3 out of 5 *****

Self-obsession isn’t an attractive quality. Self-delusion less so. Well, Young Adult gives us a lead character who has an overabundance of both. Charlize Theron stars as Mavis, once the popular girl in high-school, who has moved from a small town in Minnesota to the more bustling municipality of Minneapolis – even though how small does your hometown have do be to regard Minneapolis as the “big city”?

Now a divorcee, Mavis is a writer of fiction novels that can be found in the “young adult ” section of bookshops (as you can see, the film’s title has a double-meaning). However, she is unsatisfied with her lot in life, and rather than write, she spends most of her time drinking heavily and watching trashy reality TV shows that specifically focus on women – which I’m sure is deliberate. She may look at the likes of “tweens” in beauty-pageants and feel superior in their vacuity, but at her core, Mavis is no better. The only difference between her and Kim Kardashian is that she has a diploma.

Mavis is emotionally stunted. Her idea of being healthy is gorging on Diet Coke to ward off her periodic morning hangovers. She gets an email from her former boyfriend Buddy (Patrick Wilson), informing her that his wife has just had a baby. This is the catalyst for Mavis to jump in her Mini Cooper, drive back to her old hometown and set about rekindling the fires with Buddy. While there, she has a chance encounter with Matt (Patton Oswalt), a guy who had the locker next to Mavis’s in high-school. Matt was lower down the totem-pole back in their teenage years, so much so that he was beaten up by jocks for being gay – the fact that Matt isn’t gay was irrelevant. The assault was so severe that Matt now needs the aid of a crutch to be able to walk.

Matt and Mavis strike up an unlikely friendship – he later explains that, “guys like me are born in love with girls like you”. He warns Mavis against trying to resume her past relationship with Buddy. But Mavis lives in a fantasy land of her own vaingloriousness; as far as she’s concerned, she’s the star of her own story. Mavis thinks she’s in a fairy-tale where the princess returns to the kingdom to claim her prince. But everyone else is too busy with their own lives to play supporting roles in such a fantasy. Her fairy-tale gradually collides with the reality of where her life is actually at.

This is the second collaboration between director, Jason Reitman and writer, Diablo Cody. Their first, Juno was a resounding success. However, while I loved it, it was a divisive film in some circles. Cody has a stylised manner of writing that people tend to like or dislike. Personally, I find her incongruous way of generating humour a delight; some of the movie’s best laughs come from a dreadful cover band made up entirely of new mothers, and the town’s, “popular cripple”. And Reitman has already surpassed the directing achievements of his auspicious filmmaking father. His last outing, Up In The Air, was arguably the best film of 2010.

Theron does a fine job in the lead role, believable as a former prom-queen gone bad. She’s written to be unlikeable and Theron looks to be having an absolute hoot playing an egocentric bitch. Patton Oswalt (who’s stand-up work I highly recommend) is also impressive. There’s a reason why many felt he should have been Oscar nominated. It’d have been so easy for him to be the, “stand-up guy who’s only there for comedy relief”, but he gives the movie a solid thread of pathos.

The problems with the film are more on the technical side. The poor editing means the pacing suffers badly. Young Adult is only 93 minutes long but the running length feels like it’s at least 2 hours. There’s a lack of an impactful score, and Cody’s script – while funny – could have done with one more rewrite. Mavis eventually gets a sliver of self-awareness, but it arrives too late, and some audience members may be completely turned off the character by then.

All told, Young Adult is an uneven film. But while it may have fallen short in what it set out to achieve, I for one am grateful that stories like this have a place in cinemas. Better to reach for the stars and fail, than wallow in the cultural sewer.

3 1/2 out of 5 *****

One could argue a brief look at the publicity for Like Crazy is something of a marketing disaster; the trailer, the mawkish poster, even the title. You’d be right in surmising that Like Crazy is a love story, but it’s not the love story that the first wave of advertising would have you believe. Jakob Rehlinger – from the Nerd Hurdles podcast – argued that this same problem beset the movie, Hanna.

The couple is question is Anna (Felicity Jones) and Jacob (Anton Yelchin). Anna is an English college student in Los Angeles and takes a shine to classmate, Jacob. Sure enough a whirlwind love-affair swiftly develops between the two of them. While I’d imagine that they have been in relationships before, they approach this one with the wide-eyed wonder of a child who’s opened their Christmas presents to find that Santa has brought them exactly what they wanted.

But where’s the drama in two people who love each other in trouble-free togetherness? The major hurdle Anna and Jacob have is geographical. Anna is only in America on a student visa, and her stay in the country is far from infinite. The test comes from sustaining their love despite being in two different continents. Not only do they have to surmount this, but the quixotic rush of the early stages of the relationship dissipates, and the story explores just how well these two people are suited to each other.

The opening 20 minutes of the movie may cause some to roll their eyes with lassitude. We get the montage that we often see when people fall in love – whimsical walks on a beach soundtracked by an indie/pop guitar act. However, writer/director Drake Doremus still makes it bearable by his skillful direction. In conjunction with his cinematographer, John Guleserian, the shot arrangement is both functional and aesthetically pleasing. The composition of Like Crazy is exquisite.

As the film progresses, things become increasingly complicated. Its depiction of the interaction between Anna and Jacob is handled with class and maturity, which is in some ways ironic, as one of the best things Like Crazy does is highlight the immaturity intrinsic in falling for someone. The way people can idealise a person they’ve just met makes adapting to their less pleasing qualities a wearying slog.

Using the process of the initial high of meeting a mate, the film explores issues that its characters would prefer not to face; What will it be like meeting your spouse’s friends and relatives? How do you keep things fresh when you have to focus on your career? What do you do when the sex stops and the talking begins? And how hard are you willing to fight to keep your love alive when fate seems to have other plans? Anna bemoans the fact that the intermittent nature of their relationship means they have to keep “starting again”.

Not only is the film superbly shot, but Doremus and fellow screenwriter, Ben York Jones, make a shrewd decision in not scripting the dialogue too specifically. Capturing the verbal and physical nuances of people falling in love, and trying to stay in love, are far too delicate to orchestrate in a screenplay straitjacket. It may work for Kevin Smith, Steven Moffat or Aaron Sorkin, but it would have choked the life out of a movie such as this. Instead, Doremus allows his actors room to improvise and it allows a more naturalistic feel, which empowers the performers to take control of their characters. I particularly loved how the film exposed the monosyllabic avoidance couples communicate in when they’re trying to prevent themselves getting into an argument.

The strong casting ensures that each performance strikes the right note. Jones and Yelchin dovetail well together, even though Jones is the film’s shining light. She was the best thing in Ricky Gervais & Stephen Merchant’s, Cemetery Junction, and has an easy radiance about her, which – if she chooses her projects wisely – should thrill audiences for years to come. There’s also a small, but noteworthy appearance from Jennifer Lawrence; if you don’t recognise the name, chances are you will this time next year after her role in the upcoming Hunger Games adaptation.

Like Crazy bears comparison with two of the best romance films of recent years, Blue Valentine – in terms of narrative and (500) Days of Summer - in terms of tone. It shows that not every love story has to have the emetic reductiveness of Sex & The City. Audiences will probably feel moments of recognition, and moments of awkwardness. The chances are that Like Crazy will remind you of someone you know, if not remind you of yourself. It shows us a part of life that is often rousing and painful, and at times discomforting, which is the requisite of any substantive piece of art. After the average cinema we got in 2011, Like Crazy gets 2012 off to a strong start.

The fourth installment in the franchise—and the proper sequel to the second film Underworld: Evolution—finds our heroine, Selene, awakening from twelve years in stasis to a world where humans have purged Vampires and Werewolves to the point of extinction. This is really the only place the franchise could be taken. This place being the Resident Evil films.

Co-directors Måns Mårlind and Björn Stein borrow more than a few pages from the Paul W.S. Anderson schlock-fests:

Page 1—We see a back-story of where a True Blood-style “Great Revelation” results in lycanthropy and vampirism being treated as like T-virus infections with paramilitary units going on search and destroy missions.

Page 2—Selene breaks out of a glass stasis tube, naked, in an Umbrella Corporation lab (here trading under the name AntiGen) and has to kill her way past endlessly respawning guards who luckily have a bad case of the Stormtroopers as far as their marksmanship goes.

Page 3—Selene has to make sense of the world she’s awoken to.

Page 4—Fights with rotting-looking dogs in a dark, cramped space.

Page 5—Teams up with a preternaturally strong and intelligent child sidekick.

Page 6—A genetically enhanced werewolf bears a striking similarities to Nemesis, at least in concept.

But to be fair, Mårlind and Stein borrow pages from other sources as well. Twilight and True Blood get their due in the form of a love triangle between being set up for the unavoidable next film. An Edward-esque vampire named Theo seems poised to come between Selene and her missing werewold/vampire hybrid boyfriend Michael. Really, this film has everything.

Except zombies. I’m holding out hope for those later in the series. In fact, if the next film doesn’t see a vaccine for vampirism and lycanthropy going horribly awry and turning humans into the walking dead, I’ll be demanding my money back. And I’ll be swearing a lot while I do it.

What the film doesn’t have, besides zombies, are engaging performances by any of the actors—including a sleep-walking Stephen Rea. For a film that is trying so hard to be Resident Evil, they seem to have forgotten Milla Jovovich is interesting to watch even if she’s just eating dry toast. Kate Beckinsale is about as interesting as watching dry toast. The first Underworld film became a cult favourite due mostly to the Adam West-meets-William Shatner camp of Shane Brolly and Bill Nighy‘s terrible (awesome) performances. No one here seems willing to make a fool of themselves and that’s the film’s great loss.

What the film does do well is bulk up on the gore. Finally the violence in Underworld is as dark and visceral as as war between vampires and werewolves should be. Unfortunately you have to endure some terrible 3D at the same time.

Apparently this was one of the first features filmed with the Red Epic cameras being used in The Hobbit. Since Awakening features some of the worst cardboard cut-out 3D I’ve seen since the rebirth of 3D, things don’t bode well for Middle Earth. In several scenes it’s exactly like you’re looking at a diorama with layered planes of paper dolls instead of experiencing an immersive world.

In a lot of ways Awakening is a better film than the previous Underworld films. But that actually makes it a less enjoyable film. And if you’re just going to see Beckinsale’s ass wrapped in vinyl, find a picture on the Internet—it’ll last longer.

Before I get to my thoughts on the past year in movies, it’s only fair to begin with three caveats: 1) I will only be dealing with films released in the UK in 2011, so films like The Artist, Shame and Martha Marcy May Marlene will not be considered. 2) I can only talk about movies that I’ve seen, so if you feel that I’ve omitted a movie that you liked, it’s likely that I never got round to watching it. 3)  I will be mentioning numerous films in this post, and they will contain a certain amount of spoilers.

Now that’s done with, the vagaries of American releases generally means that the year begins with the films that have been jostling for recognition at the prestigious awards ceremonies. The dust settled with The King’s Speech the clear winner from the awards season. Essentially Good Will Hunting using the British aristocracy, it contained fine work from Colin Firth and Helena Bonham-Carter (who should be recognised for how good an actor she is rather than her ostensible fashion sense or choice of husband). However, the awards laden on the movie was primarily down to shrewd marketing, which goes some way to explaining why it garnered more attention than Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan. The heavy influence of  Dario Argento – which pervades every frame – shouldn’t take away from the superb job Aronofsky did helming the story. I sympathise that he seemed to get minimal credit, but when you watch Natalie Portman’s performance, you can understand why. Portman gives the performance of her career, finally realising the promise she showed when she burst onto the cinema screen as a 12 year old. Added to this, she’s lain to rest the ghosts of her part in the Star Wars prequels. Black Swan was Portman’s moment of creative maturation; the little girl from Leon has finally grown up.

