Recent Films Round-up (Part Two)

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Bruce Willis, Calibro 35, Cinema, Cinema Reviews, Coen Brothers, Dark Skies, entertainment, Film Reviews, Films, Hailee Steinfeld, Helen Mirren, Horror, Horror Movies, Jeff Bridges, Joaquin Phoenix, John Malkovich, Matt Damon, Movie Reviews, Paul Thomas Anderson, philip seymour hoffman, Red, SF Movies, The Master, True Grit, Western Movies

Continuing the review round-up of recent films watched over the past couple of weeks. The Master has been high up on my list of films to watch ever since I saw the first trailer for it. Paul Thomas Anderson has become one of the most distinctive voices in cinema for a few years now, but for me, There Will Be Blood and The Master are truly visionary films. Epics of the interior and exterior. Despite the luminous cinematography, many of the best scenes in The Master are head-to-head dialogue exchanges between Joaquin Phoenix’s engagingly chaotic drifter and Philip Seymour Hoffman’s egotistic cult-leader.

Supposedly based on the life of L. Ron Hubbard, The Master charts a life of desperate seeking on the part of Joaquin Phoenix’s Freddie; a desire to be a part of something, to find a meaning where there is no meaning, and so many of the film’s scenes revolve around that idea – from Freddie’s aimless pursuit of work that he only ends up failing at, or the to-and-fro march from wall to window that Hoffman’s character puts him through, ostensibly to train him, but as it descends into surrealism Freddie hasn’t really found anything of substance, he continues blindly through the world, searching for meaning. This metaphor is also captured so beautifully by his nostalgia and longing for an old affair that represents the only time in his life when there was meaning, but he can never recapture that. There is some sort of structural metaphor at play here as well, of America’s search for identity as a country in the immediate post-war period.

All that said, the film is gorgeous to look at, the performances are astonishingly good, the score is wonderfully unsettling and at times it’s incredibly touching. I can see, however, that the film is a ‘difficult’ film. It intentionally frustrates the viewer looking for a linear story with resolution. The characters are not terribly nice people. Both Freddie and Lancaster Dodd do and say some pretty unpleasant things, but they have such a chemistry on screen, each there to provide the other with the meaning to life that they think they need. Freddie is an animal, sexually motivated, prone to violence, alcoholic, and as such may not be likeable to everyone, but Phoenix injects a vulnerability and world-weariness to him, a questing, forlorn nature that makes it impossible not to find some sympathy with him, even if it’s the sympathy you give to a disease-ridden, broken, savage old dog.

Spectacular film-making. One of my favourites of the year. Lingered long after the final frame. I should have reviewed it sooner after I watched it, which is why it is being lumped in with this round-up.

Not so much a remake as a revisit to the Charles Portis source novel of True Grit, the Coen Brothers’ gritty western is an elegiac version of a great story. Shot with washed-out filters in a winter country bled dry of colour, Hailee Steinfeld’s precocious Mattie Ross out for revenge grabs our attention from the opening. She more than admirably holds her own when Jeff Bridges’ grungy portrayal of Rooster Cogburn shows up, larger than life, drinking and shooting his way through the rough justice of the old west.

Ably supported by Matt Damon’s Texas Ranger and a typically colourful cast of Coen grotesques, Bridges cuts through the romanticised vision of the gunfighter to bring us this jaded lawman, still good at heart, but with questionable methods. It made me want to rewatch the 1969 film, a film I remember well from my childhood, for the contrast in approaches to the story.

Not quite sure why I chose to subject myself to Dark Skies. It came with a slew of bad reviews. I suppose it was part of the unending quest to find a properly scary film, and some aspect of this being about aliens just appealed to me.

As is often the case with low expectations, the film rarely turns out to be as bad as you think it’s going to be.  It’s a competently handled chiller, documenting a family breakdown as much as alien abduction. There many levels where Dark Skies could have worked on a much more sophisticated level as metaphor for the breakdown of the family, and I genuinely think the film-makers were striving for something like that. More time is spent developing the characters than creating scares, which can only be a good thing. Unfortunately, those characters are uniformly mundane, dull everyfolk, in yet another white American suburban middle class home of the kind we have seen far FAR too much of. Instead of trying to reference Spielberg, it would have been far more interesting to make the characters stand out as something other than the target demographic.  There are some quite effective scares and one or two in particular lingered with me after the film and gave me nightmares. So, job done. Shame the film doesn’t have the courage of its convictions and the ending is wholly predictable.

