara Goenaga, Bullying, Carmelo Gómez, David Cánovas, Drama, Fernando Cayo, Investigation, Maribel Verdú, Review, Spain, Suicides, Thriller

Original title: La punta del iceberg

D: David Cánovas / 96m

Cast: Maribel Verdú, Carmelo Gómez, Fernando Cayo, Bárbara Goenaga, Jesús Castejón, Carlo D’Ursi, Juan Fernández, Álex García, Ginés García Millán, Nieve de Medina

Why have three employees at the Tecnocentro offices committed suicide in the last few months? Is there a link between the three untimely deaths? And if there is, is their work the link? These and other questions, and any answers, become the responsibility of project manager Sofia Cuevas (Verdú). Tasked by her boss, Enzo (D’Ursi), with visiting the offices, speaking to the staff there, and compiling a report, Sofia isn’t too keen on the idea. Unable to get out of it, she arrives there and meets the head of the Tecnocentro division, Carlos Fresno (Cayo). He’s abrasive, abrupt, and won’t entertain the idea that there is any link between the three men other than that they were unable to deal with the pressures associated with their jobs.

Unimpressed by Fresno’s uncaring attitude, Sofia is further dismayed when she learns that the office she is allocated to work from, was the office of the last man to kill himself, Marcelo Miralles (Millán). She talks to Miralles’ secretary, Gabriela Benassar (Goenaga), and begins to get the feeling that not all is right at Tecnocentro. As she learns more about the demands made of the employees there, she begins to suspect that Fresno’s management skills leave something to be desired, and that he’s guilty of bullying people. But is it enough to link the three men, or even to explain why they took their own lives, and all at the Tecnocentro offices?

Sofia eventually learns far more than she expected about Fresno’s management style, and is provided with enough evidence to see him dismissed. With a further tragedy looming, and Fresno making it clear to Sofia that if she writes the correct report she can expect a promotion and the commensurate raise, she is faced with the possibility that her investigation is merely a matter of protocol. But if it is, how can she proceed, and how can she ensure that Fresno’s bullying isn’t ignored or swept under the carpet?

The answer to that final question is, in the end, quite an obvious one. The viewer is given advance warning of how The Tip of the Iceberg will end soon after Sofia arrives at Tecnocentro and she receives a certain phone call. Everything that happens between that particular call and the one that closes the movie is largely filler; the viewer doesn’t have to have seen many corporate thrillers to know that the company is up to no good, that it views its employees as entirely expendable, and that the bigwigs in charge have no intention of making any changes – and especially if it will affect the bottom line.

So the movie offers nothing new in terms of plot or storyline. It’s clear from the start that Sofia is regarded by her male bosses as dependable in a way that is also patronising. She doesn’t have much of a life outside the offices where she works, she says she’s still in a relationship with a botanist when anyone asks but later reveals that she isn’t, and her reputation as being tough and uncompromising precedes her to the Tecnocentro building. She’s a “safe pair of hands”, expected to go in there, do her job (as instructed), and come back. She’s not expected to rock the boat.

But while Sofia may be tough and uncompromising, she also has standards, and worse still for the company she works for – which is never named – she has principles too. When her investigation reveals levels of bullying for which there can be no justification, it’s Sofia’s quiet outrage that ensures this matter won’t be swept under the carpet, or left to wither and die for lack of attention. But despite all this, she’s still a woman in a predominantly man’s world, and the movie articulates this throughout, sometimes cleverly, though usually with a bluntness that is actually a little tarnished thanks to the way in which it’s driven home.

Elsewhere in the script, which is an adaptation of a play by Antonio Tabares, and was co-written by director Cánovas, José Amaro Carrillo, and Alberto García Martín, there are quite heavy doses of sexism, with Álex García’s super-confident Jaime Salas hitting on Sofia at every opportunity, and her role as investigator being undermined by almost everyone who she comes into contact with. This is meant to be a damning critique of the entrenched ideas at the heart of modern business ethics, but while it has some merit on that level, it’s laboured use within the movie doesn’t add anything to the basic storyline. The same goes for the way in which Goenaga’s exploited secretary, Gabriela, is treated by both Miralles and Fresno (and which leads you to wonder why she works at Tecnocentro in the first place).

But while the movie doesn’t offer very much in the way of originality, it does feature impressive – and expressive – art direction by Uxua Castelló that is admirably enhanced and emboldened by Juan Carlos Gómez’s chilly cinematography. The Tecnocentro offices are open-plan yet claustrophobic at the same time, and there’s a surface glamour to everything that belies the distress and desperation being experienced by most of the employees. Adding to the sense of unease and dismay that permeates the visuals is a quietly angry performance by Verdú that anchors the movie and provides the viewer with someone to eventually root for (such is our first impression of Sofia: that she has adopted the don’t care attitude of her male colleagues in an effort to fit in, that we don’t trust her to see or understand the problems going on at Tecnocentro).

Making his feature debut, director David Cánovas has created a dangerous world of expediency and mistrust that doesn’t allow Sofia to be herself until she’s faced with the logical, and tragic, extension of the management style – profits before employees – that she is a willing part of. As he explores this notion, Cánovas makes some salient points about modern technology’s demands on people’s time and effort, and the way in which large corporations or companies justify their constant chasing after profits as the only way they can validate themselves. It’s just a shame that these points are used in service of a largely pedestrian plot, and aren’t expanded on to make sure that the somewhat tepid thriller elements are allowed to have more of an impact.

Rating: 7/10 – some viewers may be wondering, “Is that it?” by the movie’s end, but The Tip of the Iceberg is a slow-burn drama that seems like it’s not trying too hard, but which has a steeliness to it that makes up for the lack of originality; Verdú is on fine form as usual, and strong supporting turns from the likes of Gómez (as an unreliable union rep) and Goenaga help bring a strong sense of humanity to a movie that points out how badly some employers can behave – and deliberately so.

The Accountant (2016)

11 Friday Nov 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Action, Anna Kendrick, Autism, Ben Affleck, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Drama, Gavin O'Connor, J.K. Simmons, John Lithgow, Jon Bernthal, Living Robotics, Review, Thriller, Treasury

D: Gavin O’Connor / 128m

Cast: Ben Affleck, Anna Kendrick, J.K. Simmons, Jon Bernthal, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, John Lithgow, Jeffrey Tambor, Jean Smart, Andy Umberger, Robert C. Treveiler

To all intents and purposes, Christian Wolff (Affleck) is a public certified accountant who also happens to have high-functioning autism. He’s occasionally blunt to the point of rudeness, has trouble interacting with other people in certain situations, does his best to fit in, lives alone in a spartan apartment, and is the man to go to if you’re a big time criminal organisation and you want your “books” to look whiter than white. Over time he’s attracted the attention of the US Treasury Department, and in particular, soon-to-be-retired agent Ray King (Simmons), who wants to track Wolff down before he goes. To this end, he coerces Treasury analyst Marybeth Medina (Addai-Robinson) into helping him.

Meanwhile, Wolff is hired by a legitimate company, Living Robotics, to audit their accounts in full as one of their own analysts, Dana Cummings (Kendrick), has spotted what appears to be a huge, unaccounted loss. The company is owned by Lamar Blackburn (Lithgow), and it makes high-end prosthetic limbs. Wolff soon goes to work and it doesn’t take him long to identify just how much money has been stolen from the company – over $61m. But the apparent suicide of one of the company’s senior executives (and a lifelong friend of Blackburn’s) brings Wolff’s investigation to an abrupt halt. But Wolff is unable to leave it at that and intends to find out if the senior executive was responsible.

There follows an attempt on his life which he foils, and he learns that Dana is being targeted as well. He gets to her in time and going against his usual “mission parameters” he determines to keep her safe. In the meantime, Medina has managed to put a name to the face of the “Accountant” and has tracked him to where he lives, but with Wolff having gone to ground after the attempts on his and Dana’s lives, the Treasury Department is no nearer to catching him. Holed up in a fancy hotel, he and Dana develop a friendship, while Wolff figures out that Living Robotics hasn’t been stolen from, but that they’re operating a scam designed to inflate their share price when the company goes public. Now that he knows what’s been going on and why, Wolff decides to pay Lamar Blackburn a home visit… but Blackburn has a small, private army, led by The Assassin (Bernthal), in place to ensure that Wolff doesn’t get to “finish the job” he started.

On the surface, The Accountant is a slightly above average Hollywood action thriller with a good cast and good production values. Its decision to make its central character suffer from autism – even if it’s at the high end of the range – is different, and for the most part, works thanks to Affleck’s studied, and muted, performance (the script does, however, have to keep reminding itself that Wolff is indeed autistic, and should show some ritual behaviour from time to time). Also for the most part, it makes the usual unexplained narrative leaps that compromise the logic and flow of the story, and has many of its characters doing things in ways that are consistently at odds with their usual behaviour.

It’s also a movie that contains a number of scenes that are so redundant or unnecessary (and sometimes both) that you begin to wonder if a Director’s Cut due to be released on Blu-ray and DVD in six months’ time has been released to cinemas instead. When King coerces Medina into helping him track down Wolff, he does it by virtue of her having lied on her Treasury application form; she helps him or he’ll see that she’s prosecuted (forget that he appears to be the only one who’s vetted her properly since she applied). As the scene plays out, the viewer can only sit back and ask themselves, couldn’t he have just asked for her help, or used his seniority to get her working on the case? Wouldn’t that have been simpler? Of course it would, but the scene is there nevertheless, and the way it pans out it just doesn’t work.

Elsewhere, Wolff and Dana hit it off way too quickly, not only because her life is in danger and he’s yet another assassin who’s too good deep down to “walk away”, but because it’s an attempt to remind us that Wolff can connect when he tries, and the script seems to be saying, look, give the guy a break, he’s never had a girlfriend before. It’s the wrong kind of break, though, because Wolff gets close to Anna Kendrick in full on perky, quirky mode, the actress using all her standard comic traits and reactions in a role that is yet another too easy variation on the role she usually plays almost everywhere else. In their scenes together, Affleck doesn’t even have to try too hard: he’s inhabiting the role, she’s channelling the ghost of every eager-to-please young actress from the Sixties.

And then there’s the moment, around two thirds in, where the movie decides to grind to a halt and spend around ten minutes detailing a back story involving King that nearly kills the movie’s momentum. And then there’s the final showdown between Wolff and the Assassin, which veers off into left field territory – unless you’ve been paying attention – and ends on an emotional note you won’t have seen coming. All of which adds up to a movie which is, appropriately or not, somewhat schizophrenic in places, or perhaps put more plainly, deliberately uneven.

In the end, The Accountant is yet another example of action movie making that only takes risks with its central character, and only when it doesn’t get in the way of his being an extremely talented assassin. The scenes where we witness Wolff grow from easily agitated pre-teen to kick-ass teenager thanks to his tough-as-nails father are weirdly compelling (when they shouldn’t be), and the action sequences are imaginative and well choreographed for the most part, even if they also lack the necessary “wow” factor that should have viewers hoping for more. By the end it’s clear that the producers are hoping that further on down the line there’ll be more adventures for Christian Wolff as he goes about writing other wrongs with his pocket protector and his high-calibre arsenal.

Rating: 7/10 – worth seeing for another committed performance from Affleck that elevates the otherwise pedestrian nature of the material on offer, The Accountant does its best to be more than a standard Hollywood action thriller, but can’t quite pull it off; with O’Connor handling things well from behind the camera, but without injecting too much pizzazz into proceedings, the movie ends up being exactly the kind of Saturday night choice that goes perfectly with pizza and beer.

Arrival (2016)

10 Thursday Nov 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Aliens, Amy Adams, China, Denis Villeneuve, Drama, Forest Whitaker, Jeremy Renner, Literary adaptation, Michael Stuhlbarg, Montana, Mystery, Review, Sci-fi, Shells, Thriller, Translation

D: Denis Villeneuve / 116m

Cast: Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker, Michael Stuhlbarg, Mark O’Brien, Tzi Ma

Louise Banks (Adams) is a linguistics professor whose private life has recently been shattered by the break up of her marriage and the death of her daughter from cancer. Getting by but still grieving, Louise is as unprepared as the rest of the world when twelve huge spaceships suddenly appear one day in different locations around the globe. Soon, though, she is approached by the US military – in the form of Colonel G.T. Weber (Whitaker) – to aid in communicating with the aliens on board the ship that hovers over American soil in Montana. The best in her field in terms of linguistics and translations, Louise joins Weber’s team along with mathematician and scientist Ian Donnelly (Renner).

In Montana, Louise and Ian are advised that the most important question is, What do they want? Later, they ascend into the ship – called a “shell” by the military – and have their first encounter with the aliens. A symbol is written on the screen that separates the aliens in their atmosphere from Louise and Ian et al in theirs. Using it as the basis of the aliens’ language, Louise soon deduces that the symbol doesn’t just translate into one word, but into many. From then on she is able to determine much more of how the aliens communicate. Meanwhile, at the other arrival sites, particularly in China, suspicion and distrust of the aliens’ intensions are leading to veiled threats of attack on the shells, while violent unrest occurs around the globe.

Louise begins to have visions of a little girl, who in various ways helps her to understand more of what the aliens are communicating. When she translates a symbol and the meaning is “Offer weapon”, it causes the CIA agent in charge of the whole operation in Montana, Halpern (Stuhlbarg), to order an evacuation. But Louise insists they should stay, to keep faith with the aliens, and to complete the mission to find out why they are here. She returns to the shell by herself, and by coming into direct contact with the aliens, Louise learns why they have arrived, and why she’s having visions of the little girl, a revelation that has a profound effect not just on her, but on her understanding of her marriage and also, her daughter’s death.

There’s a dearth of good, old-fashioned, serious sci-fi in the movies right now – in fact, it’s been that way for some time – but Arrival is here to redress the balance. Playing with notions of time and memory and the nature of happiness, the movie is a thought-provoking treatise on what it is to mourn a life while discovering at the same time that that life has much more to offer even though the person has passed away. It’s a bit of a mindbender at times, but Villeneuve confidently handles the narrative twists and turns of Eric Heisserer’s script – itself an adaptation of the short story Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang and heavily reworked by Villeneuve himself – so that the viewer can still grasp the subtleties of what’s happening and why.

Along the way, said viewer is treated to an intelligent story and plot that packs an unexpectedly emotional wallop towards the end, as the various strands of Louise’s life are brought into sharp relief, and the aliens’ reason for visiting Earth is revealed. Louise herself is brought to life by Adams in a performance that acts as a reminder that, away from the DC Extended Universe, she is still one of today’s finest actresses. As the emotionally distant Louise, Adams shows just how removed she is from everything going on around her – at first. But as Louise slowly begins to unravel the complex patterns of the aliens’ language, she begins to reconnect with herself and everyone around her; and particularly Ian. Adams is the movie’s chief ingredient for success, her succinct, subtle portrayal of Louise proving layered and intuitive, and deeply moving come the movie’s end.

But while Adams’ performance is the bedrock upon which the movie supports itself, there’s so much more to recommend it. Though she plays the central character, and the rest of the cast have essentially supporting roles, the likes of Renner and Whitaker still manage to contribute well-rounded and credible characters that are necessary to the plot, while even Stuhlbarg’s paranoid (and potentially one-note) CIA agent fits in to the overall set up without feeling extraneous or unnecessarily villainous. Villeneuve also allows each character to display their own fears and concerns, and a corresponding sense of wonder, at being in such close proximity to the aliens and their craft.

Visually, the movie is a gloomy-looking, though consistently well-thought out viewing experience, with Villeneuve choosing to dial down on any bright colours and in doing so, adding texture to the narrative. The aliens operate in a cloudy grey environment and “write” using appendages that produce a black inky substance that is surprisingly vibrant, while at the military base, the various comms rooms and private quarters also lack for vivid colours, with only computer screens providing any brightness to offset the gloom. Villeneuve is making a conscious choice here: the bleak, low-lit hive of activity reflecting the interior of the aliens’ ship, as if to insinuate that there is a greater level of connection between “us” and “them” than is immediately apparent.

The visuals are more than ably supported by a distinctive sound design that unnerves far more than it reassures, and which also includes a suitably eerie and mournful score by Jóhann Jóhannsson, Villeneuve’s go-to composer. Keeping the viewer on edge as Louise deconstructs the alien message, the visuals and the sound design combine to create a haunting, other-worldly feel that is not only entirely appropriate given the nature of the story, but also serves to highlight the idea that if we aren’t alone in the universe, then ideas of melody and tone may still hold but are likely to be interpreted in completely different ways.

Ultimately though, it’s Villeneuve’s confident handling of the material that impresses the most. He’s not afraid to take his time in telling the story, and doesn’t drip-feed all the relevant information at regular points in the narrative. Instead he lets the story unfold at its own pace, revealing key plot points quietly and without the usual fanfare required in other sci-fi movies, and the result is a measured, affecting tale that contains a major twist, one that perhaps for the first time, is allowed to play out over much of the movie’s running time, rather than just suddenly and without warning, and which in its simplicity and emotional effectiveness, elevates Arrival over and above any other sci-fi movie you’re likely to see this year (and probably for some time to come).

Rating: 9/10 – a beautifully constructed movie with a clever, intelligent script, superb cinematography from Bradford Young, an intense soundtrack, heartfelt performances and all held together by a director at the top of his game, Arrival is a must-see movie that is less about why the aliens are here, and more about why we are here; quite simply, one of this year’s best movies.

Despite the Falling Snow (2016)

08 Tuesday Nov 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Antje Traue, Charles Dance, Cold War, Defection, Drama, Espionage, Literary adaptation, Moscow, Rebecca Ferguson, Review, Romance, Russia, Sam Reid, Shamim Sarif, Spying

D: Shamim Sarif / 93m

Cast: Rebecca Ferguson, Sam Reid, Charles Dance, Antje Traue, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Thure Lindhardt, Anthony Head

One of the things that never happened in the Golden Age of Cinema was an author being given the opportunity to make a movie of one of their novels or stories. Some were employed to adapt their novels and stories, but none were ever allowed to step behind the camera as well and actually direct the movie. Nowadays, this isn’t so unusual, but it’s also still not very prevalent. So step forward Shamim Sarif, author and movie maker, who has been making movies from her novels from the very beginning. She is possibly unique in this way, and has gained a very good reputation from working on both sides of the creative arena. Despite the Falling Snow is the third movie she’s made from one of her novels, and while she may be well regarded in some quarters as the perfect person to adapt her work – after all, who knows it better than she? – the finished product here isn’t quite the testament to her talents as a director.

The movie begins in New York in 1961 with the defection of a Russian government official called Sasha (Reid). As he’s helped to escape from his Russian handlers, he asks about his wife, Katya (Ferguson). She’s back in Moscow, but his new, US handlers have no idea where she is or what has happened to her. Fast forward thirty years and Sasha (Dance) is a successful restaurateur who has a niece, Lauren (also Ferguson) who is the spitting image of Katya, and who wants to travel to Moscow to try and find out what happened to her aunt. Sasha refuses to go with her, though, so Lauren, who’s lucky enough to be an artist who’s been asked to mount an exhibition in Moscow, heads off by herself.

While Lauren’s story plays out in 1991, Katya’s story plays out in tandem from 1959 to 1961. Katya is a teaching assistant who’s also helping her friend and government official Misha (Jackson-Cohen) steal secrets and pass them on to the Americans. At a party she meets Sasha but is unimpressed by him. It’s only when Misha persuades her to get close to Sasha because of his position in the Kremlin that she finds herself falling in love with him. Meanwhile, in 1991, Lauren meets and befriends a journalist called Marina (Traue) who helps her in finding out about Katya. Marina learns that Misha (Head) is still alive, and they make plans to visit him. When they do they find he’s become an embittered, angry old man who wants nothing to do with them.

Back in 1961, Katya and Sasha wed, but she agonises over whether she should tell him she’s a spy. In 1991, Marina’s behaviour becomes suspicious, and the unexpected arrival of Sasha in Moscow prompts a revelation. Katya’s decision to tell Sasha leads to his agreeing to defect, but thirty years on only Misha holds the key to what happened to her.

A romantic drama set – partly – during a period of intense political and social upheaval, namely the early Sixties, Despite the Falling Snow has such a generic feel to it that it could have been made about any couple in any country at any time, and still have made the same kind of impact. This is thanks to Sarif’s uninspired, pedestrian direction, and a visual style that never rises above formulaic. It’s as if Sarif has forgotten to add the drama needed to make the narrative more than just a succession of events and scenes that show how two people came together and then were separated by fate in the form of expediency. Even when suspicion falls on the officials in the Kremlin, including Sasha and Misha, it’s a moment where real terror at being found out translates instead as a mild concern. Misha is almost fatalistic about the whole thing, a reaction that not even the talented Jackson-Cohen can make convincing; this man should be even more scared than he’s been already.

But if the steady stream of narrative downplaying that infuses the scenes in early Sixties Russia also makes those scenes feel awkward and inconsistent, then spare a thought for those set in 1991. Sarif makes reference to the Berlin Wall having come down two years earlier, but her new Moscow is an uneasy mix of contemporary US stylings and Russian forebearance, as evidenced by Marina’s designer clothing and old Misha’s tower block abode. The juxtaposition jars, and adds to the overall feeling that Sarif wants her characters to look glamorous against the concrete backdrop of post-Stalinist Russia (Katya seems never to be without her red lipstick). The visual conceit is highlighted by Sarif’s decision to have Katya and Sasha, and Lauren and Marina, walk along the same snow-laden stretch of riverside pavement at different times, but instead of creating an echo of past events, it appears to be more of a budgetary deference than a creative decision.

Elsewhere, narrative developments that appear out of nowhere are treated as if they are absolutely necessary to the overall plot, and that includes a left-field decision to have Lauren and Marina begin a sexual relationship. Old Sasha’s willingness to stay home out of harm’s way is overturned by the contents of a fax, while Old Misha’s decision to spill the beans about what happened to Katya is spurred on by feelings of guilt, and that old chestnut, a terminal illness. And when the viewer does find out what happened to Katya, Sarif handles it in such a hamfisted way that any emotional weight the scene might – or should – have engendered with said viewer, is lost before the scene’s even begun.

A lacklustre movie then, one that doesn’t even aim particularly high, but which does feature another of Charles Dance’s supporting roles (is he semi-retired now, is that what’s going on?) and a level of political naïvete that further dilutes the drama that isn’t really there. On the performance side, Ferguson is unable to make much of either role, as Sarif never allows the viewer to engage with them as anything other than under-developed non-characters. Reid is earnest but treading in a pool so shallow it’s practically evaporated, while Traue is allowed to look moody and resentful in equal measure even when she’s kissing Ferguson. Dance and Head bring a degree of old-time gravitas to the proceedings, but even they can’t avoid the pitfalls that are inherent in the script. On this showing, Sarif needs some more time to clarify her goals in making such a movie, and maybe next time, getting someone else to direct.

Rating: 4/10 – Sixties Moscow never looked cleaner, quieter, or more family friendly than it does in this movie, and that’s despite several efforts to make it look as if it’s not brand new; as a drama it never gets started, despite the best efforts of its cast, and by the end you’ll only want to know what happened to Katya just so that you can move on in (roughly) the same way everyone else does: without too much fuss.

The Girl on the Train (2016)

07 Monday Nov 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Alcoholism, Drama, Emily Blunt, Haley Bennett, Justin Theroux, Literary adaptation, Luke Evans, Murder, Paula Hawkins, Rebecca Ferguson, Review, Tate Taylor, Thriller

D:Tate Taylor / 112m

Cast: Emily Blunt, Haley Bennett, Rebecca Ferguson, Justin Theroux, Luke Evans, Edgar Ramírez, Laura Prepon, Allison Janney, Darren Goldstein, Lisa Kudrow

Whenever a novel becomes an unexpectedly massive success – such as Paula Hawkins’ The Girl on the Train did in 2015 – then a movie adaptation is sure to follow. But what happens when the source material isn’t strong enough to support a movie version? What do the makers of such a movie do to combat this? The answer, when you watch the movie version of The Girl on the Train, becomes obvious quite quickly: they don’t do anything, they merely transcribe events and characters to the screen and do nothing to circumvent the problems in the novel. Oh – and they do so in the hope that no one will notice.

From the beginning of The Girl on the Train we have a clumsy voice over that introduces us to Rachel Watson, a thirty-two year old woman who rides the train to and from work every day, and who seems to have created a fantasy world built around another woman (Bennett) that she sees most days from the train. The woman in question piques Rachel’s interest, as she lives a few doors away from where Rachel’s ex-husband Tom (Theroux) lives with his new wife, Anna (Ferguson), and their baby daughter, Evie. Believing this woman to have a perfect marriage (but having no real reason to believe this at all), Rachel is shocked one morning to see her kissing a man who isn’t her husband.

Rachel is so disturbed by this that she decides to confront the woman. But Rachel is an alcoholic, and though she makes the attempt, she suffers a blackout and wakes the next morning with cuts and bruises and blood on her clothes – but no memory of how any of it happened. Things get worse when a detective (Janney) visits Rachel and asks her if she knows the woman, whose name is Megan. Megan has gone missing, and because Rachel was spotted in the area where Megan was last seen, the detective wonders if Rachel is involved in Megan’s disappearance in some way. Able to stall the detective’s questions, Rachel then makes a fateful decision.

Anyone who has read the book will know that Rachel’s decision is to involve herself in the life of Megan’s husband, Scott (Evans). And the movie follows this route as well – how could it not? – but as with the novel, the movie has the same problem: her decision makes no sense at all. It’s obvious from Rachel’s behaviour – when she’s not fantasizing about a complete stranger, she’s stalking her ex-husband – that she’s got what you’d politely call “issues”, but the only reason the movie has for this behaviour is the fact that Rachel is an alcoholic. It was a contributing factor in her divorce from Tom, and it leads to a couple of minor revelations later on, but it ends up being a catch-all for anything she does that seems a bit manic or ill-advised. The novel tries to make her appear vulnerable; here she just seems desperate.

But as her involvement with Scott is passed off as trying to help (and punish Megan if she stops being missing), Rachel abandons all sense of decency and respect for the ordeal Scott is going through, and pushes her own agenda, which is to find Megan’s abductor or killer – and hope that it isn’t her. This leads to a couple of major revelations, and a final denouement that will have female audiences cheering, and male audiences shaking their heads at the reverse misogyny on display. In essence, the problems in the novel have become the problems in the movie.

The main problem audiences will have is a lack of someone to even remotely care about. Despite a powerful and from time to time, deeply moving performance by Blunt, The Girl on the Train operates in an emotional vacuum. The trials and tribulations of the various characters are often on display, but it’s like watching a trio of strong-minded women who’ve all decided to give up on being independent, and who can only define themselves through their relationships with men. Rachel is the ex-wife who can’t deal with the fact that her marriage is over, Megan is the wife who needs affairs to feel some kind of connection with herself, and Anna is the ex-lover turned second wife whose chief function is being the mother of Tom’s child. Viewers may find themselves put off by the relentless undermining these characters experience, and the various ways the movie reinforces the ways in which said characters were undermined in the novel.

But beyond all the ersatz feminism, there remains the problem of the central mystery. Megan’s disappearance becomes a murder enquiry when her body is discovered in some nearby woods. But though Rachel wonders if she did kill Megan during her blackout, the likelihood of that actually having happened is so small it’s on a virtually sub-atomic level. So that leaves Anna, a character so gloriously one-dimensional that Ferguson’s talents as an actress are wasted; her husband Tom, whose outward calm and sincerity masks a need to control his environment; and tortured husband Scott, whose wild, angry outbursts could be a smokescreen for something much darker. And those are the only suspects, as the man Megan is seen kissing is her shrink, Dr Kamal Abdic (Ramírez), and despite the screenplay’s ham-fisted attempt to put him in the frame, he’s the classic red herring. This then makes it easy to work out who killed Megan, and also why.

For a thriller based on the novel “that shocked the world” – really? – The Girl on the Train is a bit of a damp squib, only showing signs of life when focusing on Blunt’s portrayal of Rachel. Blunt brings some much needed craft to her performance, ensuring that while everyone around her aims for competent, she’s proving capable of giving a layered, compassionate performance that elevates the material whenever her alcoholism is mentioned, or she’s on screen. In contrast, Taylor, who failed to find the motivation to make The Help (2011) as compelling as it should have been, leaves the viewer with the feeling he’s only semi-engaged with the project, and as a result, none of it resonates in the way that it should. It all leaves the movie looking and sounding like an uninspired echo of the original novel – and a less than engaging one at that.

Rating: 5/10 – slickly, professionally made, but as hollow as an Easter egg, The Girl on the Train delivers low rent thrills and annoying plot developments as it unfolds the mystery of Megan Hipwell’s disappearance; the non-linear approach of the novel is retained, and used to good effect, but this is still one literary adaptation that should have been more enticing and rewarding than it actually is.

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (2016)

05 Saturday Nov 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Asa Butterfield, Drama, Eva Green, Fantasy, Hollowgasts, Peculiars, Review, Samuel L. Jackson, Terence Stamp, Tim Burton, Time loop, Wales, World War II, Ymbrynes

D: Tim Burton / 127m

Cast: Eva Green, Asa Butterfield, Samuel L. Jackson, Ella Purnell, Judi Dench, Rupert Everett, Allison Janney, Chris O’Dowd, Terence Stamp, Finlay McMillan, Lauren McCrostie, Hayden Keeler-Stone, Georgia Pemberton, Milo Parker, Raffiella Chapman, Pixie Davies, Joseph Odwell, Thomas Odwell, Cameron King, Kim Dickens

Teenager Jake Portman (Butterfield) is very close to his grandfather, Abe (Stamp), who tells him stories of when he was a boy and lived on an island off the coast of Wales during the Second World War. Abe lived at Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, a place where children with paranormal abilities could live freely and without fear of persecution. In time, Abe had to leave, but he’s never forgotten his time there, and he’s told Jake many stories during the course of Jake’s growing up, but Jake has always believed them to be Abe’s version of fairy stories. But one day, Jake finds his grandfather’s body in the woods near Abe’s home; he’s been attacked and his eyes removed. With his last breath, Abe exhorts Jake to find “the bird, the loop and September 3, 1943”.

The discovery of a letter from Miss Peregrine to Abe, added to advice given by Jake’s therapist (Janney), sees Jake and his dad, Franklin (O’Dowd), heading for Wales. They stay at the local inn, and soon, Jake is searching for the “peculiar” home. He finds it in ruins, the result of a direct hit by a German bomb on September 3, 1943. But while he marvels at confrmation of the home’s existence, several of the children Abe has told him about, make themselves known and draw Jake into their world. They travel through a “loop”, a part of time that has been folded in on itself and now re-plays the same day over and over: September 3, 1943. And Jake meets Miss Peregrine (Green) herself, the children’s guardian, called an Ymbryne, a bird able to take human form (and vice versa) and manipulate time.

Miss Peregrine wastes no time in welcoming Jake into the home, and he spends the evening there until he realises his father will be looking for him. He returns as quickly as he can, but not before Miss Peregrine shows him just how dangerous it is outside of her protection. Jake sees a hideous creature called a “Hollowgast” come for the children before Miss Peregrine dispatches it with a crossbow. From there stems a warning relating to Wights, former Peculiars who have been the unfortunate victims of an experiment to harness an Ymbryne’s power. One Wight in particular, Mr Barron (Jackson), has made it his mission to track down all the Ymbrynes and take their eyes. But while the way through the loop remains hidden, the children are safe… until Jake unwittingly leads Mr Barron right to them…

When author Ransom Riggs’ novel, Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children was first published in 2011, it was an unexpected success. Riggs’ tale of peculiar children with strange abilities and the evil creatures that hunt them was the first in a trilogy of novels that breathed new life into gothic fantasy. It was obvious that a movie version would be made, and who better to bring the novel to life than Tim Burton? His brand of weird humour and his visual stylings were perfect for Miss Peregrine…, and with a script courtesy of Jane Goldman (X-Men: Days of Future Past, Kingsman: The Secret Service), all the signs were good that the movie would be as dark and strange and captivating and exciting as the novel.

And for the most part it is. Ultimately, it’s the adaptation that doesn’t work entirely, with Goldman unable to pin down the main storyline, and fumbling with the subtext relating to humans as monsters during World War II (it’s no coincidence that Abe is a Polish Jew and a survivor of the ghetto, and that the hollowgasts’ name sounds like something else from World War II). With the main ingredients of Riggs’ tale broadened at first and then allowed to carry on broadening, the movie ends up being only half as rewarding as it could have been. Things begin well with Stamp’s genial yet firm Abe trying to keep Jake safe from the threat of the Wights and the Hollowgasts, but once Abe dies there’s an uneasy switch from Abe and Jake to Jake and Franklin, and their trip to Wales. Goldman rushes things along and soon Jake is getting to know the likes of Emma Bloom (Purnell), who is lighter than air and has to be weighted down; Millard Nullings (King), an invisible boy; and Olive Abroholos Elephanta (McCrostie) who can set things alight just by touching them.

It’s this stretch of the movie that is the most enjoyable, as Jake (and the viewer) gets to know everyone, and the idyllic, if repetitive, nature of the children’s existence is explored. There are terrific performances from all the child actors playing the Peculiar Children of the title, and a wonderful performance from Green as their guardian. With her probing stare and knowing smiles, Green is the movie’s ace in the hole, and the movie misses her energy whenever she’s off screen. Once things start to unravel and Mr. Barron gains the upper hand, the movie pauses to regroup itself, and heads for a crowd-pleasing finale at the end of Blackpool Pier that involves a riotous showdown between Hollowgasts and animated skeletons á la Jason and the Argonauts (1963). Along the way it abandons any notion of cohesion and continuity, and its attempts to make sense of the time loop/time travel conundrum the Peculiars and Jake find themselves in are brief and inconclusive (and baffling to anyone not paying full attention).