The Coen Brothers continued their prolific output (seriously, do those guys ever take a day off) with a remake of the Western, True Grit. The Coen’s are smart enough to know that it makes little sense to retread the same ground of such an iconic movie, and so the 2011 version was very much their own. It remained a Western, but one that went through the Coens’ idiosyncratic filter. And in the same way that Leon was the launching point for the aforementioned Portman, the Coens’ may have unearthed a gem of an actor in Hailee Steinfeld. It takes a lot to hold your own in the presence of Matt Damon and Jeff Bridges, especially for a performer as green as Steinfeld. But while True Grit was an enjoyable watch, it didn’t live up to the brothers’ previous efforts, such as No Country For Old Men or A Serious Man. I suspect that creative burnout may have been a factor, and it’s little surprise that their next release won’t be until 2013.

One of the stronger independent titles to open 2011 was Blue Valentine. Starring Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling as a married couple, it traverses the events of their marriage. This is a rare example of a romance film that’s not a romantic comedy. It may be best described as an “out of love” story. The characters are both good people, but wrong for each other, together more out of initial attraction and social obligation. I’ve often wondered whether people who fully commit before they’ve had a thorough chance to know each other is a contributory factor to divorce rates. The movie makes for uncomfortable viewing, as it should. Picasso once said, “art is a lie that reveals the truth”. Well Blue Valentine reveals an uncomfortable truth about relationships that many may find too hard to stomach. Gosling is superb, but even he is surpassed by Williams. Who’d have thought the blonde one from Dawson’s Creek would go on to be one of the planet’s best actors.

As the glitter of the awards season faded, we were given a series of disappointing high-profile films, and some strong low-budget pictures. Paul was Simon Pegg & Nick Frost’s attempt to permeate into the North American mainstream, which resulted in a movie that had some pleasing pop-culture references, but lacked the charming wit of either Shaun Of The Dead or Hot Fuzz. I think the need to turn a profit is due to Edgar Wright’s commercial – if not creative – failure with Scott Pilgrim vs The World.

Another lacklustre screening was Limitless. Now I know one Kennedy Gordon thinks highly of this film – you can read his thoughts here. However, it seemed little more than a good movie pitch that needed at least two rewrites. Thankfully, this mediocrity was offset by Rango and Never Let Me Go. 

Gore Verbinski’s filmography isn’t one to inspire confidence, but Rango was an absolute delight. An animated movie with Johnny Depp voicing the titular character, the film manages to live in the world of referencing pop culture, without falling into the Dreamworks trap of being narratively lazy. It performs the tightrope act of chasing whimsy without tumbling into the pit of self-indulgence. It’s now the second year in a row where the best animated film was not from PIXAR, putting a lot of pressure on their upcoming film, Brave.

Never Let Me Go, based on Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel is probably the least “sciency” science-fiction film in years. The pace of the movie is extremely measured, but is ultimately rewarding in its denouement. A lot is demanded of the cast, but they all do an excellent job, particularly Carey Mulligan and Keira Knightley – it’d be nice if people could start to be kinder about the good performances she has given, rather than single out her failures. Name me an actor that hasn’t dropped a few rickets in their career? Go on, I’ll wait…

The summer blockbusters were profitable but ultimately forgettable. X-Men: First Class suffered from a disjointed screenplay, Thor from the lack of a robust villain – a must in any genre fiction tale. Super 8 was over-reliant on special FX, when J.J Abrams would have been better served by trusting his talented young cast, The Inbetweeners Movie was a clear case of shark-jumping, while Captain America was hamstrung by the fact that Cap’… well, despite Chris Evans’s best efforts, he’s simply a lukewarm character. Maybe we’ve been spoilt by Christopher Nolan in recent years, but this summer’s stories were all stuck in second gear.

It was only the autumn that prevented this year being something of a washout. Woody Allen showed that while he may be long past his best, he remains better than a great deal of his peers. Midnight in Paris was a marvellous piece of surrealist fancy, bursting with playfulness and fine acting work, especially from Corey Stoll, Alison Pill and Kathy Bates. It takes some doing to impress the audience at the Cannes Film Festival, but Woody managed it.

Another filmmaker who reminded us of his quality was Kevin Smith. Going outside traditional funding methods, Red State was a fine piece of horror filmmaking. Showing a visceral side we’d never seen from Smith before, it was a welcome return to form. Smith has stated that we are now in the valedictory period of his career, and it looks as if he’ll leave the stage with his fans crying out for more.

We also got the pulsating Drive. A hodgepodge of 80s mis-en-scene, taut pacing, and exploitative violence. It may not be the year’s best film, but I suspect that Drive will be the movie that becomes the most enduring work of 2011. We’ll get to the “best movie of 2011″ in a moment.

British cinema had a good year creatively, with the fun Attack The Block (why it’s taken so long for an alien invasion movie to be set in a council estate is beyond me), and the offbeat Submarine - as a side point,  Submarine’s lead, Craig Roberts has “Future Doctor” material written all over him.

However, the best British films of the year, and two of 2011s best were the vicious Kill List and Tyrannosaur. Kill List is ostensibly a story about hitmen, when it’s really about a man “paying the piper” for his past transgressions. Not for the faint-hearted, Kill List has a piercing and compelling intensity.

Tyrannosaur is the debut film from the wonderful actor, Paddy Considine, and bears comparison to when Gary Oldman went behind the camera to make Nil By Mouth. Both films explore the dark recesses of humanity and put you through the emotional wringer from start to finish. Tyrannosaur is anchored by powerhouse displays from Peter Mullan and Olivia Colman. Most Brits will know Colman from her work in Peep Show or Rev. North Americans may recognise her as the human embodiment of “Prisoner Zero” in Matt Smith’s first appearance in Doctor Who. After her performance in Tyrannosaur, Colman should go on to be an established name in her own right, rather than “the girl from that thing”.

Two of the minor disappointments from the second half of the year were Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Melancholia. The cliched lie, “it’s not you. it’s me” springs to mind regarding these two movies. Both are well executed, with skilled performances, and expertly shot (the apocalypse has never looked so beautiful as it did in Melancholia).  However, I found them both far too detached to draw me in. Now I think both Tomas Alfredson and Lars Von Trier made the films they wanted to make, but I don’t think they’re attuned to my individual sensibilities (I was one of the few people that preferred Let Me In to Let The Right One In).

While I don’t think 2011 ended up being as bad as some had feared midway through the year, it lacked consistent quality. For every film that I’ve praised on here, they are two more that fell short of competence, let alone high-class. It was a year of sporadic sunshine amidst extended periods of pouring rain. Personally, I’m not sorry to see the back of 2011, and hold out hope that it was an aberration rather than an indication of where cinema is heading.

HIGH POINTS OF 2011:

Best Film - Perfect Sense 

I’ve already gushed at length about this film. But I have no problem doing so again. A movie that came out of nowhere, a low-budget rose that grew from concrete. David McKenzie directs an astonishing “high-concept” tale that operates on numerous levels. Ewan McGregor has clearly reached a point in his career where he’s decided to be an actor, rather than a celebrity, and he reminded me of what an accomplished actor he can be. 2011 had a few good films, and couple of very good ones, but only Perfect Sense has a genuine claim to greatness.

Special Mentions: Black Swan; Submarine; Drive; Rango; Kill List; Tyrannosaur; Midnight In Paris

Best Director – David McKenzie  (Perfect Sense)

See above. Someone write him a blank cheque for his next movie.

Special Mentions: Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan), Richard Ayoade (Submarine), Joe Cornish (Attack The Block), Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive), Kevin Smith (Red State), Gore Verbinski (Rango), Ben Wheatley (Kill List), Paddy Considine (Tyrannosaur), Woody Allen (Midnight In Paris)

Best Male Actor – Ryan Gosling (Blue Valentine; Drive; The Ides of March)

Gosling had one hell of a year. He’s been one of America’s best character actors for a while, but in the last 12 months, he’s become a star. In my review of Drive, I compared him to Marlon Brando. Gosling has the ability to remain entrenched in the public sphere, while still making high-class films. Whether he can deal with the new-found attention he’s sure to receive could be another matter. But if he can keep his head, movie fans are in for a treat. He has the potential to become an all-time great of his profession.

Special Mentions: Colin Firth (The King’s Speech; Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy), Craig Roberts (Submarine), John Boyega (Attack The Block), Neil Maskell (Kill List), Peter Mullan (Tyrannosaur), Ewan McGregor (Perfect Sense, Beginners), Joseph Gordon-Levitt (50/50)

Best Female Actor – Olivia Colman (Tyrannosaur)

As mentioned above, Colman is remarkably affecting in Tyrannosaur. Her performance of good-hearted tenderness in a world of misery and abuse will melt the stoniest of hearts. She deserves every single plaudit that comes her way (for her delivery in the film’s revelatory moment alone, if nothing else). The fact that she looks set to miss out on an Oscar nomination is nothing short of scandalous.

Special Mentions: Natalie Portman (Black Swan), Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit), Michelle Williams (Blue Valentine), Lubna Azabal (Incendies), Carey Mulligan (Never Let Me Go; Drive), Jessica Chastain (Take Shelter), Eva Green (Perfect Sense), Yasmin Paige (Submarine), Saoirse Ronan (Hanna)

Best Supporting Male Actor – Christopher Plummer (Beginners)

A sinch to sweep the board during the current awards season, Plummer excels playing a man who comes out as gay in his twilight years. While it’s a dream role for an actor, it needs to be handled with extreme care to work effectively. Mercifully, Plummer avoids resorting to reductive and insulting stereotypes, and imbues the character with wonderful humanity.

Special Mentions: Kyle Gallner (Red State), Eddie Marsan (Tyrannosaur), Corey Stoll (Midnight In Paris), John Hurt (Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; Melancholia), Michael Fassbender (X-Men: First Class)

Best Supporting Female Actor – Barbara Hershey (Black Swan)

Hershey gives a chilling turn as the insidious and stifling mother of Portman’s ballerina, giving Black Swan a new take on the Oedipus myth. It shouldn’t need stating, but Hershey’s performance is another tangible reminder that female actors don’t have an expiration date. Not every role for a woman over the age of 40 has to go to Meryl Streep.

Special Mentions: Helena Bonham-Carter (The King’s Speech), Keira Knightley (Never Let Me Go), MyAnna Buring (Kill List), Melissa McCarthy (Bridesmaids), Elle Fanning (Super 8), Jessica Barden (Hanna), Charlotte Gainsbourg (Melancholia), Sally Hawkins (Submarine; Never Let Me Go), Alison Pill (Midnight In Paris)

3 out of 5 *****

There is an argument for saying that if you were to distill Steven Spielberg into a giant chunk of celluloid, the end result would be War Horse. Based on the popular children’s book, and the even more popular stage production (which Lindsey Kalenborn was kind enough to review here), the story focuses on young Albert Narracott, and his beloved horse, Joey.

The opening of the film is set in the lush Devon countryside in the early part of the 20th century. Simple living and English countryside accents abound. The lifestyle is basic and insular, where everyone knows each other’s business – making it easy for Spielberg to introduce us to the characters, as well as the setting.

However, the way of life is shaken by an oncoming storm; The First World War. Needing to make ends meet, Albert’s father, Ted (Peter Mullan) sells Joey to the British Army. A heartbroken Albert tries to enlist, but is held back as he is not of legal soldiering age.

Joey is a thoroughbred rather than a workhorse, but he is a headstrong animal with an unquenchable spirit. One area where Spielberg deserves credit is anthropomorphising Joey to prevent viewers looking upon him as a dumb animal – a prejudice that shouldn’t need addressing, but like all prejudices, sadly does.

As anyone with a knowledge of their history will know, in 1914 the British attitude in heading to France for battle was, “Tally ho chaps, this’ll be a lark, King & Country, give the Bosch a damn good thrashing, be back home for Christmas!” And as anyone with a knowledge of their history will know, a mass bloodbath developed that took four years to bring to a resolution. Joey and Albert – who enlists as soon as he reaches adulthood – are caught up in this battle. While suspecting Joey dead, Albert vows that he will be reunited with him again.