With the sequel hitting cinemas currently, it was time to finally see Red. If only because there are so few fun films these days that succeed as multi-purpose vehicles. In this case, action-comedy with an impressive ensemble cast. John Malkovich and Helen Mirren in particular appear to be having a whale of a time.

This is not a film that needs any sort of in-depth critique. It is comic-book cinema and bundles of fun. Cartoonish and ridiculous with some great music. It is still one of the more original and enjoyable action films of recent years. Much needed after the po-faced Bourne films and the various wannabes that followed (Taken etc…).

At the very least, I have to thank Red for introducing me to the incomparable Calibro 35. Italian jazz-funk-rock in the style of 1970s crime movie soundtracks. This is what all my best dreams should sound like.

 

Recent Films Round-up (Part One)

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A Field in England, Apocalyptic Fiction, Ben Wheatley, Cinema, Cinema Reviews, entertainment, Film Reviews, Films, magic mushrooms, Matthew Goode, Mia Wasikowska, Movie Reviews, Park Chan-Wook, Seth Rogen, Stoker, This is the End

Other than the full blog reviews of Man of Steel, Star Trek: Into Darkness and Pacific Rim I’ve seen quite a few films on the small screen and one or two others on the big screen, not all worthy of full page reviews, but here is a general round-up in a couple of parts.

First up, and probably one of the best out of the collection seen in the last couple of weeks is Ben Wheatley’s Civil War-era head-trip, A Field In England. An intense, funny hallucination of a film, filmed in gorgeous black and white cinematography on a shoestring, with some terrific performances.

This is brave, unconventional film-making and I’m so glad we have someone like Ben Wheatley making films like this and Sightseers and Kill List. Savage, weird, wholly unsettling films that make you remember how great cinema can be when boundaries are breached and two fingers are shown to predictability.

Trying to sum this film up is impossible. At it’s most basic, it’s about five men in a field during the English Civil War looking for treasure. Magic mushrooms are consumed. Black magic occurs. Is it a meditation on the British class system? Are they all in purgatory? Is it straight-out fantasy complete with magic? Answering those questions is kind of missing the point. It really has to be seen. If nothing else, it is the closest depiction of the magic mushroom experience committed to film. Not that I would know about such things… ahem…

Next is one of a slew of upcoming apocalypse comedies, This Is The End. If you know the players involved, Seth Rogen, Danny McBride, Jonah Hill etc… then you already know exactly what the film will be like.

It’s a collection of dick jokes, riffs on horror films (The Exorcist being the most obvious one) and general arseing around. Some jokes are funny. Some definitely aren’t. Some outstay their welcome.

There is a modicum of satirical fun being poked in Hollywood’s direction. Michael Cera’s cameo is hysterical. Rihanna is swallowed by a flaming hell-hole. There is one gimp-suit reveal that is cringe-inducingly amusing. Much of it feels like self-indulgence. Best parts of the film are the straight scenes at the beginning between Seth Rogen and Jay Baruchel. After that the tonal shifts are jarring and many scenes just feel thrown in for the hell of it. Bring on The World’s End.

Director Park Chan-Wook’s English language film, Stoker, was a pleasant surprise. I had heard many good things about it, but didn’t quite know what to expect.

Not a single frame is wasted in this hypnotic film. Every image and texture is relevant to the story in some way, be it directly or as a subtle, metaphorical image, all building and layering to create a whole. The foreshadowing is so beautifully done throughout it makes a repeat viewing an absolute must.

India Stoker is left to live with her unstable mother and creepy uncle after her father dies, but what is the uncle’s true purpose? What secrets is he hiding? The answer is more complicated than you might think and the film moves in unexpected directions. Despite India Stoker being a closed character, whose thoughts you aren’t privy to in the way you might be in novel, she still elicits a great deal of sympathy and draws the viewer in.

The film-making here is sensual, creating a complete world, using sound to create texture and music to unsettle; using editing to fracture time and represent mental states. You constantly question what is real as the entire film has a dream-like feel. The acting performances are top-notch and while it might not be for everyone – it does move at a slow pace (albeit full of dread and tension) – I would recommend this thoroughly, if even just to see what cinema is capable of when utilised to the full extent of its capabilities.