But while the script tries to work out how best to tell the story, and in doing so deviates from Riggs’ original halfway cliffhanger-ish ending, the movie is rescued by Burton and his striking visual compositions and the movie’s darkly exuberant set design and decoration. This is, at times, a sumptuous movie to watch, and Burton’s trademark gothic flair is well in evidence as he guides the viewer through a series of imaginative and impressive sequences that more than adequately show how good a fit for the material he is. But again, when the story has to take centre stage it’s often weak and lacking focus, though to be fair to Goldman she is trying to cram an awful lot into a two hour movie, and as good as she is as a screenwriter, when the source material is as detailed as it is, it’s unsurprising that some of the good stuff is going to be overlooked or a way for it all to fit in isn’t explored with any vigour.

Alongside Burton’s efforts, those of Green, Jackson, Stamp and Purnell are most welcome, with Jackson’s pantomime performance proving weirdly appropriate. Fans of the novel will be surprised to find that this is, unless a sequel is green-lit, a stand-alone movie with only a couple of nods to the book’s original ending. Does this work? The answer is impenetrable, either way. Fans and supporters of the novels will be disappointed that this isn’t the beginning of a series, and newcomers will most likely have wanted to spend more time getting to know all the peculiar’s; all in all, there’s something for everyone, just not as much for avid fans of the book.

Rating: 7/10 – with its script proving too wayward, and feeling like it was rushed (or hastily rewritten at some point prior to filming), Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children entertains in fits and starts; and yet it’s hugely enjoyable when Goldman and Burton’s sensibilities meet in the middle, and there’s more than enough on display to justify the movie’s being seen by as many people as possible, so perhaps this is one adaptation where advance knowledge of the plot isn’t necessary… or desirable.

Mr. Church (2016)

05 Saturday Nov 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Breast cancer, Britt Robertson, Bruce Beresford, Cooking, Drama, Eddie Murphy, Natascha McElhone, Pregnancy, Relationships, Review, Tearjerker

D: Bruce Beresford / 104m

Cast: Eddie Murphy, Britt Robertson, Natascha McElhone, Xavier Samuel, Lucy Fry, Christian Madsen, Mckenna Grace, Natalie Coughlin, Madison Wolfe, Lincoln Melcher

In 1971, something unusual happens to single mother Marie Brooks (McElhone) and her ten year old daughter Charlotte (known as Charlie) (Coughlin): they find they have a cook. His name is Henry Joseph Church (Murphy), and he is effectively a legacy from the man who was Charlie’s father. Employed to look after Marie and Charlie after her father’s death, Mr. Church – as he likes to be called – has been paid to look after them for the next six months. The timescale is important because Marie has breast cancer and has been given that amount of time to live, though she hasn’t told Charlie any of this.

At first, Charlie doesn’t want Mr. Church in their home. But once she tastes his cooking, she slowly comes around to the idea that having him there during the day is a good idea. He brings books into the home that Charlie begins to read, and he makes things easier for Marie. But after six months, Marie is still alive, and is still alive again in six years’ time, though much sicker by now. When Charlie (Robertson) is asked to the prom by the boy she likes, Owen (Samuel), she doesn’t want to accept because she’s afraid Marie won’t be alive by then, but Marie confounds expectations and even helps her decide on a dress. Throughout all this time, Mr. Church has been the rock that both women have relied on; the only thing that bothers Charlie is that after six years, she still doesn’t know anything about him.

But one night she sees him going into an infamous club called Jelly’s. She doesn’t say anything, and soon after she goes off to Boston University, helped in part by savings Mr. Church has put aside for her. There she meets new people, works hard, and winds up pregnant. Unsure of what to do, she returns home, and with her mother no longer alive, she goes to Mr. Church’s home. He lets her stay on the condition that she continues to respect his privacy. She agrees, but later on, the temptation to find out more about him, leads her to break that one rule and in doing so, bring an end to their relationship.

Putting aside the Beverly Hills Cop retread that was made for TV in 2013, Eddie Murphy hasn’t appeared in a movie since A Thousand Words (2012). In fact, since he made the execrable Norbit (2007) his career has consisted of four theatrical releases, and five outings as Donkey (from Shrek) on both the big and the small screen. Once upon a time, Murphy was the world’s biggest movie star. Now he’s rarely seen at all, and when he is, there’s precious little fanfare. Mr. Church is a movie that has slipped under most people’s radar, and it’s indicative of both Murphy’s place in the acting firmament, and it’s likely reception, that this movie isn’t being promoted more heavily. It’s a small movie, to be sure, but one that has a lot more going for it than might be readily expected.

For starters, there’s Murphy’s portrayal of Henry Joseph Church. Henry is a quiet, proud man, though he has his demons (as Charlie discovers when she stays with him). Murphy focuses on the man’s quiet demeanour, his initially reserved, almost calculating approach to being Marie and Charlie’s “cook” (he becomes so much more to both of them), and the way in which his relationships with them give his life a greater meaning. And even when he’s dealing with his inner demons, what is more impressive in terms of the character is the alacrity with which he can forget about those demons and continue to be supportive of Charlie and Marie. Murphy doesn’t strike a false note throughout (though an angry outburst nearly takes the shine off, coming across as an awkward line reading of an equally awkward piece of dialogue). Like a lot of comedians, Murphy is a fine, dramatic actor, and here he judges the character and the emotional links to the narrative with quiet aplomb, grounding a movie that at times can strike the viewer as being cloyingly sentimental.

But Murphy is the antidote to that feeling, even when he’s involved in some of that overly sentimental material. Mr. Church is a guardian angel, someone who knows exactly what to do in any given situation, and the former star of movies such as The Golden Child (1986) and Vampire in Brooklyn (1995), effortlessly redeems himself for some of the dreadful movies he’s made in the last twenty, thirty years. Using a neutral expression for the most part, Murphy still manages to evoke feelings and responses in the viewer that a lot of actors would struggle to achieve across a movie lasting five times as long. And in conjunction with Britt Robertson, he’s found someone who can match him in terms of displaying their character’s emotional stance without resorting to an exaggerated acting style. Mr. Church is a tearjerker, and one that works best because of the understated way in which its characters are played.

That’s not to say that the movie is entirely successful, though. Given the era it all takes place in, you could be forgiven for thinking that at some point, racism will rear its ugly head, but there’s not one scene that addresses the issue directly. This makes it seem as if the story is taking place in an historical vacuum, an idea that is further compounded by the realisation that Mr. Church doesn’t have a family of his own, or even friends, and his emotional well-being is entirely dependent on the white family he works for. There are moments where this is highlighted, and awkwardly, leaving the viewer with the suspicion that any such notions were ignored or removed during the movie’s production. But equally, it’s a measure of the movie that as race isn’t an issue for Marie and Charlie, then their acceptance of Mr. Church is a valuable lesson in how to make a movie about just the characters and their relationships, and not about any extraneous issues such as race or creed.

Some may find that the movie is overly and severely sentimental, but this, for once, isn’t a bad thing. There are several moments where the emotional message behind the movie is turned on like Xmas lights, and while these moments do stick out from the rest of the material, it’s a tribute to veteran director Bruce Beresford (and his cast) that they don’t overwhelm the episodic storyline, or prove too off-putting. There are also times when the characters avoid talking to each other, and almost in deference to Jack Nicholson’s character in A Few Good Men (1992) when he tells Tom Cruise’s character that he “can’t handle the truth”. These moments can be frustrating, but by the time you’ve registered the frustration, the story has moved on and the “danger” has passed.

Having previously directed the likes of Driving Miss Daisy (1989) and A Good Man in Africa (1994), Beresford is a good choice for the director’s chair, adding layers of subtlety when required, and allowing emotional outbursts to happen without their feeling staged, or pulling the viewer out of the narrative. He keeps things very simple throughout, and doesn’t allow the various “tragedies” that occur during the narrative to define the characters, leaving them free to grow in their own way. Even secondary characters such as Madsen’s Army vet with a drink problem are allowed to shine at various points in the movie, and while some of them may feel extraneous to things, they all have their place in driving the story forward. It all helps Mr. Church to become more than just a deft “feel-good Samaritan movie”, and more of an ode to (mostly) uncomplicated, mutually dependent and rewarding relationships.

Rating: 7/10 – with its simple message, and even simpler approach to the material, Mr. Church might seem, at first, to be lacking in depth, but thanks to good performances from Murphy and Robertson, and pertinent direction from Beresford, the movie has more to offer than meets the eye; easy to watch and even easier to admire for what it gets right, Murphy’s latest outing won’t win many awards or attract great swarms of viewers, but it is worth seeing as a reminder that he’s still a very talented actor indeed.

The Library Suicides (2016)

01 Tuesday Nov 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Catrin Stewart, Drama, Dyfan Dwyfor, Euros Lyn, Fflur Dafydd, Literary adaptation, Murder, National Library of Wales, Review, Ryland Teifi, Suicide, Thriller, Twins, Wales, Y Llyfrgell

Original title: Y Llyfrgell

D: Euros Lyn / 87m

Cast: Catrin Stewart, Dyfan Dwyfor, Ryland Teifi, Sharon Morgan, Carwyn Glyn

Twins Ana and Nan (Stewart) both work in the archive section of the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth. Their mother, Elena (Morgan), is a famous author who has raised her daughters by herself. Ana is the creative, more outgoing twin, while Nan is the dependable, more introverted one. Their lives are orderly, well-managed and maintained, and their work appears to be all they have outside of their relationship with their mother. But all that changes when Elena commits suicide by jumping from a second story window at their home. With Ana and Nan both present in her dying moments, Elena says that “it was Eben”.

Eben (Teifi) was once a student of Elena’s who in the time since her death, has been granted access to her papers, and is intending to write her biography. The papers are kept at the National Library, in a vault room below ground. Late one afternoon he arrives at the Library to begin work on the biography. He’s shown in by security guard Dan (Dwyfor). Soon the Library closes, and once all the other visitors have left, Ana and Nan begin to carry out a plan they’ve hatched to kill Eben for causing the death of their mother.

Along with Dan, there’s another guard called Glyn (Glyn). The twins offer them both coffee laced with crushed sleeping tablets. Glyn succumbs, but Dan rejects the offer. Ana tempts him with alcohol (also laced with crushed sleeping tablets) but he only drinks enough to pass out for a short while. While both men are “out of action”, the twins confront Eben in the vault room. They pull guns on him, tie his hands together, put a noose around his neck, and make him stand on a chair. But as they pull away the chair, Dan – who has woken up and has seen what’s happening on a security monitor – cuts the power to the building. The lights go out, there’s a crash followed by a gunshot, and in the moments that follow, both Ana and Nan become aware that their plan for revenge isn’t going to go as well as they’d planned…

The Library Suicides is a bit of a rarity. It’s a Welsh thriller where the entire cast speak Welsh throughout (there’s the odd English phrase or word, but it still leaves the cast speaking Welsh for ninety-nine percent of the running time), and it’s largely set in the actual National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth. There’s also something of a mystery to be solved, as the circumstances surrounding Elena’s death aren’t as clear-cut as they seem, and in particular, Eben’s involvement – if any – in what happened that day. As Ana and Nan put their plan into action, Eben’s behaviour, allied with some unexpected interventions by Dan, ensure that Ana and Nan have to improvise quite a bit, and in doing so, learn more about their mother than they suspected could be true.

Adapted from the novel by Fflur Dafydd (who also provides the screenplay), The Library Suicides is a smart, intriguing psychological thriller that makes good use of its unique location – it’s like a maze in there – and manages to keep the viewer guessing for most of its relatively short running time before it conforms to thriller conventions and reveals all. Before then, though, it throws in a few deft twists and turns, and keeps its focus firmly on Ana and Nan as they try to contain the fallout from Dan’s cutting off the power, and also contain their own feelings as they both learn about and reveal things about their mother.

In the hands of experienced director Euros Lyn – better known for his TV work on shows such as Daredevil, Broadchurch and Doctor Who – The Library Suicides is a dour but imaginative thriller that features a terrific dual performance from Stewart (who is herself a twin in real life), an ominous score courtesy of Dru Masters, and sterling cinematography from Dan Stafford Clark that captures the chilly atmosphere of the Library and the claustrophobic nature of the material as the characters become more and more trapped by the decisions they’re forced to make. One of the main reasons for how good the movie is lies at the door of Stewart, who at first makes it very difficult for the viewer to tell Ana from Nan and vice versa, but as the movie progresses, slowly but surely, she expertly defines both twins’ individual psychology, and in the process, gives two awards-worthy performances.

The mystery surrounding Elena’s death, and the meaning behind the phrase, “it was Eben”, is slowly but surely revealed as the movie progresses, and the deep, dark secret lurking behind it all (while it will be obvious to some viewers) is handled with care throughout. Lyn resists the temptation to make more out of it than there is, making it all more low-key than a lot of other movies would feel comfortable with. By doing so, Lyn ensures the viewer is more attentive and more invested than in a lot of other, similar thrillers out there, and he sprinkles some misdirection here and there to keep audiences on their toes.

This being a modern day thriller, there’s blood to be spilled, and though the physical demands of the production are entirely evident on the screen, it’s often the movie’s subtext that has the advantage of making more of an impact as the movie progresses. The movie is as much about redacted memory and the suppression of feelings than it is about revenge for an undisclosed crime, and Dafydd’s script keeps sight of all this even when said blood is being spilled. In particular it’s what the twins remember that carries emotional and dramatic weight, and again, both Lyn and Stewart are more than up to the challenge of revealing just enough to keep viewers enthralled and wanting to see what happens next. In the end it’s only a last-minute reveal that proves unnecessary, and while it may be clever in the context of what’s gone before, it does the narrative no favours and seems tacked on for effect – which it doesn’t need to do.

Rating: 8/10 – deliberately paced, and with the look and feel of a “Nordic noir”, The Library Suicides is a movie that gives its characters solid reasons for what they do, and never short changes them or the audience as a result; Stewart’s performances are compelling, and Lyn’s direction expertly juggles the visual demands of those performances, while also negotiating the spaces within the National Library with vigour and aplomb, making this one night shift that’s hard to forget.

Mini-Review: The Late Bloomer (2016)

28 Friday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Brittany Snow, Comedy, J.K. Simmons, Johnny Simmons, Kevin Pollak, Literary adaptation, Maria Bello, Puberty, Review, Romance, Sex, True story

D: Kevin Pollak / 94m

Cast: Johnny Simmons, Brittany Snow, Maria Bello, J.K. Simmons, Kumail Nanjiani, Beck Bennett, Paul Wesley, Blake Cooper, Jane Lynch, Sam Robards

Peter Newmans (Simmons) is essentially a sex therapist, but one with a difference: his job is to convince sexaholics that they should channel their sexual energy into other avenues, such a hobby or work. In essence he’s encouraging his patients to be as celibate as he is. Yes, that’s right, Peter is celibate, and has reached the age of thirty without ever having sex, or even a girlfriend. He’s attracted to his neighbour, would-be chef Michelle (Snow), but she’s already in a relationship, and anyway, he wouldn’t know what to say or do even if she wasn’t. Luckily, Fate steps in when Peter collapses and is rushed to hospital. There he’s told that he has a tumour that has been pressing on his pituitary gland, and this has been the cause of his asexuality. But once the tumour is removed, puberty is going to hit him like a ton of bricks.

And so it proves. Initial attempts by his friends, Rich (Nanjiani) and Luke (Bennett), to get Peter laid don’t work, and it’s not until he wakes up one morning with an erection that Peter finally gets to experience the pleasures of, to begin with, excessive masturbation. It also changes the way he views his work, and he begins to encourage his patients to fully embrace their sexual desires, a change that causes concern for his boss, Caroline (Lynch), who has Peter booked on several publicity spots (he’s written a book on how to avoid “unnecessary” sex). But when Michelle becomes single, Peter’s continued inability to properly express his feelings for it – now thanks to the hormones raging inside him – leads him to alienate her, and also Rich. With only his long-suffering parents (Bello, J.K. Simmons) to turn to, Peter has to find a way of becoming the responsible adult – the man – he would have become if he’d gone through puberty at the right time.

A comedy that wants to be raunchy and sweet at the same time, The Late Bloomer is based on the book, Man-Made: A Memoir of My Body by Ken Baker. So, in essence it’s a true story (Baker did suffer from the same kind of tumour that Peter does), but this is a movie where the approach and the way the material has been handled, will inevitably lead the viewer to wonder if Baker’s experiences have been fairly or even halfway accurately transferred to the screen. Because this is a movie that wavers throughout in its efforts to tell a coherent story. It wants to be a raunchy comedy for the most part, and there are laughs to be had, but this is at odds with the romantic aspects of the material, and the non-existent sympathy for Peter and his situation.

With the movie lacking a clear focus, scenes come and go without any connection to each other, and Simmons is left looking and sounding like a complete doofus. As the movie progresses it becomes clear that the screenplay (assembled by five – count ’em – five screenwriters) and the director are not in sync, and despite several efforts by the cast, are never likely to gel no matter how hard they try. This leaves the movie looking disjointed and poorly assembled. There’s a funny, rewarding, and charming movie to be made out of Baker’s memoir, but this isn’t it.

Rating: 4/10 – a movie that strives to be liked but stumbles at almost every turn in its efforts to do so, The Late Bloomer wastes a ton of potentially humorous situations by ditching subtlety at every opportunity; Pollak’s feature debut as a director, he might be better off choosing any future projects by making sure they have a more polished script, and a better sense of where they’re going (and how to get there).

Doctor Strange (2016)

25 Tuesday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Astral plane, Baron Mordo, Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Cloak of Levitation, Drama, Fantasy, Mads Mikkelsen, Magic, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Rachel McAdams, Review, Scott Derrickson, Sorcerer Supreme, The Ancient One, Tilda Swinton

D: Scott Derrickson / 115m

Cast: Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Rachel McAdams, Tilda Swinton, Mads Mikkelsen, Benedict Wong, Michael Stuhlbarg, Benjamin Bratt, Scott Adkins

Stephen Strange (Cumberbatch) is a gifted neurosurgeon. He’s also an arrogant pain in the ass. His ego is on a par with Tony Stark’s, and he enjoys reminding people just how good he is. But one rainy evening, Strange’s car ends up in the river and his hands are so badly damaged that he’ll never be able to operate again. Angry and full of self-pity, Strange learns of a man who suffered a severed spine and was paralysed from the chest down, but who somehow managed to walk again. Strange tracks the man (Bratt) down, and is told of a monastery in Kathmandu, Nepal, where he learned how to walk again. Strange travels there and meets The Ancient One (Swinton), a mystic who teaches him that their plane of existence is one of many, and that Strange must let go of everything he thinks he knows in order to achieve “enlightenment”.

Strange proves to be an eager and willing (if still slightly sceptical) pupil. He learns how to cast spells, how to travel from one place to another by visualising it in his mind and creating a portal through which to get there, and the existence of a former pupil, Master Kaecilius (Mikkelsen), who believes he can gain immortality by helping a creature from the Dark Dimension, Dormammu, take over the Earth. As Strange’s powers grow, Kaecilius begins attacking the three sanctums that help keep Dormammu and his like from entering our world. Aided by another Master, Baron Mordo (Ejiofor), Strange attempts to stop Kaecilius from bringing about the end of the world; he also receives help from an unlikely source: the Cloak of Levitation, which chooses Strange as its master.

But the London sanctum falls to Kaecilius’s onslaught, and he moves on to attack the sanctum in Hong Kong. Strange and Mordo arrive too late to avoid its destruction and the arrival of Dormammu in our world, but Strange has an idea that will counter-act all the death and destruction that has followed in Dormammu’s wake. If he fails, however, it will mean the end of all life on Earth…

Another Marvel movie, another origin story. But Stephen Strange has always been the odd character out in the Marvel Universe (cinematic or otherwise), a humbled physician redeemed by the power of magic and able to deal with the kind of villains that would give the likes of Iron Man and Captain America more than a run for their money. (Not that Strange is in any immediate danger here; Kaecilius isn’t exactly the most threatening villain Marvel has come up with, but he is good at running a lot.) With Phase Three of the Marvel Cinematic Universe now under way, this gives Marvel the opportunity to add fresh characters to the roster, and take their ongoing series of movies in a new direction.

But is it any good? Well, predictably, the answer is Yes – for the most part. The standard Marvel formula is firmly in place, although there is less humour to be had this time round, and while the template is tweaked here and there, most viewers will be reassured that the House of Spidey hasn’t strayed too far from the formula that has made their movies so successful in the past. What is different, and markedly so, is the visual style adopted for the movie. Away from all the mind-bending, Inception-style graphics, Doctor Strange is both darker in tone and look. Even the hospital where Strange works isn’t as brightly lit as you might expect. But it’s not a gloomy movie over all, it’s just that for once, Marvel have realised that – scenes involving the Cloak of Levitation aside, and Strange’s “borrowing” habits in the library – this needs to be a serious piece above all.

Strange’s arrogance, and then his anger, in the beginning gives Cumberbatch the opportunity to play unlikeable with an unexpected fierceness. One scene in particular with McAdams as Strange’s one-time significant other, Christine Palmer, sees the actor deliver cruel lines of dialogue in a way that hasn’t been done before in a Marvel movie (he’s the hero and he’s being delberately objectionable). Even when he begins to accept that magic really does exist, he’s still an egotist, making snarky, caustic comments, but thanks to the script – by Derrickson, Jon Spaihts, and C. Robert Cargill – he’s also on a journey of self-discovery, and this comes across more and more effectively as the movie progresses.

With the main character in good hands (Cumberbatch inhabits the role with his customary panache, and even slips in an Alan Rickman tribute for those paying attention), it’s a shame that the rest are painted in such broad strokes. Baron Mordo, Strange’s arch-nemesis in the comics, is here very much a secondary character whose time will come in a later movie, while The Ancient One, despite being well-played by Swinton, is burdened with some astonishingly po-faced dialogue (“I spent so many years peering through time… looking for you.”) that you start to wonder if the half-smile Swinton adopts at times is in acknowledgment of how daft some of her lines truly are. As mentioned before, Mikkelsen’s master-turned-bad is not one of Marvel’s best villains, while McAdams is sidelined for much of the movie, though at least she’s not there as a damsel in need of being rescued.

The visuals are, unsurprisingly, stunning. The folding of cityscapes and the weird monstrosities glimpsed in the Dark Dimension are both equally impressive, but there is one sequence which stands head and shoulders above all the others: when Strange reverses the destruction of the Hong Kong sanctum. If anyone wants a clue as to why Marvel is more successful at the box office, and critically, than DC, then it’s this particular sequence that should be watched for one of the answers. Both DC and Marvel have been guilty of going down the destruction-porn road before, and audiences have begun to voice their dislike of these big, CGI-driven demolition extravaganzas. But here, we don’t see the destruction of the Hong Kong sanctum, just the aftermath, and then, in a complete stroke of genius, we see the destruction in reverse – and it’s so much more effective for being shown in this way. Clearly, someone at Marvel is listening.

Where Stephen Strange will fit into the wider Marvel Cinematic Universe remains to be seen (though a pre-end credits scene points him in one particular direction), and he won’t be back in another solo outing for some time, but as an introduction to a character with so much more to be explored, Doctor Strange has to be considered a success. Like most of Marvel’s output in the last eight years, though, it does have its fair share of pitfalls, and it does stumble at times in trying to simplify the more esoteric aspects of playing with magic, but overall this is an exciting, well-crafted, rewarding, and enjoyable first outing for the future Sorcerer Supreme.

Rating: 8/10 – superb spectacle can’t compensate for some poor decisions when it comes to the secondary characters, or the tangled logic surrounding Kaecilius’ need to bring Dormammu into this world, but these are minor gripes in a movie that takes a challenging character and does him justice from start to finish; by doing more than enough with the formula to make it more interesting, Doctor Strange becomes a movie that contradicts the claim that Marvel are just churning out the same movie over and over again.

Michael Moore in TrumpLand (2016)

24 Monday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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American politics, Documentary, Donald Trump, Election, Hillary Clinton, Michael Moore, Review, Wilmington Ohio

D: Michael Moore, Dana Calderwood / 71m

With: Michael Moore

Filmed in front of a live audience at the Murphy Theatre in Wilmington, Ohio, where the majority of people there have already indicated they will vote for Donald Trump in the upcoming US Presidential election on 8 November, Michael Moore in Trumpland is aptly named. (In an ironic twist on the value afforded free speech in America, Moore originally planned to perform his show at the Midland Theatre in Newark, Ohio, but the management nixed the idea.) Moore addresses the the relative virtues of both candidates, and asks the audience why it is that of the two, Hillary Clinton has been so stigmatised and attacked by her peers since her husband became President back in 1993.

In practice, Moore is reliably left-wing, but prefers to be thought of as a political activist, so this is an unsurprising move (and movie) from Moore. Releasing such a documentary with only weeks to go before the election, there’s little chance he’ll have any discernible effect on the way people vote come 8 November, but ever the optimist, Moore gives it his best shot. His audience, supposedly made up of confirmed Trump voters, seem more than willing to give Moore’s less than impassioned rhetoric a chance, and he regularly picks up laughs at both candidate’s expense (there’s even a moment where some audience members stand and applaud him). With the audience increasingly agreeing with him (especially the women), Moore basks in the rosy glow of the political commentator who appears deliberately partisan – at first – but who then reveals his own preference for President.

What Moore does that is clever is not to vilify Donald Trump outright. Instead he highlights some of Trump’s more extreme views by having his Mexican and Muslim audience members segregated at the back of the theatre. The Mexicans, and one Guatemalan woman, are kept behind a representation of the wall Trump wants to build along the US-Mexico border. The Muslims are kept watch over by a drone, which at least isn’t armed. It’s broad, uncomfortable humour that is maintained throughout the show, and by picking on these particular ethnic communities, Moore ends up being just as objectionable in his approach as Trump is with his. The wall and the drone remain in place (apparently) throughout; did Moore need to be this heavyhanded?

With the Mexicans and the Muslims sidelined because of Trump’s dislike for them, Moore sidesteps around Trump entirely and focuses on the decline of the white American male. He reveals his theory that men are becoming increasingly unnecessary in a world where there are more women than men and the birth rate amongst males is declining. Anxiety about the male role – “there are more women in law schools than men” – is at the heart of the typical Trump voter, posits Moore, and he makes a convincing argument, even if it does require a bit of a leap of understanding. It’s an extended sequence that has many women in the audience nodding their heads in acknowledgment, and several of the men looking stony-faced and unhappy at their perceived masculinity being lampooned in such a way.

He moves on to further highlight the demographic that is likely to vote for Trump based on promises he’s made: the poor, disadvantaged person who doesn’t have a job, maybe not even a home or a family, but who does have a vote, that one precious right that will mean they’ll vote for Trump because he’s promised to make things right for them, and he’s promised to go after the institutions that have contributed to so many people becoming dispossessed. As Moore puts it, “Trump’s election is going to be the biggest ‘Fuck you’ ever recorded in human history”. It’s a powerful moment, and the audience is deathly quiet, hanging on Moore’s every word, because he makes the one salient point that everyone seems to be overlooking: voting for Trump will be voting for the wrong reason, because Trump has no intention on following through on his promises.

Moore follows this up with a mock TV news report that shows what the US will be like once Trump is elected and moves into the White House. It’s a clumsy, awkward device, and it sits uneasily against the convincing, well thought out oratory of the previous minutes. It’s often the way with Moore: he makes a passionate plea for change or understanding or the use of common sense, and then he bludgeons everyone with the same point, almost as if he thinks he’s dealing with people who couldn’t possibly work it out for themselves (which is ironic, as that’s what he’s hoping for).

And then it’s Hillary’s turn, in the movie’s final section, and the one where Moore wears his heart, almost literally, on his sleeve. He likes Hillary, once called her a “hot, shit-kicking feminist babe”, and he bemoans the treatment she’s received over the years. This leads to Moore bringing in Pope Francis because he thinks they have a lot in common (and yes, this is a bit of a stretch), and he asks the audience to say nice things about her (even the Republicans and Trump voters). It’s a heartfelt but naïve approach, as Moore makes the most of Hillary’s virtues, and he explains why everyone has a chance to atone for the way she was treated in the past, and is still treated now.

By the end, Moore has made his position clear: vote for Hillary because it’s the right thing to do for the country, for America. The audience seems to agree with him because he gets a standing ovation. But throughout there have been shots of those audience members who clearly don’t agree with him, and who remain unmoved, even when he appears to be remarking on Trump’s good points. As a result it all smacks of too little, too late, and Moore himself lacks the anger and the disgust seen in previous documentaries. He’s impassioned at times, but this is less a rallying call than a plea to be nice to Hillary.

It’s hard to believe that Moore, despite his research and friendly approach, thinks that this will have any impact on the hearts and minds of American voters in a few weeks’ time. Liberals and democrats will vote for Hillary, right-wingers and Republicans (mostly) will vote for Trump. And there’ll be a sizeable portion of the electorate that won’t decide until the day itself. All this is normal, and all this is entirely predictable. It’s easy to see why Moore has released this movie, but as an intelligent, well-reasoned, though one-sided “debate” there are too many longeuers and references to issues away from the Presidential race to make Moore’s latest documentary as effective as he may have hoped. It’s good that he’s tried to “clear the air”, but in taking a less aggressive tone than usual, Moore has let both candidates off the hook for their past misdeeds, and in doing so, has made his show too much about him, and not enough about them.

Rating: 7/10 – with Moore displaying less outrage than on previous outings – only his disgust at the lack of healthcare reforms leading to 50,000 deaths a year really gets him angry – Michael Moore in TrumpLand ends up looking and sounding more tepid than vital; as a vehicle for raising political awareness it also falls short, and as an examination of the candidates’ campaigns it doesn’t even get started, but this is very much a love letter to Hillary above all else, a decision that both overwhelms and undermines the movie at the very same time.

NOTE: There’s no trailer available for Michael Moore in TrumpLand.

The Whole Truth (2016)

22 Saturday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Courtney Hunt, Crime, Drama, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Jim Belushi, Keanu Reeves, Louisiana, Murder, Renée Zellweger, Review, Thriller, Trial

D: Courtney Hunt / 93m

Cast: Keanu Reeves, Renée Zellweger, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Gabriel Basso, Jim Belushi, Jim Klock, Ritchie Montgomery, Christopher Berry, Nicole Barré, Sean Bridgers, Mattie Liptak

In a small Louisiana town, young Mike Lassiter (Basso) is arrested for the murder of his father, Boone (Belushi). Having confessed to the crime, Mike says nothing more, even to his lawyer, Richard Ramsey (Reeves). Obviously this makes it hard for Ramsey to mount a defence, but as a friend of the family, and someone that Boone helped become a lawyer, he has inside knowledge about Boone that the jury won’t be aware of. With his client staying quiet, Ramsey’s only choice is to malign Boone’s reputation as a good father to Mike and loving husband to Loretta (Zellweger).

As the trial begins, Ramsey is joined by a junior lawyer, Janelle Brady (Mbatha-Raw). Together they begin to piece together a defence based on Boone’s abusive behaviour towards Mike and Loretta, while the prosecution – led by Leblanc (Klock) – reinforces the details surrounding the murder and Mike’s subsequent confession. The case seems hopeless until Ramsey calls Loretta to the witness stand, where she confirms just how abusive her husband could be. But as the trial continues, Janelle becomes suspicious about what might have really happened; she comes to believe that Mike is taking the fall for his mother. There’s no evidence to support this, however, and when Mike takes the stand and delivers a bombshell that no one could have prepared for, his testimony takes the trial in a direction that no one could have prepared for either.

With an introductory voice over by Reeves that sets the tone for the whole movie (he sounds bored and uninterested), The Whole Truth is one of those courtroom dramas where secrets are revealed every so often in an effort to keep the audience guessing as to what’s happened, or is happening, and which should add up to a last-minute revelation that will have said audience saying to themselves, “Wow! I never saw that coming!” Except, in reality, The Whole Truth opts for secrets that have no impact on the movie’s ending, and which are pretty much forgotten about once they’ve been revealed.

You don’t have to have seen hundreds of courtroom dramas to know that ninety-nine per cent of the time, if the defendant has confessed to the crime (but isn’t saying why they did it), then the chances of them actually being guilty are greatly reduced. And while it would be unfair to reveal if this is the case here, let’s just say that there is a formula here that’s being adhered to, and said formula shouldn’t spring too many surprises on anyone familiar with the genre. And thanks to screenwriter Nicholas Kazan (known here as Raphael Jackson, and perhaps wisely), the movie plods along from one unexciting revelation to another in a dour effort to appear exciting. It’s all so sloppily written that, from Ramsey’s “knowing” voice over to both his and Leblanc’s inability to cross-examine witnesses, The Whole Truth acts more as an educational movie about how not to make a courtroom drama than the effective thriller it wants to be.