The first hour of War Horse, set before the outbreak of war, is essentially high-budget, ITV1 fare. The intrinsic mawkishness is supplemented by a John Williams score, which comes ready-made, dripping with treacle, absent of any ardour. The screenplay from Lee Hall (Billy Elliott) and Richard Curtis (Love Actually) sounds like a first draft, especially the dialogue. While I think this is done with the aid of making it accessible for North American viewers, I’m not sure if it artistically mitigates the decision.

Thankfully the quality rises when we move into the miasma of WWI. It’s not as if Spielberg needs to prove how skilled he is at helming a story in this backdrop, but he does so with aplomb. The visual is prioritised over the verbal, and the story improves as a result. We see the effects of war, not only on those in the middle of it, but to the citizens on the fringes. They may not have paid with their lives, but the conflict came at a cost to all, soldier or not.

The themes of enduring love, loss and the terror of a loved one going into harm’s way are at play in War Horse. But the trope that is the movie’s most abiding, and most effective, is the loss of innocence (something that is often overlooked when people speak of Spielberg). The First World War was debatably the time when a large portion of the globe lost its innocence, the first of many scars on the psyche of the West. Personally I was glad to see a story that focused on WWI for a change – I have a bugbear with people who refer to WWII as “the war”, and I wonder if WWI seems to lack the same redolence because it didn’t have any Nazis in it.

Despite the script, strong actors can always elevate average material and the likes of Mullan, Emily Watson, Benedict Cumberbatch, David Kross, Niels Arestrup, Eddie Marsan and Toby Kebbell have the talent to make silk purses out of sows’ ears. And if nothing else, the lachrymose first hour is proficiently filmed.

Leaving the cinema my friend said War Horse felt like a Christmas film. I said it was more like a children’s movie. I think we both meant the same thing. Now there’s nothing wrong with setting out to make a tale for kids. I actually think many children would like War Horse and it’d be a good starting point to educate them about WWI. Spielberg can justify directing what was a simple story, the problem is that it’s executed in such a simple way. War Horse is the kind of film that “Wendy” would love (Movies You Should See will explain the reference).

Yesterday 2oth Century Fox came out with Rise of the Planet of the Apes on Blu-ray and DVD. I have seen the cult classic Apes films from back in the day and enjoyed them for the storyline. I did not know if this film was going to be great or be a dud. It turns out that Rise is a great film. Rise is a prequel to the original Planet of the Apes. The film shows the starting point of where the apes attempt to take over the world. The plot is centered around a scientist, Dr. Will Rodman (James Franco) who looks for a cure for the Alzheimer’s disease that his dad, Charles (John Lithgow) has and needs to be supervised as his condition continues to get worse.

Rodman looks to cure Alzheimer’s with a new drug called ALZ-112 that has been tested on apes. One of the apes called Bright Eyes shows signs of great mental growth from the treatment. After an incident with Bright Eyes the company shuts down the trials, but Rodman keeps the study alive with Bright Eyes’ offspring Caesar that inherited the ALZ-112 drug from his mother. A bond grows with Caesar and both Rodman and his father at Rodman’s home. That is all I will say about the film since I feel you need to check out the film because it is on my favorite films of this year.

Rise does a great job of tying the old films and brings in the new CGI technology of now to create a great film. Caesar is played by actor Andy Serkis, who played Gollum in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Serkis does one hell of a job as Caesar. At one point I started rooting for Caesar with all the different struggles he faces in the film. Make sure you watch the credits since there is a little footage after the film ends!

3 out of 5 *****

Take Shelter begins with a shot tilted upwards towards a looming tree, its leaves swaying gently in the breeze. This shot isn’t self-indulgent visual pretension, but the point of view of our protagonist, Curtis LaForche (Michael Shannon). He seems uneasy, and this isn’t helped by an ominous storm cloud whirling in the distance. Drops of rain begin to fall, which on inspection appear as a rusty orange colour, rather than vitreous.

This is the first of many unsettling scenes. Take Shelter communicates in harbingers. Curtis lives in a small Ohio town with his wife, Samantha (Jessica Chastain) and their young daughter, Hannah (Tova Stewart). Hannah is deaf, and as such, Curtis & Samantha communicate with her using sign-language, which Samantha seems to be better at than her husband. The community is blue-collar, working-class and generally church-going, but more out of keeping up appearances rather than devout faith. To be honest, the movie probably shows a more accurate portrayal of your average Republican voter than any of those tiresome & interminable GOP debates that have recently plagued American television. 

Curtis’s friend and work colleague, Dewart (Shea Wigham – who stars with Shannon in Boardwalk Empire) confesses his envy for Curtis’s settled life. However, despite his ostensible domestic contentedness, Curtis is plagued by vivid nightmares of disaster befalling him and his family. These dreams have an impact so profound that Curtis grows ever more convinced that these visions will be made manifest. While the movie is set during the summer, Curtis believes a storm is brewing – literal & figurative. His concern turns to worry, worry turns to terror, terror turns to manic paranoia.

Initially he keeps these thoughts secret from Samantha. The nightmares are causing him to wet the bed. Curtis feels a combination of shame, as well as high anxiety. While this cross-section of society is not outwardly prejudiced, there is an old-fashioned way to how things are done. Men go to work, before retiring to the local bar in the evenings. The women stay at home, and look after their respective children. Samantha has a side-job on Saturdays, selling clothes from a stall. But Curtis is the primary breadwinner, and believes as the man that it is his obligation to be as sturdy as an oak tree, providing and protecting at all times. He leaves the job of nurturing to Samantha.

Believing that a storm of “Book of Revelations” proportions is imminent, he mortgages the family home – and eventually his daughter’s medical treatment – to expand an old storm shelter in his backyard. By this time he has confessed his worries to Samantha, but it doesn’t prevent him pouring every spare ounce of time and money into this project.

It doesn’t escape Curtis that he may be losing his sanity. There is a history of mental illness in the family, and he needs constant medication to be able to sleep at night.

Unsurprisingly, his unravelling puts an arduous strain on his marriage. He and Samantha are devoted to each other, as well as Hannah. But there are signs that – as can happen in marriages – that while they still love each other, they are no longer in love with one another. Not only does the story have interesting gender connotations, but also religious ones. Does Curtis’s deteriorating mental state have anything to do with him often choosing not to go to church on Sundays? Is it his family that need shelter or is it his own mind?

It should barely need mentioning that Shannon – who has worked with the writer-director, Jeff Nichols before – is excellent as the lead. Three years ago, he stole Revolutionary Road from Kate Winslet & Leonardo DiCaprio, picking up an Oscar nomination, while his work in Boardwalk Empire has been nothing short of stellar. If anything, Chastain’s performance is even better. She has been a busy girl over the last 12 months. Significant parts in The Help, The Tree of Life, and The Debt, with Ralph Fiennes’s Coriolanus still to come, she may be Hollywood’s next breakout female star.

The main negative is the movie’s pacing. It could have done with at least 15 minutes shaved off its 124 minutes running length. There is a line between building layers onto one’s story and just dragging scenes out. Too often the latter happens. It’s not a major problem but does prohibit any aspirations the film has to achieving greatness. And I’m yet to decide whether the ending was artistically opaque or downright muddled.

These flaws are a real shame, as there’s so much to like about Take Shelter. The visual depiction of the town is near faultless. Most of the time you could have sworn that you were in the 1970′s/80′s. The mis-en-scene isn’t too dissimilar from the design seen in Super 8. Only a few minor mentions of the Internet, cellphones and a 2010 calendar let us know that we’re in the present day.

While Take Shelter can be added to the list of post-summer movies that have turned 2011 from a moribund cinema year into a mediocre one, I can’t shake the feeling that it could have been that little bit better.

Yesterday the Internet was ablaze with news that a potential big-screen version of Doctor Who is in its early developmental stages. The reaction was febrile and divisive, but also puzzled those who aren’t fans of the popular television series. After all, it’s an iconic part of the now lucrative speculative-fiction oeuvre, it would bring a ready-made audience to the cinema – particularly in the UK. A large part of the promotion would also be less of a worry for BBC Worldwide.

So why does such a prospect fill me, and many other “Whovians” with dread:

1) In the realm of spec-fiction, Doctor Who has always been confined to the medium of television. It’s a truism in the arts that television is a writers medium, while movies are a playground for directors. Simply put, moving the story to the cinema screen could be to the detriment of a well-crafted story, especially when you can offset that with dazzling action scenes and explosions.

2) One argument that has been stated in defence of a film outing for The Doctor is that there are many examples of a well-known character co-existing on more than one entertainment format, such as the tales of Superman or The Terminator. Thing is, it’s tougher to find examples of  both actually working. I mean, really working. At best, one medium shines while the other suffers in comparison. Sherlock Holmes is probably the exception that proves the rule, and it remains to be seen where the Baker Street sleuth will stand with audiences this time next year.

3) David Yates is slated to direct this movie adaptation, and has stated that it should retain its British flavour. That’s a given, but it doesn’t prevent fans from shuddering with terror that in actuality we will have to endure the nightmare child embodied in the picture at the top of this post. A large part of Doctor Who is its offbeat eccentricity. That doesn’t correlate with the box-office money-spinner that any studio would expect to garner for bankrolling such a production.

4) Yates is developing the project with Jane Tranter. Tranter was an important cog in the machine during Russell T Davies’s tenure on the show. Now the bad news. She was also part of the team that relocated Davies’s Torchwood from Cardiff to America, giving it a transatlantic update in the mini-series, Torchwood: Miracle Day. It was a disaster from start to finish. While the blame cannot solely be laid at Tranter’s door, her recent track record would hardly inspire one with confidence that she could do a better job this time around.

5) Doesn’t this all smack of bit of a cash-in? As I’ve recently stated in this blog, the success Doctor Who has enjoyed since its return surprised everyone. It has been lucratively successful, and not just domestically. What’s the motivation for bringing this to the silver screen? If Yates really wanted to work on Doctor Who, has he ever thought of picking up the phone and giving Steven Moffat a call?

6) Both Moffat and former Doctor, David Tennant have poured scorn on the idea of a Doctor Who movie in the past. They state that just because something works in one artistic medium, it doesn’t guarantee a similar result in another format. Is Doctor Who going to end up in the same hall of woe as Daredevil, Watchmen and Dorian Gray?

7) Maybe the biggest worry of all. Doctor Who’s increasing success globally is correlating (coincidentally?) with the indifference meted out to it by some in Britain. I’ve already mentioned that the show is regarded as a problem by the BBC, rather than as a boon to its programming. Handing it over to BBC Worldwide to produce movies would give it the ideal excuse to wash their hands of the television series. And if the movie turns out to be a failure, then consider Doctor Who finished, left to gather dust at the back of the cultural cupboard.

Reports say that we won’t see the movie for at least three years. So we’d better make the most of The Doctor while we can. The programme celebrates it’s 50th anniversary in 2013. It looks increasingly like it’ll be less of a milestone, and more of a swansong.

The Leeds film festival opened last night with a showing of Andrea Arnold’s (Fish Tank) Wuthering Heights. Her adaptation forgoes the stereotypes of the period drama to deliver a minimalist take on Emily Brontë’s classic novel. Instead of frilly dresses and posh accents we get mud, blood and thick Yorkshire accents. Not that you will not have to worry much about the accents as the dialogue is kept to an absolute minimum. The mood is set with some stunning cinematography, although one could argue that it is hard to mess up shots of the Yorkshire Moors.

The first thing that Arnold does is to change class system undertones of the tale to racial ones by making Heathcliff black. This paves the way for the bullying handed down by Hindey (the son of the family that adopt Heathcliff) to be motived purely by the racial hated. What further emphasises the move away from the traditional is the language, the dialogue is rough, expect to hear terms that nobody in Downton would have heard of, let alone say and that includes racial slurs. This decision is one that adds to the mood of the film and helps set up the darkness however it can be shocking if you were to go into this film expecting a nice Jane Austin style romp.