The most expensive B-movie ever? Pacific Rim (Movie Review)

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Cinema, Cinema Reviews, entertainment, Film Reviews, Films, Godzilla, Guillermo Del Toro, Kaiju, Movie Reviews, New Films, Pacific Rim, Sci-fi, summer blockbuster, Toho

Many aspects of this film appealed to me before I went to see it. I liked that it wasn’t a sequel, or a remake/reboot, or an adaptation of a comic, or a TV series/Video game/theme park ride. It’s an original story (well perhaps, but more on that later…) and an unashamedly loud, brash summer blockbuster. The fact that Guillermo Del Toro was the director drew me to it all the more, and who doesn’t want to see GIGANTIC robots beating the utter crap out of GIGANTIC monsters?

Undoubtedly some SPOILERS AHEAD.

There is no doubt it achieves its main aim of putting that particular robot/monster titanic slugfest on the screen in some style. And for me, they were often its most entertaining sequences. The sheer volume in the cinema was enough to convincingly emulate the sensation of being slammed in the face by a double-decker bus sized fist. It definitely achieves that sense of scale, which was another thing that enticed me in the original teaser trailers and posters – they weren’t mincing around with exoskeletons or even Transformer-sized robots; these Jaegers were colossally immense, awe-inspiring constructions.

Beyond the megalithic punch-ups, I can’t say there is much more to recommend the film. Perhaps that is being unkind. I liked the concept of the ‘Drift’, the two pilots acting as right and left hemispheres of the brain, the ‘neural handshake’. That concept had great potential for revealing elements of backstory and character in a clever plot-relevant way. There is a stupendous amount of detail involved in the Jaegers and some of the world-building is interesting: for example I liked the way they dive straight in and take you through to a point well past the first incursion, or response, and submerge you face-first into this new world order. It’s a bold narrative move. Too many films these days (superhero movies, I’m talking to you) spend so much time with origin stories and set-up that it’s impossible to have a complete story in the world within the available running time.

But I’m being generous. This is a hugely expensive B-movie, complete with TERRIBLE dialogue, bad acting (Charlie Hunnam I’m looking at you, although the awful accent they saddled you with didn’t help), stock characters and over-used predictable plot elements.

At times it’s so ridiculous that I almost lost interest in the entire film. For example, when the two wacky scientists make their entrance (and any time they’re on the screen, to be honest). Various plot-convenient Jaeger abilities that had hitherto gone unemployed – ELBOW ROCKET! SWORD MODE! (why the thundering hell didn’t they use the sword before that point? And while I’m at it, why not just open up with plasma cannon to the head before the Kaiju get their slimy paws on you?). And the ending – let’s penetrate the giant alien ship and upload the virus to the alien mainframe then inexplicably escape let’s penetrate the Breach and nuke the sonsabitches then inexplicably escape.

And then I’m ticking off the painfully overused tropes and clichés – the loss of a parent/sibling/loved-one in the opening scenes to set up a character’s arc; the gruff commander with a secret, a rousing speech at the right moment and an eventual self-sacrifice for the good of the many (but really, who thought the ‘cancelling the apocalypse’ line was a good idea?); the cocky ace pilot whose respect our hero has to earn; the shadowy, uncaring government types etc…

It’s pointless going into the various plot holes in any detail, but the parts that really leapt out at me were the incredibly important scientist sent on his own into a life-threatening situation. No back-up at all? Not one guy who can maybe handle himself in a fight or possessing even an iota of common sense to help him on this perilous journey that might save the entire human race from becoming Kaiju muesli? What about the evolution that led from planes and tanks to humongous killer robots? Was there no inbetween stage where all that incredible technological know-how thought that perhaps barrages of intelligent missiles to the head might be more effective at taking down the Kaiju? Okay, that might not plug the breach, but seems a method that might have been considered.

Perhaps I’m asking too much of a film that is blatantly riffing on the classic Toho Godzilla films, which I used to enjoy heartily in all of their silliness. There was no pretence at being anything other than giant monsters fighting each other. The Jaegers reminded me of Jet Jaguar from Godzilla vs Megalon, and there is no doubt that Del Toro has made his own version of those films, with the sugary Japanese pop-culture references and instant appeal to kids (I would have loved the hell out of this film as a thirteen year-old boy).