Kazan’s script is one of the main offenders, but it’s not alone in handicapping the movie at every turn. Since coming to people’s attention with her well-received debut, Frozen River (2008), director Courtney Hunt has only worked on five TV episodes before taking on the challenge of molding this movie into something that isn’t the cinematic definition of “generic”. That she never gets to grips with the material, and films everything in a bland, TV-movie-of-the-week style, is evident throughout, and the look of the movie – all washed-out and looking as if bright colours were a no-no – further undermines any attempts the movie might make to stand out from the crowd. It’s as if cinematographer Jules O’Loughlin was instructed not to make the movie look attractive.

And then, somewhat inevitably, there’s the cast. Keanu Reeves has the kind of career that fluctuates between godawful and cautiously optimistic with almost absurd regularity. John Wick (2014) was a reminder that when he’s asked to play taciturn and given minimal dialogue, he’s playing to his strengths as an actor. But then he also appears in movies such as Man of Tai Chi (2013 – and which he directed), and Knock Knock (2015), and you’re reminded that he’s only good with certain material. Here he struggles as usual with both his character and his character’s dialogue, with his occasional voice overs further underscoring how often he looks and sounds removed from the movies he makes. He makes for an unconvincing trial lawyer as well, and The Whole Truth teeters on the edge of disaster every time Ramsey gets up to question a witness.

Making her return to acting after a six-year hiatus, Renée Zellweger is, as many people have already pointed out, hard to recognise as Loretta. Even when she speaks you could still be forgiven for thinking she’s someone else, and this proves to be something of a distraction whenever she’s on screen. Why she picked this movie to make her comeback is a mystery that’s more intriguing than the central mystery around who killed Boone, and though she has second billing, Loretta is more of a supporting role than a lead. She’s not asked to do too much, and when Loretta takes the stand, Zellweger treats us to a glimpse of what she’s capable of, but otherwise it’s a performance that dozens of other actresses could have given. Mbatha-Raw is underused as well, her character the inexperienced, somewhat naïve ingenue who gets her one chance to shine in court before being relegated back to the sidelines.

With the performances unable to lift the movie out of its self-imposed narrative doldrums, and Hunt apparently unable to make much out of the material, The Whole Truth proves to be hugely disappointing, and resoundingly flat. There’s no impetus, no energy in the courtroom scenes, and by the end it’s difficult to care who did what, why or how. Courtroom dramas succeed or fail on the quality of the secrets that are revealed during a trial, and the odds against the defence lawyer winning, but here there’s so much apathy on display that any impact is curtailed before any such secrets are fully revealed. This may be a courtroom drama per se, but someone really should have pointed out that the drama was, in legal terms, misrepresented.

Rating: 4/10 – originally set to star Daniel Craig as Ramsey, The Whole Truth is a movie that wouldn’t have turned out any better even if he hadn’t dropped out just days before production was due to begin; clumsy and dull, the movie is like drudge work for the eyes and ears, and never once feels like it’s going to step up a gear and become even slightly interesting.

Mini-Review: The Fits (2015)

21 Friday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Anna Rose Holmer, Boxing, Dancing, Drama, Fits, Review, Royalty Hightower

D: Anna Rose Holmer / 72m

Cast: Royalty Hightower, Alexis Neblett, Makyla Burnam, Da’Sean Minor, Lauren Gibson, Antonio A.B. Grant Jr, Inayah Rodgers

Toni (Hightower) is an eleven year old who hangs out with her older brother Jermaine (Minor) at their local gym where he’s training to be a boxer. She uses the time and opportunity to work out, and occasionally, spars with Jermaine and his friend, Donté (Grant Jr). It’s a situation she’s more than happy with, but when she becomes aware of the dance class that takes place elsewhere in the building, Toni becomes intrigued by the sense of camaraderie and commitment the girls in the group exhibit.

Eventually she joins the group. Some of the older girls are rehearsing for an upcoming competition after achieving success in another. As Toni begins to make friends and learn the routines, one of the older girls has a fit. Though unexpected, the group carries on rehearsing until the same thing happens to another of the older girls. Suspicion for the fits falls on the water supply to the building, but even though everyone is advised to drink bottled water, the fits continue to affect several of the girls, including some of the younger ones. But is there a simple solution to what’s happening, or is it a form of hysteria that has no obvious source?

Anna Rose Holmer’s debut feature is a low-key, minimalist drama that unfolds slowly and with great deliberation. It maintains a steady, thoughtful pace throughout, and uses an observational approach that’s almost documentary-like in style (and which should be unsurprising given Holmer’s background in documentaries, and where she’s known as Anna Farrell). The story is kept very simple, as Toni’s attempts to fit in are offset by the rising tide of paranoia that affects the dance group, even after the mains water is ruled out as a cause for the fits. Holmer is clever enough not to provide any definitive answers for the seizures, and the movie retains its credibility even as the mystery deepens.

But while Holmer’s approach to her own material is consistently and carefully measured, it’s the material itself that doesn’t reward the viewer quite as effectively. Toni’s switch from boxing to dancing comes about thanks to her curiosity about the dance group, and a need to fit in amongst children of her own age and gender. But Toni makes few efforts to forge any friendships, and she remains a passive observer of each successive seizure and development. This makes it difficult to invest in the movie on a personal level, and while emotions run high on screen, the distancing effect adopted by Holmer makes Toni’s experiences more of an intellectual exercise than a moving one.

Rating: 7/10 – bolstered by a terrific performance by Hightower, The Fits is nevertheless a movie that keeps its distance from the viewer and makes it difficult to enjoy on a conventional level; strong on ideas, but with Holmer focused more on how the movie is assembled, it’s a feature to be admired for its rigorous approach rather than how affecting it is.

Complete Unknown (2016)

20 Thursday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Azita Ghanizada, Drama, Identity, Joshua Marston, Michael Chernus, Michael Shannon, Mystery, Rachel Weisz, Review

D: Joshua Marston / 91m

Cast: Rachel Weisz, Michael Shannon, Michael Chernus, Azita Ghanizada, Omar Metwally, Frank De Julio, Condola Rashad, Kathy Bates, Danny Glover

What if you could just up and walk away from the life you were living, and go and be somebody else, assume a different identity and create a history for yourself to go with that identity? And what if you could do that over and over, changing your name and your looks every so often, and living a new life each time? What would be the rewards of doing such a thing? What would be the downside? And even if you could, why would you do it in the first place?

This is what Rachel Weisz’s character, Jenny, does. The movie opens by introducing us to some of the identities she’s adopted in the fifteen years since she left her home and family and friends behind and became someone else. She’s lived in Australia, been a magician’s assistant in China, and an ER nurse somewhere in the US. Currently she’s a biologist who’s part of a team that have discovered a previously unknown species of frog in Tasmania. Her name is Alice Manning, and her work has brought her back to New York, where she comes from originally. Looking to reconnect with her past she tracks down Tom (Shannon), a land reform advocate on a mission to have environmental protection clauses inserted into the legislature. As we learn later on, Tom is Jenny’s only link to her past since the death of her father, and despite the time and distance she’s put between her first life and her current one, she still has a need to affirm its existence.

Adopting a softly, slowly approach, Alice gets to know Tom’s work partner, Clyde (Chernus). She dazzles him, and when it comes time for Tom’s birthday, Clyde invites her along to the birthday party as his plus one. Once there, Tom becomes suspicious that Alice isn’t Alice, but the Jenny he remembers. As the party continues, Alice admits to changing her identity when she wants to. Some of the guests are impressed, others think it’s a horrible idea because of the lies involved. Tom remains bemused, certain and yet uncertain that Alice is Jenny. He tries to tackle her about it, but her answers offer confirmation and non-confirmation at the same time. It’s only when they all go to a club to spend the rest of the evening dancing that Tom becomes convinced that it’s Jenny and not Alice. When she leaves, in a hurry to get away suddenly, he follows her and gets her to admit to her deception.

What follows can best be described as a cinematic chamber piece, as Alice and Tom walk the streets debating the rights and wrongs of Jenny’s “lifestyle”, encounter Kathy Bates’ Nina who is out walking her dog, and who subsequently has a fall, and her husband Roger (Glover) when they help her back to her apartment. Further discussion around why Jenny left follows, and eventually, Tom tells her he wants to see how she moves on to the next identity. Having experienced some form of emotional epiphany, Tom returns home to his wife, Remina (Ghanizada)… and on the cusp of a revelation, the movie ends.

Fans of very slow-paced dramas will enjoy the last half an hour of Complete Unknown, as the script – by director Marston and Julian Sheppard – winds down in terms of pace, interest, and credibility. It’s here that Marston sheds any notion that he knows where the movie is going, and the viewer is left wondering if there has been any point to the movie at all. Tom and Alice/Jenny’s relationship is the key focus by this time, but it’s not as dramatic as it should be, and Marston is unable to create any drama or sense of heightened feelings as the emotionally distant duo fret over each other’s pain, but only for a short period before they move on. For both there are meant to be “lessons learned”, but it’s hard to tell if any “lessons” have been doled out. Jenny can’t explain with any precision why she does what she does, and Tom is so tightly wound-up at times that it’s hard to work out if he’s mad at Jenny for disappearing all those years ago, or because his marriage is about to go through a potentially very rough patch.

Throughout the movie, Marston fails to explain things in a way that isn’t confusing to the viewer, or problematical for the characters. Jenny/Alice’s motivation for leaving behind her original life remains spurious at worst, and unsatisfactory at best. And more importantly, the script never sells the viewer on the reasons for Jenny/Alice wanting to return to her roots, undermining her previous determination to avoid any confrontation from her past. Similarly, Tom’s steely-eyed persistence in wanting to know why Jenny left so abruptly, is shown as being immediate and close to the surface, the dynamic of which seems absurd given the passage of time. Are we really meant to believe that he hasn’t moved on after fifteen years? And if we are, then why doesn’t the script explain why?

It’s these dramatic exclusions that hurt the movie most, draining it of the few mystery elements it’s set up at the beginning. The result is a dry, mannered, unconvincing movie that fails to provide depth for its characters to build on, and lacks the necessary desire to fill in the multitude of gaps in the narrative. Marston doesn’t really know where his movie is going to, and he’s curiously unable to make sense of Jenny’s need for reinvention, or the mechanics of it (toward the end, Tom challenges Jenny over her ability to change her identity, and tells her he wants to see how she does it; she takes him to her apartment and packs a bag – and that’s it).

Against this, Weisz provides a thankfully intuitive performance that goes a long way toward helping the viewer engage with the material, but even she can only do so much. Shannon is largely passive throughout, his face a blank canvas that gives little away, and his default manner one of bewilderment. In their scenes together there’s precious little spark to help explain the feelings they had for each other, and why it’s so important for Jenny to see Tom again, and the distance between them is another aspect of the production that Marston is unable to do anything about.

Rating: 4/10 – questions of identity are left hanging in Complete Unknown, and what could have been an absorbing, insightful examination of one woman’s need to be different versions of herself, is abandoned in favour of a trite, vaguely rewarding trawl through poorly constructed dialogues that leave everything open for interpretation; a slowburn movie that treats its central character like a cypher (because it can’t do anything else with her), Marston’s micro-drama is unlikely to generate the interest it needs in order to find an audience willing to forgive its indolence.

Mini-Review: Mascots (2016)

19 Wednesday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Alvin the Armadillo, Chris O'Dowd, Christopher Guest, Comedy, Corky St Clair, Jack the Plumber, Jane Lynch, Jim Piddock, Netflix, Parker Posey, Review, Sid the Hedgehog, The Fist, Tom Bennett

D: Christopher Guest / 94m

Cast: Carrie Aizley, Sarah Baker, Bob Balaban, Ed Begley Jr, Tom Bennett, Jennifer Coolidge, Kerry Godliman, Matt Griesser, Christopher Guest, John Michael Higgins, Michael Hitchcock, Don Lake, Jane Lynch, Christopher Moynihan, Chris O’Dowd, Jim Piddock, Parker Posey, Harry Shearer, Fred Willard, Zach Woods, Susan Yeagley

Sports mascots from around the globe gather to take part in the 8th World Mascot Association Championships, though strangely, we only get to meet competitors from the US, Canada, and the UK. There’s Mike and Mindy (Woods, Baker), teachers at Rhea Perlman Middle School; Cindi Babineaux (Posey), a former dance student; Owen Golly (pronounced “jolly”) Jr (Bennett), a third generation mascot; Tommy ‘Zook’ Zucarello (O’Dowd), a hockey mascot with a penchant for drugs and sexual misconduct; and Phil Mayhew (Moynihan), a real estate appraisor.

We meet them in the days leading up to the Championship, watch them deal with various problems related to being a mascot, and the pressures of being in such a low-profile tournament. Alongside them we get to meet the judges (Lynch, Lake, Begley Jr), the Championship organiser (Hitchcock), and a handful of interested parties, including Owen’s father (Piddock), Cindi’s sister, Laci (Yeagley), and Phil’s coach (Willard). As the big day approaches, each of the contestants faces a crisis that could mean the difference between winning and losing.

If that brief synopsis of Mascots seems a little tired, and a little uninspired, then that’s because it’s an adequate representation of the movie itself. This is the fifth movie of its type from Guest, and it has the look and feel of an idea that has been put aside in the past because it just doesn’t match up to the quality of its predecessors. There’s the same set up as before, with brief character introductions giving way to even briefer journeys to the main venue, followed by a series of obstacles that the contestants need to overcome before the big day. Along the way there are the usual monologues or discussions to camera that reveal character flaws or embarrassing histories, wedded to documentary style footage that shows the same characters behaving badly or with few social skills.

As a result, the situations and the jokes feel forced and the humour dries up very quickly in any given scene. And many of those same scenes are superfluous and dull, failing to advance the basic storyline, and feeling more extraneous than relevant. That said, the cast do the best they can, but some are more fortunate than others, with Bennett and Moynihan coming off best, while the likes of Willard, Lynch and Hitchcock play the same old characters they always play. Guest, though, actually does play a character he’s played before: Corky St Clair from Waiting for Guffman (1996). It all adds up to a fitfully amusing movie that never manages to gather any momentum, and remains unrewarding except for a couple of the mascot performances.

Rating: 5/10 – a bit of a struggle to get through, Mascots is another Netflix movie that promises more than it can deliver; time for Guest et al to hang up the mockumentary approach and find a new way to lampoon the people whose niche pursuits have provided us with so much hilarity in the past.

War on Everyone (2016)

18 Tuesday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Alexander Skarsgård, Comedy, Corrupt cops, Crime, Drama, John Michael McDonagh, Michael Peña, New Mexico, Review, Tessa Thompson, Theo James, Thriller

D: John Michael McDonagh / 98m

Cast: Michael Peña, Alexander Skarsgård, Theo James, Tessa Thompson, Malcolm Barrett, Caleb Landry Jones, Stephanie Sigman, David Wilmot, Paul Reiser

Do you like your cops as corrupt as the criminals they arrest/steal from? Do you like to see cops misuse their position and betray your trust in them at every turn? And do you like them to have so little regard for your (or anyone else’s) dignity or safety that they’d hit a mime with their car just to see if he yells in pain? Well, if you only answered yes to that last question, then War on Everyone is the movie for you. It’s a buddy cop movie where the cops in question, Detectives Bob Bolaño (Peña) and Terry Monroe (Skarsgård), will do everything they possibly can to screw over everyone they meet, be it their long-suffering boss, Lt. Stanton (Reiser), or one of their stoolpigeons, Reggie (Barrett), or just about anyone operating on the wrong side of the law (like them).

When news reaches them that a big heist is being planned, naturally Bob and Terry want to know all about it so they can grab the money once the robbers have done all the hard work. But the man planning the heist is a shadowy figure they’ve not encountered before, and the details are equally shadowy; all they have are the men who’ll be involved but not the location or where the money is to be taken. With Reggie managing to get himself the getaway driver’s job, Bob and Terry think they’ve got it all worked out: follow Reggie, grab the cash at the earliest opportunity, and head off to somewhere foreign with no extradition arrangement with the US. But of course, nothing goes to plan, and Bob and Terry find themselves up against a British aristocrat called “Lord” James Mangan (James), the mastermind behind the heist, and someone who doesn’t take kindly to their efforts to hijack the robbery and take most of the money.

After the relatively sombre and restrained The Guard (2011) and Calvary (2014), writer/director John Michael McDonagh has decided to cut loose – and quite a bit – with this tale of two ultra-corrupt cops that’s set in New Mexico, is bolstered by the inclusion of Glen Campbell on the soundtrack, and which has a very gritty Seventies vibe to it. War on Everyone is also extremely funny in places, as you’d expect from McDonagh, and there are a plethora of laugh-out-loud moments to keep the audience happy and the script from seeming too formulaic. McDonagh is great at creating a world for his dysfunctional characters to inhabit, and the bright, airy spaces of New Mexico are used to good effect to create a surprisingly natural background for the absurdities that unfold in the foreground.

The plot, such as it is, is acceptable without pushing any boundaries or bringing anything new to the table, and McDonagh is keen to highlight the fact that he knows this, and that the audience should just go along with it. It’s Bob and Terry who are the movie’s real focus, even though their relationship – built as ever on mutual trust and respect while everyone else (bar Bob’s family) is fair game – is one we’re meant to enjoy for its verbal jousting and the pair’s unspoken dependence on each other. Only when it seems that Bob has run out of luck do we see how much Terry depends on him as both a partner and a friend. But in keeping with the characters’ macho exteriors, it’s a necessarily brief glance – and then back to the action.

With McDonagh having established the bond that unites these two latter-day Robin Hoods (only difference: they don’t give to the poor), he adds subplots and secondary characters to flesh out the drama, but in the process and with the exception of Landry Jones’ twitchy portrayal of Mangan’s right hand man, Birdwell, never quite manages to make them as memorable as they need to be. Despite sending Mangan (literally) on an acid trip that’s designed more to show off some fancy camera moves and elaborate staging than to look into the mind of the character, the villain is essentially colourless and in the end, easily dealt with. Likewise, Terry’s love interest, Jackie (Thompson), who he places under his own personal protection and who he promptly falls in love with. Jackie’s a sweet enough character, and as a counterpoint to all the cynicism on display elsewhere she fits the bill, but McDonagh doesn’t develop her in any way, and she remains a frustrating caricature: the girl who needs to be rescued.

As the two felons with badges, Peña and Skarsgård make a great team. Peña is the erudite, well-read partner who can quote from the Greek classics, and who realises that they can’t keep doing what they’re doing indefinitely (it doesn’t help that he looks a little like a Latino version of the British movie critic Mark Kermode). Skarsgård brings the muscle, folding in on himself a lot of the time and accentuating his forehead, as if he’s about to use it as a battering ram. He’s the more dangerous of the two, unpredictable, and Skarsgård projects just the right amount of bottled-up menace that the role requires. Together the two stars are a joy to watch, and McDonagh ensures that their camaraderie is entirely believable, even when he takes them out of their New Mexico comfort zone and sends them off to Iceland to track down an absconded Reggie.

Making his first feature away from Ireland, McDonagh shows a confidence in his decision that isn’t supported by the way he handles the material, and on this occasion McDonagh the director doesn’t know quite what to do to combat the problems inherent in McDonagh the writer’s screenplay. But the movie is an enjoyable one for the most part, provided the viewer keeps their expectations to a minimum; then they might be pleasantly surprised by Bob and Terry’s antics, and also more invested in how things turn out. One area where the movie can’t be faulted is in its cinematography, courtesy of the very talented Bobby Bukowski, whose previous movies include Rosewater (2014) and The Iceman (2012). Thanks to his efforts, War on Everyone is often beautiful to look at, and he keeps the camera moving in ways that are often very inventive – and often without the viewer realising it.

Rating: 7/10 – at times a raucous, freewheeling movie with plenty of buzz about it, War on Everyone can’t sustain it’s initial set up for very long, and McDonagh’s script loses its freshness around the halfway mark; good performances from Peña and Skarsgård help things immeasurably, but this has to go down as a missed opportunity from McDonagh, but not so bad that his next movie won’t be as highly anticipated as this one was.

Sacrifice (2016)

09 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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David Robb, Drama, Joanne Crawford, Literary adaptation, Peter A. Dowling, Radha Mitchell, Review, Rupert Graves, Sharon Bolton, Shetland Islands, Thriller

D: Peter A. Dowling / 91m

Cast: Radha Mitchell, Rupert Graves, David Robb, Joanne Crawford, Ian McElhinney, Liam Carney, Peter Vollebregt, Conor Mullen, Declan Conlon, Deirdre Monaghan

Consultant surgeon Tora Hamilton (Mitchell) wants to have a baby. After four miscarriages – and with no real reason why they should be happening – Tora and her husband, Duncan (Graves) relocate to his hometown in the Shetland Islands from New York. She starts afresh in the local hospital, while he works on an industrial project elsewhere on the island. She’s welcomed by one and all, especially by Duncan’s parents, Richard and Elspeth (Robb, Monaghan), who have arranged both their jobs, the house they live in, and the hassle-free adoption of a baby eight months from then via a specialised clinic on a neighbouring island. Everything is perfect.

But then Tora discovers the body of a young woman buried in the peat at the rear of the house, and everything stops being so perfect. The woman had died as her heart was cut from her body, and strange runes have been carved into her back. Tora also notices tell-tale signs that the woman had given birth a week or two before her death. The later discovery of a ring bearing the initials of a local councillor’s wife makes Tora believe she’s identified the young woman’s body, but she’s dismayed to learn that the woman in question died several years before. Unconvinced that she could be wrong in her belief about the woman’s identity, she challenges the local police, led by D.I. McKie (McElhinney), along with Sgt. Dana Tulloch (Crawford), to look into the matter further. She begins her own parallel investigation, one that touches on a local legend involving male firstborns.

She also finds herself becoming suspicious of Duncan, as well as several of the more important men on the island, all of whom have a single male child that was the result of a pregnancy with their first wives; what makes it all so strange is that these women all died soon after their pregnancies, and some from a stage four cancer that precludes their being pregnant in the first place. She and Sgt. Tulloch find linking evidence of a fraudulent use of charity funds, as well as a connection with the adoption clinic. But when Tulloch is killed, her death leads to the confession of the local solicitor; he admits to killing the woman found by Tora, and more besides. Everything is resolved – or, at least it seems to be – until eight months later, when Tora and Duncan are on the verge of completing their adoption of an unwanted baby.

The Denver Post had this to say about the novel on which Sacrifice is based: “The page turner of the summer… Extraordinary”. High praise indeed, but the same can’t be said for Peter A. Dowling’s muddled, plodding adaptation, which struggles to maintain a coherent or consistent tone, and which steadfastly refuses to explain its fractured storyline in any great depth or detail. So much goes unexplained that after a while, the viewer has no choice but to either go with the movie and hope for the best, or stage a King Canute-like attempt to stem the tide of narrative short cuts and poorly handled plot developments that make up large parts of Dowling’s untidy screenplay.

Thrillers like Sacrifice often require more of a commitment to suspended disbelief than usual. The quiet, seemingly idyllic island community, the hint of magical fantasy that informs local beliefs and behaviours, the sense of a long-term mystery needing to be solved, the plucky heroine going up against a shadowy menace that will protect itself at any cost – all these elements, if mishandled, can undermine the overall mood that the movie is attempting to create. And so it proves here, with Bolton’s well-received novel churned over repeatedly and reduced to a mass of warmed-over clichés. It’s almost as if Dowling couldn’t be bothered to make any of it even halfway plausible, from Tora’s opening miscarriage (which takes place while she ministers to a woman about to give birth – oh, the irony!), to the scene where a conveniently placed cleaner allows her access to the dental wing of the hospital, and all the way to the end and the moment where the chief villain hands Tora a sacrificial dagger and then stands directly behind her (what could possibly happen next?).

These and other moments will have even the most casual of viewers scratching their heads in disbelief, and faced with such ill-advised decisions, the cast have no choice but to keep a straight face and do their best against all the odds. Mitchell, an actress who just doesn’t seem to get the right breaks career-wise (seriously, 2016 has seen her in this, London Has Fallen, and The Darkness – time to rethink her representation perhaps?), and while she’s often been the brightest thing in some truly mediocre movies, not even she can rescue a movie that doesn’t allow its central character to grow or develop in any way. Likewise, Graves is saddled with the kind of secondary role that requires him to pop up from time to time, act shady on occasion to attract suspicion, and then pull action hero duty against a secondary villain in a vain attempt to inject some excitement into a movie that’s been determinedly second-rate up until then. It’s a thankless role, and Graves looks increasingly put out by the role’s lack of, well, everything, as the movie progresses.

Dowling also fumbles the use of local folklore, neither explaining it fully or giving the viewer any clue as to why its practices would be maintained in a more contemporary setting (though, on the plus side, this does mean the chief villain doesn’t get to monologue his way through the inevitable cliff-top showdown). And the whole thing is so unnecessarily convoluted it’s a wonder any of the participants can keep track of what they’re doing and why – just like the audience. Ultimately, Sacrifice is a movie that doesn’t try hard enough to be anything other than just about acceptable as a time waster.

Rating: 3/10 – another low-budget, poorly made thriller that at least acknowledges it doesn’t have pretensions, Sacrifice is so bad that at times you wonder if it wouldn’t have been improved by the introduction of some humour to leaven things out; a “meh” movie then, and one that cuts corners both narratively and through the erratic editing process, leaving the unsuspecting viewer to wish that they too had been killed and left in a peat bog, thus ending their misery at watching a movie that wants to be like The Wicker Man (1973) but ends up being more like The Wicker Tree (2011).

Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016)

06 Thursday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Barry Crump, Child services, Comedy, Drama, Julian Dennison, Literary adaptation, New Zealand, Rachel House, Review, Rima Te Wiata, Sam Neill, Taika Waititi, The Bush, Wild Pork and Watercress

D: Taika Waititi / 101m

Cast: Sam Neill, Julian Dennison, Rima Te Wiata, Rachel House, Tioreore Ngatai-Melbourne, Oscar Kightley, Stan Walker, Mike Minogue, Cohen Holloway, Rhys Darby

Ricky Baker (Dennison) is a problem child. He’s in the care system, and has a reputation for disobedience, stealing, spitting, running away, throwing rocks, kicking stuff, defacing stuff, burning stuff, loitering, and graffiti-ing (and that’s just the stuff Child Services knows about). In short, he’s a real bad egg. But he’s been given one last chance: to be looked after by Bella Faulkner (Te Wiata) and her grouchy husband Hec (Neill) on their farm. Bella is endlessly upbeat despite a tendency for inappropriate comments (“Whoo! You’re a big fella. Who ate the guy who ate all the pies, eh?”), but her heart’s in the right place and she more than compensates for Hec’s less than welcoming behaviour. Ricky runs away the first night, but doesn’t get very far, and soon he’s running away each night – but he’s always back in time for breakfast.

Responding to Bella’s ministrations, Ricky soon settles in and begins to take an interest in the farm and Hec’s role. Hec teaches Ricky to shoot, and they begin to form a bond. When Ricky’s birthday comes around, the Faulkners get him a dog, which he names Tupac. But tragedy strikes, and Ricky is required to go back into the care system. Refusing to go he heads off into the Bush, and determines to remain in hiding. Hec soon finds him, and they begin the return journey home when Hec breaks his ankle. Forced to stay in the Bush while his ankle heals, six weeks pass, during which Child Services, in the form of would-be Agatha Trunchbull, Paula Hall (House), and the police, search for the missing pair. An encounter at a lodge with a trio of hunters who are looking for Ricky and Hec leads to Hec being regarded as a pervert, and Ricky having been kidnapped.

Ricky and Hec go on the run, and decide to hole up in the Bush until the search for them peters out. They survive by catching or foraging for food, use the “Knack” – a kind of semi-mystical knowledge that allows them to avoid being found and to survive in the wilderness – and slowly and surely learn to trust and respect and depend on each other. But the search for them continues unabated, thanks to Paula Hall’s determination that “no child is left behind”, and the occasional help afforded them by strangers such as young girl Kahu (Ngatai-Melbourne), and raving conspiracy theorist Psycho Sam (Darby). But inevitably the pair are tracked down and it only remains to be seen if they go out with a bang or a whimper.

An adaptation of the novel Wild Pork and Watercress by Barry Crump, Hunt for the Wilderpeople is one of the most enjoyable and endearing movies you’re likely to see all year. It has charm by the bucket load, an irresistible central character in Ricky Baker, is peppered with some of the funniest dialogue heard in a very loooong time, and features some absolutely stunning New Zealand scenery. And because it all takes place in New Zealand there’s a fantastic Lord of the Rings joke to round things off. It’s a movie that, thanks to the efforts of writer/director Taika Waititi, provides enough comic indulgence for two movies.

It features a quartet of wonderfully bizarre and idiosyncratic performances as well, from Neill’s wonderfully arch turn as a man with all the parental skills of a confirmed malcontent, to Te Wiata’s brief but heartfelt portrayal of a woman for whom the act of caring compensates greatly for the one regret she’s ever had in life, to House’s grotesque Child Services agent, a loud, over-earnest, bullying monster of a woman who won’t be beaten by Ricky at any cost, as evidenced by this brilliant exchange:

Ricky Baker: I’ll never stop running!
Paula: Yeah, and I’ll never stop chasing you – I’m relentless, I’m like the Terminator.
Ricky Baker: I’m more like the Terminator than you!
Paula: I said it first, you’re more like Sarah Connor, and in the first movie too, before she could do chinups.

But when all’s said and done, this is Dennison’s movie. He owns the role of Ricky Baker as if he’s played it all his life, from the constant gangsta/thug life referrals, all the way to the petulant disregard for others he uses as a shield against getting hurt. Dennison is nothing short of superb here, soaking up Waititi’s fluid direction and relaying with disarming simplicity the problems of being in a care system that doesn’t actually care about him. He’s also a great physical comedian, using his size in unexpected ways to draw out several moments of equally unexpected humour. And his timing isn’t too bad, either. Witness the scene where he tries to cajole Hec into looking for a Russian bride online: when Hec looks at him with disdain, Ricky’s deadpan “Too soon?” is served up to perfection.

In amongst the humour, Waititi is wise enough to keep the sermonising about the importance of family ties, and just what makes a family, to a minimum, and the demonisation of Child Services via the character of Paula is kept from becoming too silly or ridiculous thanks to Waititi’s assured handling of his own script, and House’s confident awareness of the character’s narrative limitations. She’s a cartoon figure in many respects, and in some ways the Yosemite Sam to Ricky’s Bugs Bunny, but not drawn or portrayed too broadly to be completely obnoxious or hateful. (There’s a sad back story there, no doubt, and one that would be good to know more about.) The relationship between Ricky and Hec is allowed to develop naturally, and is helped by the passage of time. Neill and Dennison work very well together, and the early scenes where they clash adds poignancy later on when it becomes clear to both of them just how much they need each other.

As mentioned before, the whole thing plays out against the backdrop of some spectacular New Zealand scenery – the opening credits sequence as the camera skims the treetops of the Bush sets the tone for the movie’s overall look and feel – and DoP Lachlan Milne captures the rugged beauty of the Bush itself and the surrounding terrain with clarity and precision; it’s a visually splendid movie to watch. And to cap it all off, the soundtrack, with its mix of original compositions and well-chosen songs – Nina Simone’s version of Sinnerman is put to particularly good use – adds an extra layer of finesse to a movie that already has more than enough finesse already.

Rating: 9/10 – a feel-good movie that doesn’t even have to try too hard to make its audience laugh or cry, Hunt for the Wilderpeople is beautifully observed, beautifully constructed, and effortlessly satisfying; Waititi is to be congratulated for taking material that could have been treated with far less care than is shown here and making it feel special, and for making a movie about a fat kid and his grumpy “uncle” that is nothing short of “majestical”.

Wiener-Dog (2016)

05 Wednesday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Black comedy, Cancer, Danny DeVito, Doody, Drama, Ellen Burstyn, Greta Gerwig, Indie movie, Julie Delpy, Review, Todd Solondz

D: Todd Solondz / 88m

Cast: Julie Delpy, Keaton Nigel Cooke, Tracy Letts, Greta Gerwig, Kieran Culkin, Connor Long, Bridget Brown, Danny DeVito, Sharon Washington, Ellen Burstyn, Zosia Mamet, Michael James Shaw

A portmanteau of stories connected by the titular animal, Wiener-Dog is the kind of quirky, off-kilter indie movie that attracts audiences attuned to quirky, off-kilter indie movies. That’s to say there’s a certain audience out there for it, and it’s a movie that does its best to be quirky and off-kilter, but as with most portmanteau movies – indie-based or otherwise – some stories work and others don’t. And this won’t help it reach a wider audience. Making a quirky, off-kilter indie movie isn’t a bad idea, but in order for it to avoid being stuck in a niche market, it really needs to be thought through in better fashion than writer/director Todd Solondz has done here.

We first meet wiener-dog as he’s taken to a shelter. Why he’s taken there we never find out – it probably doesn’t matter, but if it does, Solondz isn’t looking to give the viewer any clues – but it’s not long before he’s given a home by Danny (Letts) as a surprise gift for his young son, Remi (Cooke). Remi’s mother, Dina (Delpy), isn’t too happy though about having a dog in the house, and she’s keen to make it clear that the dog is Remi’s responsibility alone. Remi has recently survived a brush with cancer, and is only too happy to have a dog to look after. But an unfortunate occurrence involving the dog and a granola bar leads to wiener-dog being taken back to the shelter.

Ear-marked to be put down, wiener-dog is saved at the last minute by veterinary nurse, Dawn (Gerwig). She takes the dog home with her and christens her Doody. At a local store she runs into Brandon (Culkin), who she knew in high school. He’s going on a trip to visit his brother, Tommy (Long) and his wife, April (Brown), and he invites Dawn along. With nothing better to do, she accepts. When they get to Tommy’s house, Dawn learns that he and April both have Downs Syndrome. When it’s time to leave, Dawn makes a gift of Doody to the couple.