Aside from the beautiful shots of the Moors, the real positives of this film are the young actors and actresses, the young Heathcliff, played by Soloman Grave and Shannon Beer who plays Cathy, are stronger than their adult counterparts (James Howson and Kaya Scodelario respectively). The chemistry between the two younger characters feels much more real than that between the adults. It is here that the weaknesses of the film really start to show, as we rejoin the story years later when Healthcliff returns to confront Hindey and Cathy, who is now married to the Lord of the local estate. The two main characters just have too little chemistry between them, a situation that is not helped by the fact that no person in this film has any redeeming features which means the audience has no positive emotional attachment to the characters. This is coupled with the fact that there seems to be an element of assumed knowledge of the story to understand the motives of the characters that undermine the film. An example of which is when Healthcliff decides to leave again and marry Isabella. There is nothing in the film to foreshadow this decision, and we are left perplexed to why he would do this apart from the fact he is just a bastard.

There are also a number of small things that damage the film, mainly linked to Arnold’s attempts to enforce the dark tone. We get numerous close ups of animal killings, lambs, hares and hangings of dogs all feature in this film and even more perplexing is the decision to have it almost constantly raining at the farm while it is almost always sunny at the manor house despite the fact the two are within walking distance.

Overall this film is nothing more than average, the attempt to return the story to its dark origins on paper is a good idea however Arnold’s methods leave much to be desired.

4 1/2 out of 5 *****

The following post is by Mark Perez (eldiablito on our forums & eldiablito_72 on Twitter)

Weekend is a film directed by Andrew Haigh. This is his second feature film. Before that he worked as an editor on Black Hawk Down, Hannibal Rising, and Gladiator. It stars a cast of unknowns, and takes place in Nottingham. I wasn’t aware of this going into the movie, so I was taken aback once the actors began speaking. It was a pleasant surprise to the ears of this anglophile.

This is one of the best “gay” movies I’ve ever seen. There, I’ve said it, and there’s no turning back. I also feel that I’m doing it an injustice by even labeling it in that fashion. It’s a fantastic film, period. That being said, it’s very much an important part of new gay cinema, much in the same way Gus Van Sant’s Milk is.

Back to the film. It stars Tom Cullen, and Chris New, as Russell & Glen. We first meet Russell – who’s very much the guy next door – about to attend a party. He eventually excuses himself, to get some rest for the night. Cut to him sneaking away to a gay bar. It’s there that Glen catches his eye. Russell tries to make a connection, but instead gets accosted by a “Hobbit”.

It’s only the next morning that we realize that Glen saved him from the aforementioned Hobbit. And now things begin to get interesting. Glen is an artist, and is compiling information to use as part of the project. He audio records Russell, and asks him questions regarding their sexual encounter. Russell consented to this, the night before, while they were drunk. Their dialogue, and interaction captivates the viewer, much in the same way Jesse and Celine’s did in Before Sunrise and Before Sunset.

This movie doesn’t hold back in its view of their reality. It gets very intimate, and the sexual situations, are upfront, without being vulgar. Russell, we find out, is not completely out of the closet. He never discusses his life with his straight friends. Glen, on the other hand, is out and proud, and is quick to point out that as far as he is concerned, most straight people are okay with gay people, as long as they don’t have to hear the details. So while he is putting all this data together for an exhibit, he highly doubts that any straight people will come to see it. We learn that Russell believes in marriage, while Glen feels that it’s conforming. Furthermore, he doesn’t “do boyfriends”. They are polar opposites, yet, are very much attracted to each other.

Eventually Glen discloses information that points toward their new found relationship coming to a quick end. This doesn’t necessarily give the situation a sense of urgency, but clearly changes the game.

This film is beautiful to look at, and the dialogue, intriguing. I think the only thing I had a problem with was the drug use towards the end of the film. I didn’t exactly think it was necessary to the story, but it just happens to be what these two particular men do together.

I really do hope this movie gets the audience it deserves, because again, it’s so much more than just a “gay” film. It’s a movie about two people, who happen to be men, that find a real connection with each other.

This post originally came from my blog at techsupportrich.com

I’m sitting here looking through my new triple play Blu-Ray set of Senna, great film by the way. This little pack has the Blu-Ray version of the film, a DVD copy of the film, and kind of almost a digital copy of the film. That’s the triple play idea. I can see the day coming where such a thing isn’t necessary. I only need a DVD copy of the film because I’ve got just the one Blu-Ray player. Can you imagine buying a DVD that came with a VHS copy of the film? That would be silly, but it’s effectively what we’re doing with these triple play sets.

However, what I’m interested in today, is the digital copy of the film. So why include a digital copy? I presume it’s so I don’t rip the DVD. Soon in the UK we’ll be legally allowed to transfer media from one medium to another, which will apply to ripping both CDs and DVDs. If the movie company are happy for me to have a digital copy, then why not include some software that would rip the DVD to a format of my choosing? DRM.

Saying that there is a digital copy included is true, but not the whole story. Each triple play set comes with a code which allows you to download the movie from iTunes. The digital copy included on the disc is encoded with Windows Plays For Sure DRM, which at this point means you can play it on a Windows PC and nothing else. I’m struggling to think of a popular portable device that can play this particular flavour of DRM. iOS can’t, Android can’t. As far as I know, even Windows Phone 7 can play Plays For Sure files. It’s safe to say that most people who buy triple play sets, are going to download the iTunes copy. It’s the only option I’ve ever taken because there’s just no way the Windows version will play on my Mac.

What I find most interesting about all this, is what this does for Apple. Making the iTunes version of the film be the digital copy, means that every triple play set is a reason to buy an iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch or Mac. It’s safe to assume that if you’re buying a Blu-Ray that comes with a digital version, then you intend to watch that movie on a portable device. Whether it’s your phone, or tablet. The only phones or tablets available that play the digital copy, are i devices. Genius.

This little move by Apple does something very special. It changes iTunes from being a store like Amazon or Play, into a format like DVD or Blu-Ray. Steve Jobs once described Blu-Ray as a bag of hurt. I don’t think he always felt that way.

Anyway, while we’re talking about this, isn’t it obvious that Google have to do something about this? I don’t doubt that iOS will become the default standard for people who buy tablets, but the closest competitors will be running Android. There are also more Android phones out there in the world, than there are iPhones. Wouldn’t it make the most sense if the two files that were available to you in your triple play set, were the iTunes copy, and something that runs on Android? Because, well, here’s the thing. I want a copy of my film that plays on my Android phone, so I’m ripping the DVD, which is what they didn’t want me to do in the first place. And I plan on getting an iPad so I’m downloading the iTunes versions too. Why not? I payed for them.

But HANG ON! I just thought of something else. That code for the iTunes movie, only works once. As soon as I use it, the code becomes useless. That means that I no longer own a triple play Blu-Ray set, I own a double play one. At least as far as anyone buying my used copy is concerned. By making the digital copy on the disc totally pointless, and by giving you a code for a one time only download of the useful copy, they give a swift kick to the second hand film market. Movie companies hate it when normal people sell their old DVDs and Blu-Rays to each other, because somebody new sees the movie, and they don’t make any money off it. I suddenly feeling dumb for going through all my discs and making sure I’ve downloaded the digital version from iTunes.

3 1/2 out of 5 *****

Some movies open with a sequence that doesn’t only set the scene, but works as a mission statement for what is to follow. Drive begins in a hotel room, with Ryan Gosling’s voiceover in the background. It’s only as the camera pans to the left that we realise that what we are hearing is not a voiceover. Gosling is issuing instructions into a phone. He is about to embark on a job as a getaway driver for an imminent robbery. The rules are simple: You give him the location, and he’s yours for five minutes. He doesn’t get involved in the robbery. He doesn’t carry a gun, and his five minute window is non-negotiable. Anything that happens outside of those five minutes is not his concern.

Gosling’s character is nameless throughout. He’s credited as “the driver”. His boss, Shannon (Bryan Cranston), who gets him the vehicles he needs to execute his getaways calls him, “kid”. It’s clear that only Shannon has earned the right to give him a nickname. 

Director Nicolas Winding Refn builds the tension piece by piece, so Gosling’s preparation in the opening minutes is the calm before the storm. Not only is it a deliciously cool start to the story, but it is a microcosm for the rest of the film. It stands to reason that Gosling has to evade the police, and does so. But not with daredevil feats of speed, but with guile and cunning. The streets of California exist in his head like a road map. There’s not a side-street or back-alley that can escape his navigational skills.

The driver lives strictly by his self-imposed code, and is brilliant at one thing; driving. He prepares meticulously, and shows in the opening sequence that there is no getaway driver as good as he is. He works the gears, knobs and dials of a car with the precision of a watchmaker. He is inscrutable and seldom speaks. This is a character that owes much to the assassins and samurai from Japanese cinema, as well as bearing comparison to Clint Eastwood’s characters in Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns.

The plot only gets moving when he meets his neighbour, Irene (Carey Mulligan). Her husband is in prison, and she is left to raise her young son, Benicio, on her own. The chemistry between Irene and the driver fizzes with desire. He also takes a shine to Benicio. But any chance of him stepping into the breach as a surrogate father figure are dashed when Standard – the husband – is released from jail. While Irene lusts after the driver, she is shackled out of dutiful obligation to Standard. Mulligan does a good job here, as you can see how conflicted she feels as her desire for the driver is offset by her shame for daring to think about looking elsewhere for a lover.

The other major plot strand involves two local gangsters, Nino (Ron Perlman) and Bernie (Albert Brooks – playing very much against type). Bernie is entering into business with Shannon, setting up a race car team. Guess who they are going to hire to be their driver?

The first two-thirds of Drive are superb. The driver sets the tone with his eremitical demeanour. The movie excels in its economy of dialogue. Scenes that flesh out the characters are deliberately prolonged, having pauses where most stories would feel the need to have their cast speak. But he ends the perfunctory plot scenes once they’ve served their purpose. Again, most films would draw them out to a more predictable conclusion, but once the point has been made, Refn moves on, much like the driver.

As I said at the start, the driver has a strict code that he lives by. So it only makes narrative sense to put him in a position where he may have to break that code. The film progresses, and the veneer of mechanical exactitude slips, which was fine. However, the final 20 minutes take a exploitative turn, and while remaining entertaining, do not befit a tale such as this.

As the plot strands come together, Drive becomes violent. Very violent. While the events that happen are necessary to the story, the way they are executed was clearly a conscious choice from Refn to be visually incendiary. It seems that he much prefers violent imagery to violent symbolism.

However, these are minor quibbles to what is a fine piece of work. As always, Gosling anchors the film magnificently. He has a natural screen magnetism, and at times with his accented intonation and grubby attire, he reminded me of a specific actor; Marlon Brando. It may be hyperbolic to say so, but some actors – such as Brando or Katharine Hepburn – have “it”. I think Gosling is one such actor.

Added to this is the wonderful job Refn does of shooting Los Angeles as a city-scape. I’ve always had a theory about how no filmmaker can ever be great until they give a location a sentience all of its own. Refn dovetails nicely with his cinematographer, Newton Thomas Sigel. You will do well this year to see many films with better shot composition than Drive.

As well as looking stunning, the film has a stylised 1980′s feel. The entire mis-en-scene; the music, the colour palette, even the font used in the opening & closing credits. If it weren’t for the up-to-date mobile phones used, you could easily think that this was a movie set in the 1980′s. Regardless, Drive is a strong showing from all involved. If the quality of movies can remain to this standard in the closing months of 2011, maybe the cinema year won’t be such a washout after all.

4 out of 5 *****

If you have any interest in going to see this film, then you probably shouldn’t read this review. At least not yet. Wait until you’ve seen it first, as there’s no way I can avoid dissecting the movie in detail on here. Perfect Sense is not a simple or superficial story, and it’d be inappropriate of me to discuss it in those terms.

The movie is penned by Danish scribe, Kim Fupz Aakeson, and it shows. It’s the kind of story that you’d more commonly expect from the Scandinavian or Mediterranean stable of art-house cinema. To call it high-concept is probably an understatement. The plot is has strong elements of science fiction, but is more redolent of Andrei Tarkovsy than H.G Wells or Isaac Asimov.