Still… I can’t help but feel Del Toro is capable of something so much better. The script feels at times written by a committee to include all the elements such a film requires. I’m a huge fan of Del Toro’s subtler fantasy/horror movie work in The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth. I would love to see the version of Lovecraft’s Mountains of Madness as directed by him if he ever gets to go ahead with it. Pacific Rim feels like Del Toro is playing with his toys.

A Fresh Point of View: End of Watch (A Movie Review)

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Buddy Cop Dramas, Cinema, Cinema Reviews, DVD reviews, End of Watch, entertainment, Film Reviews, Films, Found Footage Films, Jake Gyllenhaal, LAPD, Michael Peña, Movie Reviews, Writing

I can’t say I’ve ever been a fan of US cop dramas, films or otherwise. Hill Street Blues is probably the last example of the genre I ever watched and that was a bazillion years ago. Showing my age. After that, in film at least, US buddy cop dramas in particular were a common trope from Lethal Weapon to Bad Boys and everything inbetween, and realism was never high up on the list of priorities.

End of Watch surfaced last year and I ended up watching it the other night as a random choice, purely because I’d heard it was supposed to be quite good and the film we wanted to watch (Django Unchained) was unavailable.

Firstly, this film is chock full of cop-movie clichés, from the banter between the leads played by Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Peña, to the feats of heroism and in particular the overly-intense Mexican gangster types. But it doesn’t matter (well it does in some instances…) because the film is shot from such a fresh point of view that it completely engages you. The banter is shot from a dashboard camera in the faces of the two leads, and these scenes anchor the film with believable humour and interactions, often with no relevance to the plot, but this film cares more about its characters than the loose plotline involving Mexican drug cartels.

And it’s the characters and their developing story that set this film alight. It’s not long before we find ourselves utterly invested in their lives. They are an incredibly likeable pair, and not without flaws, but the camaraderie and the close attention to their personal lives draws us in and makes us worry all the more for their safety. There is a feeling to this film, in the realism of most of the situations, that anything can happen. The outcome is never certain. Life is cheap on their watch, and death always close by.

There is a found-footage aspect to the way the film is shot and it sets its stall out that way, but doesn’t stick to it. A shaky, roving camera is still employed in scenes where there couldn’t possibly be a camera. That struck me as a little lazy and inconsistent in terms of style, even when I was still enjoying it, but it did draw me out of the movie when Gyllenhaal and Anna Kendrick are enjoying some ‘alone-time’ and we are still seeing it as though someone is standing in the bedroom shooting them with a handheld camera (which they are – it’s a film after all, but I don’t want my attention to be called to this fact). That said, it’s the camera-work that makes the film so special, putting the viewer right in the action, whether it’s a car chase and shootout or a mundane street scene, it creates a convincing point of view that makes you look over your shoulder.

South Central L.A. is the stage for the film, and while there is surely some realism in the way it’s portrayed, it’s so difficult to transcend the tropes set up by the glut of films from the 1990s that were set there. Boyz n the Hood, Menace II Society, South Central and so many others. There is some mention of how the neighbourhood has changed, which could potentially have been an interesting sociological angle – looking at how Hispanics have moved in large numbers, but in the film, it’s the Mexicans who end up being the bad guys instead of black people. That’s a little unfair, as they do balance it out with Michael Peña showing the flip-side of Mexican culture in L.A., but the stereotypical gangsters are a little ridiculous at times with dialogue that consists of saying ‘fuckin’ at a machine-gun rate.

I really wasn’t expecting to enjoy the film as much as I did, and by the end I was utterly gripped and absorbed in the lives of the two cops. The point of view is so deep that at times you do feel like a silent participant, sitting in the cop car with them listening to the wonderful dialogue exchanges; in the choking miasma of a burning building with them as they rescue some kids from a house fire; eavesdropping on a late-night drunken conversation at the end of a wedding, the kind fuelled by alcohol as well as emotion.

Doubtlessly, the film will not appeal to everyone, and perhaps some people will only see the flaws; the clichés. Maybe even some people might find it boring as its random, directionless nature–which so well represents the highs and lows of a typical work shift–leads them into one drug-den or conversation about relationships too many.

All I’ll say is, even if US cop dramas aren’t your thing, try a fresh point of view and give it a chance.