We next see Doody with screenwriting professor Dave Schmerz (DeVito). Dave is trying to get his own screenplay produced, but his agent hasn’t even read it, and Dave is getting more and more depressed about it as a result. He’s lost his enthusiasm for teaching, and in turn has lost the respect of his students. Even when he’s assigned a new agent who tells him she may have a deal with Dreamworks set up for him, Dave’s newfound happiness is undermined by news that his students have complained about him. Angry and upset by this, Dave assembles a bomb, attaches it to Doody, and sends her into the college where he works.

Our final encounter with the dog is when she’s owned by Nana (Burstyn) and is called Cancer. Nana lives with her caregiver and appears miserable and grumpy. She receives a visit from her granddaughter, Zoe (Mamet), and her current boyfriend, Fantasy (Shaw), a performance artist she thinks is cheating on her. The visit is cut short before Nana can give any practical advice, and afterwards she has goes outside and has a dream where younger versions of herself endlessly repeat how better her life would have been if she’d been nicer to people, less critical of them etc.

There’s one last scene involving wiener-dog in animatronic form, but that’s basically it, a collection of four stories where the dog is largely coincidental to the tales being told, and the characters – as per Solondz’ usual penchant – are disillusioned, emotionally stunted, socially awkward lost souls who are unable to connect to others on any meaningful level. Now, there’s aways room for this kind of movie making, and in the past Solondz has been an accomplished purveyor of tales about such people. He’s pretty much built his career on the back of them, and Happiness (1998) is a superb example of what he can do when the muse takes him. But Wiener-Dog is neither as sharp as that movie, or as engaging. There’s Solondz’ trademark waspish humour, but unfortunately, it’s also not as acute as it needs to be.

The first tale is possibly the most satisfactory, with Remi’s persistent questioning of his mother leading to some of the most inappropriate parenting seen on screen for a while. Dina doesn’t do much to reassure Remi; instead she offers worst-case scenarios and semi-pious examples of times went horribly wrong for want of the right thing being done. It’s reassurance by scare tactics, and while Solondz is aiming for very black humour in these moments, the awfulness of Dina’s approach is just that: awful. Delpy is a superb actress, and she handles the dialogue well, but even she can’t find the fine line that stops emotional support from becoming emotional abuse.

The story involving Dawn and Brandon – characters reunited from Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995) – runs out of ideas very quickly, and Solondz doesn’t have anything to offer in terms of the characters or their lives, other than that Dawn and Brandon both exist in the kind of emotional bubbles that are difficult for others to break through, and partly because the two of them aren’t especially aware that that’s the kind of lives they lead. Dave’s tale is flat and uninvolving, a tired story about a tired man that you don’t spend enough time with to really care about. DeVito is often a better dramatic actor than he’s given credit for, but here he just doesn’t have the material to work with. But spare a thought for Burstyn, who has even less to work with, and who is left to yield the floor to Mamet and her character’s own worries. The focus isn’t on Nana enough for the dream visitations of her younger self to have any relevance, and once they occur her tale is effectively over, leaving the viewer to wonder why the story was included in the first place.

The cast do their best, but Solondz maintains a dreary, desultory tone throughout, aiming perhaps for slice of life tales that are meant to be affecting and saying something about modern day ennui, but instead, giving the viewer brief character sketches that say little beyond the obvious, and which lack the necessary depth to make these characters sympathetic or intriguing. It’s hard to care about any of them, and in the end, Solondz reveals just how little he cares about them, or the dog, as he pulls the rug out from under the audience with a scene that’s so gratuitous and unnecessary that you feel like slapping him in the face for being so arbitrary and cruel.

Rating: 4/10 – with past glories fading away with every passing minute, Wiener-Dog is not the movie to sound hurrahs for Solondz’ return to movie making after five years away; as it squanders every opportunity to be interesting or appealing, the movie gets bogged down by its attempts to say something about the lives of the disconnected, and in doing so – and with an irony that only highlights Solondz’ clumsy approach to his own material – keeps its characters at a safe distance from the audience as well.

Oh! the Horror! – The Darkness (2016) and Lights Out (2016)

04 Tuesday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Anasazi, David F. Sandberg, Diana, Drama, Grand Canyon, Greg McLean, Horror, Kevin Bacon, Maria Bello, Radha Mitchell, Review, Teresa Palmer, Thriller

The Darkness (2016) / D: Greg McLean / 92m

Cast: Kevin Bacon, Radha Mitchell, David Mazouz, Lucy Fry, Matt Walsh, Jennifer Morrison, Parker Mack, Paul Reiser, Ming-Na Wen

In The Darkness, a family returns home from a trip to the Grand Canyon, unaware that their autistic son has released an ancient supernatural force that had been imprisoned in a secret Anasazi location. Once the feuding Taylors – dad Peter (Bacon), mum Bronny (Mitchell), teenage daughter Stephanie (Fry), and son Michael (Mazouz) – get settled back into the routine of sniping at each other and generally ignoring the fact that their combined behaviours are slowly tearing the family apart, the inevitable strange things start to happen. First, the taps in the kitchen turn on by themselves…

… and with that, any aspirations to be or do anything different for the remainder of the movie goes so far out of the window you’re not even sure if it’s landed anywhere. The Darkness is a shockingly bad amalgam of horror tropes and the supposed best bits from other horror movies. But in the main it’s Poltergeist (1982) that gets ripped off the most here, from the American Indian connection to the spiritual healer recommended to Peter by his boss (Reiser), and all the way to the portal that opens up in Michael’s bedroom.

With the script having been cobbled together by director Greg McLean, Shayne Armstrong and Shane Krause, the movie ambles along on creative life support before it reaches the end and gives up the ghost entirely. Along the way it attempts to add depth by giving the Taylors their own personal demons to face as well as the ones formerly held at bay by Anasazi rituals. Peter once had an affair (though of course it didn’t mean anything), Bronny has a history of alcohol abuse, and Stephanie is bulimic (though one trip to the doctor’s seems to sort that one out). Personal demons, supernatural demons – what has this poor misguided family done to deserve all this? (What’s that? The supernatural demons are metaphors? Oh, right…)

There’s no shortage of cringeworthy moments in The Darkness (though the demons going by the collective name of Jenny is probably the best/worst), and the cast appear to have given up quite early on – Bacon in particular looks like he’s wondering if he could drop a few scenes and thereby lessen his involvement – but it’s McLean’s lack of focus on both the performances and the material that hurts the movie the most. With the script on only nudging terms with credibility – and yes, this is a horror movie, and yes, credibility is often the first thing to go when one is being made – it still needed a firmer hand at the controls, but McLean, now a long, long way from the glory days of Wolf Creek (2005) just lets the movie drift to a unsatisfactory finish that is at least in keeping with how unsatisfactory the rest of the movie has been.

Rating: 3/10 – meh horror that lacks commitment from all concerned, and offers nothing new… at all; daft, confusing, muddled, and dramatically inert for long stretches, The Darkness will make you feel uneasy – but, sadly, not for the right reasons.

Lights Out (2016) / D: David F. Sandberg / 81m

Cast: Teresa Palmer, Gabriel Bateman, Alexander DiPersia, Maria Bello, Billy Burke, Alicia Vela-Bailey, Andi Osho

Martin (Bateman) is a young boy whose stepfather is killed in a very violent fashion. His mother, Sophie (Bello), already on medication for depression, is acting strangely. She talks to someone called Diana (Vela-Bailey) who doesn’t appear to be real. But one night Martin sees the hand of an unnatural figure in his mother’s room. Scared, he finds it difficult to sleep properly, and instead, falls asleep at school. When this happens for a third time, and the school can’t get hold of Sophie, they contact his older sister, Rebecca (Palmer). Rebecca left home years before, shortly after her father (Sophie’s first husband) decided to leave for good himself. Rebecca looks after Martin, but thanks to the intervention of Child Services, isn’t allowed to do so full-time.

With the aid of her would-be boyfriend Bret (DiPersia), Rebecca finds herself quickly coming to terms with the fact that Diana is real – desite having died many years before – and needing to do something about the wraith’s deadly attacks on Martin and herself. Armed with the knowledge that Diana’s attacks only take place in the dark thanks to the extreme heliophobia she suffered from when she was alive, Rebecca and Martin take steps to protect themselves, and to get Sophie to admit that her childhood friendship with Diana is allowing the spectre to exist. But Diana has other plans…

Expanded on from his 2013 short movie of the same name, David F. Sandberg’s Lights Out is an efficient, no-nonsense horror thriller that takes its basic premise – lights on: no ghost, lights off: there it is – and finds various clever ways of keeping the central conceit from getting too stale too quickly, even at eighty-one minutes. While Diana’s back story only partially explains her reason for haunting Sophie and her family, and Diana herself isn’t quite as frightening as she’s meant to be, nevertheless, Sandberg succeeds in making her as credible a character (in the circumstances) as can be, and manages to achieve the same success with Sophie, Martin and Rebecca. Sandberg is helped by strong performances all round – Palmer is particularly good as Rebecca – and a script by Eric Heisserer that does its best in avoiding the pitfalls of dishing up too many horror movie clichés (though it does serve up two unsuspecting police officers as victims of Diana’s wrath, just to keep the momentum going).

The movie is strong on atmosphere, with certain scenes having a clammy, claustrophobic feel to them that isn’t entirely to do with the characters being in confined spaces, and Marc Spicer’s cinematography makes the darkness that surrounds the characters for most of the movie as threatening as possible thanks to some very good lighting choices and some expert framing. The look of the movie is of primary importance in how scary it is, and Sandberg provides viewers with a mix of generic visuals and heightened situations that is surprisingly uncomfortable to watch at times. It’s not entirely successful – Bret is a seriously one-note character, the basement of Sophie’s house conveniently reveals a secret that otherwise would never have been known, a confrontation with Sophie about Diana (and her death) features some very stilted and ill-chosen dialogue – but on the whole it’s a far better movie than expected.

Rating: 7/10 – a horror movie that dares to be different, and succeeds for the most part, Lights Out has a creepy central premise that’s handled well and makes for some effective jump scares (for a change); inevitably, a sequel has already been greenlit, but this is an effective, self-contained movie that stands on its own and proves that intelligence and horror can go hand in hand, and not just wave to each other in passing.

The Lunchbox (2013)

02 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Comedy, Dabba, Dabbawala, Drama, Irrfan Khan, Mumbai, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Nimrat Kaur, Review, Ritesh Batra, Romance

Original title: Dabba

D: Ritesh Batra / 104m

Cast: Irrfan Khan, Nimrat Kaur, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Lillete Dubey, Nakul Vaid, Bharti Achrekar, Yashvi Puneet Nagar, Denzil Smith, Shruti Bapna

In Mumbai, a dabbawala is literally “one who carries a box”. A dabbawala is part of a delivery system that allows workers who don’t want to eat at a food stand or a restaurant, to have hot, home-cooked food for lunch. The lunchboxes are collected from the worker’s home in the morning, delivered in time for their lunch break, and then returned to the worker’s home by the evening. This service first started in 1890, and has grown to the point where anywhere between 175,000 and 200,000 lunchboxes are delivered every day, and incredibly, it’s estimated that dabbawalas make less than one mistake in every six million deliveries.

It’s this amazing service that forms the backdrop and set up for The Lunchbox, a wonderfully complex, and still very simple, May-December romance that develops between soon-to-retire claims actuary Saajan Fernandes (Khan) and housewife Ila (Kaur). Saajan is a widower, well-regarded in the workplace but somewhat withdrawn from his colleagues. He doesn’t socialise outside of work, and he appears to be resigned to remaining alone. Ila has a husband, Rajeev (Vaid) who is distant from her, and from their young child, Yashvi (Nagar). Ila wants Rajeev to play more of an active part in their marriage; some nights he comes home and doesn’t say a word. Ila’s aunty (Achrekar), who lives in the flat above them, suggests that Ila make delicious lunches for Rajeev, in order to help rekindle the romance they used to have.

But instead of Rajeev receiving the first of these lunches, it’s Saajan who gets to discover just how good a cook Ila is. When she realises that her husband hasn’t been receiving the lunches, she leaves a note in the next one, advising the person who is getting them, about the mistake. Saajan is amused by this, but he’s even more enamoured by the quality of Ila’s cooking. He replies to her note, and so begins a correspondence that both keep to themselves, and which enables both of them to feel that there is more to life than the boundaries that seem to keep them hemmed in. As their relationship begins to deepen, Saajan has to cope with the irritating interruptions and attention of his successor, Shaikh (Siddiqui), while Ila has to cope with her father’s long-term illness, and the effect it’s having on her mother (Dubey), and the realisation that Rajeev is having an affair.

The first, and so far, only feature from Mumbai-born Ritesh Batra, The Lunchbox is so deceptively simple, and so elegantly complex, that it’s difficult to work out which of these two aspects is the more effective. Ostensibly a romantic drama with comedic overtones, the movie resists the temptation to be acceptably superficial, and instead, lays the groundwork for perceptive ruminations on growing old in modern India, and what it means to accept the role in life you believe you’ve been given. Through Saajan’s listless acceptance of his fate as a widower with no future in retirement, the movie casts an observant eye over what it is to become inured to a certain way of life, and to regard change as unobtainable. Saajan believes his fate is unavoidable, and in believing so, can do nothing about it.

Ila wants her husband back from wherever it is that his mind is taking him. She at least believes she can change things back to how they were, and has yet to resign herself to a stale marriage of convenience. But Rajeev’s continued indifference, and Ila’s eventual discovery of his infidelity, both serve to leave her feeling trapped and unable to make a better life for herself and Yashvi. Thankfully, Saajan’s enjoyment of her food, and his willingness to engage with her via the notes they send each other, allows her to feel that there is hope for the future, whether she leaves Rajeev and goes to live in Bhutan with Yashvi and Saajan (as he suggests at one point), or even if it’s just her and her daughter.

For Saajan, things are made more complicated by his age and his position in the workplace. After thirty-five exemplary years in the same job, he’s retiring out of some sense of commitment to the memory of his late wife. Closed off from everyone, including himself from time to time, Saajan has resigned himself to a life of anonymity and seclusion, and in a place, Nashik, for which he has little actual enthusiasm. It’s only through the persistence of his successor, the garrulous and irritating Shaikh, and Ila’s notes, that Saajan begins to come out of his shell. He becomes more outgoing, less gloomy, and he tolerates Shaikh’s ebullient behaviour, even when he joins Saajan for lunch and the older man finds himself sharing with the younger man – and is surprised to find he’s happy to do so.

Saajan and Ila’s relationship develops to the point where the audience is practically praying that they’ll meet and properly fall in love, and not rely on the kind of epistolary romance that suits a novel but not necessarily a movie (unless that movie is Whit Stillman’s Love & Friendship). But the course of true love is never known to run smoothly, and despite their obvious need for each other, Saajan’s awareness of the age difference between them leads him to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. An arranged meeting doesn’t go as planned, and their romance suffers as a result, leaving both parties to decide if what they had was even tangible. Decisions are made, and though they seem immutable, Batra’s clever script allows for optimism in the face of dramatic certainty.

Batra is helped immensely by his two leads. Khan is a perceptive, dignified actor, and he brings those qualities to bear on a role that requires him to reveal more and more about Saajan as the movie progresses. With his gaze registering bemused astonishment with every mouthful and smell of Ila’s cooking, Khan is a delight to watch, and he handles the disappointments and self-imposed barriers to living that Saajan endures with an emotional clarity that is an acting masterclass all by itself. Kaur is equally impressive. Whether Ila is trading quips or recipe tips with her aunty, or whether she’s coming to terms with the likelihood of a loveless marriage for years to come, the actress displays a range and an understanding of her character’s situation that is breathtaking to watch. Both actors are superb here, so much so that it’s very difficult to envisage anyone else in either role.

With Batra proving to be as good a screenwriter as he is a director, The Lunchbox is in very good hands throughout. He makes a background character out of the city of Mumbai, and the hustle and bustle of its streets and trains and buses – all constant reminders that life goes on around us, vibrant and compulsive, even if we choose to step back from it – is used to potent effect, as Saajan in particular experiences its highs and lows. Batra is aided by sterling work from DoP Michael Simmonds, and the movie’s slow, lyrical pace is courtesy of editor John F. Lyons. Scenes play out sometimes at such a stately pace that it’s hard to believe it’s all been agreed in advance, and that so many quiet moments could have such a cumulative, and remarkable effect. But the pace and the tone of the movie are aspects that have been achieved with a great deal of skill, and they serve the material with undisguised aplomb.

Rating: 9/10 – a beautifully observed, beautifully constructed movie that takes two trapped souls and sets them free by virtue of their finding in each other a kindred spirit, The Lunchbox is touching, affecting, stylish, and endlessly gracious in its delivery; a sparkling romantic drama that pays dividends from the very start, and which never short changes either its characters or its audience, it’s a movie that delights with ease, and lingers in the memory long after it’s over.

Monthly Roundup – September 2016

30 Friday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Andrew Asper, Antoine Fuqua, Ben-Hur, Chris Pratt, Denzel Washington, Drama, Elizabeth Mitchell, Fantasy, Florence Foster Jenkins, Frank Grillo, George Montgomery, Ghostbusters (2016), Glenn R. Miller, Historical drama, Horror, Hugh Grant, Ione Butler, Jack Huston, James DeMonaco, Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Meryl Streep, Paul Feig, Review, Richard Boone, Robbers' Roost, Sidney Salkow, Stephen Frears, The Magnificent Seven (2016), The Purge: Election Year, Thriller, Timur Bekmambetov, Toby Kebbell, Western, Zoombies

The Purge: Election Year (2016) / D: James DeMonaco / 109m

Cast: Frank Grillo, Elizabeth Mitchell, Mykelti Williamson, Joseph Julian Soria, Betty Gabriel, Terry Serpico, Edwin Hodge, Kyle Secor

Rating: 6/10 – several years after the events in The Purge: Anarchy (2014), ex-cop Leo Barnes (Grillo) is now head of security for Presidential candidate Senator Charlie Roan (Mitchell) – whose anti-Purge stance has made her a significant target come the latest Purge night; more of the same from writer/director DeMonaco, with the villainous Founding Fathers coming in for more grief thanks to the series’ need to avoid repeating itself, but without it actually finding a solution to the problem, all of which leads to The Purge: Election Year sounding good on paper, but proving instead that it’s an idea that’s already running out of steam.

Ben-Hur (2016) / D: Timur Bekmambetov / 125m

Cast: Jack Huston, Toby Kebbell, Rodrigo Santoro, Nazanin Boniadi, Ayelet Zurer, Pilou Asbæk, Morgan Freeman, Sofia Black-D’Elia

Rating: 3/10 – meh; a waste of time, money, resources, the cast, the crew, and another unwanted remake which ruins the one thing it should have moved Heaven and Earth to ensure it got right: yes, the chariot race, a sequence that’s assembled and edited so badly that you won’t have any idea what happens to Messala (Kebbell) other than that he loses.

Robbers’ Roost (1955) / D: Sidney Salkow / 83m

Cast: George Montgomery, Richard Boone, Sylvia Findley, Bruce Bennett, Peter Graves, Tony Romano, Warren Stevens

Rating: 6/10 – revenge is on the mind of cowboy Jim Wall (Montgomery) as he tries to track down the killers of his wife, some of whom he suspects may be part of a notorious gang of cattle rustlers led by Hank Hays (Boone); an average Western bolstered by a strong cast, Robbers’ Roost is rough and tough and bristling with repressed macho energy, all of which is channelled – eventually – into a less than exciting showdown, and an about-face by Hays that undermines both the character, and Boone’s enjoyable portrayal of him.

Florence Foster Jenkins (2016) / D: Stephen Frears / 111m

Cast: Meryl Streep, Hugh Grant, Simon Helberg, Rebecca Ferguson, Nina Arianda, Stanley Townsend, Allan Corduner, Christian McKay, David Haig, John Sessions, Brid Brennan

Rating: 7/10 – the true story of musically misguided socialite Florence Foster Jenkins (Streep) as she determines to bring her less than gifted voice to the unsuspecting ears of the public; as light and fluffy as a soufflé (and as enjoyable), Florence Foster Jenkins tries to be serious from time to time, but nothing can detract from Florence’s whimsical nature or the script’s determination to be nicer than nice, even when it needs to be a tad dramatic, such as when Florence’s husband (a terrific Hugh Grant) is shown to be having an affair, or Florence faces jeers rather than cheers from her audience.

The Magnificent Seven (2016) / D: Antoine Fuqua / 133m

Cast: Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D’Onofrio, Byung-hun Lee, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Martin Sensmeier, Peter Sarsgaard, Haley Bennett, Luke Grimes, Matt Bomer

Rating: 4/10 – a land-grabbing, thieving, murdering businessman (Sarsgaard) plays nasty with the small town of Rose Creek and threatens to ruin them all, leaving them with only one choice: to hire a band of mercenaries who’ll save the town and defeat the evil land baron; leaden and uninspired, Fuqua’s remake features characters you don’t care about, a huge body count that quickly becomes tedious to watch, and a cast that move about like they’re wading in treacle searching for some much needed motivation (not that they’re likely to find any, as it’s something the script isn’t interested in exploring in any real depth).

Zoombies (2016) / D: Glenn R. Miller / 87m

Cast: Ione Butler, Andrew Asper, LaLa Nestor, Kim Nielsen, Marcus Anderson, Brianna Joy Chomer, Ivan Djurovic, Aaron Groben, Kaiwi Lyman-Mersereau

Rating: 3/10 – somehow monkeys become infected with a virus that brings on zombie-like symptoms, and before you can shout “No, don’t open the door!”, they’re loose in the grounds of a massive zoo just days before it opens to the public; rubbish on a bargain basement level, Zoombies is lame in so many ways you’d need more time than the movie plays for to go through it all – and that’s if you can at least stomach the movie’s incessant inanity, and it’s seriously worst-ever gorilla suit.

Ghostbusters (2016) / D: Paul Feig / 116m

Cast: Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Leslie Jones, Kate McKinnon, Chris Hemsworth, Neil Casey, Michael Kenneth Williams, Matt Walsh, Andy Garcia, Cecily Strong, Ed Begley Jr, Charles Dance

Rating: 3/10 – more meh; a perfect example of just how out of tune some movie makers are when it comes to remakes, Ghostbusters is so lame it makes Ghostbusters II (1989) look like a masterpiece of comic horror fantasy, and labours consistently under the impression that if you put four comediennes together in the same room, instant hilarity will be the result – an idea that this farrago lays to rest speedily thanks to Feig and Katie Dippold’s creatively moribund screenplay (and let’s try to forget the awful cameos from Murray, Weaver, Ackroyd, and Hudson).

Me Before You (2016)

29 Thursday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Charles Dance, Comedy, Drama, Emilia Clarke, Euthanasia, Janet McTeer, Jojo Moyes, Literary adaptation, Quadriplegia, Review, Romance, Sam Claflin, Thea Sharrock

D: Thea Sharrock / 110m

Cast: Emilia Clarke, Sam Claflin, Janet McTeer, Charles Dance, Matthew Lewis, Brendan Coyle, Samantha Spiro, Jenna Coleman, Stephen Peacocke, Vanessa Kirby, Ben Lloyd-Hughes, Joanna Lumley

Will Traynor (Claflin) is young, smart, successful, and thanks to an accident involving a motorbike, a quadriplegic. Louisa Clark (Clarke) is also young, but while she’s smart enough and able bodied, she’s reached her mid-twenties without having travelled or worked anywhere except in the local cafe. Will is financially well off and can afford the best care available; he also has doting parents (McTeer, Dance) who don’t want him to limit himself because of his disability. Louisa, nicknamed Lou by everyone who knows her, lacks ambition, and has a fitness-obsessed boyfriend, Patrick (Lewis), who treats her like a member of his (non-existent) fan club. Will wants to die, and has agreed to give his parents six months before he does. Lou wants a life but doesn’t know how to go about claiming one.

Lou loses her job at the cafe. Will needs a live-in carer. Lou applies for the job despite having no previous experience. Will’s mother hires her anyway, surmising that Lou’s madcap personality can bring Will out of his bitter moods. At first it doesn’t work. But as time goes on, Lou and Will establish a friendship that sees both of them venture out of their shells, and begin to engage/re-engage with the wider world. Lou introduces Will to her family. They go on outings together. Patrick suspects that Lou has stronger feelings for Will than she’ll readily admit. Patrick is right. After Will suffers a recurring bout of pneumonia, Lou persuades Will to take a holiday to Mauritius. She goes with him, as does Will’s personal care-giver, Nathan (Peacocke). The night before they’re due to return, Lou tells Will she loves him. But Will has devastating news for her…

On the surface, Me Before You – adapted by Jojo Moyes from her novel of the same name – is a brisk romantic drama with comedic elements that is designed to tug at the heartstrings of viewers susceptible to this kind of thing, and leave them blubbing into their Kleenex by the movie’s end. And on a superficial level, the movie does this very well indeed, and is quite charming as it does so. But there’s a lot more going on in Me Before You than meets the eye; a lot more. The only question to ask is: how much of it is deliberate?

First there’s Lou, a bubbly, positive bundle of energy who pulls faces a lot when she’s nervous, and whose eyebrows appear to have (literally) wandered in from a documentary on endangered insects. She also has the worst fashion sense this side of anyone in either Zoolander movie. But she’s cute and she’s lovable, and she’s like an adorable puppy; she just wants to be liked sooooo much. But it’s not until she rounds on Will for being rude to her (for the umpteenth time) that their relationship truly begins. He stops behaving like an arse, she starts to like him. And romance begins to make itself felt, even if it’s only one-sided at first.

And secondly, there’s Will, a once-energetic, care-free young man who had the world at his feet, the admiration of his friends and colleagues, and a beautiful girlfriend (Kirby). He loses all that, and more besides. He loses the will to live, and he shuts himself away. He does his best to alienate the people around him, while refusing to show anyone just how much pain he’s in. When Lou chastises him for his behaviour it makes him rethink his approach, and the way he feels.

But that’s the wicked attitude that sits at the heart of the movie. Moyes, aided by director Sharrock and the twin efforts of Clarke and Claflin, brings these two lonely characters together and gives them an unrealistic chance at happiness. We’re told at the beginning that Will’s condition is irreversible, and we’re told his intentions soon after. And through Lou’s efforts at bringing Will out of his shell, the audience is persuaded to believe that there is hope – for Will, for Lou, for both of them as a couple. But it’s a false hope, and one that the movie focuses on for a large part of its running time. As each shared experience brings Lou and Will closer and closer to each other, the audience is encouraged to believe that there will be a glorious Happy Ever After.

But anyone who has been paying attention will know that true love doesn’t conquer all, and that in the real world, fairy tale romances have a nasty habit of folding under the pressure of expectations (it doesn’t help that Moyes has also written a sequel, helpfully entitled Me After You). And so it proves here, as the kind of wonderful romance that only happens in the movies is derailed by narrative considerations it cannot avoid. It’s like a kick in the teeth, and the average viewer could be forgiven for thinking that the movie has stopped being a positive message about overcoming the restrictions of a truncated lifestyle, and has become a glowing advert for euthanasia.

But strangely, such narrative concerns do little to hinder the movie’s charm and likeability. Despite the darkness at the heart of the story, Lou and Will’s burgeoning love affair is one that tugs at the heartstrings and proves impossible not to root for. Moyes is clever enough to make their relationship credible enough amid all of Lou’s self-doubt and Will’s hatred of his condition, and she and first-time director Sharrock are aided immensely by the performances of Clarke and Claflin. Both actors have the measure of both their characters and the drama that underlies the surface fluffiness of their romance. Clarke’s surprisingly malleable features express joy and sadness and confusion and worry with undeniable charm, while Claflin expresses more with a look than some actors manage with their whole body and a lengthy monologue.

Me Before You isn’t a perfect rom-dram – or rom-com – though it has the best elements of both, and it sometimes goes out of its way to paint an idealised picture of Will’s condition that is at odds with its own narrative agenda, but for all that it’s a warm-hearted, often very funny movie that is engaging, affecting and hugely enjoyable despite the last-minute change into movie-of-the-week melodramatics. And if it all looks a little too sleek and shiny in terms of its overall look, then chalk that one up to DoP Remi Adefarasin – he makes it all look like the fairy tale it so nearly is.

Rating: 8/10 – amiable and smart enough to overcome the necessity of its downbeat ending, Me Before You is entertaining, and full of light, lovely touches that should bring a smile to lovers of this type of movie; Clarke and Claflin are well-cast, and there’s good support from veterans McTeer and Dance, but it’s Moyes who earns the plaudits by retaining the structure and difficult denouement of her novel.

The Girl With All the Gifts (2016)

28 Wednesday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Colm McCarthy, Drama, Fungal infection, Gemma Arterton, Glenn Close, Horror, Hungries, Literary adaptation, M.R. Carey, Paddy Considine, Review, Sennia Nanua, Thriller

D: Colm McCarthy / 111m

Cast: Sennia Nanua, Gemma Arterton, Paddy Considine, Glenn Close, Anamaria Marinca, Fisayo Akinade, Anthony Welsh, Dominique Tipper

In the future, humanity has been infected by a variety of fungus known as Ophiocordyceps unilateralis. Victims lose the power to think and reason, and the basic need to eat living flesh becomes paramount. For this reason, the victims are called Hungries. But they won’t eat each other, only those who aren’t infected, and with the infection being passed on through blood and saliva, it’s even more important not to get bitten. Civilisation is in ruins, and what few survivors there are, are holed up in places like the army base located somewhere outside London. It’s here that the army, apparently under the command of Sgt. Parks (Considine), is working with a scientific team led by Dr Caroline Caldwell (Close), in an effort to find a cure for the fungal infection. Their best hope? Synthesizing an antidote from the brains and spinal columns of children who are second generation Hungries.

Second generation Hungries – children born with the infection – are able to think and reason but still hunger for flesh. There’s around twenty of them at the base, all kept in cells, and all kept in restraints when they attend their “schooling”. Their teacher, Helen Justineau (Arterton), is well-liked but naïve. She has a “class” favourite, Melanie (Nanua). Melanie is ten years old and very intelligent, even though she has no experience of the outside world, and she dotes on Helen as a surrogate mother. Meanwhile, Dr Caldwell is working her way through the children, using them (and then disposing of them) in her efforts to find a cure.

Inevitably, the base is overrun. In the melee that follows, Melanie saves Helen from being attacked, and they in turn are saved, unwittingly, by Sgt. Parks in an armoured vehicle. They, along with Dr Caldwell and two privates, Dillon (Welsh) and Gallagher (Akinade), escape into the nearby countryside. Their aim is to get to another base called the Beacon, but in order to do so, they find themselves having to travel through a Hungry-infested London, and having to rely on Melanie to help get them through…

At no point in The Girl With All the Gifts is the word zombie used or referred to. But this is clearly a movie featuring zombies, and there’s a significant amount of zombie carnage going on, but M.R. Carey’s adaptation of his novel of the same name isn’t really interested in all that. It’s an important part of the narrative, certainly, but the focus here is on watching Melanie become self-aware, and what that will ultimately mean for the non-Hungries she’s travelling with. As she learns more and more about the world she’s a part of, Carey’s best trick is to let Caldwell – so intent on doing good and saving the world – provide the impetus for the irrevocable choice that Melanie makes at the end of the movie (you’ll have to see the movie to find out what that is).

Along the way, Melanie’s interactions with Parks and Helen – her default step-parents, if you like – allows her to become more emotionally aware as well. Her initial doting on Helen, a young child’s needy infatuation, becomes more intense and more meaningful. Likewise, Parks’ simmering mistrust of Melanie and her motives gives way to mutual respect and trust, and Melanie learns from this as well. And when Gallagher is in danger from a group of feral Hungry children, it’s Melanie’s liking for him as an older brother that prompts her to insist they rescue him. All Melanie wants is to have a family around her, and even Caldwell fits into the mix as a grandmother figure. And thanks to the clarity and consideration found in Carey’s script, this need is defined without coming across as too laboured or too obvious.

It’s the personal relationships that anchor the movie, along with McCarthy’s strong, confident direction (all the more impressive for this being only his second feature), Kristian Milsted’s bleak yet arresting production design, and an eerie, unsettling score courtesy of Cristobal Tapia de Veer. With zombie movies virtually ten a penny these days, and with most looking to stand out from the crowd by virtue of any gimmicky concept they can come up with e.g. Zoombies (2016), The Girl With All the Gifts avoids such narrative and structural conceits by playing it completely straight and by applying studious attention to the details (though that’s not to say the script gets it right all the time; there are a handful of decisions made by the characters that don’t always add up).

The performances too are a major plus. Arterton, an actress whose career has never really taken off in the way that may have been expected, plays Helen with a quiet, sincere focus that gives the character a surprising depth. Considine is on equally fine form, Parks’ initial animosity toward Melanie giving way to the already mentioned respect, and the actor revealing an emotional quality to the character that could so easily have been overlooked. Close has the toughest role, as Caldwell’s single-minded pursuit of a cure creates more problems than it does answers, and leaves the character perilously near to being one-dimensional. But Close avoids this by imbuing Caldwell with an awareness of the cost to herself from her actions.