The story – set in present day Glasgow – focuses on the romance between Michael (Ewan McGregor) and Susan (Eva Green). Michael is a  head chef, and we first meet him after he has a one-night stand. As he wakes, he unceremoniously asks his companion for the night to leave – he says that he can’t sleep when someone else is present in bed with him.

Susan is an epidemiologist, who is nursing a broken heart. Her stoic, cool demeanour is an unsurprising counterpoint to Michael, whose workplace is next to Susan’s flat. It leads to one of the more inventive “meet-cutes” I’ve seen for a while, particularly in an era when smoking is increasingly depicted as solecistic in society.

The laboratory where Susan works leads us into the plot; a worldwide pandemic is affecting the planet’s denizens that is causing everyone to lose their senses (literally). One by one, people lose the ability to smell, taste, hear, see and touch. Susan is one of many scientists who work to figure out the cause of this epidemic. But the film is not about how this has happened, but rather how people respond to such an occurrence.

Each time a sense is lost, there is a harbinger that precedes it. First, people are overcome with grief. Then crippling terror. Unadulterated rage comes next. Before finally, the human race feels an uplifting shot of bliss. Director David Mackenzie does a good job of making these sequences work as – like the whole film – they could have descended into farcical territory. It’s not easy depicting people behaving with emotional abandon. The fact that there were a few nervous chuckles in the screening that I was at proved this. As people, we condition ourselves to be restrained, and always in control.

In this story, agency is now a thing of the past. Humanity is helpless to stop the inexorable loss of our senses. One of the major questions posed is how do people behave when we are robbed of the things we take as read? Panic spreads, and governments make cack-handed attempts to keep order. There are numerous occasions when rioting breaks out, cars are upturned, and debris litters the streets. It will trigger potent memories for anyone who was affected by the recent looting that broke out in Britain.

However, in the midst of such uncertainty, another of the movie’s multifarious themes is that life goes on. Our species is nothing if not resilient and adaptable, and people find new ways to cope with the loss of our senses. Street performers put on shows communicating smell using sounds and verbal description. When taste is no more, people become emancipated to consume anything, as all that matters now is texture and consistency, rather than flavour. In lieu of going deaf, nightclubs are crammed with speakers for people to lean against, still able to feel the vibrations of the songs that are playing. As every sense becomes extinct, this new-world paradigm brings Michael and Susan closer together. What may have been nothing more than flirtation rapidly develops into a full-blown love story. As Tyler Durden said in Fight Club, “It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything”. People care less and less about ego and pride. They are reduced to their most basest of characteristics. And while some are eroded by this, others are elevated.

This is a story that sounds great in principle, but should fall apart as it progresses. There are so many ideas at work here, so many motifs in play, that preventing a tale like this from unravelling is a triumph for both Mackenzie and Aakeson. So much so, that I’ve been rendered unable to convey what I feel about this film. I may have been able to process the events of the story, but at the time of writing, I’m still working on processing the feelings it evokes, and as a result, I apologise for this post being a ham-fisted ramble. It’s probably my own fault for writing this so soon after returning from the cinema, but I daren’t have left it until tomorrow.

What Mackenzie has achieved here reminds me in some ways of Charlie Kaufman’s Synecdoche, New York. Both stories are sweeping in their ambition, exploring the depth of the human experience.

And Perfect Sense’s reach doesn’t exceed its grasp. Thanks to great work from all involved, it is moving, profound, affecting and thought-provoking. I expect like me, you’ll anticipate the denouement before it happens, but that shouldn’t serve to make it any less poignant. Personally my left leg was shaking, while a few rows in front of me, there was a woman who almost stood up, as she struggled to contain her ardour.

In the final monologue of The Office, David Brent ponders how best to make a difference in the world – “I realised that I do. We all do. It’s how we interact with our fellow man.” This could have been the mantra for Perfect Sense.

Yes, life is hard, painful, and often a thankless struggle. But it’s so much preferable to the alternative. And while some may find it pretentious and/or schmaltzy, David Mackenzie has made a film that contains such a beautiful and powerful sentiment, it could just be the film of 2011.

The following post is by Lindsey Kalenborn (lindseykal on our forums & @lindseykal28 on Twitter)

The most engaging part of the movie by far is the middle sequence.  Set in the early 1950’s, the film weaves in and out of the life of an eleven year old boy and his brothers with the haziness of a slow Summer day. They play outside. They fight, make up, get into trouble, and do their chores. They idolize their mother; they respect and fear their father.

I would say the film’s major theme is the intermingling of love and fear we have towards our fathers. So often in movies, fathers that physically discipline their children fall into three categories: abusive monsters, cold-hearted bastards, or drunks. Brad Pitt plays a loving, affectionate, supportive father.  He’s also short tempered, critical, and will give you a beat-down if you step out of line.  It’s an interesting, layered character, shown from the perspective of a child.

Sean Penn, a star of the film, has admitted that he doesn’t fully understand The Tree of Life. He is not alone, as the beginning and the end of the movie had me scratching my head.

For instance, there is a very long sequence with shots of volcanoes and dinosaurs. What is this? An homage to the long monkey sequence of 2001: A Space Odyssey about the beginning of life? Are the volcanoes references to the father’s temper blowing up? That what we think are life’s struggles mean nothing in the cosmic scheme of things? It’s surreal and I know I’m not getting something. So unless I go online, find someone more perceptive than me, crib their ideas and pawn them off as my own I just have to admit I didn’t understand it all.

But that’s part of the fun of a Malick movie. I can’t wait to go online and see what such aforementioned perceptive people have to say and ask what on earth that was all about. I want to hear theories and hypotheses and debates about the footage.

Are large portions of the movie pretentious visual montages? Well, yes. It’s a Malick movie. But – and I do not make this statement lightly – it is the most visceral childhood experience captured on film that I have ever seen.

If you’ve never seen a Terrence Malick movie, for God’s sake don’t start with The Tree of Life. His debut Badlands is much more suitable for the uninitiated. It has the natural imagery and brilliant camera work that he’s famous for, as well as a clear linear narrative and plot with some action moments. It’s a masterpiece, but an accessible masterpiece.

The Tree of Life is a difficult film and will not be for everyone. However, I give it a high recommendation, if only for the strong sense of nostalgia it inspires. The fact that it’s exquisitely shot and beautifully acted is all icing on the cake.

The following post is by Lindsey Kalenborn (lindseykal on our forums & @lindseykal28 on Twitter)

I’ve seen some real pieces of dreck before but this was ridiculous.

I should probably back up a bit, as I‘m getting ahead of myself. Bucky Larson, starring Nick Swardson and Christina Ricci was released in theaters last week. Swardson is best known for his stand up and his minor character roles in Adam Sandler comedies. This is his debut starring role and will probably be his last for at least a few years. I have a feeling that he may end up going to “movie jail” for a while after this debacle.

The premise of the film is that Bucky, a hapless grocery bagger from Iowa, decides to follow his dreams of starring in adult movies. Simple enough. Well, five minutes in I was incredibly offended. Not from the raunchy premise, but offended as a consumer that anything this poorly written received funding to be filmed.

The “jokes” are terrible and mostly consist of Swardson prancing around in  buck teeth and a bowl cut wig. He’ll say something in a lisp and people comment on what a loser he is. He dates Christina Ricci who takes a shine to him; God knows why. Ricci’s acting is decent and she gives the role her all. But the script gives her such inane dialogue that I ended up embarrassed for her. Not embarrassed for the character, but for the actress herself.

I try not to write a review without saying something positive, but it‘s a struggle. There is a scene where Kevin Nealon, playing Bucky’s aggressive and territorial room mate, refuses to share any of his milk so that Bucky can have a bowl of cereal. That was kind of funny. And…..that’s it.  I think it lasted about forty seconds.

Walking into the theater to see a movie named Bucky Larson, I really wasn’t expecting  much. I wasn’t expecting Shakespeare, or even Bridesmaids. However, I was expecting a mildly bad comedy that would make me laugh a bit, pass a lazy Sunday afternoon, and would be forgotten by dinner time. One thing that I can say about the movie is that I won’t be forgetting this anytime soon.  It has been burned in my brain and it‘s there to stay.

My brother and I have similar sensibilities when it comes to movies, and after seeing Nick Swardson’s stand-up live last year, he wouldn’t stop raving about what a genius he thought he was. Swardson’s Comedy Central TV show, Pretend Time has also received some positive hype as being hilarious, if strange.  The previews for the movie were terrible, but I was hoping for some quirky moments reflecting Swardson’s bent sense of humor. I thought I was in for a flick in the vein of Benchwarmers or Grandma’s Boy:  dumb, juvenile, and a guilty pleasure.

Well, I was wrong.  Boy, was I.  There were four people in the theater and by the end three had walked out, including the friend I was with. She chose to go watch The Help instead even though she missed the first fifty minutes. I wanted to write this review so I stuck through the entire mess until the bitter end. What can I say, I’m a slave to my art.

I had a debate with myself about whether I thought it’s worse than Gigli, it’s that bad. Gigli wins, mostly because of the tasteless and cruel jokes about people with special needs, but Bucky is a close second.

The great Roger Ebert discussed the movie North with the following quote, and it pretty much sums up everything I have to say about Bucky Larson: Born to be a Star:

“I hated this movie. Hated hated hated hated hated this movie. Hated it. Hated every simpering stupid vacant audience-insulting moment of it. Hated the sensibility that thought anyone would like it. Hated the implied insult to the audience by its belief that anyone would be entertained by it.”

*Author’s Note:  I don’t read reviews of the movies that I am writing about because I don’t want to be influenced by what other people have to say. But I do have to mention that when I finished this write-up I went to Rotten Tomatoes to see what people had to say about Bucky Larson. To say it’s not favorable is an understatement, as it received a zero(!) percent in the ratings.

I can’t even remember the last time I’ve seen a movie get zero percent. Even though I have a feeling of vindication I almost feel sorry for the filmmakers. Almost. Those filmmakers made me watch Bucky Larson, and that’s not something you just forget.

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/bucky-larson-born-to-be-a-star-wspoilers/feed/ 0 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/warrior-wspoilers/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/warrior-wspoilers/#comments Tue, 20 Sep 2011 23:03:36 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=11126

I’m sure that Warrior will precipitate many essays by bloggers and film students. It contains themes that are intriguing from the perspective of masculinity in cinema. It delves into the world of mixed-martial arts, sometimes referred to as “cage fighting”. But while the octagon is the setting, it is not the story. The movie depicts numerous injuries, bumps, and bruises. However, it’s the psychological wounds rather than the physical ones that power the movie. Warrior is a film about damaged people in desperate need of healing – once again I’m not talking about any physical injuries.

The plot centres around the estranged Conlon family; Brendan (Joel Edgerton), Tommy (Tom Hardy), and Paddy (Nick Nolte). Paddy’s rampant alcoholism led to his wife leaving him, taking a pre-pubescent Tommy with her, prior to him joining the Marines. The then teenage Brendan stayed with his father. Both had a talent for physical combat in school, and were trained by Paddy as young boys – in between bouts of abuse and neglect. Now grown men, Brendan – once part of the famous UFC circuit – has retired to raise his two young girls with his wife, Tess (played by Jennifer Morrison). Tommy has retuned from a harrowing tour of Iraq, and unlike his elder brother, has no peace in his life. A combination of what he endured in battle, and his troubled upbringing has left him embittered and riddled with inner-fury and self-loathing.

This is something he carries with him when fighting. When in the ring he acts the way Mike Tyson might have done if his sport of choice was MMA rather than boxing. Otherwise he says little and exudes constant menace.

Brendan is content with his domesticated life, carving out a career as a physics teacher in a local high school. But it’s not well-paid, and despite his and his wife’s best efforts, they are set to lose their house.