But this is Nanua’s movie. She gives such a finely nuanced performance that it’s hard to believe that this is her feature debut. As Melanie develops both emotionally and in terms of her relationships with the adults around her, Nanua displays a maturity that is quite impressive for her age, and her understanding of Melanie’s needs and desires is often very affecting. She tempers this with a no-nonsense, direct approach that matches the mood of the movie, and which allows her to dominate the scenes she’s in, making her more than a match for her more experienced co-stars. Wherever her career takes her, Nanua is off to a very good start, and her portrayal here is award worthy.

Rating: 8/10 – a post-apocalyptic thriller that boasts a clutch of very good performances and a tremendous sense of time and place, The Girl With All the Gifts is a surprisingly effective, and affecting, movie that breathes new life into a mostly moribund genre; it may not be the prettiest movie to watch, and it doesn’t shy away from being uncompromising when needed, but this is a genuinely rewarding movie that shouldn’t be missed.

Swiss Army Man (2016)

26 Monday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Corpse, Daniel Kwan, Daniel Radcliffe, Daniel Scheinert, Drama, Manny, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Paul Dano, Review

D: Daniel Scheinert, Daniel Kwan / 97m

Cast: Paul Dano, Daniel Radcliffe, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Antonia Ribero, Timothy Eulich, Richard Gross

Stranded and alone on an island in the Pacific, Hank Thompson (Dano) has decided to end it all. He’s going to hang himself. But as he’s about to do so he spies a man’s body lying on the shoreline. Hoping the man (Radcliffe) is still alive, Hank forgets about killing himself and rushes to the man’s side. But he’s too late. The man looks as if he’s been in the water for too long, and it’s also not long before the accumulation of the gases inside his body begin to make themselves known. At first, Hank is annoyed and dismayed by the noises (and smells) coming from the man’s corpse, but when the tide starts to carry him back out to sea, Hank realises that the dead man’s flatulence is the answer to his being stranded on the island. Hank straddles the dead man’s back, points him away from the island and lets the escaping gases propel them both across the open ocean. And then he falls off…

Hank comes to on another beach, but this time he’s not on an island somewhere. He’s made it to US soil. And so has the dead man. Feeling a debt of gratitude to the dead man, Hank takes his corpse with him as he begins his trek back to civilisation. That first night he seeks shelter in a cave. The next morning, the corpse begins to speak, hesitantly at first, and then with increasing fluency. His conversation, though, is naïve and childlike, and Hank finds himself having to explain much about life and love and the nature of relationships. The corpse, who Hank names Manny, sees a picture of Hank’s “girlfriend”, Sarah (Winstead), on Hank’s mobile phone. He becomes obsessed with meeting her, so much so that to appease him, Hank constructs a hideout in the woods where he can teach Manny the best way to approach her, and how to talk to her without sounding stupid.

When they move on, they discover that they’ve been nearer to civilisation than either could have expected. And by chance they find themselves in Sarah’s back yard, where her daughter, Chrissy (Ribero) is playing. She’s curious about them at first, but Manny starts talking about being dead and then alive thanks to Hank. Chrissy becomes scared, and Sarah comes out to see what’s going on. When she sees Hank and Manny, she calls the police. In turn, EMT’s arrive to take away Manny’s body, and Hank’s dad (Gross), whom he’s distant from, also turns up. But Hank can’t bear to be separated from Manny, and so he makes one last desperate act of compassion, one that astounds everyone.

At one point in Swiss Army Man, Hank tells Manny that, “You can’t just say anything that comes into your head, that’s bad talking.” Judged against the things that Hank doesn’t say, it’s a self-serving rebuke that highlights just how uncomfortable he is with his own thoughts. If, as seems likely – and despite the best efforts of writers/directors Scheinert and Kwan to make it seem otherwise – that Hank is imagining Manny’s return to life as a way of coping with his own issues of being alone (and not just on the island), then Hank is arguing with himself. Or more accurately, attempting to persuade himself that he doesn’t have to be alone, and that he can find happiness in a relationship with Sarah. But where you might expect Manny to act as a deus ex machina, a source of resolution for Hank’s emotional fragility, what Scheinert and Kwan do in their script – and achieve thanks to two standout performances by Dano and Radcliffe – is make Manny the unbridled id to Hank’s more cautious super-ego.

It all makes for a fascinating and delicately balanced examination of one man’s lack of faith in himself. In the same way that we never learn how Hank came to be on the island in the first place, we never learn who Manny really is and why he came to be washed up there either. But it makes perfect sense if you accept that Manny’s physical self is real, and that his subsequent, miraculous ability to talk is due to Hank’s attempts to work out, or through, his own emotional distance from everyone. For Hank, Manny offers him a chance to examine his life and begin to make a difference. But Manny’s “approach” to life is the antithesis of how Hank approaches life; it’s no coincidence that Manny appears to be more “alive” than Hank.

By “resurrecting” Manny and making him Hank’s companion and eventual friend, Scheinert and Kwan have created a unique cinematic relationship. There’s a troubling sequence around the hour mark where Hank dresses up as Sarah in order to teach Manny what to say and how to behave around her. From this we can discern the exact nature of Hank’s relationship with Sarah, and also just how important it is to him. The sequence is troubling for the way in which Hank readily becomes Sarah, and readily accepts the off-kilter “courtship” that ensues. It all leads to a moment that is both uncomfortable for the audience and potentially cathartic for Hank, but he backs away at the last second, content still to grab defeat from the jaws of victory.

It’s been said elsewhere, but Swiss Army Man is definitely unlike any other movie you’ve ever seen. As if its basic premise isn’t bizarre enough, Scheinert and Kwan’s decision to include metaphysical and reality-bending aspects to the narrative makes it even more extraordinary, and so too is their decision not to shy away from the more singular side effects of being a corpse (“Manny, I think your penis is guiding us home”). As mentioned before, the movie benefits greatly from the performances of Dano and Radcliffe, both actors unsurprisingly committed to their roles and unsurprisingly affecting, and effective, as two halves of the same person. Dano’s offbeat acting style suits Hank immensely, his tremulous delivery and poignant facial expressions matched perfectly by Radcliffe’s mostly static gaze and conscience-free dialogue.

Aside from Dano and Radcliffe’s involvement, the movie has plenty else to recommend it, from the two Daniels’ sense of the absurdity of Hank’s situation and his decreasing mental stability, to the crisp, carefully composed cinematography of Larkin Seiple, a catchy indie soundtrack, and a deliciously tart sense of humour that helps alleviate the inherent darkness of the material. It’s not a perfect movie – amongst other things there are too many continuity problems for that – but it is one that brings its own rewards if you’re willing to go along with it. Scheinert and Kwan are to be congratulated for coming up with such an unusual, and diverting, cinematic experience.

Rating: 8/10 – a movie that defies easy categorisation – and for once, that’s a good thing – Swiss Army Man is likely to divide audiences, and be unapologetic for doing so; if you go with it then it’s an outlandish yet entertaining treat, but if you don’t then you’re missing out on one of the most original, inventive and surprising movies made in recent years, and one replete with enough fart jokes to keep anyone and everyone happy.

Mini-Review: De Palma (2015)

25 Sunday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Brian De Palma, Career, Documentary, Interview, Jake Paltrow, Noah Baumbach, Review

D: Noah Baumbach, Jake Paltrow / 110m

With: Brian De Palma

It’s a great idea: take a movie maker whose career spans over fifty years, put him in front of a camera, and let him talk about that career in as much detail as he can. It’s a great idea, and it’s a simple one, and Brian De Palma is a perfect choice. He’s had a career with its fair share of ups and downs, critical and commercial successes and failures, and he’s not hesitant about defending some of the “poor choices” he’s made over the years. From his early days making student shorts such as Woton’s Wake (1962), De Palma is captivating and incisive about his work. He talks about each movie he’s made – some in more depth than others – but always with a view to explaining what he feels went right and what went wrong with each movie, and why. He talks about his disagreements with the studios, with screenwriters (De Palma is possibly the only director who worked with Robert Towne and thought he wasn’t doing a good enough job), and occasionally with actors (his remarks about Cliff Robertson are hilarious).

In terms of actual movie making, De Palma is a knowledgeable, avuncular storyteller, able to recall the reasons he made certain movies, the battles he had to fight to get some of them made, and why some weren’t as successful as others. His reasoning at times is a little self-serving (he still thinks The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990) holds up as a movie), and he’s dismissive of the critics and their views (unless that critic is Pauline Kael, who championed his work when few others would). He has some great anecdotes to tell about the likes of Robert De Niro and Sean Connery, and he’s not afraid to talk about the accusations of exploitation and Hitchcockian mimicry that have dogged his career.

There are well-chosen clips from each of De Palma’s movies, and most serve as visual references for his opinions and recollections. Here and there are revelations that many people won’t be aware of, or have seen, such as the alternative ending to Snake Eyes (1998), and his use of Michael Caine’s double in Dressed to Kill (1980). There’s a whole mineful of useful, interesting information being relayed here, and De Palma is an engaging, smart, occasionally witty interviewee; listening to him talk about the perils involved in getting a movie off the ground is like a masterclass in itself (and it’s happened to him way too often for comfort). But you also get a good sense of how tenacious he’s been in the past, and how determined he’s been to make the movies he’s wanted to make.

If there’s one issue that De Palma the movie is unable to address, it’s that De Palma the man goes unchallenged throughout. By giving De Palma a free pass, he’s allowed to make several remarks that would normally require further exploration (see The Bonfire of the Vanities). This leads, on occasion, to a number of moments where the viewer may be tempted to ask their own questions in the hope that De Palma somehow picks up on them. Someone once observed that “all directors are egomaniacs”, and while De Palma seems a little less egocentric than most, eagle-eyed viewers will notice that he rarely accepts any blame for those of his movies that didn’t work out so well. But then, De Palma is telling his story, not someone else’s, and like any artist who creates alternate realities for a living, sometimes the line between truth and reality can get blurred by self-interest.

Rating: 8/10 – fans of Brian De Palma will find his reminiscences and opinions of great interest, and even casual admirers will be drawn in by his winning (and occasionally) belligerent approach; as mentioned already, De Palma is a great idea, and one that could (and should) be used to capture the views and experiences of his contemporaries – so, calling Mr Spielberg, and Mr Scorsese, and Mr Coppola…

The Jackals (1967)

22 Thursday Sep 2016

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Bank robbers, Diana Ivarson, Drama, Gold mine, Prospector, Review, Robert D. Webb, Robert Gunner, South Africa, Vincent Price, Western

D: Robert D. Webb / 96m

Cast: Vincent Price, Diana Ivarson, Robert Gunner, Bob Courtney, Patrick Mynhardt, Bill Brewer, John Whiteley

The mid- to late Sixties were a strange time for Vincent Price’s career. Prior to making The Jackals, the actor had teamed with Roger Corman to make a series of gothic horrors based on the works of Edgar Allan Poe, made a handful of TV appearances in the likes of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, showed he could do camp as well as anyone else in two movies as Dr. Goldfoot, and proved especially hammy (though to good effect) with occasional appearances as Egghead in TV’s Batman. And then he made this: a Western filmed in South Africa – and possibly the oddest movie in his filmography.

A remake of Yellow Sky (1948), which starred Gregory Peck, Anne Baxter, and Richard Widmark, The Jackals begins with shots designed to establish its South African setting. We see zebras and elephants, and other animals, while a drum- and xylophone-based music score stands out awkwardly in the soundtrack’s foreground. We also see some snippets of tribal dancing until a group of cowboys are shown riding through the South African countryside. Soon they reach a small town, where they rob the bank. In the getaway, one of them is shot and killed. The group’s leader, Stretch (Gunner), persuades the rest to traverse an inhospitable desert area as a way of losing the posse chasing them. When they get to the other side, they find a ghost town, and the two remaining people who live there.

One is a young woman, Willie (Ivarson). She wants the men to go, but her grandfather, Oupa (Price), invites them to stay for as long as it takes for their horses to be well-rested. The men soon learn that Oupa is a prospector and has been working a nearby gold mine. At first, they intend to steal everything that the old man has accumulated, but Stretch’s attraction for Willie leads to his having a change of heart, and he strikes a deal with the old man that is meant to avoid any bloodshed. But two of Stretch’s men, Dandy (Courtney) and Gotz (Mynhardt), have their minds set on taking all the gold, and having their way with Willie. The longer they stay, the more that tempers flare, and Stretch’s command is called more and more into question, until Dandy can’t wait any more – and tries his best to remove his “competition”.

Why Price made this particular movie isn’t known. It’s likely he signed on because it meant a chance to visit South Africa, it’s also likely it was because it meant a change of pace and character for someone who had become somewhat typecast as a horror star (it didn’t help that he went from this to making Witchfinder General (1968) for Michael Reeves). Whatever the reason, the finished product is not one of his best; though he is the best thing in it, by a longshot. With a twinkle in his eye, and a laugh not too far from his lips, Price plays Oupa like the kindly old man he was in real life. He’s the only member of the cast who appears to be behaving normally (given the circumstances), and the only actor who can speak his/her lines without sounding like they’re still learning them.

But Price, despite being top-billed, is actually playing a supporting role. Off screen for much of the movie, Price has to leave the heavy lifting to contract players Gunner and Ivarson. Alas, neither of them are particularly convincing, especially as a romance develops between their characters and they’re required to look as if they’re attracted to each other. Gunner went on to make one more movie, playing the astronaut Landon in Planet of the Apes (1968), while Ivarson made three more movies before leaving the business. It’s easy to see why both actors didn’t have longer careers; Gunner looks tense and uncertain throughout, and makes hard work of his dialogue. Ivarson spits out her lines with venom, mistaking her character’s insecurity for hatred, and her performance is maddingly one-note as a result. Watching them both, you just wish and pray that they’ll loosen up at some point; sadly, they don’t.

They’re not helped by the vagaries of the script, a combination of Lamar Trotti’s 1948 screenplay and Harold Medford’s undistinguished update. The characters have all the traits of often-seen stereotypes, from Courtney’s scheming Dandy (the only one who looks as dapper as his name), to Brewer’s good-natured oaf, and on down to Whiteley’s callow youth. And with lines of the calibre of, “I just wanted to show you how safe you’d be if I really wanted to get rough” (spoken by Stretch after he forces himself on Willie), the movie strays too close to misogyny for comfort – and not just the once.

In the director’s chair, Webb adopts a tired, bare minimum approach that doesn’t help either. Scenes come and go in a perfunctory manner, as if most of them were assembled from first takes (there are a lot of continuity issues here), and lack the vitality needed to keep the audience involved with the material. Even the final shootout, usually the one aspect of a Western that most directors manage to get right, is so flatly choreographed and shot that by the time it’s over, it’s as much a relief for the viewer as it is for the characters. This was Webb’s last outing save for a couple of documentaries, and as swansong’s go isn’t one that can be recommended. As well as being unable to extract decent performances from his cast, he’s unable to elicit good work from his DoP, David Millin, or rescue the movie with his editor, Peter Grossett.

There’s too much that doesn’t work in The Jackals, and the whole thing is saddled (no pun intended) with a score that is completely South African in flavour and style, and which never matches the content or the mood of the narrative. All it does is remind the viewer that they’re watching a Western that’s been made in South Africa, and even though it’s a 20th Century Fox movie, it’s clear that concessions were made in order to get the movie agreed to and completed. As a further consequence of the movie’s low budget and scaled-back production values, it all leads to the realisation that whenever anyone is walking or running, it’s not footsteps that appear on the soundtrack but the sound of hoofbeats instead.

Rating: 4/10 – pretty meagre stuff, with poor performances from everyone except Price, and ineffectual direction from Webb, making The Jackals a disappointing experience from start to finish; as a curio it has a certain caché, but unless you’re a fan of Price there’s very little here to reward the casual viewer, and even less for regular Western enthusiasts.

NOTE: At present there is no trailer available for The Jackals.

Welcome to the World of High Concept/Low Return – Don’t Breathe (2016) and The Shallows (2016)

18 Sunday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Blake Lively, Blind man, Drama, Dylan Minnette, Fede Alvarez, Home invasion, Horror, Jane Levy, Jaume Collet-Serra, Medical student, Mexico, Murder, Review, Robbery, Seagull, Shark, Stephen Lang, Surfing, Thriller

Don’t Breathe (2016) / D: Fede Alvarez / 89m

Cast: Jane Levy, Dylan Minnette, Stephen Lang, Daniel Zovatto, Franciska Töröcsik

You can hear the pitch even now: “What if these thieves tried to steal a lot of money from someone, and that someone was blind and he trapped them in his house and turned the tables on them?” A grateful production executive greenlights the project in seconds, and sometime later, the finished project is hitting screens with all the fanfare required of an original thriller (Don’t Breathe is being advertised and touted as a horror movie. It’s not; but more of that later.)

However, the grateful production executive clearly abdicated any responsibility for the project once he gave it the go-ahead. If he hadn’t, then maybe he could have insisted that the basic storyline, the marginally interesting characters, and the increasingly silly narrative be better developed before filming began. Sadly, it wasn’t, and the intriguing pitch that started everything off goes nowhere fast before throwing itself head first into the Comedy Zone in its last twenty minutes.

Every year the critics – and audiences – latch on to a movie they believe is a cut above the rest when it comes to other thrillers/horror movies/comedies etc. Don’t Breathe is one such movie, but as it does so little to justify its elevated importance, it’s tempting to wonder if the critics – and audiences – have seen a completely different cut of the movie; and if they have, why aren’t we allowed to see it? The basic premise is somewhat intriguing – three delinquents, Rocky, Alex and Money (Levy, Minnette, Zovatto), decide to go for broke on their next robbery/home invasion, but come up against a blind man whose resourcefulness (and unnerving ability to be in the wrong place at the right time) puts them in a life or (mostly) death situation.

Alvarez is a rising star in the horror firmament, and his remake of Evil Dead (2013) was better than expected. But here he’s in classic thriller territory, with a group of “innocents” being pursued by a relentless killer (Lang’s preternatural blind man), and finding themselves pushed beyond their limits. And though Alvarez is undoubtedly talented, here it’s obvious that he doesn’t have any answers when a script breaks its own rules – repeatedly. The blind man is referred to as an Army veteran, and because he’s played by Lang, we know he’s going to be a hard man to beat. But where a blind person’s other senses are often enhanced, here they come and go on a whim and a prayer. One minute he can hear extremely well, enough to pinpoint someone’s position in a ventilation system, the next he can’t hear a heavily wounded Minnette sneak up on him.

The problem with Don’t Breathe is that it wants to be a thrill ride with bloody (but non-horror) moments, but it forgets to add the thrills. A string of attempts to escape the house are repeatedly set up for Rocky and Alex to fail (Money exits stage left early on), and the plot’s major “twist” seems at first to be “great”, but it’s more of a way to keep the plot from collapsing in on itself (and pad out what would otherwise be a pretty meagre running time). In the end, the script, by Alvarez and Rodo Sayagues, runs out of steam and values unfortunate laughs over the muted tension it’s achieved earlier on. And as for the coda, well, let’s just say that clumsy is as clumsy does, and the end of the movie is very, very clumsy indeed.

Rating: 5/10 – with no one to care about or root for, Don’t Breathe becomes an exercise in soulless thriller tropes that let’s down the viewer continually once the blind man makes his presence felt; notwithstanding an eerie sequence in the basement when the lights go out, and some excellent production design, the movie will have long-standing fans of the sub-genre yawning at the absurdity and hamfisted nature of it all.

The Shallows (2016) / D: Jaume Collet-Serra / 86m

Cast: Blake Lively, Óscar Jaenada, Angelo José Lozano Corzo, José Manuel Trujillo Salas, Brett Cullen, Sedona Legge, Diego Espejel

As with Don’t Breathe, you can hear the pitch just as clearly: “What if a surfer, a lone woman even, gets trapped on a rock two hundred yards from land, but can’t get there because there’s a huge great shark stopping her?” And once again, a grateful production executive greenlights the project in seconds, and sometime later, the finished project is hitting screens with all the fanfare required of an original thriller. And yet…

The problem with The Shallows, however, is that, like Don’t Breathe, you don’t get a chance to really care about the main character, Nancy (Lively). We get to spend an awful lot of time with her, and while her predicament is scary enough on its own, it isn’t really enough in general terms for it all to work as well and as harmoniously as it would like. We get some back story – Nancy’s making a pilgrimage to the beach her mother, who has died recently, fell in love with twenty-five years before – but it’s very perfunctory and serves to pad out the script at the movie’s beginning. Then we have an extended section that shows just how good a surfer Blake Lively’s stunt double is, before Nancy’s leg gets chomped on and she makes it to the rock (along with an injured seagull).

And then the movie does something unforgivable: it makes Nancy’s predicament boring to watch. As if realising that having its heroine stranded on a rock with nowhere to go isn’t quite as cinematic as it hoped, the movie brings in a drunken Mexican (and brings back two surfers from earlier on), and serves them up to the shark as a way of re-engaging the audience’s interest (the drunkard’s death is particularly nonsensical, and any viewer who doesn’t hang their head in despair at the way in which he goes to his death, should give up now if they think it makes any sense whatsoever). Then it’s full speed ahead to the final showdown, Nancy vs shark, and the kind of over the top outcome that provokes laughter instead of relief.

After a string of uneven yet mostly effective thrillers starring Liam Neeson – Unknown (2011), Non-Stop (2014), Run All Night (2015) – Collet-Serra seems unable to do anything positive with Anthony Jaswinski’s tension-free script. From the decision to shoot most of the movie against a green screen (making most shots and scenes look false and oddly lit), to failing to address issues of continuity (how do the two surfers fail to see the drunkard’s remains on the beach when they come back?), Collet-Serra allows the fractured narrative to play out with barely an attempt at tightening things up, or avoiding treating the viewer like a numpty (sure, you can “stitch” a bite wound with just a couple of pieces of jewellery and not bleed out – no problem).

As the injured yet resourceful Nancy, Lively is a good enough actress that she can overcome some of the more bizarre decisions her character makes – resetting a seagull’s dislocated wing, anyone? – but for most of the time she’s either yelling in pain or shouting for help. Some of the earlier scenes are geared around showing off her figure, and there’s a particularly gratuitous surfboard-cam cleavage shot that adds nothing to the sequence it appears in, but as the movie progresses she keeps covered up and her predicament is kept to the fore – until the end when she’s required to strip back down to her bikini. We may be in the twenty-first century but in certain regards, it seems, the times they aren’t a-changin’ (or are ever likely to).

Rating: 4/10 – a thriller that plays out by the odd numbers alone, The Shallows does everything it can to fall short of expectations and commitment; with its unhappy use of CGI, and an overbearing score courtesy of Marco Beltrami, it’s a movie that brings apathy and indifference to the table in ever increasing portions.

The Meddler (2015)

17 Saturday Sep 2016

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Bereavement, Comedy, Drama, J.K. Simmons, Lorene Scafaria, Mother/daughter relationship, Relationships, Review, Romance, Rose Byrne, Susan Sarandon, Widow

D: Lorene Scafaria / 103m

Cast: Susan Sarandon, Rose Byrne, J.K. Simmons, Jerrod Carmichael, Cecily Strong, Lucy Punch, Michael McKean, Jason Ritter, Jo Jordan

Marnie Minervini (Sarandon) is recently widowed. She has a daughter, Lori (Byrne), who lives and works in Los Angeles in the TV industry. At a loss as to what to do with her time, and despite being financially comfortable thanks to her late husband Joe’s foresight, Marnie chooses to focus her attention on Lori. But Marnie has no idea that her attentions are overbearing, and she ignores Lori’s protests that she’s trying too hard to involve herself in her daughter’s life. When Lori gets an plus-one invitation to a friend’s baby shower, Marnie invites herself along. Lori doesn’t show but Marnie is a hit with her daughter’s friends, and soon she’s spending more and more time with them, particularly Jillian (Strong), who reveals her wish to be married but who can’t afford it.

Marnie persuades Jillian to let her pay for the wedding, and soon she and Jillian’s friends (and Lori’s) are planning all the details, including the bridal outfit. Meanwhile, Lori announces that she’s going to New York for a while. The pilot she’s working on is being filmed there, and it makes sense for her to be there if any problems arise. Marnie throws herself into helping others, from the Genius at an Apple store, Freddy (Carmichael), to an elderly lady (Jordan) at the hospital where she volunteers. She even meets a retired policeman called Zipper (Simmons) when she inadvertently wanders into the background of a movie that’s being shot, and is mistaken for an extra.

A trip to New York to visit Lori and Joe’s family goes awry, and Marnie returns to Los Angeles chastened and beginning to realise just how much her grief has been channelled into helping others at the expense of herself. She spends more time with Zipper, and comes to Lori’s aid when she has an emergency. Jillian’s wedding goes off without a hitch, and Marnie is given a special mention for her help in organising it all. But Marnie still has to make a decision about whether or not she wants to continue as she is – constantly occupied yet unhappy – or begin a new stage in her life, one that will see her still helping others but not out of personal necessity.

While it’s an apt description of Marnie’s character (for the most part), The Meddler is only so apt when it applies to Marnie’s relationship with her daughter. Away from this, it’s not quite so appropriate, as Marnie’s actions are more altruistic than interfering. This leads to a curious fracturing of the narrative, as the scenes where Marnie uses her financial good fortune, and in the case of the old lady in the hospital her compassion, carry a less distinctive dramatic weight than in those where she spars with Lori for her daughter’s attention. It’s hard to determine if writer/director Scafaria, here following up her feature debut Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2012), intended it this way, or if it was something that was decided on in post-production.

What emerges is a movie that is able to examine an aging woman’s experience of grief and the twofold way in which she assimilates and deals with it. On the one hand, her relationship with Lori suffers because Marnie isn’t able to tell her daughter just how much she’s still hurting from the loss of the man who was so important to both of them. Instead she tries to protect and control Lori’s life to the extent that she’ll be kept perfectly safe – and Marnie won’t need to worry about losing her as well. That her actions are having precisely that very effect is the irony that compounds the situation, and stops things from being resolved between them. Scafaria makes a clever decision in their early scenes by playing up the humour inherent in the idea of an overbearing mother (at one point Lori suggests her mother take up a hobby; Marnie’s reply? “Maybe you could be my hobby!”). But the humour is gradually eroded and left behind in favour of exchanges that highlight the pain both women are suffering, and the additional pain their discord is causing each other.

Scafaria has created an emotionally complex, unfailingly brave character in Marnie Minervini, and she’s been blessed with the involvement of Sarandon in the role. The actress inhabits the part so completely, and with such ease, that it becomes a quiet masterclass in screen acting. Sarandon’s performance is so subtle, and so shaded, that often it seems she isn’t doing anything at all. And yet, every expression, every gaze, and every physical movement is in service to the character’s emotions, and her struggle to make sense of her continuing grief. To some degree we’re used to Sarandon giving impressive performances, but here she excels in a role that isn’t flashy, isn’t contrived, and isn’t weighted down by unnecessary layers. Sarandon doesn’t even attempt to make Marnie sympathetic beyond the fact of her being a widow; any sympathy Marnie receives from the viewer is earned through Sarandon’s careful attention to the character and the lessons she learns along the way.

If there’s one criticism that could be levelled at the movie, it’s that Sarandon’s performance is so good that it eclipses those of the rest of the cast. By comparison, Byrne and Simmons et al fall just that little bit short of impressing as much. It’s not their fault, nor is it Scafaria’s – Sarandon is just that good – but it does make the movie feel a little uneven, as if the secondary characters, while important to the overall story, lack the necessary colour to make them stand out. In any other movie it probably wouldn’t be a problem, but here it detracts from the effectiveness of the various relationships.

Elsewhere there’s still much to admire, from the storyline involving the old lady in the hospital who keeps using a hand to make circles in the air, and which is given a poignant resolution; to the brief scene with Joe’s relatives where a very important clue as to the depth of Marnie’s grief is revealed; and Zipper’s owning chickens, which leads to the line, “Turns out, for the optimal combination of happiness and productivity… All roads lead to Dolly [Parton].” These are all minor moments in the overall fabric of the movie, but their understated nature is perfectly in tune with the gentle, good-natured approach Scafaria brings to the material. It’s a simple story, told simply and well, and at no point is the viewer left on the outside looking in. The humour is there, the drama is there, and the pathos is there, and it’s all impeccably put together by its writer/director in conjunction with its editor, Kayla Emter.

Rating: 8/10 – movies like The Meddler come along maybe once or twice a year, and often go overlooked, which is a shame, as Scafaria’s heartfelt tale of unaddressed grief is moving, life-affirming and overwhelmingly positive in its outlook; Sarandon is magnificent, Scafaria directs her own script with skill and clarity, and the movie offers a slew of rewards for anyone lucky enough to see it.

Mini-Review: Café Society (2016)

14 Wednesday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Blake Lively, Comedy, Crime, Drama, Hollywood, Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart, Love, New York, Review, Romance, Steve Carell, The Thirties, Woody Allen

D: Woody Allen / 96m

Cast: Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart, Steve Carell, Blake Lively, Jeannie Berlin, Ken Stott, Corey Stoll, Sari Lennick, Stephen Kunken, Parker Posey, Paul Schneider, Anna Camp, Sheryl Lee

In the Thirties, naïve young Bobby Dorfman (Eisenberg) leaves the safety of his parents’ (Berlin, Stott) home in the Bronx to move to Hollywood and start a new life. Taken under the wing of his uncle, super-agent Phil Stern (Carell), Bobby is shown around town by Stern’s secretary, Vonnie (Stewart). He quickly falls in love with her, despite her having a boyfriend, and they spend a lot of time together. But when the man in Vonnie’s life reneges on a promise to leave his wife for her, she allows herself to be wooed by Bobby, and in time he asks her to marry him and go with him to New York (he’s bored by the shallowness of Hollywood and its denizens).

But Vonnie’s “boyfriend” finally leaves his wife and she chooses to marry him instead of Bobby. Heartbroken, and hardened by the experience, Bobby returns to New York where he goes to work with his older brother, Ben (Stoll), running a nightclub called Le Tropical. Ben has criminal ties, but keeps Bobby clear of any involvement. Eventually, Bobby meets and marries a recent divorceé, Veronica (Lively). They have a child, and the club becomes a focal point for the famous, the infamous, and everyone in between. Now settled firmly into the roles of husband, father and successful businessman, Bobby’s world is turned upside down when Vonnie pays a visit to Le Tropical with her husband, and it becomes clear that they still have feelings for each other.

Woody Allen’s latest, annual, offering is an outwardly frivolous affair that touches on many of the tropes that have kept his movie career going for nearly fifty years. There’s the relationship between an older man and a (much) younger woman; love denied; philosophical enquiries into the natures of life, love and art; class merits and social acceptance; ambition; and all wrapped up in a slightly more jaundiced approach than is usual. Beneath the glamour and the glitzy lifestyles on display in both Hollywood and New York, Allen makes it clear that happiness is much harder to find than it appears. It also appears to be much more of a commodity, as Bobby’s offer of a romantic life in New York is spurned for a superficial one in Hollywood.

Allen once again assembles a great cast with Eisenberg as yet another on-screen substitute for The Man Himself, and Stewart putting in her best performance in quite some time as the (not really) conflicted Vonnie. But it’s the supporting characters who steal the show, in particular Bobby’s aunt Evelyn (Lennick) and her pacifist husband, Leonard (Kunken). Their problem with an abusive neighbour provides a much needed break from the predictable nature of the central romance, while Stoll’s droll gangster is worthy of a movie of his own. It’s this imbalance that hurts the movie at times, as the romance between Vonnie and Bobby, though given due emphasis by Allen’s screenplay, isn’t as compelling as you’d expect. It’s the distractions from the main storyline that work better as a result, and while Allen peppers things with his trademark wit (“First a murderer, and now a Christian!”), it’s not enough to offset the familiarity of a romance seen too often before.

Rating: 7/10 – Vittorio Storaro’s gorgeous cinematography is Café Society‘s biggest draw, along with its cast, but this is ultimately a Woody Allen movie that sees him revisiting familiar ground to sporadically good effect; enjoyable enough then, but there’s a sense that Allen’s once-a-year workload is still providing similar returns with each new movie.

I Am Not a Serial Killer (2016)

12 Monday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Billy O'Brien, Christopher Lloyd, Clayton, Dan Wells, Drama, Funeral home, Horror, Laura Fraser, Literary adaptation, Max Records, Murders, Review, Serial killer, Sociopath

D: Billy O’Brien / 103m

Cast: Max Records, Christopher Lloyd, Laura Fraser, Christina Baldwin, Karl Geary, Dee Noah, Lucile Lawton, Anna Sundberg, Raymond Brandstrom, Michael Paul Levin

Welcome to the small US town of Clayton where the mutilated remains of one of the townsfolk ends up at the Cleaver-run funeral home. It’s actually the second such corpse to end up there, but the owner, April Cleaver (Fraser), isn’t too happy about the boost in business – given the circumstances. The same can’t be said for her son, John (Records), who views (literally) the bodies with a kind of excitement. Which isn’t surprising, as John has been recently diagnosed as a sociopath.

John ticks all the boxes for incipient sociopathy: bedwetting, pyromania and animal cruelty, but he’s self-aware and has a set of rules that he follows in order that he doesn’t act out on his violent impulses. He has a friend, Max (Brandstrom), that he hangs out with and does “normal” stuff, and he has a liking for a girl who lives across the road, Brooke (Lawton) (though he doesn’t know how to approach her, or talk to her even when she speaks to him). Aside from his mother, his aunt Margaret (Baldwin), and older sister Lauren (Sundberg), the only other people he interacts with are his therapist, Dr Neblin (Geary), and the elderly couple across the street, the Crowleys (Lloyd, Noah).

After the discovery of the second body, John starts to notice a mysterious man wandering around town and acting suspiciously. One day he follows the man, who bumps into Mr Crowley. Crowley is going ice fishing and the stranger invites himself along. John follows them out to a lake and watches as the stranger makes to stab the old man in the back. But John is astonished to see Crowley whirl round and using some kind of black, stick-like growth that shoots from his hand, kill the man instead. And then it gets weirder still…

What John sees causes him no end of confusion and indecision. But he’s also fascinated, impressed even on one level, and says nothing to anyone about what he’s seen. He begins to follow Crowley around town, until one afternoon the old man visits a barber’s. Once the other customers are gone, and the barber is distracted, Crowley locks the door and puts the Closed sign in the window. While he proceeds to kill the barber, John sets off the security alarm. Two policemen arrive, but when one of them discovers the barber’s body, Crowley kills both of them as well. Shocked, but also scared of putting anyone else in harm’s way, John decides that it’s down to him to do something about Crowley’s killing spree. But can he do it without betraying his own set of rules, and without giving in to the urges he manages to suppress?

Adapted from the novel of the same name by Dan Wells, I Am Not a Serial Killer is a dark comedy/drama that manages to work on several levels, and with a good deal of style and panache. Visually it’s a very dour, moody piece, even when Clayton is buried under a couple of feet of snow. Robbie Ryan’s cinematography is an obvious asset, whether it’s capturing the look and feel of a small town teetering on the edge of hysteria, or reflecting on the dark emotions that drive both John and Mr Crowley. (It’s a banner year for Ryan, with Ken Loach’s I, Daniel Blake and Andrea Arnold’s American Honey also lensed by him and due out.) As the movie progresses and the streets of Clayton become emptier and emptier, Ryan’s camerawork helps increase the sense of isolation experienced by the characters, and heightens the drama. For a relatively low budget movie, Ryan’s work is exemplary and helps elevate the somewhat uneven material.

This unevenness is due to the twists and turns of the story, some of which work perfectly – Crowley’s first on-screen kill – and some of which don’t – John’s mother being put in harm’s way near the end. In adapting Wells’s novel, O’Brien and co-screenwriter Christopher Hyde have rightly emphasised the struggle John has in keeping his impulses in check, but they’re less successful in examining and relating the reasons why he keeps Crowley’s secret to himself. He’s clearly appalled by both the fact of Crowley’s being a serial killer, and the manner in which he carries out his kills, and also that he’s been doing it for a very long time (there’s a nod to Lloyd’s role in the Back to the Future trilogy, as one of Crowley’s younger identities is called Emmett). This is at odds with his sociopathy, which is played with and included as and when the script requires it. Other emotional outbursts are also at odds with Dr Neblin’s diagnosis, and there’s even room for a last-minute joke to further call his condition into question.

Notions of sociopathy aside, John is a wholly sympathetic character that, strangely enough, audiences should be able to identify with. As a teenager, he has trouble fitting in, and as a protagonist he’s pro-active in ways that we’d like to think that we would be in a similar situation. As he and Crowley play their game of cat and mouse, it’s easy to root for him because even when he appears to have killed someone – a definite no-no according to the rules – John’s reaction is one of horror rather than indifference. What’s also very clever (and very cleverly handled) is the way in which Crowley is allowed to go from homicidal maniac to a character every bit as sympathetic as John, and with a compelling motive for his actions as well.

Threaded throughout the story are moments of rich, dark humour – John’s way of dealing with a bully, Max’s father being interviewed on TV while he’s part of an angry mob – and John’s family background is given its fair share of screen time, revealing greater depths to the characters than is usual. As the fractured family, Fraser is under-used as John’s mother, while Baldwin is the strong-willed yet fair aunt, and Sundberg pops in and out of the narrative to remind viewers that John isn’t the only one trying to figure out their place in life. As John, Records gives an intuitive, carefully modulated performance that matches the character’s feelings of paranoia, while Lloyd provides a perfect mix of pathos and menace as the neighbourly serial killer with an even darker secret.

O’Brien ensures the movie is never less than intriguing, and directs at an unhurried, deliberate pace which suits the material and gives the narrative room to breathe. He’s also able to ensure that when things get really weird, the viewer isn’t put off by these developments or left stranded in open disbelief (a likely occurrence if this was in the hands of a less confident director). And the denouement, when it arrives, is unexpectedly touching, a surprise that is pulled off with aplomb, and which makes the movie a much more rewarding experience than usual.

Rating: 8/10 – there’s much to admire about I Am Not a Serial Killer, from its familiar small town vibe to its potent murder scenes, and the many ways in which it manages to subvert those small town vibes in order to heighten the drama; Records and Lloyd make for great adversaries, the special effects in the movie are used sparingly and to good effect, and the whole thing is far more entertaining and enjoyable than its semi-morbid title would have you believe.

Zoom (2015)

11 Sunday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Alison Pill, Animation, Brazil, Breast enlargement, Canada, Comedy, Drama, Drugs, Gael García Bernal, Love dolls, Mariana Ximenes, Movie director, Pedro Morelli, Review, Sex, Tyler Labine, Writing

D: Pedro Morelli / 93m

Cast: Gael García Bernal, Alison Pill, Mariana Ximenes, Tyler Labine, Don McKellar, Claudia Ohana, Michael Eklund, Jennifer Irwin, Jason Priestley, Clé Bennett

A worker in a factory that produces state of the art love dolls. A movie director trying to make an artistic masterpiece. A model who discovers she has a talent for writing. Three people who aren’t connected. Or are they?

That’s the question you’ll be asking yourself if you watch Zoom, a freewheeling, energetic look at three lives that may or may not be intertwined, and one of which is presented in the same rotoscopic animation style as A Scanner Darkly (2006). Unafraid to take chances with its narrative, the movie invites the viewer along on a cleverly structured, and constructed, meta-ride that rewards them over and over again as the movie progresses. It’s a likeable, good-natured movie that appears to veer off in unlikely directions in an effort to be “different”. But this veering off is a major part of the movie’s charm, and while some twists and turns may seem frivolous, they all add to the huge amount of fun that can be had from Matt Hansen’s lively screenplay.

It certainly begins in an unexpected fashion, with two workers at a love doll factory, Emma (Pill) and Bob (Labine), having sex surrounded by the fruits of their labours. It’s both funny and disconcerting to see Emma and Bob being “watched” while they copulate, but it’s done in such a matter-of-fact way that the disconcerting aspect soon goes away (even if the love dolls’ voyeuristic perspective doesn’t). Alas, Bob’s post-coital attempts at conversation soon fall flat and he makes unflattering comments about the size of Emma’s breasts. An aspiring comic book artist, Emma has drawn a picture of herself as a voluptuous warrior princess; using this and Bob’s attitude as a spur for doing so, she goes ahead and has a breast enlargement.

Emma has also been chronicling the story of a movie director, Edward (Bernal), as he nears completion of his latest feature. Edward is known for making popular action movies but wants to make an artistic statement this time round, a fact he’s trying desperately hard to hide from studio head Marissa (Irwin). Meanwhile he lives a hedonistic lifestyle, often bedding two women at the same time. When Emma decides to put an end to this behaviour by severely reducing the size of his penis, Edward’s resulting loss of confidence begins to affect his ability in making his movie. And when Marissa finally sees a rough cut that ends too abruptly for her liking, Edward is persuaded to oversee further shooting that will add an action climax much like the ones he’s famous for.

Edward’s movie is about a Brazilian model, Michelle (Ximenes), whose career is far from fulfilling. An encounter with a publisher leads her to turn her back on modelling in order to write a novel. She leaves behind her less than supportive boyfriend, Dale (Priestley), and heads for a beach town in Brazil where she continues to write her story about a young woman who works in a love doll factory and wants bigger breasts. As Zoom continues, each story, already inextricably linked, reveals different facets of the wider story being told, and challenges our notions of what’s real and what’s fantasy.

Morelli juggles the various storylines and multiple perspectives with a confidence that draws out the subtle nuances and refinements of the script. Visual clues and riffs abound throughout, and there are a number of verbal references that serve to enhance the quick-witted nature of the narrative, and it all helps to take the viewer on a multi-stranded journey of discovery that never skimps on invention. Emma and Bob find themselves in possession of a large quantity of cocaine, the sale of which will help pay for the breast reduction she now wants. Michelle finds herself on the verge of a relationship with local bar owner, Alice (Ohana). Edward goes to ever-increasing lengths (no pun intended) to reassert his masculinity, even as his control over his movie defaults to his scheming colleague, Horowitz (McKellar). Each story grows closer and more connected to each other, until Hansen and Morelli manage to pull off something of a magic trick: three narratives become one and they all fit seamlessly together.

A tremendous amount of thought has been put into Zoom, and though a handful of scenes have the feel of having been added during shooting, the movie as a whole has a gleefully anarchic approach that is helped immeasurably by the commitment of its cast. Bernal, his performance augmented by the comic book style animation his storyline is presented in, plays Edward as a combination of preening pleasure seeker and tortured artist, and does so without making his character seem at odds with himself. Ximenes has arguably the most dramatic role, but acquits herself well, portraying Michelle’s determination and vulnerability with a poise and conviction that feels entirely natural. Labine provides his usual slacker screen persona (which isn’t a bad thing; he hasn’t worn out his welcome in the way that Seth Rogen has, for example), Michael Eklund adds another oddball role to his CV as a love doll customer with an uncomfortable demeanour, and McKellar is suitably venal and crafty as Edward’s “successor”.

But it’s Pill who most impresses. As the outwardly mousy Emma, Pill delivers a pitch perfect portrayal of a woman with bigger (pun intended) plans than anyone can imagine. Always undervalued and unappreciated for herself, Emma has a better focus on her life and what she wants than anyone else, and Pill is the movie’s consistent source of emotional honesty. Her open, expressive features (even when hidden behind some very large frames) have the ability to convey so many different feelings and emotions that watching her is always a pleasure. Just watch her in the scene where she tries to insist that her breast enlargement be reversed; the combination of her countenance and her vocal delivery is expressed with such delicacy that it’s a shame when the scene ends.

Zoom premiered a year ago today at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival, but has since been released in only a handful of countries. This is a shame as it’s an imaginative, skilfully handled tale that wears its quirkiness on its sleeve with pride, and offers anyone lucky enough to see it a very good time indeed. Morelli, Hansen, the cast, and everyone else involved in the movie should all be congratulated for achieving something that doesn’t conform to the moribund excesses of current Hollywood movie making.

Rating: 8/10 – an extremely pleasing mix of animation and standard photography, Zoom establishes each of its three storylines with speed and efficiency, and never relaxes in its efforts to surprise and entertain the viewer; a small-scale gem that deserves a wider audience – like so many other indie movies out there – it’s diverting and rewarding in equal measure and well worth checking out.

Black Tar Road (2016)

09 Friday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

A Junkie Love Story, Abovo Films, Amber Dawn Lee, Drama, Drugs, Love, Noelle Messier, Prostitution, Review, Truck stop

D: Amber Dawn Lee / 85m

Cast: Amber Dawn Lee, Noelle Messier, James Black, Darin Cooper, Jeff Chassler, Ron Allen, Eugenia Care, Leif Gantvoort

You’re an aspiring actress who wants to be known for more than roles as The Hottie in short The Bigfoot Hunters (2013), or as Hippie Barfly in lame horror Butterfly (2010). So what do you do? Simple: start your own production company and put your other talents as a writer and a producer and a director to the fore. Amber Dawn Lee did exactly that in 2010 when she formed Abovo Films. Six years on and we have the first feature made by Lee through her own production company, the abrasive romantic drama, Black Tar Road.

Originally titled A Junkie Love Story before its release, Black Tar Road is a bleak, occasionally disturbing look at love amongst the ruins of two women’s lives as they come together and find a semblance of happiness while nothing around them changes. Heather (Messier) is a hooker who finds her customers at a local truck stop. She’s tall, skinny, and by her own admission, not the prettiest woman to look at. But she has nowhere else to go, and no real ambitions to better herself other than to travel west to Pasadena. But even then she has no idea what she’ll do when she gets there. Charlie (Lee) is a trucker, working off a debt to a criminal gang by transporting illegal items around the American southwest. She’s a drug addict, too, injecting heroin at an often alarming rate but somehow managing to function. Beyond clearing her debt she too has no ambitions or plans; the only difference between her and Heather is that she at least has travelled, even if it is behind the wheel of a truck.

Their relationship begins in an offhand, casual way, in a bar. There’s an attraction on Charlie’s part that happens straight away, but Heather is looking for a friend to help make her life more bearable. She’s not looking for love as she doesn’t think it’s real anymore. Charlie thinks along similar lines, but the ease with which they come together as friends makes it inevitable that they’ll fall in love. As both director and writer, Lee doesn’t shy away from how broken these two women are, nor how much they want to feel normal (whatever that means for them). As their friendship develops and becomes sexual as well as more emotional, Lee’s script allows them a respite from the pain and disappointment of their regular lives. Together, they can block out all the bad stuff and ignore it for a while, but thanks to their own failings and their own individual problems, all that stuff is still going to be there to trip them up.

As Heather and Charlie become closer and more committed to each other, as well as the idea of their being a couple, there’s the likelihood that we’ll get to know more about them. Up til now, Lee has provided very little back story for either character, and while this doesn’t hinder our understanding of the two women, it does create a distance between them and the viewer that restricts the amount of sympathy we feel for them. Heather was popular in high school, and is reminded of this from time to time, but we don’t know the circumstances that have led her into prostitution. Likewise, Charlie’s addiction to heroin is presented as an integral, and important, part of her lifestyle and character. Lee refrains from exploring each character’s unwillingness to change (or at least try to); instead she makes their determination not to change a kind of feminist badge of honour, as both women try to convince each other, and the audience, that this is who they are and they don’t need to be any different.

Lee paints a pretty miserable picture of both women’s lives from the outset, and the first half an hour may test the patience of viewers who don’t like their movies to be quite so grim, but once Heather and Charlie begin their relationship in earnest, then Lee allows the movie to breathe a little. She lets the two women experience joy and hope in equal measure, and changes the parameters by which they relate to the world. Lee shoots several scenes in black and white to highlight the difference that their romance means to them, how simple their lives have become in these moments of intimacy and love. These are affecting moments, driven by the closeness and the bond between Heather and Charlie, and by Lee’s careful, though obvious, signposting of the way in which things might change for the worst.

As the beleaguered women, both Lee and Messier are on fine form. Lee plays Charlie as a more internalised role, a mostly quiet(er) counterpoint to Messier’s garrulous Heather. Charlie’s drug habit leaves her looking haggard and on the verge of death a lot of the time, and Lee isn’t afraid to look suitably ghastly. Heather has a nervous laugh that animates her face in a way that shows off her insecurity around other people; like Lee, Messier isn’t afraid to look worn-down or exhausted. Both actresses express a degree of fearlessness in their roles that adds texture and a coarse vitality to their roles, but they’re equally adept at showing the vulnerability and the tenderness that Heather and Charlie are able to show each other, and no one else.

For all its positive qualities though, Black Tar Road does founder at times, and Lee makes some narrative decisions that don’t make a lot of sense. Charlie does something that should see her pursued by the police, but once it’s done and she’s panicked a bit over it, it’s forgotten and never mentioned again. It’s a very unlikely outcome, and some viewers may well continue watching the movie waiting for this “something” to come back and bite Charlie in the ass. That it doesn’t is unfortunate, and the sequence in which it occurs ends up feeling like an unnecessary addition to Charlie’s storyline. Heather, meanwhile, looks after her grandmother, who is borderline catatonic. This never amounts to anything significant, unless it’s to show that Charlie and Heather aren’t entirely self-centred; if that’s the case, then it’s a very clumsy way of telling viewers something they’ll already have guessed for themselves. There’s also way too many scenes of Charlie shooting up and then waking up – often in the street – some time later; each time, she comes to, she gets up, and carries on as if it’s never happened.

At times unremittingly bleak – Heather contributes a voice over in the opening ten minutes that will have some viewers convinced this is going to be a suicide tale – Black Tar Road uses a framing device to provide a degree of optimism as to the movie’s eventual outcome. But said optimism is ultimately in short supply, and while this is in keeping with the not-so-cautionary tale that Lee is telling, any viewer approaching this movie expecting a happy ending, may be better off looking elsewhere.

Rating: 7/10 – a gritty drama that doesn’t send its main characters on a search for personal redemption – and is all the better for it – Black Tar Road overcomes some narrative fumbles along the way to become a low-key, bittersweet tale of love against the odds; at times earnest and impassioned, and buoyed by two impressive performances from Lee and Messier, the movie may appear too dour for its own good, but it’s a look on the dark sides of hope and personal need that succeeds more often than it fails.

Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising (2016)

06 Tuesday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Bad Neighbours 2, Chloë Grace Moretz, Comedy, Kappa Nu, Neighbours, Nicholas Stoller, Review, Rose Byrne, Sequel, Seth Rogen, Sorority, Zac Efron

aka Bad Neighbours 2

D: Nicholas Stoller / 92m

Cast: Seth Rogen, Zac Efron, Rose Byrne, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ike Barinholtz, Kiersey Clemons, Beanie Feldstein, Dave Franco, Jerrod Carmichael, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Elise Vargas, Zoey Vargas, John Early, Hannibal Buress, Selena Gomez, Kelsey Grammer, Lisa Kudrow

Meh (see also Mechanic: Resurrection and Bastille Day).

Rating: 3/10 – a disastrous sequel that should be subtitled The Movie Laughs Forgot, Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising is another “comedy” that barely succeeds in raising a smile, let alone any genuine outbursts of laughter; a lame retread of the original, the cast sleepwalk through their roles, the script allows for long stretches of tedium, Stoller appears to have been on holiday for the whole of shooting, and any chance of a good time is dismissed from the off, leaving the audience to wonder how on earth this was made in the first place.

Bastille Day (2016)

05 Monday Sep 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Action, Bombing, Charlotte Le Bon, CIA, Crime, Drama, Idris Elba, James Watkins, José Garcia, Kelly Reilly, Paris, RAPID, Review, Richard Madden, Thriller

D: James Watkins / 92m

Cast: Idris Elba, Richard Madden, Charlotte Le Bon, Kelly Reilly, José Garcia, Thierry Godard, Anatol Yusef

Meh (see also Mechanic: Resurrection).

Rating: 3/10 – uninspired, heavy-handed, preposterous, and as dead on arrival as the four victims of its fictional bombing, Bastille Day limps along from one turgid, barely credible scene to another with all the panache and style of a boxer who’s on the ropes and seeing double of everything; not even Elba’s stoic presence can save this Euro-mess of a movie, an action thriller that insults its audience at every turn, plays fast and loose with its own narrative, and which flags up every single plot development with all the subtlety of a punch in the face.

Monthly Roundup – August 2016

03 Saturday Sep 2016

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A Perfect Day, Aid workers, Animation, Benicio Del Toro, Blue Sky, Curt Siodmak, Denis Leary, Drama, Espionage, EVP, Fedja Stukan, Fernando León de Aranoa, Galen T. Chu, Harrison Gilbertson, Haunt, Haunted house, Horror, Ice Age: Collision Course, Ione Skye, Jacki Weaver, Jean Byron, John Leguizamo, Ken Hughes, King Donovan, Liana Liberato, Little Red Monkey, Mac Carter, Mélanie Thierry, Meteorite, Mike Thurmeier, Morello Curse, Murder, Nuclear scientists, Olga Kurylenko, Queen Latifah, Ray Romano, Review, Richard Carlson, Richard Conte, Rona Anderson, Russell Napier, Sci-fi, Scrat, Simon Pegg, Spaceship, Sylva Langova, The Balkans, The Fifties, The Magnetic Monster, Thriller, Tim Robbins

The Magnetic Monster (1953) / D: Curt Siodmak / 76m

Cast: Richard Carlson, King Donovan, Jean Byron, Harry Ellerbe, Leo Britt, Leonard Mudie, Byron Foulger, Michael Fox

Rating: 6/10 – a sample of selenium, bombarded with alpha waves, becomes a lethal danger to mankind as it develops exponentially – and only the A-Men from the Office of Scientific Investigation can stop it; an exposition heavy sci-fi thriller that takes time out for (stranger) domestic interludes involving Carlson and Bryan, The Magnetic Monster packs a lot in to its relatively short running time and is unexpectedly entertaining for all its techno-speak and overly serious demeanour.

Haunt (2014) / D: Mac Carter / 86m

Cast: Harrison Gilbertson, Liana Liberato, Ione Skye, Jacki Weaver, Brian Wimmer, Danielle Chuchran, Ella Harris, Carl Hadra

Rating: 3/10 – a family move into a house where tragedy struck the previous owners, and the son (Gilbertson), along with abused neighbour Sam (Liberato), discovers that the place is haunted by a vengeful spectre; muddled, confused and scare-free, Haunt aims for unsettling and frightening but misses by a mile thanks to weak plotting, a jumbled storyline, stock characters, absentee direction, and an overbearing score (and that’s without mentioning the performances, particularly Weaver’s – which is dreadful).

Ice Age: Collision Course (2016) / D: Mike Thurmeier, Galen T. Chu / 94m

Cast: Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary, Queen Latifah, Simon Pegg, Keke Palmer, Adam Devine, Wanda Sykes, Seann William Scott, Josh Peck, Jennifer Lopez, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Jessie J, Nick Offerman, Chris Wedge

Rating: 5/10 – while Scrat does his best to keep his acorn safe aboard a spaceship, his actions lead to a massive meteorite heading for Earth, which in turn leads to Manny (Romano) and the usual gang having to formulate a plan to avoid the extinction of them all; while the series can still manage to sprinkle a handful of inspired visual gags throughout each entry (and this is no different), the law of diminishing returns is having a savage effect on the storylines, with this outing proving less than inspired, and leaving the characters teetering on the edge of becoming their own caricatures.

Little Red Monkey (1955) / D: Ken Hughes / 71m

aka The Case of the Red Monkey

Cast: Richard Conte, Rona Anderson, Russell Napier, Sylva Langova, Colin Gordon, Donald Bisset, John King-Kelly, Bernard Rebel, Arnold Marlé, John Horsley

Rating: 7/10 – when several nuclear scientists are murdered, and the culprit appears to be a little red monkey, Scotland Yard and a visiting US State Department agent have to make sure that defecting Professor Leon Dushenko (Marlé) doesn’t end up dead as well; an agreeable, fast-paced thriller, Little Red Monkey mixes international espionage, early Cold War paranoia, romance, and intrigue to good effect, and thanks to the script by Hughes and James Eastwood, has a discreet Hitchcockian vibe that benefits it tremendously.

A Perfect Day (2015) / D: Fernando León de Aranoa / 106m

Cast: Benicio Del Toro, Tim Robbins, Olga Kurylenko, Mélanie Thierry, Fedja Stukan, Eldar Residovic, Sergi López

Rating: 7/10 – a group of aid workers in the war-torn Balkans try to have a dead body removed from a well that provides drinking water, and are met by every type of obstruction possible – bureaucratic, cultural, and just plain bizarre; A Perfect Day‘s very good cast can’t mitigate against the episodic nature of the story, or de Aranoa’s offhand treatment of some of the minor characters, but otherwise this is a pointed, unsentimental look at the quieter horrors that war can throw up, and when it wants to be, uses black humour as a trenchant counterpoint to all the tragedy.

Mechanic: Resurrection (2016)

31 Wednesday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Action, Arms dealers, Australia, Crime, Dennis Gansel, Drama, Hitman, Jason Statham, Jessica Alba, Malaysia, Michelle Yeoh, Review, Sequel, Thailand, Thriller, Tommy Lee Jones

D: Dennis Gansel / 99m

Cast: Jason Statham, Jessica Alba, Tommy Lee Jones, Michelle Yeoh, Sam Hazeldine, John Cenatiempo, Toby Eddington, Femi Elufowoju Jr, Anteo Quintavalle

Meh.

Rating: 3/10 – a terrible sequel that lies dead on the screen, Mechanic: Resurrection features some of the worst green screen work ever (the opening fight in Buenos Aires), a plot that makes absolutely no sense at all, and performances from all concerned that border almost on perfunctory – if only they could have made that much effort; action movies don’t have to tie up every loose end or narrative loophole, but this has a script that just doesn’t know when to give up and go home, making it one of the worst experiences you’re likely to have at the cinema all year.

Alive Inside (2014)

26 Friday Aug 2016

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Alzheimers, Bobby McFerrin, Care homes, Dan Cohen, Documentary, Elder care, Gregory Petsko, iPod, Memory, Michael Rossato-Bennett, Music, Music & Memory, Oliver Sacks, Review, Samite Mulando

aka Personal Song

D: Michael Rossato-Bennett / 78m

With: Dan Cohen, Oliver Sacks, Gregory Petsko, Samite Mulando, Bobby McFerrin, William Thomas, Michael Rossato-Bennett

It’s estimated that as many as 5.1 million Americans may have Alzheimer’s disease. If this figure is correct then the US healthcare system is in for a rocky ride in the decades to come, as that figure rises in line with a rapidly aging – and longer living – population, and the cost of medication to treat the condition rises right alongside it. But what if there was an alternative to the use of drugs such as NAMENDA XR®, or Aricept, an alternative that was also cheaper to implement?

Step forward Dan Cohen, founder of Music & Memory, “a non-profit organization that brings personalized music into the lives of the elderly or infirm through digital music technology”. Michael Rossato-Bennett’s inspiring documentary introduces us to the former consultant/trainer for the U.S. Department of Education as he attempts to convince healthcare professionals and pretty much anyone who will take notice, of the beneficial effects of music on the memories and cognisance of Alzheimer’s sufferers. Originally, Rossato-Bennett was meant to follow Cohen around for one day only, filming his attendance at a care home and recording the effects – if any – on the residents there. Using iPods and music choices that reflected the eras when these people were young, Cohen was able to prove that music could “reawaken” Alzheimer’s sufferers, and retrieve memories long believed lost.

Cohen found a perfect example in Henry, a ninety-four year old who was withdrawn and barely able to speak. Within moments of Henry’s being fitted with headphones and music from his youth played for him, he reacted with spontaneous enthusiasm. Henry responded in a way that amazed everyone, and the longer he listened the more articulate he became. He was able to tell Cohen how the music made him feel, and soon he was able to sing independently of the iPod, revealing a deep melodic voice almost unaffected by the passing of the years. (At this point, Rossato-Bennett decided one day of filming Cohen wasn’t enough: he followed him for the next three years.)

Other patients benefitted from Cohen’s approach to palliative care. While the drugs they were taking each day did little to alleviate their isolation, Cohen’s iPods brought people out of their lethargy. Families could reconnect with their loved ones again, and those sufferers who were still able to understand what the disease was doing to them were able to appreciate the renewed lease of life this music therapy afforded them. People like Denise, a bipolar schizophrenic who felt every emotion so intensely that her life was like being on an emotional rollercoaster. Cohen’s “intervention” saw her do away with the walking frame she’d been using constantly for the previous two years, and dance. And for the first time in a long time, she could honestly say she was happy.

With such dramatic but telling effects on a range of Alzheimer’s sufferers, it would seem absurd for the US healthcare system to ignore Cohen’s work. But you’d be wrong (if unsurprised). As Gregory Petsko, Professor of Bio-Chemistry and Chemistry at Brandeis University puts it so tellingly, he could write a prescription for a thousand dollar drug and no one would bat an eyelid. But if he wanted to prescribe a forty dollar iPod, then questions would be asked. It’s at this point that Cohen begins to encounter all manner of excuses from doctors and care providers unwilling to adopt his unique methods. (It’s not mainstream enough for them.)

Cohen perseveres though, focusing on the US care home system, but he makes a limited amount of headway, despite continued, and incontrovertible, evidence that his idea works. When the uptake of iPods ends up being less than one per cent, an exasperated Cohen throws in the towel. But the story doesn’t end there. Some time later, footage of Henry is posted on Reddit, and it goes viral, and now Cohen is appearing on television and promoting his use of iPods…

There’s a great deal of joy to be had from Alive Inside. Joy at seeing Alzheimer’s sufferers regain a semblance of their old selves, joy at knowing that this particular form of therapy works independently of any drugs, joy at seeing the relief and happiness it brings to families and loved ones, and joy that Cohen’s efforts haven’t all been for nothing. There’s something incredibly powerful and uplifting in seeing someone who is withdrawn – mentally, emotionally and physically – emerge as if from a deep sleep and re-engage with their past and their present surroundings. There are several of these moments in the movie, and rather than become expected or commonplace, each is a moment to be thankful for, a transformation that reinstates identity and awareness.

In between these powerful moments, Rossato-Bennett is astute enough to provide viewers with historical, social, medical and political contexts for the current state of care home facilities, particularly in light of the introduction in 1965 of Medicare and Medicaid. By treating Alzheimer’s sufferers as patients, the elder care programme has effectively mistreated millions of people in the forty-plus years since; they’ve been victims of a system that has failed to do anything other than make them physically comfortable for as long as possible. As one esteemed physician and researcher puts it, he’s worked in the field of dementia for thirty-eight years and he’s not been able to do anything as productive for dementia sufferers as Cohen has with his iPods. It’s admissions like these that add to the emotional impact of seeing the effect of music on so many people, especially when you have someone as authoritative as Oliver Sacks confirming that musical memories are able to withstand the ravages of Alzheimer’s far better than other kinds of memory. (If this is the case then why the hesitation in adopting Cohen’s idea?)

Cohen himself comes across as a committed, dedicated individual with a great deal of empathy for the people he meets, be they Alzheimer’s sufferers, care providers such as nurses, or the families struggling to come to terms with the premature “loss” of a loved one. As the movie follows him on his quest to improve the lives of so many “lost souls”, his approach and consideration of others serves as a reminder that we should cherish our time with our elders, and recognise their value as individuals, even if they are distant or unresponsive. It’s an important message, and one that shouldn’t be diluted or allowed to fade away. Thanks to Cohen and his efforts, and the reawakening of a man named Henry, that’s unlikely to happen anytime in the near future.

Rating: 8/10 – an impressive, solidly mounted documentary, Alive Inside skimps on statistics in its attempt to put across its feelgood story, but that’s a minor quibble when there’s so much that’s delightful to be had; Rossato-Bennett should be congratulated for his efforts, as his movie tells what could have been a remarkable if dour story with careful consideration and passion.

For further information about Dan Cohen and his work, visit http://musicandmemory.org

Spaceman (2016)

23 Tuesday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Baseball, Bill Lee, Brett Rapkin, Canada, Drama, Drugs, Ernie Hudson, Josh Duhamel, Literary adaptation, Pitcher, Review, Sport, True story, W. Earl Brown, Winter Ave Zoli

D: Brett Rapkin / 90m

Cast: Josh Duhamel, W. Earl Brown, Winter Ave Zoli, Ernie Hudson, Carlos Leal, Caroline Aaron, Claude Duhamel, Stefan Rollins, Wallace Langham

If you’ve heard of Bill Lee, one-time pitcher (and a left-handed pitcher at that) for the Boston Red Sox and the Montreal Expos, then chances are you also know about his drug-related background, his independence and need to challenge authority, plus his support for Maoist China, Greenpeace and school busing in Boston (amongst others). He was a well-known counterculture figure who appeared in an issue of the pro-marijuana magazine, High Times, and who once threatened to bite off the ear of an umpire in a 1975 World Series game. In later life, while still involved with baseball on a variety of levels, he was also asked to run for President of the United States on behalf of the Rhinoceros Party (his slogan: “No guns, no butter. Both can kill.”) If nothing else, Bill Lee has led an extraordinarily rich and eventful life.

Which makes Spaceman all the more confusing for focusing on the period that immediately follows the end of his professional career. Fired for one challenge to authority too many (walking out before a game in protest at the release of a fellow player), Lee (Duhamel) expects to get right back in the game, so confident is he that his unique skills as a pitcher will be more than enough to offset his off-the-pitch behaviour. But when the offers don’t come rolling in, Lee finds himself at a loss. His agent (and friend), Dick Dennis (Brown), keeps getting the runaround when he tries to contact the big league teams, and soon the message gets through: nobody wants him because everyone is tired of his shenanigans. He’s also thirty-six, and time isn’t on his side.

Lee’s also trying to do right by his three kids. He’s separated from his wife (Zoli) and can only have them over by arrangement. He’s as unorthodox a parent as he is a baseball player, but his relationships with his children are one of the few aspects of his life that he gets right. Otherwise, Lee smokes a lot of weed, drinks a lot of booze, and dreams of making it back into the Big Leagues. But the offers don’t come, his eventual divorce sees him deprived of any visitation rights, and to cap it all he receives an invitation to play for a Canadian seniors team. Intrigued and offended at the same time, Lee attends one of their matches, and helps them win. His need to play keeps him with the team for a while, until Dennis swings him a tryout for San Fran at their training facility in Phoenix. Lee motors all the way down there, only for the head coach (Langham) to dismiss him, and for Lee to learn that he won’t ever be taken back into the Big Leagues. A coaching offer comes along too, but the lure of playing sees him contemplating returning to Canada and resuming playing in the Seniors’ league.