You may be thinking from the analysis above that I thought Warrior was brilliant. I didn’t. I didn’t hate it either. It’s by no means a bad film, and is a well-made piece of popcorn cinema. But by and large, it follows a formula that we have seen before. Early in the film, we learn that there is a lucrative knockout tournament taking place in Atlantic City. Of course, both Brendan and Tommy enter, and are set on a collision course not only for glory, but to reach closure on the family issues that have been unresolved between them for years. That may have just been the most redundant sentence I have ever written as you can ascertain the narrative of the film after about the first 30 minutes.

However, just because something is predictable doesn’t mean it can’t be entertaining. The movie does a good job of depicting the sub-culture of MMA (even if some of the fights are an exaggerated version of the real thing); the gyms, the graft, the sounds of fists and limbs colliding. The working-class ethic and tunnel vision that these men have is redolent of two recent films; The Fighter and The Wrestler. 

One thing about the movie I did like was that not only are these men fighting against each other, but are also figuratively fighting against their own country. There was a strong underpinning of a government that is letting down its working and lower-middle class citizens, making upward social progression next to impossible. How many people in society these days compromise their principles just to keep the wolves from the door?

Added to this is a complexity to the character of Brendan, which was a pleasant surprise. Played with an understated honesty by Edgerton, he is a loving husband and father. But this doesn’t preclude his ego from getting the best of him; when finances become tight, his first refuge is to return to the cage, despite having acquiesced to Tess’s pleas to give that lifestyle up. He believes that as the man, it is his job to be the primary breadwinner. It’d be fair to surmise that earning money in such an atavistic way only serves to sustain his sense of self.

Tommy is less complicated. Like the real life character of Mike Tyson, his savage persona only serves to mask a childlike hurt within. But Hardy does a good job in a somewhat limited role, imbuing Tommy with a steely gravitas. He has a naturally muscular on-screen dominance, which should serve him well in what will likely be his star-making role as Bane in The Dark Knight Rises next summer. And while it is becoming increasingly difficult to decipher Nick Nolte when he speaks, I liked his performance as a man desperate to atone for his past transgressions. What helped this is that while Paddy yearns for forgiveness, he deserves none.

All in all, a decent piece of work, as long as you don’t go in expecting too much. Director Gavin O’Connor does a good job helming this tale. The fight scenes are bristling with brutal energy – professional wrestling fans should keep an eye out for an appealing cameo. And I think it’s an interesting case study as far as depiction of the male in cinema goes. As Tess says to Brendan, “I thought we agreed we weren’t going to raise our children in a family where their father gets beaten up for a living.”

 

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/warrior-wspoilers/feed/ 2 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/red-state-wminor-spoilers/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/red-state-wminor-spoilers/#comments Tue, 13 Sep 2011 03:22:36 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=11017

The story of how Red State came to be warrants a blog post in itself, and will have to wait for another day. Being one of a lucky handful to get tickets to a screening in Brixton, the length of the queue as we awaited outside the cinema almost reached out onto the road, in front of oncoming traffic. It was clear that these were Kevin Smith die-hards; people who avidly follow his Twitter feed, are regular subscribers to his Smodcast network of podcasts, and could probably recite the dialogue from the “37 in a row” scene ad-nauseum.

Add this to the fact that Kevin Smith was giving the audience a Q&A after the showing, not to mention that Red State has been largely distributed outside the medium’s normal parameters, meant that the sense of anticipation was sizzlingly palpable. But enough about the build-up, what was the film like?

As many who have seen the trailer will know, the story concerns three high-school males who are entrapped, and held captive by a group of fundamentalist Christians, featuring the always underrated Michael Parks and recent Oscar winner Melissa Leo in lead roles. It’s little secret that they have been loosely based on the real-life Westboro Baptist Church; if you have never heard of them, I suggest you look them up, as I refuse to give them any more publicity here than I need to.

The ATF, led by John Goodman are called in to rectify the situation, but it becomes quickly apparent that Parks, and his cult of indoctrinated followers, are armed with a lot more than bibles, crosses and prayers. The movie didn’t get its title due to the setting, but for the bloodshed on screen throughout the 90-odd minutes running time. Be warned, Red State fully earns its 18 certificate in the UK, and its R rating in North America. That’s to be expected with Kevin Smith, but for once it’s more to do with violence rather than profane dialogue.

As long as films are made, the fundamentals remain the same; If your story is well written and well cast, then you’ll never have anything worse than a highly watchable movie. Smith’s best work has always followed this principle, and he achieves it again with Red State. It should be as no surprise that the likes of Goodman, Leo, Parks and Stephen Root are all top class. But a mention should also be given to the cast’s younger members; Nicholas Braun, Michael Angarano, Kyle Gallner & Kerry Bishe. Gallner in particular has an easy screen presence, while Bishe proves that demented people tend to be made rather than born. I’ll be sure to keep an eye on their future work.

What was very pleasing was how the story reached its resolution. This kind of story has been seen before; Smith later mentioned in his Q&A that he deliberately tried to mirror the independent movies of the 1970′s. This informed the look, and credit must go to cinematographer David Klein, as well as Smith. The joke – often propagated by Smith – about his films looking like garbage can stop. It’s proficiently shot, with the composition bearing similarities to the work of Paul Greengrass. Also, Smith weaves in echoes of the Waco siege into the story, as well as the way that the American authorities – driven by fear of the unknown - deal with potential mischief-makers; The term “9/11″ is mentioned more than once.

I count myself very fortunate to have heard from Smith after the end credits. As I was digesting what I had seen, he explained his thought-processes when creating the story. One thing Smith has always had going for him is that he is fully aware of what he can, and just as importantly, can’t do. Stating that he could never make a horror movie in the vein of a master like Dario Argento, he worked on making Red State unsettling rather than terrifying. The phrase he used was “rope-a-dope”. Which is apposite as even though you may think that you’ve seen this kind of film already, you never feel 100% comfortable. And just when you finally think that you’re settled, you get hit with a haymaker to keep you honest. Tristan O’Field – late of Movies You Should See – described these as, “Oi!” moments; occasions when you are so stunned that only an unintelligible yelp can articulate your feelings. Red State has a few of those, and while it’s not in film of the year territory, it’s a well-crafted, smartly-executed horror flick, and is fully deserving of praise.

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/red-state-wminor-spoilers/feed/ 4 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/the-inbetweeners-movie-wspoilers/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/the-inbetweeners-movie-wspoilers/#comments Tue, 06 Sep 2011 02:05:47 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10931

First off, I confess that I’ve only put the spoiler warning in the title to err on the side of caution. However, I doubt this post will ruin things for you any more than any other review of this movie you might read.

It’s rare that a film is released in this country that is dependent so heavily on the UK box-office takings. The Inbetweeners Movie is something of an event over here, due to the popularity of the television sitcom. Its success thus far, has been limited to these shores, making any potential earnings elsewhere something of a bonus. And as I sat down, I wondered whether the film would stick to what had made it so successful in Britain, or would it make an active play to try and bring in viewers from the North American market?

Well, it was a bit of both, and it’s one of many things that makes The Inbetweeners Movie a disappoinment. Caught between two stalls, it falls short of repeating the quality of the sitcom, and probably doesn’t have enough to make people on the other side of The Atlantic care either. The story takes the four social duds – Will, Jay, Simon & Neil – out of suburbia, and to the Greek island of Malia, for a wild lads’ summer holiday. They have just finished school, and as many males of that age do, think that a hedonistic time in the sun is the perfect way to make the most of their new-found adulthood.

For those who had never seen the television version of the show, The Inbetweeners specialised in high farce; think Fawlty Towers with hormone-ridden teenage boys. This is a pattern that continues as the movie progresses. I think we all know what happens to the best laid plans. Well, it turns out that plans don’t have to be well laid to go horribly wrong. One of the best things about the show’s first two series’ was how reminiscent it was of so many males in their awkward teenage years. It avoided looking for the issues so often raised in fiction about young people. Shorn of sensationalist topics, such as drug abuse or teenage pregnancy made the tone of the show familiar to so many. Obviously you had to allow for a degree of comedic licence, but the fact is that most people don’t grow up as cool, or popular, or geeks, or outcasts. They’re just, “inbetween.”

Which makes the problems in the film all the more frustrating. The main one is the dialogue, which is simply appalling. Back in the early 90s, Quentin Tarantino bemoaned how he’d watched so many movies where the only purpose of dialogue was to advance the plot. This is fully in effect here. While there are some funny set-pieces, you still have to earn the right to make your audience laugh. Iain Morris & Damon Beesley’s screenplay is like a house without a solid foundation. Secondly, the film introduces four girls into the picture, whom the guys meet on holiday. Not only do they unimaginatively mirror their male counterparts, but they have no personality; this is not to denounce the four actresses, as their task was so thankless that I could feel little for them other than sympathy. To call them one-dimensional would be an overstatement.

One area of the film that I will defend is against accusations of homophobia or sexism. Yes, there are plenty of unsavoury terms used in the script. But it correlates accurately with the way many 18 year old boys talk, especially around each other. The movie doesn’t denounce or celebrate this – leaving it up to the audience to determine their own opinions – but it would be disingenuous not to include such coarse banter in the story. And to anyone who things that the film is sexist, I haven’t seen many movies with such an overbalance of nudity in favour of male flesh rather than female.

However, the film has proved a domestic box-office hit, and I only hope that tabloid clamours for a sequel are promptly silenced. This is definitely time to end the story of The Inbetweeners, as the movie has only continued the downward spiral in quality that was evident in Series 3. I only hope that time doesn’t sully what had been one of the better British sitcoms of recent years. What it did so well was look at how reluctant teenagers – particularly male teens – are to leave themselves bare and be “found out”. This a quality sadly lacking from the movie, and you’d probably be better off directing your attention to Submarine instead (which you can also find reviewed on Simply Read).

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/the-inbetweeners-movie-wspoilers/feed/ 1 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/submarine-wspoilers/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/submarine-wspoilers/#comments Fri, 02 Sep 2011 16:29:00 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10902

The events of one’s adolescence may not be the most significant part of a person’s life, but at the time, there are few other occasions that seem so important. If proof were needed, Richard Ayoade’s Submarine shows that you can take the coming-of-age story and set it anywhere. This is the kind of film that would normally be in the midwest of America. Submarine takes place in Swansea.

The story centres around 15 year old, Oliver Tate (played by Craig Roberts). We’ve seen the type before; solipsistic and socially awkward. But just because he periodically reads the dictionary or went through “a hat phase”, doesn’t prohibit him from trying to fit in the same as any other teen. Of course fitting in (for a straight male at least) means finding a girlfriend & losing one’s virginity. Oliver has his eyes set on Jordana Bevan (Yasmin Paige), who he states is, “moderately unpopular, making a romance between us more likely.” The desire for a girlfriend isn’t just about satiating his teenage hormones; it proves to everyone that he’s not gay, which is the worst slur that can be directed in the school playground. 

The rigours of  the school experience are captured expertly; the casual cruelty with which the weaker pupils are treated, the rat-race for acceptance, and enduring lessons rather than enjoying them. All Oliver wants to do is spend his time with Jordana, while simultaneously trying to prevent his parents’ marriage from falling apart. An old flame of his mother’s, Graham (Paddy Considine) has moved in next door, and Oliver worries that she may be tempted away from his father to start a new life with him. Oliver’s parents, Jill (Sally Hawkins) & Lloyd (Noah Taylor) are in a disintegrating union, with the pair of them too uptight and dolorous to prevent what looks to be an inevitable divorce.

Often in movies, we see the efforts the protagonist goes through to get the girl. But what happens then? What if Romeo & Juliet’s families had been friends? How much comparing thee to a summer’s day would there have been? After the initial flush of romance, Oliver has to deal with the more mundane realities of such a relationship.

This film is Ayoade’s directorial debut. He’s best known for playing the role of Moss in the sitcom, The I.T Crowd. And despite his background, this isn’t a TV guy trying his hand at a movie. He helms the story with the proficiency of someone with a wealth of experience in this medium, you’d be forgiven for thinking this was his tenth film rather than his first. There is a distinct and strong Wes Anderson influence at work, which fits an offbeat tale such as this.