Director Brett Rapkin has been here before. In 2003, he and fellow movie maker Josh Dixon joined Lee on a trip he was making to Cuba. The resulting footage made up the bulk of the documentary Spaceman: A Baseball Odyssey (2006). Ten years on and Rapkin’s decision to revisit Lee’s life (or at least a part of it) has led to his making a movie that starts off strong with Lee’s determination to stand up for his teammate, but then it settles into an amiable groove that is pleasant to watch but eventually becomes so placid that not even the scene where he loses his visitation rights scores any dramatic depth.

By focusing on a period when Lee wasn’t playing baseball, it seems that Rapkin (who also wrote the screenplay) has chosen to explore the nature of the man behind the legend. But when the man is the legend, there’s little room for any real exploration, and so we have several moments where Lee informs anyone who’ll listen that he needs to play baseball, several scenes where Lee mooches around at home in his Y-fronts, and even more scenes set in a bar where he squanders his time in playing the wounded, unappreciated hero. With the introduction of the Canadian seniors team, the movie does find something more interesting to focus on, but even then it continues to be more amiable than sharply detailed.

As the Spaceman, Duhamel makes up for his appearance in the dreadful Misconduct (2016) by infusing Lee with a great deal of charm and affability. The employment of a scruffy beard adds to the character, while his scenes with Zoli reveal the pain Lee is suffering at the collapse of his marriage (something that didn’t happen in real life). But on the whole, Duhamel has little to work with, and while he’s able to give a warm, occasionally disarming performance, he’s too confined by the conventional nature of the material and the flatly handled narrative. The supporting cast have even less to hang a performance on, with only Zoli making any kind of impression, playing Lee’s wife with a brittle dismay that seems all too appropriate.

While the movie as a whole is affectionate in its view of Lee and his anti-establishment outbursts, and his self-aggrandising, it does make an effort to remind viewers that for all his grandstanding he was an exceptional pitcher. At the San Fran tryouts, and before he’s sent on his way, Lee’s gift with a baseball is used to outclass an arrogant batsman, a scene that trades on an overly familiar scenario in sports movies while doing so with a valid sincerity (look closely at any shots of Lee pitching though and you’ll see that the shot has been reversed; Duhamel isn’t a leftie). Sadly, there are too few scenes of Lee doing what he did best, but thankfully, when there are they lift the movie out of the doldrums.

Rating: 5/10 – not a bad movie per se, but one that never aspires to be anything more than good-natured, Spaceman struggles to find any dramatic traction that might keep an audience from losing interest; ultimately, Rapkin’s debut feature shows him working at a purposely even keel and forgetting to add some highs and lows to give texture to his otherwise genial look at a baseball hero and his fall from the Big Leagues.

Suicide Squad (2016)

21 Sunday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Amanda Waller, Arkham Asylum, Belle Reve, Captain Boomerang, David Ayer, DC Universe, Deadshot, Drama, El Diablo, Enchantress, Harley Quinn, Jai Courtney, Jared Leto, Jay Hernandez, Joel Kinnaman, Killer Croc, Margot Robbie, Midway City, Review, Rick Flag, Task Force X, The Joker, Villains, Viola Davis, Warner Bros., Will Smith

D: David Ayer / 123m

Cast: Will Smith, Jared Leto, Margot Robbie, Joel Kinnaman, Viola Davis, Jai Courtney, Jay Hernandez, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Cara Delevingne, Karen Fukuhara, Scott Eastwood, Adam Beach, Ike Barinholtz, David Harbour, Common, Alain Chanoine, Ben Affleck, Ezra Miller

At the beginning of 2016, DC Comics fans had two movies to look forward to in the coming year: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Suicide Squad. Anticipation for both these movies was almost stratospherically high. But Batman v Superman proved to be a messy affair that lacked coherence and couldn’t even give audiences a rousing showdown between the Caped Crusader and the Man of Steel. Critically pounded, and causing a division between fans that in some quarters got way too heated, the movie fell short of making a billion dollars at the box office, and was judged a disappointment. Earlier this month, an extended cut of the film was released on home video, and though the extra footage tidied up a few things left adrift in the theatrical cut, the general consensus was that the additional thirty minutes didn’t make it a better movie.

Fans quickly turned their attention to Suicide Squad to save the day, and the hype began all over again. In development since 2009, the movie arrives now with all the fanfare of a Second Coming. Promoted and advertised and pushed for all it’s worth (IMAX screenings feature a new, Suicide Squad-inspired countdown that’s a nice but unnecessary gimmick), this was Warner Bros.’ chance to prove that they were listening when critics and fans alike said Batman v Superman was too dark and sombre. Director David Ayer promised there would be humour, and the tone would be lighter. Has he delivered? Predictably, the answer is yes and no.

Suicide Squad is, first and foremost, just as messy as it’s DC Extended Universe predecessor. Its plotting is murky and frustratingly lacking in detail, character motivations vary wildly (sometimes in the same scene), there’s the usual over-reliance on a surfeit of destruction-porn, and no one to root for or care about, even though the script does try its best to make Deadshot (Smith) and El Diablo (Hernandez) at least halfway sympathetic. What fun there is to be had can be found in the opening twenty minutes as we’re introduced to each member of the squad, from the assassin who never misses with a gun, Deadshot, to meta-humans such as Killer Croc (Akinnuoye-Agbaje) and El Diablo, wicked witch Enchantress (Delevingne) and her human host June Moone (also Delevingne), thief extraordinaire Captain Boomerang (Courtney), and brain-fried Daddy’s Lil Monster, Harley Quinn (Robbie). Watching these characters interact with and defy authority at every turn gives hope to the direction the movie is heading in, but that hope is short-lived.

Assembled by government spook Amanda Waller (Davis), the squad is a fail-safe option if someone were to come along with Superman’s abilities and use them for evil. With explosive devices implanted in their necks to stop them absconding, the squad, led by Colonel Rick Flag (Kinnaman), are tasked with a mission in Midway City when Enchantress and her brother Incubus (Chanoine) begin building a machine that will destroy all other weapons on the planet and – well, this is one of those plot points that sounds great but is actually quite lame and badly thought out. With Flag and the squad further augmented by expert swordswoman Katana (Fukuhara), escape specialist Slipknot (Beach), and two teams of soldiers, they venture into the randomly destroyed city in search of a High Value Target to rescue. But Waller and Flag have been less than honest about the mission, and the squad must decide if working together is a more appropriate way forward than going their own ways.

It’s clear from the start that Suicide Squad wants to be edgy and smart, caustic and irreverent, and provide a great time for its audience. But as the movie progresses, and once the introductions are over, it soon becomes clear that these so-called supervillains are going to be trapped by the demands of a script that wants to show that, deep down, they’re all really good guys at heart. As a result, this leads to a watering down of the original concept – Worst.Heroes.Ever. – that should be revised to read Best.Antiheroes.Ever. Yes, they’re largely antisocial, and yes they have their issues with authority, and yes they haven’t got a problem with killing people (mostly), but by the end they’ve all bonded and are like one big happy dysfunctional family. It’s enough to tug at the heart strings.

And then there’s the Joker (Leto). Much has been made of Leto’s insistence on staying in character for the duration of the shoot – Smith has quipped that he didn’t meet Leto until after filming was completed – and the Joker’s heavily tattooed look. But it’s all immaterial as Leto is on screen for around fifteen to twenty minutes in total, in a subplot that sees him try to rescue Harley Quinn from being part of the squad. With the Joker reduced to a supporting role it’s hard to qualify Leto’s performance. Yes it’s mannered, heavily so, and completely different from any previous interpretations, but the script depicts him as a lunatic gangster figure rather than the Clown Prince of Chaos. The character has room for development, then, but right now his need to rescue Quinn keeps him working to a standard plotline and any antic diversions seem forced.

In what is fast becoming the one area in which Warner Bros. seems unable to act on the recommendations of others, Suicide Squad ramps up the destruction on offer, with endless gunfights and property devastation the order of the day. It’s all accompanied by one of recent cinema’s more overwhelming and intrusive scores (courtesy of Steven Price), a blaring cacophony of dramatic musical cues and declamatory passages that reinforce just how much the movie is like being hit repeatedly over the head (and by Harley Quinn’s mallet at that). Ayer can’t stop things from getting too overwrought in the movie’s final half hour, and inevitably any subtlety is made to hide in the shadows where it can’t interfere with anything.

Against all this the cast do their best, with Smith atoning for some recent poor choices by making Deadshot likeable and charismatic. Robbie has the most fun, and is the most fun to watch, but after a while the chirpy attitude and cheesy wisecracks begin to grate, and Ayer does away with any development the character has made as if it never happened, leaving her no different from how she was at the start. Davis essays the real villain of the piece, but once that particular “surprise” is established the character stops being interesting, as does her motivation, and she’s wisely sidelined. Kinnaman does stolid with ease but fails to make Flag memorable, while Hernandez makes El Diablo a surprisingly well-rounded character, less of a supervillain, and more Hulk-like in terms of his anger issues.

The movie is further hampered by Ayer’s insistence on giving the movie a noir feel instead of a comic book feel, and John Gilroy’s haphazard, wayward approach to the editing. Other odd moments/decisions stand out: Deadshot looking like a pimp when he’s out with his daughter; Enchantress swaying like a woman trying to keep up an invisible hula hoop; several flashbacks that slow the movie’s rhythm; a scene where El Diablo reveals a tragic consequence to his ability that feels out of place; and an origin story for Quinn that involves falling into a chemical vat for the sake of it.

Rating: 5/10 – slightly better than Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (but only slightly), Suicide Squad still has enough problems to stop it from becoming the first DC Extended Universe movie to overcome the series’ usual pitfalls; shedding its claim to being edgy and different with every minute that passes, the movie is further proof that Warner Bros. and DC need to work harder on their game plan, and that copying Marvel isn’t necessarily the right idea.

Jason Bourne (2016)

20 Saturday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Alicia Vikander, Asset, Athens, Berlin, Black ops, CIA, Drama, Iron Hand, Las Vegas, London, Matt Damon, Paul Greengrass, Review, Sequel, Thriller, Tommy Lee Jones, Vincent Cassel

D: Paul Greengrass / 123m

Cast: Matt Damon, Tommy Lee Jones, Alicia Vikander, Vincent Cassel, Julia Stiles, Riz Ahmed, Ato Essandoh, Scott Shepherd, Bill Camp, Vinzenz Kiefer, Stephen Kunken, Gregg Henry

The original Bourne movie trilogy was smart, inventive, thrilling, and a massive boost for the ailing spy genre. It made an action hero of Matt Damon, featured action sequences that were fresh and exciting, and had an emotionally complex through-line that bolstered the already intense plotting. At the end of The Bourne Ultimatum, David Webb had gained the answers to questions that had plagued him ever since he’d been saved from a watery grave by the crew of a fishing boat.

Except… he hasn’t, not really. The closing lines from The Bourne Ultimatum – “I remember. I remember everything.” – are repeated here at the movie’s beginning, and are followed by a montage of scenes from the original trilogy (as far as this movie is concerned, The Bourne Legacy (2012) never happened). But in amongst these memories are flashes of scenes we haven’t seen before. And when Jason Bourne snaps out of his reverie, we find him in the back of a truck and heading for an illegal fight ground in Greece. Clearly the years since he took down Treadstone and Blackbriar haven’t been good to him: despite his fighting prowess he still looks lost. And the bad dreams, or reveries, he’s experiencing aren’t helping. For someone who “remembers everything”, he’s having some of the most spectacularly disturbing and disorienting dreams ever. And he can’t make sense of them, especially the ones that involve his father, Richard Webb (Henry).

Help comes in the familiar but unexpected form of ex-CIA analyst Nicky Parsons (Stiles). Having hacked into the CIA mainframe, she’s done so with the aim of helping Bourne learn more about his past, and has discovered that his father had a greater role in the Treadstone programme than Bourne has been led to believe. But in hacking the CIA, Nicky has become a target and her contacting Bourne in Athens leads to his getting “back in the game”. With CIA operatives on their trail, as well as an Asset (Cassel), Bourne gains access to the information Nicky hacked, and once he becomes aware of his father’s involvement, he finds his enrolment in the Treadstone program wasn’t as clear cut as he thought. But as before, his reappearance has senior members of the CIA, including Director Robert Dewey (Jones), unwilling to let Bourne expose their Black Ops programs. Using a combination of the Asset and the head of the Cyber Crimes Division, Heather Lee (Vikander), to track down Bourne and eliminate him once and for all, Dewey plots to keep the CIA’s secrets as hidden as ever.

Fans of the Bourne Trilogy are generally dismissive of The Bourne Legacy, the Jeremy Renner starring addition to the series that failed to add anything new to the mix, and which felt like an uninspired retread of everything that had gone before. Matt Damon famously turned down the chance to cameo in Legacy, and made it clear that he wouldn’t return to the franchise unless Paul Greengrass was back on board as well. Well, Damon got his wish, and Greengrass is back as the movie’s director. But perhaps Damon should have made another stipulation: that Greengrass didn’t write the script.

Jason Bourne has many of the same attributes that The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum share. There’s the generous use of “shaky cam”, Christopher Rouse’s exemplary editing, excellent location work, and a series of intense and very well-staged action sequences (one of the series major strengths). But there’s one aspect that’s missing this time round, and aside from Greengrass’s muscular directorial style, it’s perhaps the series’ most important component: the contribution of Tony Gilroy. As screenwriter of the first two movies, and co-screenwriter of the third (though his input was drastically reduced), as well as Legacy‘s writer/director, Gilroy helped guide the series from its inauspicious beginnings to a position of critical and commercial success worldwide. His scripts had intelligence, depth and subtlety, and his villains were drawn with a vividness and care that made them worthy adversaries.

But without Gilroy (no doubt a casualty of The Bourne Legacy‘s poor reception), Jason Bourne proves just as disappointing as its unacknowledged predecessor. Nearly ten years on from the events of Ultimatum, Bourne is still an emotional mess, haunted by memory fragments that cause him pain and regret. He looks awful, and Damon plays him like a man besieged. For a man who found all the answers he needed, Bourne looks even more tormented than when he was in the dark. The movie never really attempts to explain why this is the case, preferring instead to give audiences a tortured Bourne without expanding on his back story. As a result, his decision to jump back in, prompted by some spurious nonsense involving his father, seems perfunctory instead of necessary.

With Bourne himself treated in such a cavalier fashion – he’s really just a one-man wrecking crew here – the other characters fare just as badly. Dewey is a stock villain, one step removed from twirling an invisible moustache and muttering “mwah-ha-ha!” whenever the script has him do something nefarious. Jones has no chance with the role, and there are times when his awareness of this comes through loud and clear; just watch his scenes with Vikander, and ask yourself if he looks committed. Cassel’s Asset is fuelled by revenge for the torture he suffered through Bourne’s exposure of the Blackbriar program, but as the character spends an inordinate amount of time running around chasing Bourne without actually catching him, his anger (and his back story) gets shoved to the side. And then there’s Heather Lee, the Cyber Crimes head who acts as this movie’s Pamela Landy. There’s supposed to be some mystery as to which side she’s on (she helps Bourne in various ways while pushing a separate CIA agenda), but thanks to Greengrass’s less than subtle direction, Vikander never looks anything other than extremely distrustful.

And then there’s the small but important matter of how Bourne gets about. From Greece he travels to Berlin, then to London. He does so on his own, without any help from anyone, and manages to elude detection at every turn (a facet of the series that was usually, and very cleverly explained away – but not here). And yet when he travels from London to Las Vegas he does so by commercial aircraft, and though he receives assistance from Lee in getting through US Customs, it still begs the question how UK Customs didn’t flag him up in the first place. (Also, it seems that outside of Athens and Las Vegas there’s not the CCTV infrastructure to allow the CIA to track Bourne efficiently anywhere else.) And stop and think about this: in Las Vegas, at an expo for a communications platform that Dewey wants to appropriate – don’t ask – Bourne picks up various conveniently placed bugging devices that he uses to get to Dewey, all of which begs the question, what plan did he have originally (as he couldn’t have known they were there beforehand)?

Gaping plot holes like these only add to the realisation that Jason Bourne is a less than rewarding, less than necessary sequel to four previous movies (three of which had already told the story effectively and with impressive style), that throws in a handful of rousing action sequences, makes Bourne indestructible, has a subplot involving a communications platform – actually, still don’t ask – and features some of the blandest characters in the whole series. Greengrass is a mercurial director, with a great visual style, but he’s not as good a screenwriter as he might think, and along with Rouse, he makes things too simplistic for the movie’s own good. The end result? A movie that only takes off when it’s throwing punches or chasing SWAT vehicles.

Rating: 5/10 – a missed opportunity to enhance and expand on the series, Jason Bourne trades on nostalgia instead of bringing something new to the franchise; Bourne looks tired throughout, as does Jones, and by the movie’s end the viewer will feel exactly the same way.

600 Miles (2015)

16 Tuesday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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ATF, Crime, Drama, Gabriel Ripstein, Gun running, Hostage, Kristyan Ferrer, Mexican cartel, Mexico, Review, Thriller, Tim Roth

Original title: 600 Millas

D: Gabriel Ripstein / 84m

Cast: Tim Roth, Kristyan Ferrer, Noé Hernández, Harrison Thomas, Armando Hernández, Mónica Del Carmen, Orlando Moguel, Gilberto Barraza, Harris Kendall, Ángel Sosa

Trading on long static shots and a stately pace in which to anchor its two leading characters, first-time writer/director Gabriel Ripstein has made a movie that takes an interesting (if not original) idea and transforms it into a movie that moves bluntly from scene to scene, and rarely seeks to engage with its audience. It’s a crime drama where the crime is incidental, a road trip movie where the journey is nothing more than a journey, and a buddy movie which lacks any real sense that its two main protagonists have really bonded (this is particularly thrown into sharp relief thanks to the movie’s final two scenes, the second of which has a real sting in the tale).

It also takes a long while to bring its two central characters together. Arnulfo (Ferrer), along with his bully of a friend, Carson (Thomas), smuggles guns into Mexico for a cartel. He’s a young man who lacks self-confidence, and he wants to impress his bosses, but he’s awkward and unsure of himself when he’s around them. Several runs go without incident, and Arnulfo begins to feel more confident. He meets a girl he likes and begins a (very) tentative romance.

What Arnulfo is unaware of is that his activities are being monitored by ATF agent Hank Harris (Roth). Every time he and Carson buy guns to take into Mexico, Harris is right there to collect the details of their purchases. When he finally has enough evidence to arrest them, Harris approaches Arnulfo’s truck while he waits outside a gunsmith’s for Carson to come out. Carson manages to overpower Harris before leaving Arnulfo with the problem of what to do with him. Panicked by the whole thing, Arnulfo puts Harris in the back of the truck, and not knowing what else to do, decides to drive the six hundred miles to the cartel’s base. He believes that the cartel will be able to use Harris for information.

But six hundred miles is a long way, and though Harris is stuck in a hidden section of the truck until they cross the Mexican border, once in Mexico, Arnulfo lets him ride up front, albeit tied up. And so begins a long, drawn-out section of the movie where Harris and Arnulfo get to know each other a bit better – but not in such a way that they can call themselves newfound friends. In fact, if anything, their relationship (such as it is) has the feel of a fait accompli, a way for Ripstein to pass the time until he can get to the inevitable showdown at cartel HQ. (There’s also an attempt at emotional confliction due to the fact that one of the cartel bosses is Arnulfo’s uncle.)

Alas, for all of Ripstein’s efforts, 600 Miles is as arid as the Mexican desert vistas we see in the movie. By taking an almost documentary approach to the material, and by stripping back the narrative to almost bare minimum levels, Ripstein has ensured that the movie looks good but is scarce on incident, and his characters seem to be devoid of an inner life. As a result, it’s difficult to care what happens to Harris and Arnulfo, and it’s even harder to imagine their journey together as being anything other than a chore for both to get through. Even though Arnulfo is trying to do “the right thing” as he sees it, his naïve decision has potential consequences that even he should be able to foresee. That he doesn’t is too ingenuous for the movie’s own good, and there are further instances where Ripstein’s dramatic needs – such as they are – mean that Arnulfo undergoes too many emotional transformations for them to work effectively.

As the troubled young man, Ferrer adopts a shy, deferential demeanour that fits well with the character’s insecurity and lack of worldly experience. By contrast, Roth is all silent stares and dishevelled authority. He’s a weary man in a weary job, as inured by ennui as Arnulfo is by immaturity. He’s not even very good at his job, pointing a gun at Arnulfo and not announcing his ATF status, and allowing himself to be kidnapped in broad daylight. Roth is good at playing understated characters, but he has so little to work with, not even a basic character arc, that even he can’t give the kind of magnetic, internalised performance the movie needs from the role.

What the viewer is left with is a movie that promises much in the way of well-judged characterisations, clever insights into the male psyche, and occasional outbursts of violence, but which fails to engage except on a superficial level. It’s a symptom of low budget, arthouse fare that we get interminable scenes of people staring out of or through windows, or lapsing into prolonged silence as if the mere fact of their being silent was evidence enough of some inner turmoil or struggle. In most cases this muted behaviour feels more like padding than incisive direction, and Ripstein’s efforts to convince us that these two characters are more than what we see never ring true.

Sadly, the movie is also let down (though not quite as badly) by Ripstein’s involvement in the editing, along with Santiago Pérez Rocha León. Between them, both men have shaped the style and rhythm of the movie in such a way that instead of feeling languid and somewhat pastoral in nature (which would have helped), it instead feels sluggish and lacking in passion. Certain scenes end abruptly, while others go on beyond their natural lifespan; it’s hard to know which way each scene will go. What is undeniably a plus for the production is Alain Marcoen’s simple yet highly effective cinematography, a great example of how to make a movie look dazzling even when using natural or low-level lighting.

Rating: 4/10 – audiences may well feel that 600 Miles is a triumph of style over substance, and while they might have a case, it’s Ripstein’s lack of directorial experience that hampers the movie and stops it from fulfilling its potential; Roth and Ferrer do their best to elevate the material, but they have so little to work with that ultimately, their efforts are in vain.

Before I Wake (2016)

14 Sunday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Canker Man, Drama, Dreams, Foster parents, Horror, Jacob Tremblay, Kate Bosworth, Mike Flanagan, Nightmares, Review, Thomas Jane, Thriller

D: Mike Flanagan / 97m

Cast: Kate Bosworth, Thomas Jane, Jacob Tremblay, Annabeth Gish, Dash Mihok, Antonio Evan Romero

Made in 2014 but only released now thanks to its US distributor, Relativity Media, filing for bankruptcy last year – which explains the credit “and introducing Jacob Tremblay” – Before I Wake is a horror thriller that takes the idea of dreams (and nightmares) that are able to come to life, and have a lasting physical effect on the “real” world. The focus is on a young boy, Cody (Tremblay), who has the ability to, literally, make dreams come true. After a string of foster placements break down because of this ability, Cody is placed with Jessie and Mark (Bosworth, Jane), a couple who have decided to foster following the death of their young son, Sean (Romero).

Cody settles in and at first all is well, despite his unwillingness to get a good night’s sleep. Instead he uses caffeinated drinks to stay awake, all so he can ensure that he doesn’t have a nightmare and summon the Canker Man, a force for evil that devours its victims. Cody believes the Canker Man killed his mother, and is responsible for the disappearance of some of his previous foster carers. But while he may have nightmares that bring the Canker Man to life, Cody also has regular dreams, and ones that give life to Cody’s chief interest: butterflies. Soon, Jessie and Mark are revelling in the appearance of dozens of these magnificent creatures; at least, until Cody wakes up – then they disappear in a puff of smoke.

Cody’s interest in Sean leads to his appearing one night, and as real as when he was alive. Jessie is quicker to associate Sean’s “return” with Cody’s dreams than Mark is, and she soon takes advantage of the situation, ensuring Cody sleeps so that she can spend more time with Sean. Once Mark becomes aware of what she’s doing, and highlights how inappropriate her behaviour is, it proves to be too late. Cody has a nightmare, and the couple have their first experience of the Canker Man, a terrifying creature that threatens them both. Following on from this, Jessie decides to find out more about Cody’s life before she and Mark began fostering him, and to see if his past holds any clues that will help deal with the threat of the Canker Man.

There are lots of horror movies that take place in a dream world, or in the realm of waking dreams, but very few where dreams are allowed to manifest themselves outside of these arenas. The beauty of Before I Wake – at least in its first thirty to forty minutes – is that it patiently sets up the rules of its scenario and does its best to adhere to them. During this period we see a particular cause and effect to Cody’s dreams that shows writer/director Mike Flanagan, and co-writer Jeff Howard, have thought their movie through, and have done their best to ground it from the start. However… once Jessie begins looking into Cody’s past, all that patient build up and attention to detail is abandoned, and the movie loses its identity to become yet another generic horror thriller (Flanagan refutes the idea that this is a horror movie, preferring the term “supernatural drama”; he has a point but it only goes so far).

This leaves the movie feeling dramatically rich and engaging in its first half, tackling as it does issues of grief, dependency, overwhelming sadness, and the deliberate exploitation of a child. Jessie may well be grieving still for Sean (the movie takes place six months after his death), but the way in which she so readily accepts Cody’s gift and uses it for her own needs, is in many ways more horrifying than the Canker Man himself. Mark calls it abuse, and he’s right. It’s such a breach of trust that the script runs the risk of making Jessie unlikeable as well as selfish, but thanks to Bosworth’s sympathetic performance, this is avoided. There are moments, though, when it looks as if the Canker Man is going to have a run for his money in the villain stakes. (And what a different movie it would have been if Jessie’s motivation had remained the same throughout; how would the audience have felt about her then?)

But as already mentioned, the script hives off from this approach into much more familiar, and prevalent, territory as Jessie delves into Cody’s past. This involves the easy theft of his social services file (complete with the location of the children’s home he’s sent to once things have escalated beyond the point where Jessie and Mark can deal with everything themselves), a visit to a mental institution to talk to a previous foster parent, Whelan (Mihok), and a confrontation at the children’s home where all the staff appear to have gone home for the night. Again, the credibility built up until now is left to drift off by itself, discarded in favour of a showdown between Jessie and the Canker Man that is thankfully brief, and true to the nature of, and reason for, Cody’s dreams.

Flanagan is a talented rising star, and while Before I Wake has its problems, he’s still able to show a confidence in the material, as well as the visual design, that bode well for any future endeavours. He’s also able to coax a good performance from the criminally under-used Bosworth, and shepherds Tremblay through his first lead role in fine style (even if his sing-song voice can be a bit grating at times). Sadly, Jane gets sidelined by the script too many times for comfort, but at least he’s in good company, with Gish (as a harried social worker) and Mihok allowed just enough time to move things forward when necessary. Some viewers may find themselves struggling to connect the dots once Jessie relates Cody’s unfortunate history, and some may even feel that it’s all too contrived, but at least Flanagan doesn’t pitch a special effects laden climax at his audience. There are a few scares along the way, but none that will trouble anyone who’s seen any recent scary movies, and no last minute idea for a sequel (hallelujah!).

Rating: 6/10 – a bunch of narrative inconsistencies and moments where the movie goes “off reservation” aside, Before I Wake is a hybrid horror/thriller that provides enough tension in its first half to help overlook the failings of the second; Bosworth is good value as always, and there are genuine moments of beauty thanks to Flanagan’s use of a kaleidoscope of butterflies as a potent indicator of Cody’s dream state.

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I Am Wrath (2016)

12 Friday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Amanda Schull, Christopher Meloni, Chuck Russell, Corruption, Crime, Drama, John Travolta, Murder, Rebecca De Mornay, Revenge, Review, Sam Trammell, Thriller

D: Chuck Russell / 91m

Cast: John Travolta, Christopher Meloni, Amanda Schull, Sam Trammell, Patrick St. Esprit, Rebecca De Mornay, Asante Jones, Paul Sloan, Luis Da Silva Jr, Robert Forte Shannon III, James Logan

You’re an ex-Black Ops veteran turned law-abiding car engineer about to work for Honda (probably). You come home from a job interview and meet up with your wife who’s working on an independent review of a proposed water pipeline that’s being backed by the state governor. Both of you are approached by a shady looking guy who wants help paying his parking ticket. You warn him off but he gets offended. The next thing you know, you’ve been hit over the head and are on the floor, then the shady looking guy pulls out a gun and shoots your wife. She dies instantly. Thanks to your knowledge of cars, you recognise the sound of the car engine the shady looking guy and his two accomplices drive off in. Later, at the police station, the detectives assigned to your wife’s murder are sympathetic and helpful. Even later, those same detectives tell you they’ve got someone who may have been involved. At a line-up, you pick out the shady looking guy thanks to the distinctive fly tattoo he has near his right eye. And right then and there, the rug gets pulled out from under you: the detectives don’t have enough evidence to arrest him. The shady looking guy goes free. Now what do you do?

Well, if you’re John Travolta, and the movie you’re starring in is called I Am Wrath, then you tool up and go after the man who killed your wife, and his two accomplices. But what is it that prompts you to do this? Is it a profound sense of justice needing to be done? Is it anger and a need for revenge? Is it because you’re fed up with leading a “normal” life and you want to get back to killing bad guys? Or is it because a Bible the priest at your wife’s funeral gave you, lands open at a particular place (Jeremiah 6:11 to be precise) after you’ve thrown it to the floor? And is it because the phrase “But I am full of the wrath of the LORD, and I cannot hold it in” is featured there, and it seems like God’s giving you permission to go out and kill some people? Well, praise the Lord. Seems he doesn’t mind people committing murder after all.

This is exactly how Travolta’s character, called Stanley Hill (and since when did Travolta ever look like a Stanley?), comes to make the momentous decision to take the law into his own hands and seek vengeance on shady looking guy and his pals. If you’re in any doubt as to how good or bad this movie is at this point, then rest assured the scene with the Bible is as far from cinematic gold as it’s possible to get. Travolta hurls the good book to the floor. It lands cover side down and open at the aforementioned passage. Travolta looks over at it. He gets up, a look of consternation on his face. As he approaches the Bible he begins to look as if he already knows what he’s going to read when he picks it up. And once he does, there’s no doubt: it’s a sign! And he knew it was a sign! Stanley has been given a sign from God (even though he’s not a praying man)! Say Hallelujah everyone!

Unfortunately for I Am Wrath, any further religious overtones or connotations are abandoned with undue haste. Save an artless confessional scene much later on, the script and direction steer well clear of any religious undertones and concentrate on Travolta – aided by Meloni as his pal from their Black Ops days – and his mission to avenge his wife’s death. Along the way he discovers a conspiracy that involves the police, a local crime lord, and – shock! horror! – the state governor. What could have been an intriguing, finely balanced exercise in the nature of faith versus morality, instead becomes yet another tired actioner where one man and his friend take on a whole bunch of bad guys, break every law going in the process, and are cheered as heroes for “taking out the trash” (quite literally at one point).

First optioned as a vehicle for Nicolas Cage back in 2012, and with William Friedkin set to direct, the project derailed six months later. Watching this finished result, it’s hard not to see why, as it’s difficult to tell if Paul Sloan’s script – he also plays crime lord Lemi – is the same now as it was then, free from any revisions or amendments. It’s a screenplay that signposts everything so far in advance, that even the most naïve or inexperienced of viewers would have no trouble predicting each step or move made by the characters before they happen. From Travolta reassuring his daughter (Schull) that the drive-by shooting that nearly killed her will be the only time she’s put in danger (yeah, right!), to the police (Trammell, Jones) being in the pocket of both the crime lord and the governor, to the epilogue that apparently sees Travolta at the mercy of a “surprise” (not really) gunman, I Am Wrath diligently avoids doing anything that might be construed as original or different.

Those with fond memories of The Blob (1988), or The Mask (1994), might be encouraged by the presence of Chuck Russell in the director’s chair, but any hopes that the fourteen year hiatus since The Scorpion King (2002) has left him pumped and raring to go should be abandoned from the start. It’s clear that Russell is just a director for hire, and his bland, uninspired approach to the material reflects this idea all too well. He’s unable to motivate his cast either, with Travolta going through the motions, Meloni playing the sidekick with a (much needed) sense of humour, Schull reduced to creating a character out of whatever reaction she’s required to have from scene to scene, St. Esprit oozing venom like it’s expected of him whatever the circumstances, Trammell and Jones playing detectives who don’t have an ounce of depth between them, and Sloan snarling away at everyone in lieu of providing a proper characterisation. It’s all as bad as it looks, dispiriting too, and without even a sense of its own absurdity to redeem matters.

Rating: 3/10 – another nail in the coffin of Travolta’s career, I Am Wrath is disjointed, mediocre, passionless, and calamitous in equal measure, with lacklustre direction, a weak script, perfunctory performances, and woeful continuity (look for Travolta’s disappearing/reappearing forehead contusions); when movies look and sound this stale, you have to wonder what could possibly have motivated everyone to have taken part, the answer to which would probably make for a better movie than this one could ever be.

Money Monster (2016)

10 Wednesday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Algorithms, Caitriona Balfe, Dominic West, Drama, FNN, Fraud, George Clooney, Hostage, IBIS Clear Capital, Jack O'Connell, Jodie Foster, Julia Roberts, Review, Shares, Thriller, TV show

D: Jodie Foster / 98m

Cast: George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Jack O’Connell, Dominic West, Caitriona Balfe, Giancarlo Esposito, Christopher Denham, Lenny Venito, Chris Bauer, Dennis Boutsikaris, Emily Meade, Condola Rashad, Aaron Yoo

Lee Gates (Clooney) is the host of TV show, Money Monster. Gates acts as an advisor for anyone looking to invest their money in stocks and shares, but he does so in a hyped-up, devil-may-care fashion that makes him seem sharp and ahead of the game. From the opening dance routines to his frequently ad hoc approach to any scripted segments, Gates talks and behaves as if he can’t ever be wrong. As he gears up to present the latest edition of the show, Gates is expecting to interview Walt Camby (West), the CEO of IBIS Clear Capital, an investment company whose main trading algorithm has developed a glitch and “lost” $800 million, leaving some of their investors high and dry. But Camby is off the grid, and his chief communications officer, Diane Lester (Balfe), is left to field Gates’s questions.