The performances match the quality of the direction. Roberts – who also appeared in the most recent series of Being Human - gives a staggering display in the lead role. The story is told entirely through his prism, meaning that the film rises or falls on his portrayal of Oliver. Roberts embodies all the contradictory facets of his age group; aware, but lacking self-awareness. Commenting on others, but always in his own head; Assured, but ridden with nerves; Immensely thoughtful, and incredibly thoughtless, all at the same time.

Sally Hawkins – who may Britain’s finest actress – is excellent as Oliver’s mother anxious mother, but then I could happily watch her in anything. Noah Taylor And Paddy Considine are also impressive at the two polar opposites of a potential male suitor. And Yasmin Paige is a delight as Jordana. Like Oliver, she conforms to the unofficial rules of her peer group, only to go through her own maturation process as the film develops. Regardless of social standing, the common thread linking all teenagers is that they try at all costs to avoid being “found out”. The worst thing you can do at that age is show the full gamut of who you really are.

Submarine goes about unpicking these defence mechanisms and lays its characters bare. And in a lacklustre year for cinema, thus far, it’s one of the stand-out movies of 2011.

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/submarine-wspoilers/feed/ 0 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/masterpieces-of-the-1970s-badlands/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/masterpieces-of-the-1970s-badlands/#comments Wed, 31 Aug 2011 17:25:59 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10850

The following post is by Lindsey Kalenborn (lindseykal on our forums & @lindseykal28 on Twitter)

This review contains minor spoilers:

“The three movies that I am most proud of are Badlands, Apocalypse Now, and The Departed. Those are the films where I felt the most challenged and fulfilled as an artist.” – Martin Sheen

Though Badlands borrows the well known formula of, “outlaw lovers on the lam”, it has a voice that is fresh and original, despite being filmed in 1973. Badlands is a strange and sometimes bent movie, but it’s one of the handful that will make me stop whatever I am doing and watch it if it’s on TV.  

While Bonnie & Clyde revel in their rebellion, the protagonists Kit & Holly are remote and apart from their actions and crimes. It’s as if they’re watching a movie that has nothing to do with them. The language Holly uses in her narration reads like a fairy tale or a cheap novel: “I could of snuck out the back or hid in the boiler room, I suppose, but I sensed that my destiny now lay with Kit, for better or for worse, and it was better to spend a week with one who loved me for what I was than years of loneliness.”

The performances are flawless and unforgettable. Kit is a 25 year old James Dean look-a-like played by a young Martin Sheen. He starts dating 15 year old Holly after spotting her twirling a baton on his garbage collector route. Holly’s father forbids Kit to see Holly, and this leads to Kit impulsively murdering him and taking Holly on the run.

Sissy Spacek is maybe best known as the doomed, telekinetic Carrie but I think this is her best performance. She plays one of the most passive characters I have ever watched. Spacek gives the unnerving impression that there is nothing going on behind her eyes, and plays Holly as the one in the group that never gets the joke. She seems to cling to Kit not out of loyalty or fear but because she doesn’t have the imagination to create a different life for herself.

One of my favorite parts of Badlands is Holly’s awakening. Holly & Kit have taken refuge in the forest, making themselves a haven where they can live safely off the land for a time. While looking through a view-o-scope she comes to realize she’s not tied to Kit, and not necessarily fated to go down in a blaze of glory with him. Holly narrates the voice over using her strange, flat inflection.

“One day, while taking a look at some vistas in Dad’s stereopticon, it hit me that I was just this little girl, born in Texas, whose father was a sign painter and who had only just so many years to live. It sent a chill down my spine, and I thought – Where would I be this very moment if Kit had never met me? Or killed anybody? This very moment? If my Mom had never met my Dad?”

After Holly’s moment of clarity the couple are discovered, forcing them to leave their refuge and wander again. Critics have likened this scene to Eve eating from the tree of knowledge and the subsequent expulsion from Eden. After Holly’s revelation of self-awareness she is never dependent on Kit the same way again.

“We took off at sunset, on a line toward the mountains of Saskatchewan, for Kit a magical land beyond the reach of the law. He needed me now more than ever, but something had come between us. I’d stopped even paying attention to him. Instead, I sat in the car and read a map and spelled out entire sentences with my tongue on the roof of my mouth, where nobody could read them.”

The cinematography is absolutely gorgeous. The American landscape is beautiful even when a barren wasteland is being filmed. Use of nature and light have since become Terrence Malick’s trademark, and his mastery of the craft are more than evident here in his debut. Malick’s The Thin Red Line and The New World are both atmospheric and lush films, but I never felt they had the story or character development of Badlands.

Terrence Malick isn’t for everyone. The esteemed critic Pauline Kael was one of his most famous detractors, calling his films “boring art.” While I think that is true of his subsequent films, Badlands is anything but boring. It’s a haunting film about alienation and the perversion of the American notion that anybody can make something of themselves. It is must see viewing for movie fans, and is a film that will stay with you for weeks afterwards.

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/masterpieces-of-the-1970s-badlands/feed/ 1 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/spy-kids-4d-aroma-scope/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/spy-kids-4d-aroma-scope/#comments Thu, 25 Aug 2011 13:58:10 +0000 Jakob http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10703 by Jakob Rehlinger, co-host of Nerd Hurdles.

I really didn’t expect to go to Spy Kids: All the Time in the World in 4D Aroma-Scope, but my co-host and light of my life,  Mandi, was insistent. Rarely have I seen her so excited for an upcoming movie that wasn’t about teenage wizards (or vampires). Actually, I’ve never seen her so excited for any film.

It wasn’t too surprising, I figured, since the first Spy Kids movie was truly excellent and the second two instalments were pretty great as well. Not only were they family films made by a proper director—not just cheap product rolled off a studio assembly line—but they also showed there was more to Robert Rodriguez than ultra-violent, post-modern grindhouse flicks. They had heart, a unique style, great writing and they had great casts. Some of his best work by far.

I would have been more confused by Mandi’s excitement if I’d known Mandi had never actually seen a Spy Kids movie. I didn’t know until we were pulling into the cinema parking lot that she was going purely for the Aroma-Scope experience. As far as seat-filling gimmicks go, this one apparently works (except our theatre was only about 20% full).

And as far as hi-tech cinema gimmicks go, it’s delightfully low-tech. It doesn’t require special cameras and doesn’t cause vertigo in the audience. It’s juts an old-school scratch’n'sniff card.

It also doesn’t really work. At least for me. Whenever the flashing number appeared on the screen and I scratched the corresponding dot on the card, all I smelled was a vaguely fruity, candy-like aroma. Something like if you stuck your nose in the penny-candy bins at a 7-Eleven. Supposedly, I should have been smelling bacon and dog-farts at some point. What I got out of it was was candy necklace.

But maybe that was the point. I suspect  it’s really an elaborate prank by troublemaker Rodriguez as a statement on how the 3D trend is utterly stupid. A joke that is, perhaps, a little rich since Spy Kids 3-D was in that terrible old-school anaglyph 3D.

As with 3D, or computer animation, elaborate car-chases, or any other gimmick, the success—or failure—of Aroma-Scope should have been a trivial matter. The film should have been able to entertain on it’s own.

Though I haven’t watched the first three films in years, I feel pretty confident in saying All the Time in the World is easily, far and away, the worst of the Spy Kids movies. Even without comparing the film to its older siblings, it feels more like a Nickelodeon than a Troublemaker production. Spy Kids movies have always been about Technicolor silliness, but were tempered with enough adult content to appeal to a wider audience. Though they weren’t highly complex movies, they weren’t dumbed-down for the younger members of the audience either. This film is purely for children.

Which might be why we’re given only a brief two-second long pseudo-cameo by Uncle Machete—one where he isn’t even mobile, but frozen in time. Why they even bothered to get Danny Trejo out of bed for it is baffling. Especially with his own film, the R-rated Machete, released only last year. One has to suppose it was merely just to put his name on the cast-list.

The cast-list is, by the way, the main problem with the film. The first three films in the series had great villains played by uber-charismatic juggernauts Alan Cumming, Tony Shalhoub, Steve Buscemi and Sylvester Stallone. All The Time In The World has the merely adequate verging on unwatchable (pun intended) Jeremy Piven.

This generation’s dad, Community‘s Joe McHale, proves he’s a TV-grade actor and not a movie star like Antonio Banderras while movie star Jessica Alba proves she’s still simply terrible when called on to deliver comedy (or some acting) and not just pout seductively while writing on a Sin City stripper pole. That is to say she’s in neither Carla Gugino‘s nor Salma Hayek‘s league.

The only shining light in the supporting cast of adults is Ricky Gervias providing the voice of Argonaut, the robotic dog. Depending on your feelings about Gervais, that’s probably a make or break statement.

That all might even be fine if  the kids were alright. The kids are all wrong. Rebecca (Rowland Blanchard) is no Carmen (Alexa Vega) and Cecil (Mason Cook) is no Juni (Daryl Sabara). Unfortunately, Carmen and Juni are no Carmen and Juni either. True to form, these great child actors grew up to be lousy young-adult actors and—adhering to the recurring theme of the franchise—they put aside their differences and work together as a team to derail the final third of the film.

That recurring theme, by the way, has gotten tired. The script is clearly more a re-boot than a sequel. The age/power dynamics of the siblings are carbon copies of the original duo. The life lessons about the importance of family and setting aside petty differences are rehashed from the original films as well. Not that these aren’t perennial themes worthy of revisiting, but they really felt like as much rote regurgitation this time around as the regurgitation jokes. Even all the puns and references surrounding the new angle of  spending/wasting time felt like missed opportunities instead of being a tightly written script such as the first film boasted.

The inevitable over-arching plot of a villian with a doomsday machine is to be expected and gets a pass. That’s always merely been the backdrop for the cleverly-written interpersonal dynamics and action set pieces in these films. The dynamics and set pieces are not clever this time around.

I’ll admit I could be looking back on those first three films with rose coloured glasses (or red and blue coloured in the case of the third film), but if this movie isn’t genuinely poor in comparison, I must have been far more inebriated the entire time I was studying applied arts in college than I thought (no mean statement).

Rating: 2½ inexact aromas out of 5 insufferable brats.

 

 

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/spy-kids-4d-aroma-scope/feed/ 2 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/the-help-wspoilers/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/the-help-wspoilers/#comments Mon, 22 Aug 2011 23:55:30 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10594

The following post is by Lindsey Kalenborn (lindseykal on our forums & @lindseykal28 on Twitter). 

I was wary about going to The Help, because it looked like it might have “Dances with Wolves disease”. The term “Dances with Wolves disease”, is a phrase my old roommate came up with to describe a movie where the lead is a superfluous white person that doesn’t need to be there to tell the story. Some movies guilty of contracting “Dances with Wolves disease” are Windtalkers, Glory, and Little Big Man. Luckily for the audience The Help is disease free.

The movie starts out when 22 year old Skeeter Phelan comes home from college to a culture she no longer fits into. It’s readily apparent that Skeeter has a bit more going on upstairs then her socialite friends. It’s also implied that Skeeter graduated because she wasn’t beautiful enough to get married and thus drop out of college. This undercut the believability of the movie since she is played by the lovely Emma Stone, but that‘s Hollywood for you. At a loose end, Skeeter undertakes writing a non-fiction book from the point of view of the black housemaids. This is not only a dangerous project in 1960‘s Mississippi but a potentially deadly one.

Viola Davis’s portrayal of the maid, Aibileen is the glue that holds this film together. She is fantastic, and her acting is near flawless. I started rooting for Aibileen within seconds of her first scene. When Skeeter asks Aibileen if she ever dreamed of being something other then a maid, the complicated emotions that pass over Aibileen’s face endear the viewer to the character instantly.

If Aibileen is layered and complicated, then Bryce Howard’s portrayal of the racist socialite Hilly Holbrook is very one-dimensional. The script portrays Hilly as an irredeemable monster, though it must be said that Howard is able to convey a cold viciousness that can be chilling to watch. We already knew that Bryce Howard could play the artless ingénue, but she really displays her range here, showing her ability to play a villain. I predict that this will be the last movie where her name is going to be followed with the caveat of her being Ron Howard’s daughter.

I would never insinuate that racism is not a problem that needs to be addressed until it is eradicated in all forms. At the same time if the movie was going to be a vehicle for the over-simplistic morality lesson that “racism is bad”, I really wasn’t interested. The film never really delves into the gritty horrors of the “Jim Crow” south, and skims over much of the violence that was going on at the time.

Nonetheless, I appreciated the maturity and restraint of the film. Nobody gives speeches about how racism is wrong, or looks off into the horizon predicting that someday things will be better. The Help doesn’t need the characters monologuing about how racism is bad, or the lessons they‘ve learned. Showing it is enough. When Hilly makes her maid, Minnie use the outside colored bathroom during a thunderstorm it conveys the degradation effectively.

I usually avoid chick flicks on principle due to the fact that they’re usually awful and insulting. But I wouldn’t call this movie a chick flick. It’s a historical drama about female characters, which is a refreshing change. I definitely give it a recommendation.

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/the-help-wspoilers/feed/ 0 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/midnight-in-paris-wspoilers/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/midnight-in-paris-wspoilers/#comments Fri, 19 Aug 2011 23:04:56 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10572

I’m sure there’ll be a time when Woody Allen will be feted for the great filmmaker he is. Sadly, that day will probably happen after he’s dead & gone. So in the meantime, we’ll have to make do with his latest film, Midnight in Paris. It’s tough to avoid discussing this wonderfully silly fairy-tale of a movie without spoiling so I’m not even going to try.

As he often does, Allen assembles a stellar ensemble cast. His name alone means that he has his pick of actors who want to work with him; Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, Michael Sheen, Marion Cotillard, Adrien Brody, Kathy Bates, Alison Pill (who is fast becoming one of my favourite actors), and Corey Stoll, in what I hope will be a breakthrough role.

Allen is too old to be the protagonist of his stories these days, so he has passed the baton to younger men; In the underrated Melinda & Melinda, it was Will Ferrell. In Midnight in Paris, the responsibility falls to Owen Wilson, who plays Gil. He is married to McAdams’s Inez. As the title suggests, they are holidaying in Paris. Gil is a quixotic fantasist, Inez is a joyless social-climber. Gil loves everything about Paris, Inez plans for them to settle in an upper-class American suburb. Gil is Democrat, Inez is Republican.

So far, so typically Allen-esque. The early stages of the film were breezily entertaining, but I’d seen this all before. Wilson can’t be blamed for replicating Allen in his performance, because that’s what’s expected of him. The same way that everyone can do a Christopher Walken impression, all actors of a certain age can all do an impression of Woody Allen from films such as Manhattan or Annie Hall. 

Gil is suffering from writer’s block, and on an inebriated midnight stroll through the streets of Paris, he alights upon a car of people who invite him to a party. Too drunk to argue, he accepts. What he doesn’t realise is that two of this party are Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald. Yes, they are the Fitzgerald’s you’re thinking of. They end up at a bar where they meet an author. A Mr Hemingway. Yes, it is the Hemingway you’re thinking of.

Gil’s confusion to how this can be happening to him is outweighed by the thrill he gets from meeting his idols. Who cares that he seems to be in Paris in the 1920′s? Especially when Ernest Hemingway has just agreed to pass your novel to his legendary agent, Gertrude Stein. Allen never explains how or why these events are possible. This is a correct & shrewd decision. After all, why was the step-mother so wicked? Why was Rapunzel’s hair so long? Why did the first two little pigs not have the good sense to build their houses out of bricks?

Whether you are willing to accept this conceit determines whether you’ll like the film or not. It probably says a lot about the kind of person you are. Are you the practical one who will look at this astral use of time-travel and no longer suspend your disbelief? Or are you a more creative sort who will revel in Gil interacting with the likes of Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Salvador Dali, Cole Porter, Luis Bunuel & Thomas Stearns Eliot – again, if you don’t recognise these names, then this film’s probably not for you.

Paris is shown in its best light, all idealised bohemia and romance. The opening sequence is a montage of the city’s most glorious touristy bits. The story focuses on a yearning to find something more worthwhile than the relentless chase for financial security. This ties in to the movie’s other main theme; nostalgia. Gil idealises Paris in the 1920′s, a time & place when ostensibly an artist could be an artiste. But what’s to say that the people of that time didn’t wish to belong to an earlier era?

Allen’s sharp screenplay is backed up by fine performances all around. With a cast like his, we shouldn’t be too surprised. Wilson deserves credit for anchoring the piece with a childlike wonder. He follows through with the premise the whole way, at no point winking to the camera. McAdams cruises as Inez, because… well that’s what McAdams does. When not at her best, she can still act most of her peers of the screen. Maybe she thought that she’d have been better suited to one of the other characters – I definitely thought so.

In what has been a pretty dire year for cinema, Midnight in Paris is the film of 2011 (so far at least, I’m holding out for Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy). Allen has reached a level that most artists aspire to. Free to make his stories as he wants, reference characters that won’t appeal to the broadest demographic, and not live or die on the opening weekend box-office takings. He is a cinematic treasure, and movies will be a poorer place when he’s gone.

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/midnight-in-paris-wspoilers/feed/ 0 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/second-look-a-cold-nights-death/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/second-look-a-cold-nights-death/#comments Wed, 17 Aug 2011 22:48:24 +0000 Shane http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10509

The following post is from Greg Blanchard (a.k.a. GAB on our forums). He can also be heard on the “Inappropriate Conversations” podcast, which can be found at http://inappropriateconversations.podbean.com/ or on iTunes

I don’t enjoy watching movies on YouTube. My internet connection is not particularly fast. The picture and sound quality vary significantly. Even in the best cases, it’s always a distraction to view a film in 10-minute chunks. However, on a couple of occasions this year, YouTube has delighted me by resurrecting parts of my past.

First, I discovered a poor quality yet complete set of posts for the first movie I ever (almost) remember seeing. Run a Crooked Mile was a 1969 made-for-TV film involving murder conspiracy, financial fraud, and amnesia. Image and sound quality were poor. I overcame this because I recognized enough of it to overcome sound drops and blurriness.

Today though, a video search revealed a posting of my all-time favorite in the ABC “Movie Of The Week” series:  A Cold Night’s Death from 1973.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XG8r26MuRIk

The plot brings together elements of science fiction, horror, adventure, and mystery. At the same time, it’s a character study that makes full use of its props and location. If this short plot summary sounds familiar, you may have seen the film re-aired as Chill Factor.

Robert Culp and Eli Wallach star as virtually the only actors in the 74-minute film, which the YouTube posts carve into 7 parts.  They are research scientists sent to a remote mountaintop laboratory to study the impact of high altitude on primates, all in support of space exploration. Leaders of the program have lost contact with the scientist on site, and part of the mystery is resolving what happened to him.

The plot kept me guessing and on the edge of my seat at age 8.  That is less true now, and not because I remembered the story. A Cold Night’s Death is an excellent example of the journey being more important than the destination.

Culp was the star on the TV series I Spy and would later appear regularly on The Greatest American Hero. But he’s never been better than this 1973 movie of the week. It’s harder to make the same claim for Wallach, who will always be remembered for roles in films like 12 Angry Men, The Magnificent Seven, & The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

A small cast helped control costs on a tiny TV budget. This is not a Hollywood film (in the purest sense) and it is even lower in budget than a large number of independent films today. Still, A Cold Night’s Death was shot on 35mm film rather than videotape, and several scenes are on location in the White Mountains of California.

More than anything else, this 38-year-old movie shows what can be done with limited resources when characters and actors are given room to drive a story. On re-watching, some moments reminded me of The Shining (1980) and The Thing (1982) and the earlier film pales in comparison to those classic thrillers. It is, to me, noteworthy that A Cold Night’s Death came earlier.

I believe there are several films in the ABC “Movie Of The Week” series that are worth a second look today. It aggravates me to think of how few are available either in re-run, videotape or DVD format.

For all of the better-known examples in the series, A Cold Night’s Death is my favorite. Yes, over Steven Spielberg’s Duel or pilots for future TV shows like The Night Stalker and Starsky & Hutch.

When films are put online or on YouTube, such as this one, I often wonder whether any liberties are being taken; whether appropriate “permissions” have been granted. In this case, though, I don’t care. I would buy this movie today if I could. I would have picked up a VHS or Laserdisc decades ago. But for now, 10-minute segments will have to suffice.

]]> http://www.simplysyndicated.com/second-look-a-cold-nights-death/feed/ 0 http://www.simplysyndicated.com/superhero-movie-of-the-year/ http://www.simplysyndicated.com/superhero-movie-of-the-year/#comments Tue, 16 Aug 2011 23:50:01 +0000 Kennedy http://www.simplysyndicated.com/?p=10484

Kennedy here, from Starbase 66 and Books You Should Read. As we near the end of Super-Hero Summer here at Simply Syndicated and Weather Station Studios, I’m looking back over the spandex-stretching package of costumed characters who flew across cinema screens in 2011. Old-school X-Men, Thor, Captain America, Green Lantern, Green Hornet, Cowboys and Aliens, with Conan yet to come, Priest (which I didn’t see) and, what the heck, I’ll throw in Transformers: Dork of the Moom, because some of our listeners live in Florida.

I expected to love Green Lantern and be indifferent to X-Men: First Class, but it turned out to be the reverse of that. I thought Green Hornet would suck nuggets, and it did, but in a way I kind of liked. Thor and Cap were fun, goofy comic adventures. Cowboys and Aliens was … well, I should have brought a book.

But the best super-hero movie of 2011, I would say, is one that flew under my radar, and yours, too, probably. I saw it when it was released once I knew what it was about, and then again this week on DVD, so you can believe me when I tell you it’s the best of the year.

I’m talking about Limitless.

While not based on a comic, it draws from the early Marvel approach to superheroics: loser gains powers, chooses to use said powers for good, not evil. Except for that last part, because greed drives this story.

It’s as though this movie was made for me. A slick action thriller about a down-and-out failed writer who finds success, fame and fortune through random chance, and develops heightened mental and physical powers? It appeals to everything I like in a story.

“I don’t know how to fight — or do I?” Our hero is able to access every long-forgotten memory, every observation, every fact, every movement, he’s ever seen. And he’s soon a millionaire stockbroker who speaks multiple languages, has a funny anecdote for every occasion, can kick serious kung-fu ass and can casually suggest cures for cancer over coffee.

Bradley Cooper, an actor I really like, plays Eddie Morra, and nails it. He begins the film scruffy and lost, and (no spoiler here) cleans up wonderfully as the story progresses. When he’s hurting, he looks it. Supporting cast: Robert De Niro (!!) as the maybe-he’s-evil business overlord, Abbie Cornish as the girlfriend (who strangely vanishes halfway through the story, after a major plot turn), Anna Friel as the ex-wife and the super-creepy Tomas Arana as The Man In The Tan Coat, possibly the most ominous bad guy of the year. There are also Russian mobsters and a lady who used to be on Thirtysomething.

The movie is shot through with New York light and uses, but doesn’t overuse, fishbowl lenses and fast zoom shots to illustrate how Morra sees the world with his hyper-accelerated intellect. There’s also a lot of humour, mostly from Cooper, who narrates the story in a way that doesn’t seem obvious — a rare trick in modern cinema. One sequence illustrates 18 lost hours in a way anyone who’s ever been on a bender will immediately recognize. Not me, of course. I’m just assuming.

Limitless, directed by Neil Burger from a book called The Dark Fields, didn’t garner a lot of buzz pre-release, but did surprisingly well as the only non-franchise, non-remake, non-reboot, non-sequel super-powered flick of the season. And for that, it deserves a look.

NOTE: Cooper, who also played Face in that neato A-Team movie last year, has just abandoned the Crow reboot. Word has it Mark Wahlberg is going to take over, because when you think brooding, sleek, lean, black-clad night-prowling vigilante, you think “Mark Wahlberg.” In makeup.

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