Once on air, the show is interrupted by a delivery man (O’Connell) who appears on set and reveals he has a gun. He forces Gates to put on a vest that’s crammed with C4, and threatens to detonate the explosives unless he gets some answers as to why IBIS’ algorithm went so badly wrong. The delivery man, whose name is Kyle Budwell, is appalled that Gates, and everyone else, is just accepting Camby’s line that it was all just a glitch. Why, he asks, isn’t anyone asking how it could have happened, and why is everyone not as angry as he is, especially as Gates, on a previous edition of the show, told his viewers that investing in IBIS was safer than investing in savings bonds.

The police are quick to arrive, and the show is allowed to carry on broadcasting live. Gates’s producer, Patty Fenn (Roberts), is stuck in the unenviable position of having to keep both Gates and Kyle calm, and to keep the on-set camera and sound team from being hurt as well. Soon the police – and Gates – learn that Kyle inherited $60,000 when his mother died and he invested it all in IBIS shares; now he has virtually nothing except a job that pays fourteen dollars an hour and a pregnant girlfriend, Molly (Meade). Meanwhile, Diane begins to suspect that all isn’t as it seems at IBIS when her senior colleagues prove less than helpful as she tries to piece together what happened to make the company lose so much money in one hit. And as she begins to work out what happened, so too does Patty and Gates. As the mounting evidence points to fraud on a massive scale, Camby resurfaces, and he and Gates and Kyle find themselves on a collision course to reveal the truth.

If you’re thinking that Money Monster sounds like a fast-paced financial thriller where Wall Street is the bad guy, and Clooney portrays a champion for the little guy who exposes fraud and corruption wherever they rear their ugly heads, then you’re going to be disappointed. It is a financial thriller, that much is true, but the pacing is a little haphazard, and any tension inherent in the material is worn down by director Jodie Foster’s unwillingness to have the movie edited appropriately (and it’s not as if her editor, Matt Chessé, hasn’t any experience in this area – he’s worked on both World War Z (2013) and Quantum of Solace (2008) before now). This is best expressed in a horribly lengthy sequence that sees Gates and Kyle walk from the TV studios to Federal Hall, surrounded by armed police and baying crowds. With precious little happening apart from Clooney looking anxious and O’Connell looking like he can’t work out what’s going on, the sequence comes to a contrived end long after you’ve begun hoping that they’ll get there already.

With the movie’s thriller elements lacking energy or defined purpose, there’s the small matter of the McGuffin, the $800 million. Such is the muddled approach to the story as a whole, that the script – by Jamie Linden, Alan DiFiore and Jim Rouf – never really decides if it’s important or not. That Camby is behind its disappearance is never in doubt, but Kyle’s motivations for challenging its public perception as a glitch manage to change from scene to scene. One minute he wants the money back so all the investors who’ve lost out can be remunerated, the next he wants an explanation as to how the money could have vanished in the first place, and then he’s looking for an admission of guilt. With the script unable to decide what Kyle wants, it leaves O’Connell adrift and having to do the best he can with a character who keeps telling Gates he’s not stupid, but who is then outed by his girlfriend as being exactly that (and when she does, it’s harsh).

Clooney is left stranded a lot of the time, especially in the twenty minutes or so after Kyle’s arrival on set. But when Gates is given stuff to do – argue about the state of his life against Kyle’s, plead with the public to buy IBIS shares in order to save his life – he’s stuck with dialogue that feels and sounds clunky and unconvincing. Clooney is a very good actor, but not even he can do anything with lines such as, “We take care of each other. It’s in our DNA. Not because an equation tells you to do it, but because it’s the right thing to do.” Roberts is likewise hampered by a role that requires her to be too many things at once: TV producer, hostage negotiator, amateur detective, and grudging friend (to Gates). She does her best but in the end has to coast along with the vagaries of the script like everyone else.

The script tries to make the apparent complacency of ordinary investors as much to blame for financial disasters as it does the banks, the investment companies and the government, an argument that sounds edgy but is quickly shelved once Camby’s apparent perfidy is placed front and centre, and there are some Gosh No! moments when Kyle trots out a few financial conspiracy theories, but on the whole this is a movie with a script that doesn’t know exactly what it wants to say, and sadly, a director who doesn’t quite know how to get it into better shape. There are stretches where Money Monster is quite listless, content to cruise along in neutral and wait until the next plot development hoves into view. What that means for the viewer though, is a movie that never grips as it should, and never engages consistently with its audience.

Rating: 5/10 – only moderately rewarding, Money Monster lacks discernible energy and stumbles around trying too hard to be an efficient thriller (without quite knowing how to be one); a disappointment then given the talent involved, this could have been a lot more interesting, and a lot more entertaining, if it hadn’t been so rambling in its approach and its execution.

Stranger on Horseback (1955)

09 Tuesday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Bannerman, Circuit judge, Drama, Jacques Tourneur, Joel McCrea, John Carradine, John McIntire, Kevin McCarthy, Literary adaptation, Louis L'Amour, Miroslava, Murder, Review, Romance, Trial, Western

D: Jacques Tourneur / 66m

Cast: Joel McCrea, Miroslava, John McIntire, John Carradine, Kevin McCarthy, Nancy Gates, Emile Meyer, Robert Cornthwaite, Jaclynne Greene, Walter Baldwin, Emmett Lynn, Roy Roberts

Like each decade before it, the Fifties saw Hollywood and the independent studios make low budget Western after low budget Western. Trying to wade through them now is like trying to read a library of books that have no title pages: it’s difficult to tell if any one Western is better or worse than any other. But Stranger on Horseback (a title that’s not entirely accurate), is one low budget Western that deserves a closer look, and perhaps, over sixty years after it was made, a reassessment.

Adapted from the story by Louis L’Amour, the Stranger in question is actually circuit judge Richard Thorne (McCrea). Arriving in a small town on a routine visit, he soon learns that there has been a murder recently, but that the man responsible hasn’t been arrested. When he asks why, he discovers that the town is owned and run by Josiah Bannerman (McIntire), and that the man who committed the killing is Bannerman’s son, Tom (McCarthy). Despite several warnings from the town sheriff, Nat Bell (Meyer), and Bannerman’s legal counsel, Colonel Buck Streeter (Carradine), that Josiah won’t allow it, Thorne voices his determination to ensure that Tom Bannerman is arrested and committed for trial.

News of this development reaches Josiah, and he charges Tom with persuading Thorne to accept his hospitality. Tom’s presence in town leads, unsurprisingly, to his arrest, with Thorne being aided by Bell. With Streeter manoeuvring himself into place as the trial prosecutor, and less than veiled threats made by Josiah’s men as to the likelihood of a trial taking place, an uneasy stalemate exists while Tom languishes in jail. In the meantime, Thorne begins to piece together the events surrounding the murder, while also making an impact on Tom’s cousin, Amy Lee (Miroslava). Her attentions lead to Thorne meeting Josiah, and the last chance of a peaceful outcome in regard to Tom going to trial. Realising that there’s no chance of a trial – fair or otherwise – taking place in town, Thorne decides to spirit Tom away during the night and make for the nearest town, Cottonwood. But his ruse is quickly discovered, and Josiah and his men rush to head them off before Thorne and Bell can get Tom, along with two witnesses to the shooting, to the safety of the nearby town.

For a low budget Western that runs a somewhat paltry sixty-six minutes, Stranger on Horseback is definitely deserving of a much better level of recognition amongst modern day audiences. Directed by the hugely talented Tourneur, this was one of a number of Westerns he made in the Forties and Fifties, and his second with McCrea as the lead. One of Tourneur’s strengths as a director was his ability to draw out strong performances from his casts, and then ally them to a palpable sense of mood. In doing so he made his movies stand out by virtue of their credibility and an often surprising emotional depth. Stranger on Horseback is no exception, with McCrea perfectly cast as the tough, no-nonsense judge whose reputation means he doesn’t have to carry a gun unless absolutely necessary. McCrea made a lot of Westerns in the Fifties, but this is easily one of his best, his performance far more subtle and measured than the material might seem to deserve. In tandem with Tourneur’s assured direction, McCrea makes Thorne the kind of hero whose integrity and law-abiding nature is never in question.

But it’s not just McCrea who puts in a great performance. This is a movie with a glut of them. As Thorne’s love interest, Amy Lee, Miroslava gives an insightful portrayal of a woman torn between loyalty to her family and the chance of freedom that an unexpected romance gives her (a subplot involving Amy Lee’s impending marriage to the town banker (Cornthwaite) is handled with a sobering disinterest on her part and a tired resignation on his). (Sadly, this was Miroslava’s penultimate movie before she committed suicide aged just thirty, and from her role here it seems certain that her skills as an actress, her ability to find a sympathetic core to the characters she played, would have led to even better performances over time.)

As the proud land baron Josiah Bannerman, McIntire is a terrific adversary for McCrea, his egoism a perfect counterpoint for Thorne’s rectitude. McIntire was a great character actor, often quietly giving memorable performances in the background of bigger movies, and although his presence here requires a degree of repetition in terms of relaying the same threats over and over, he nevertheless imbues Josiah with a sincerity of intent and action that overcomes an awkward last-minute reversal of purpose. And then there’s the wonderful John Carradine, cadaverously charming as ever as the smooth-tongued, lizard-like Colonel Streeter. His scenes with McCrea are a testament to his talent as an actor, his delivery and equanimity in the part a perfect example of what can be done with a supporting role if you have the skill and the encouragement of your director. It’s also a performance that foreshadows his role as Major Cassius Starbuckle in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962); both portrayals are hugely enjoyable, and both highlight just how good Carradine was when given a halfway decent script to work from.

Further down the cast list, McCarthy is appropriately callow as Tom Bannerman, while there’s a beautifully judged performance from Meyer as the sheriff who finds newfound courage thanks to Thorne’s arrival (Meyer is one of those actors whose face is so familiar, you’d swear you’ve seen him in more movies than he’s actually appeared in). Tourneur brings out the best in everyone, and in doing so, elevates the very basic plot and storylines in Herb Meadow and Dan Martin’s screenplay, making it a richer and more rewarding experience than anyone could have predicted.

While the movie is a great, unsung example of low budget Western movie making, unfortunately there is one issue it can’t presently overcome. Existing copies of the movie have become so degraded that the gorgeous Arizona locations – filmed in Ansco-color – are now a riot of over-exposed colours and blurred details. It’s so bad that when we first see McCrea riding into town it looks as if he doesn’t have a face. This is a movie in desperate need of restoration. Let’s hope a pristine copy surfaces at some point, and the movie can be seen as it was meant to be.

Rating: 8/10 – a superior Western thanks to the involvement of Tourneur, Stranger on Horseback is a richly rewarding movie with some outstanding performances to further add to its stature; with only a rushed conclusion to keep it from being a complete and utter classic, this is still a prime example of a low budget Western that shouldn’t be dismissed or ignored purely because of its provenance.

Edge of Winter (2016)

08 Monday Aug 2016

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Action, Drama, Father/son relationships, Joel Kinnaman, Percy Hynes White, Rachelle Lefevre, Review, Rob Connolly, Thriller, Tom Holland

D: Rob Connolly / 89m

Cast: Joel Kinnaman, Percy Hynes White, Tom Holland, Rachelle Lefevre, Rossif Sutherland, Shiloh Fernandez, Shaun Benson

Set in the (very) snowy Canadian wilderness, Edge of Winter begins with an awkward meeting between Elliot Baker (Kinnaman), his ex-wife, Karen (Lefevre), their two sons, Bradley (Holland) and Caleb (White), and Karen’s new husband, Ted (Benson). The reason for the meeting is due to Karen and Ted heading off on a cruise holiday and needing Elliot to look after the boys. Everyone looks and feels uncomfortable, and it’s clear from Karen’s behaviour that Elliot isn’t exactly her first choice, but he is the boys’ father.

We never learn the reason why Elliot and Karen’s marriage ended, other than that the boys were “more mature” than their father. But his nervous attitude and eagerness for their visit to go well serves as a signal that all is not well with Elliot himself, and that it’s unlikely he’ll get his wish. Of the boys, Bradley is the more withdrawn and unhappy at having to spend time with his father. He’s a teenager and probably remembers more about the breakup of his parents’ marriage than he’d like (though how long they’ve been divorced is something else we never learn). On the other hand, Caleb, who is a few years younger, is more open to the idea.

The boys’ discovery of Elliot’s hunting rifle should be the opportunity for him to lay down some boundaries, but instead he offers to take them where they can learn to shoot. On the trip, Elliot lets his sons know just how important their visit is to him, and even goes so far as to confiscate Bradley’s mobile phone so that it doesn’t become a hindrance to their all getting on. When they arrive at the place where they can learn to shoot, Bradley’s first experience of firing a rifle concludes with his being embarrassed and refusing to carry on. Caleb is more enthusiastic, and he does well. When it comes time to leave, Elliot lets Bradley drive, but an argument between the brothers leads to their car skidding off the road and into a ditch. Unable to get the car free, the trio are forced to spend the night there. And while they wait, Elliot learns something that has a tremendous effect on him.

The next morning, and with Elliot claiming that it’s too far for them to walk back to the highway, they head off to reach a cabin by a lake that Elliot says is near enough for them to get to. When they get there, both Bradley and Caleb begin to wonder just how long their father is planning to stay there before trying to get home. Elliot himself is less than forthcoming, and the sudden arrival of two fishermen leads to the realisation that their father may not even want to get back home, and that maybe what he really wants is for the three of them to stay at the cabin indefinitely…

From the very first moment we see Elliot – dealing with a debt problem on the telephone – we know that all is not well with him. He looks pale and uncertain about things, anxious and agitated in a way that speaks volumes about his character right from the off. Whether this is the way the script describes him, or a decision made by Kinnaman in terms of his portrayal, or the way that first-time feature director Connolly advised the actor to portray Elliot, his agitated state works as a clumsy kind of cinematic shorthand: this is a man on the edge. But aside from having money problems, we never learn very much about Elliot, or the reasons for his being so anxious. Instead we’re left with a poorly constructed portrait of a man trying to connect with his sons who doesn’t understand the difference between appropriate and inappropriate, and who has no cognisance of the harm he’s doing in trying to bond with them.

As a result, Elliot’s behaviour stretches the viewer’s patience. With little or no back story to fill in the gaps, he becomes the movie’s weakest link, called upon to propel the narrative forward by virtue of some equally weak plotting. The arrival of the fishermen inevitably leads the movie into confirmed thriller territory, but it’s at the expense of what little credibility has been achieved so far. Elliot’s determination to keep his sons with him becomes increasingly preposterous (just how deluded is he to believe that hiding out at the cabin indefinitely is a good idea?), and his efforts to “keep them safe” are as equally preposterous on both a dramatic and a conceivable level.

The movie isn’t helped by the pedestrian pace adopted throughout. Connolly, along with editor Greg Ng, fails to realise that this isn’t an indie character study (even though there are elements of this buried in the script), but a slowburn thriller that should be highlighting the horror inherent in its basic storyline: that the biggest threat to the two boys’ safety is their own father. Instead it downplays any terror in favour of clumsy interactions between the characters, developments in the plot that defy rational explanation (the burning of the cabin, for one), and a reveal that begs the question, how could Elliot have done this without anyone else knowing? There’s no sense of urgency to help make the final twenty minutes more exciting than the rest of the movie, and no sense that the boys are in any real danger. Instead, the script (by Connolly and Kyle Mann) lumbers through an unconvincing series of confrontations and encounters until ending on a whimper rather than a bang.

Rating: 4/10 – with its cast able to provide only adequate performances thanks to the under-developed script, Edge of Winter is a disappointing and unrewarding experience; not even the beautiful Canadian locations can compensate for a movie that consistently avoids meeting its audience’s expectations, and which wastes too much time in achieving very little of merit.

Sharknado: The 4th Awakens (2016)

07 Sunday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Action, Anthony C. Ferrante, Astro X, David Hasselhoff, Drama, Ian Ziering, Masiela Lusha, Niagara Falls, Nukenado, Review, Sequel, Sharks, SyFy, Tara Reid, The Asylum, Thriller, Tommy Davidson, Tornados

D: Anthony C. Ferrante / 85m

Cast: Ian Ziering, Tara Reid, Masiela Lusha, Tommy Davidson, Cody Linley, Ryan Newman, Imani Hakim, David Hasselhoff, Cheryl Tiegs, Gary Busey, Christopher Shone, Nicholas Shone

The title says it all. In fact, it says too much, because in hitching their bandwagon to that of Star Wars, and unleashing a torrent – a veritable Forcenado, if you like – of bad in-jokes and awkwardly added references to their own franchise, the producers of the Sharknado series have pretty much indicated that their confidence isn’t as high as it was this time last year, when Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! proved surprisingly enjoyable. Judging by the look of the movie, there was a much smaller budget available this time, despite the series’ growing success, and the calibre of familiar faces making cameo appearances couldn’t be maintained either.

But Star Wars isn’t the only movie to be given the subtlety-free tribute treatment. There’s also Pirates of the Caribbean, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and Twister (“It’s a cownado!”) to name but a few. This leaves the already fragmented plot, what there is of it, feeling like it was made up as filming went along, with returning screenwriter Thunder Levin handing out new script pages each day. As the series’ put-upon hero, Fin Shepard (Ziering), aided by the same core group as in number three, is called upon to battle a variety of shark-infested tornados when a high-tech defense system designed to stop them from forming in the first place, goes wrong. Cue a trio of sharknados, all of which mutate thanks to whatever blatantly ridiculous idea Levin had that day. As a result we have a sandnado, an oilnado, a firenado, a bouldernado, a lightningnado, the aforementioned cownado, a hailnado (a hailmarynado might have been more appropriate), a lavanado, and to top them all, a nukenado.

Part of the series’ appeal – at least until now – has been its self-awareness, and the audience’s knowledge that the makers aren’t taking any of it seriously at all. The series’ humour has been an asset in this respect, but here it’s so tired, and conveyed with such a lack of energy that the one-liners which would previously have raised at least a smile, now induce groans instead. To paraphrase the tagline from Alien, In Sharknado: The 4th Awakens, no one can hear you sigh. Even the celebrity cameos, usually the source of much of the series’ merriment, aren’t able to raise the stakes, and there’s precious little fun to be had when the likes of Alexandra Paul and Gena Lee Nolin are drafted in (for a Baywatch-themed skit with Hasselhoff), only for them to be summarily eaten moments later (now if they’d managed to get Donald Trump…).

For many though, the main source of amusement will come from the so-bad-they’re-terrible special effects. Sharknado: The 4th Awakens reaches new heights (or should that be lows) in low-budget special effects, with some of the worst CGI ever committed to the small screen. The tornados themselves give new meaning to the word “appalling”, while any attempt at combining two separate film elements always looks like the worst kind of cut and splice effect, with backgrounds looking a different colour to what’s intended, and any of the cast unlucky enough to be in the foreground often highlighted by a soft white outline. While none of the Sharknado movies will ever be known for their use of cutting edge computer wizardry, the lack of attention to detail, and a “that’ll do” attitude harm the movie even more than usual.

And if the movie’s less than half-hearted approach to special effects hurts it, spare a thought for the acting – if it can be called that. Out of everyone, Ziering can be considered lucky: he’s got the most physical role, he has no choice but to play it seriously, and even though he knows it’s all as daft as a box of frogs, all he has to do is keep a straight face when he says his lines. As Fin’s supposedly dead wife, April, Reid also keeps a straight face throughout but instead of making the best of things she looks like she’s wondering when her character is really going to be killed off and she can get out of making these movies each year (it doesn’t help that Reid isn’t the best of actresses and uses the same expression for any and all feelings or emotions).

Further down the cast list we have Lusha as Gemini, a character that’s new to the series but who helps Fin in his endeavours (though exactly what her relationship is to Fin is never explained). She’s a replacement for the part of Nova, played in previous instalments by Cassie Scerbo, and while she attacks the role with relish, she’s too intent on making everything she does overly dramatic; as a result she offers a one-note performance that does her no favours. As Fin’s kids, Linley, Newman and the Shone twins are adequate but have little to do; Hakim’s character, though the latest member of the Shepard family (son Matt’s wife), also has little to do but run around after everyone else; Hasselhoff is in the same boat; Davidson tries to inject some much needed energy into his role as the tycoon behind the high-tech defense system, and succeeds largely because he makes more of an effort than anyone else; and then there’s Gary Busey, on board as April’s father and a mad scientist-type, who literally recites the majority of his lines standing up behind a table. It looks like he did all his work in under thirty minutes, or possibly twenty.

In charge once again is Ferrante, directing with all the flair and excitement of a man who can see any chance of a better career ebbing away with every entry in the series (and the movie ends on a set up for Part 5 – lucky guy). In conjunction with returning DoP Laura Beth Love, Ferrante drops any pretence at knowing how to frame a shot or a scene, or how to give direction to a cast who can only muster the enthusiasm to pick up their paycheck. It makes for an often embarrassing collection of stitched together moments that barely add up to a fully-fledged movie.

Rating: 2/10 – for a series that was improving – however gradually – with each successive entry, Sharknado: The 4th Awakens is a massive backward step, and easily the worst entry to date; shoddy in almost every department, with just Chris Ridenhour and Christopher Cano’s driving score to recommend it, the makers have got to go a long way to justify any further adventures for the unlucky Fin and his family.

Love & Friendship (2016)

06 Saturday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Chloë Sevigny, Comedy, Drama, Jane Austen, Kate Beckinsale, Lady Susan, Literary adaptation, Marriage, Review, Romance, Whit Stillman, Xavier Samuel

D: Whit Stillman / 93m

Cast: Kate Beckinsale, Chloë Sevigny, Xavier Samuel, Emma Greenwell, Justin Edwards, Morfydd Clark, Tom Bennett, Jemma Redgrave, James Fleet, Jenn Murray, Stephen Fry

It may seem like an odd corollary, but Whit Stillman’s adaptation of Jane Austen’s posthumously published Lady Susan, and a certain Monty Python sketch involving the Piranha Brothers (Doug and Dinsdale) have something in common. In the Python sketch, Michael Palin as low-level criminal Luigi Vercotti talks about Doug as being the more vicious of the two gang leaders:

“Everyone was terrified of Doug. I’ve seen grown men pull their own heads off rather than see Doug. Even Dinsdale was frightened of Doug.”

“What did he do?”

“He used… sarcasm. He knew all the tricks, dramatic irony, metaphor, pathos, puns, parody, litotes and… satire. He was vicious.”

You could add mieosis to the list, or rhetoric, or even polemics – they’re all there in Stillman’s screenplay, all in service to one of the year’s funniest movies, and proof (as if it were truly needed) that Jane Austen had a wicked sense of humour, and enjoyed attacking the social mores of her time; no one was safe, high- or lowborn. In transferring Lady Susan to the screen, Stillman has retained the epistolary nature of the novella, allowing the audience to be swept along with the recent widow’s attempts to secure advantageous marriages for both herself and her daughter, Frederica (Clark)… while also brokering an affair between herself and the married Lord Manwaring. In the process, barbs are dispensed with precision, honeyed slanders voiced with mannered simplicity, and insults hurled with joyous abandon. There’s no turn left unstoned by the movie’s end, and nobody who doesn’t find themselves somehow injured by an unkind remark (even if they don’t know they’ve been injured – some remarks pass by so quickly the characters don’t even realise it’s happened).

This is the overwhelming joy of Love & Friendship: the ease with which the characters are disarmed by unexpected, cutting remarks, and the way in which their reactions are to stare in disbelief like rabbits caught in the headlights, trying to fathom just what to say in return – and then the moment is gone and they’re left there, still staring in shock. Stillman includes so many of these moments there’s a danger of his overdoing it, but the range of insults is so varied that everyone’s a winner, and every moment is assured a smile from the viewer. As Lady Susan (Beckinsale) weaves her tangled web of intrigue, she does so with a shrewd cunning that’s completely impressive. She’s the predatory shark in petticoats who cares for no one but herself and her assured future (or her daughter’s assured future, as that will lead to hers as well).

Watching the movie is like indulging in a massive bowl of whipped cream and citrus lemon sauce, a confection that’s rich and rewarding and a bit of a guilty pleasure. But it shouldn’t be, as Stillman elicits superb performances from his cast, with Beckinsale on particularly fine form as Lady Susan, revelling in her machinations and throwing out carefree lines such as “Facts are horrid things” with an amused detachment that fits the character perfectly. It’s good to see Beckinsale – along with Sevigny, reunited with Stillman after eighteen years – being given such a juicy role after so many bland fantasy outings. Maintaining an equilibrium and a sense of purpose while treating everyone around her – bar her good friend, Mrs Johnson (Sevigny) – with utter contempt, Beckinsale as Lady Susan is a poisonous delight, cunning, devious, and wholeheartedly shameless in her efforts to get what she wants. But there’s also grace and subtlety in her performance, a measured approach to the character and the material that reaps dividends when she’s called upon to be deceitful or just outright lying.

But it’s not just Beckinsale who puts in a fabulous performance. As Lady Susan’s confidant, Mrs Johnson, Sevigny has what looks to be the thankless role of best friend who’s there just so the main character has someone to show off to. But Stillman is too good a director, and Sevigny too good an actress, to let this happen, and even in her scenes with Beckinsale, Sevigny’s quiet attention and marvelling at the deplorable behaviour of Lady Susan’s relatives is too good to be ignored or undervalued. And she’s on even better form when the contents of a letter causes problems both for her and for Lady Susan.

On the spear side of things, there’s a pitch perfect exercise in buffoonery from Bennett as the idiotic Sir James Martin, whose halting, almost stream of consciousness dialogue is matched by the actor’s use of physical tics and surprised facial expressions; he’s like a child for whom everything is new and endlessly fascinating (he finds peas to be an amazing discovery). There’s a scene where he turns up unexpectedly at the home of Lady Susan’s brother-in-law (Edwards), and spends approximately two minutes waffling horrendously about almost nothing at all, and its one of the funniest things you’ll see this year, a perfect match of physical discomfort and mental truancy.

As befits an adaptation of a novella, the story is very slight, and does boil down to very little at all, but Stillman wisely concentrates on the characters and their idiosyncracies rather than the plot, and there’s reward enough in seeing them adrift – often – in a sea of their own making. It’s a romantic comedy, and a recalcitrant comedy of manners, and a comedy of hilarious misdirection that bubbles with energy and glee at providing so much mischief. Stillman doesn’t make very many movies these days, which is a shame, but let’s hope Love & Friendship is the beginning of a more prolific period in his career because it would be a shame if he spent another five years (the time since his last movie, Damsels in Distress) away from our screens.

Rating: 9/10 – a perfect mix of period drama (with sterling work by costume designer Eimer Ni Mhaoldomhnaigh and production designer Anna Rackard), and pin-sharp levity, Love & Friendship is perfectly designed to ensure a good time will be had by all; Stillman interprets Austen with authority, Beckinsale has a great time as the unprincipled Lady Susan, and the viewer is treated to one of the few comedies released this year that doesn’t rely on crass jokes or gross-out humour – and is all the more impressive for it.

The Bronze (2015)

05 Friday Aug 2016

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Amherst, Bryan Buckley, Coaching, Comedy, Gary Cole, Gymnastics, Melissa Rauch, Olympics, Review, Sebastian Stan, Thomas Middleditch

D: Bryan Buckley / 100m

Cast: Melissa Rauch, Gary Cole, Thomas Middleditch, Sebastian Stan, Cecily Strong, Haley Lu Richardson, Christine Abrahamsen

The cast of hit TV show The Big Bang Theory are all talented actors and actresses. But although they’ve all found fame and fortune through appearing on the show, some of them want to be known for more than their TV roles. And that’s a fair enough ambition. In recent years, Kaley Cuoco has broadened her horizons with movies such as Authors Anonymous (2014) and Burning Bodhi (2015), while Simon Helberg has worked with his wife, director Jocelyn Towne, on I Am I (2013) and We’ll Never Have Paris (2014). Now it’s Melissa Rauch’s turn to branch out, and in doing so, she makes sure that the image of her as the helium-voiced, large-breasted Bernadette Wolowitz (neé Rostenkowski) is done away with completely.

With her hair tied back and sporting a mono fringe that keeps her eyes hooded for the most part, Rauch’s incarnation as 2004 bronze-winning Olympic gymnast, and hometown heroine, Hope Ann Greggory is as far from the squeaky, shiny Bernadette as you could get. She’s rude, crude, unnecessarily aggressive, has an ego the size of the Olympic rings, and is content to live off her past glories as an Olympic gymnast. Stores and restaurants in her hometown of Amherst, Ohio let her have freebies, while her long-suffering father, a postman called Stan (Cole), has to contend with her stealing money from the mail he delivers. She won’t get a job, looks down on everyone around her, has never been in a relationship, and always wears her 2004 TeamUSA jacket with sweatpants.

Years before, after suffering a recurring injury that ended her gymnastics career, Hope fell out with her mentor, Coach Pavleck (Abrahamsen). But with Pavleck’s recent, untimely death, Hope receives a letter that gives her the chance to inherit $500,000 from Pavleck’s estate – but only if she coaches Amherst’s newest hope for gymnastic glory, “Mighty” Maggie Townsend (Richardson), and gets her to the upcoming Olympics. Threatened by the idea that Maggie might eclipse her fame and become Amherst’s new town heroine, Hope agrees to coach her but the training regime she comes up with leads to Maggie putting on weight, being unable to focus, and messing up her gymnastic routines. But Hope’s efforts to sabotage Maggie’s future come to a halt when ex-Olympic Gold medallist Lance Tucker (Stan) baits her into coaching Maggie properly. Now all that remains is for Hope to coach Maggie in such a way that she’ll not only impress at the National Finals, but at the Olympics as well… but can Hope be that selfless?

Well, the answer to that one is obvious. Anyone who’s ever seen this type of movie, where the curmudgeonly, grumpy, outrageously inappropriate central character gets to say outrageously inappropriate things at every opportunity (and get away with them), will be unsurprised by the way in which Rauch and her co-screenwriter husband Winston have dictated the arc of Hope’s redemption. And while there’s more than a whiff of formula about everything, what some viewers may perceive as a major failing on the Rauchs’ part, is actually something that makes the movie far more interesting than expected.

Although The Bronze is ostensibly a comedy, there are character elements that feel more at home in a drama, particularly a grim psycho-drama about a character who is unable to connect with other human beings due to a lack of compassion, and through mutual dislike. Take away the “humour” in Hope’s situation and you have a scenario that’s terrible for the way in which it shows how a person clinging desperately to fame, paves the way for, and ensures, their own downfall. Hope is a parasite, living off old glories and refusing to adjust to the reality of her present situation; she’s in so much denial she’s practically drowning. As a character with serious mental health problems, Hope is fascinating to watch, but as a foul-mouthed, shameless self-promoter whose attitude is “funny”, she’s not so fascinating.

Rauch appears so determined to portray Hope as a kind of anti-Bernadette that she moves too far in the opposite direction, spraying venom at everyone around her, and particularly at Stan, whose acknowledgment of his daughter’s situation is key to the main storyline. There are moments where Hope’s derisory treatment of her father begs the question, why would she be so dismissive of him and his love for her? On what level does that make her feel better? (Both are unfair questions: the movie makes no effort to explain Hope’s motivation for being nasty, she just is.) With other questions like these bouncing around throughout the movie – would love interest Ben (Middleditch) really find her so attractive as a person after being mistreated by her so often, and so callously? – The Bronze becomes an exercise in belief suspension that is increasingly hard to maintain.

With its central character proving immensely unlikeable, even when she begins to slowly change into a more rounded individual (it’s a movie convention that seems extra tired here), it’s left to the supporting characters to make an impact, but thanks to the script, no one is allowed to overshadow Hope or her story arc. Cole is as good as ever, though under used; Middleditch and Stan are polar opposites as Ben and Lance, two caricatures of how men apparently behave; Richardson gives new meaning to the phrase “silly goose” (but not in a good way); and Rauch channels her inner bitch with ruthless determination, setting her jaw against any notion of broadening the character’s appeal.

First-time feature director Buckley fails to make much of an impact, but does manage to generate some interest when Hope and Lance spin and whirl around her hotel room in a wonderfully choreographed sex scene that features sterling work from Rauch and Stan’s body doubles. It’s the one scene in the movie that stands out from all the rest, and without it, The Bronze would remain stubbornly parochial in its approach. Visually there’s nothing new here, and tonally it sticks to its hard-hearted groove even when it’s meant to be uplifting. In trying to move away from her role as Bernadette on The Big Bang Theory, Rauch has certainly managed to create a completely opposite character, but sadly, Hope isn’t someone you want to spend too much time with.

Rating: 4/10 – disappointing and badly misjudged, The Bronze is rarely funny, and thanks to its rampant female misanthropy, something of a chore to sit through; there’s the essence of a powerful drama buried beneath all the name-calling and rude behaviour, but unfortunately, that’s not the story that Rauch has chosen to tell.

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