Tag: film

Motherless Brooklyn

Last week I watched the fabulous “Knives Out” a homage to the whodunnit. In Motherless Brooklyn we have another modern take on a classic genre, as Edward Norton’s passion project delivers a stylish “gumshoe” detective drama.

This well told, well made, melodic paced drama sees Norton play Lionel Essrog a smart, hardworking private detective who struggles to combat his tourette’s style “affliction”, which for the first 10 minutes feels like it will be distracting, to Norton’s credit becomes a charming quirk. Lionel takes on the case to find the killers of his inspirational father figure which leads him into the world of power obsessed officials running corrupt city departments to deliver their “vision” of change.

The story fizzes along well, although, maybe as expected in a 144 minute film, has a baggy 20 minutes as we head into the final act, Norton’s voiceover evokes memories of classic 50’s detective dramas and the story twists and turns its way to a clever conclusion.

Norton is well supported by a strong cast, especially Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Laura Rose and Alec Bladwin as power driven city official Moses Randolph.

Motherless Brooklyn is a well made, well told story, evoking classic detective drama with a modern take. Norton carries the film well with a super central performance, dust off the trench coat and hat and go check it out

Knives Out

Unlike Knives Out the big reveal on Rian Johnson’s modern whodunnit is coming right at the beginning.. absolutely loved this from start to finish and it is right up there with the very best things I’ve watched this year.

It is indeed a big screen modern take on the most classic of stories the whodunnit and it’s a genre Johnson clearly understands and certainly enjoys and that comes through in every one of its 130 minutes.

A wonderful ensemble cast led by a fantastically enjoyable Daniel Craig, getting to reuse his Logan Lucky Southern US accent, who brings a modern take on the super sleuth (a consulting detective no less), but the show is probably stolen by Ana De Armas as our central character Marta, who keeps you guessing throughout with a smart performance.

The story bounds along at a great pace, with enough twists to keep whodunnit fans interested but also with the wit and fun that such an homage to the genre needs.

All of the twists and the payoff fit together beautifully and, as with any really good sleuthing adventure, when you look back, all the clues to the mystery are in plain site and depending how close you watch will depend when you spot them.

Knives Out for me was a fantastic revival of a classic genre, delivered with real care, attention to detail and a sense of fun, each of the stellar cast delivers exactly the performance you want and it gave me one of my most enjoyable cinema trips of the year.

Dust off the deer stalker and give it a go…

21 Bridges

Cop killers on the loose, shutdown Manhattan, 21 bridges, 4 tunnels, 3 rivers and loop the trains… there’s the setup, but to be honest they really could’ve said anything, the setup didn’t matter.

This is the most generic of cop thrillers with a plot you’ve seen a 100 times before from Dirty Harry onwards.

That said, this is still an enjoyable action thriller, Chadwick Boseman carries the film brilliantly and is well supported by Sienna Miller, Stephen James and the always dependable JK Simmons. While the plot is hugely unoriginal and the “twists” are signposted as well as the local town centre it rolls on at a good pace and its 99 minute running time leaves it pretty lean, for a story as flimsy it didn’t need to be overly complex and it isn’t.

The ending is a little contrived and unsurprising but overall if you’re looking to waste away an hour and half with a decent if not overly taxing cop thriller then 21 Bridges should fit the bill.

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Frozen II

The problem this film will always have is it’s not Frozen and to be clear it isn’t. I love Frozen and in the song “Let it go” it has a wonderful anchor tune that lives long in the memory.

While it never hits the heights of the classic original, this is by no means a miss and is more than solid sequel. It doesn’t quite have the heart or emotional pull of its predecessor or the original feel of the story, but it still has plenty going for it.

The animation is stunning and for me there felt like some hugely cinematic shooting choices not often seen in animation.

The story is relatively straightforward but I thought the final act worked well and provided an emotional end that tugged on the heart strings.

The humour remains just as strong with Olaf providing the comic centre and the scene were he recreates the original film for their new friends is brilliantly done (stay for Olaf’s end of credit sequence) as is Kristoff’s 80’s power ballad.

The original Frozen was such a wonderful movie the sequel would always struggle to live up to it and while it falls short it is still enjoyable and the young members of the audience clapped and cheered at the end so it seems it ticked the boxes of its target demographic.

Le Mans 66

Le Mans 66 on the surface tells the story of Ford’s attempt to beat Ferrari at Le Mans with the help of retired racer Carol Shelby (Matt Damon) but it isn’t really about that and is much more about British “journeyman” driver Ken Miles (Christian Bale).

It was a bit of an odd film in my opinion, while some people are singing its praises it didn’t fully work for me some of it was great while some of it really just grated.

It’s not an awful film by any stretch and has lots of things that it does right, but a whole lot it didn’t. Bizarrely and maybe the most confusing thing is many of the things that I enjoyed were also some of the things that drove me to distraction.

Firstly there are the performances, Damon and Bale are as you’d expect more than watchable with a strong and believable central relationship. Josh Lucas and Tracy Letts bring home the slimy Ford suites that constantly try to derail the pure racer enthusiasm of Bale and Damon. But then that is also the problem, Letts and to an even greater degree Remo Girone’s Enzo Ferrari are cartoonish villains the caricature corporate suite and untrustworthy foreigner.

Oh and then there is the accents, to a US audience maybe this plays differently but to a British ear those accents were such a distraction, while I got used to Bale’s on the whole as it made its way around the country, his wife (played by Caitriona Balfe), turned in a horribly unconvincing brummie accent, along the lines of Pol in Peaky Blinders and it grated on me from start to finish and of course there are the Dick Van Dykeesque moments I was expecting a “this car isn’t half quick and there’s no mistake Mary Poppins” to be uttered at any minute.

The heart of the film is the motor racing, which at times works brilliantly, maybe no better than when Miles races through the rain and the dark at Le Mans, it also perfectly captures his utter joy behind the wheel. There are also some real hold your breath moments as cars spin and contort in an array of accidents. But then there is also the continual use of sports action film tropes, the unconvincing commentary box and the family watching at home on TV “expositioning” away the race.

Lastly there is the length, it’s too long and could easily have lost half an hour but then the film never felt long, it did power on at a good pace and the story was intriguing enough to keep me hooked for the 2 1/2 hours.

In the end and while it maybe doesn’t sound like it, this was a film I enjoyed but with a few too many flaws

stopping it been great, but the story, the action, Damon and Bale give you enough to keep your foot down and heading onto the end.

Last Christmas

I have to admit in the build up to Christmas I’m a real sucker for channels like Christmas 24 with their saccharine sweet made for TV xmas movies.

To be fair to Last Christmas it’s better than that and if your idea of a trip to the cinema is something non challenging that is “nice” then this will be right up your street, it is the definition of nice.

There’s a nice story, nice performances a nice happy ending which a film like this is always going to have and there’s a “twist” that is as subtle as a not very subtle thing.

But all that said there’s things to like, Emelia Clark is full of charm, Emma Thompson is wonderfully Emma Thompson and the script has enough laughs and touching moments to keep you entertained.

There is also a little (very little) bit of political commentary looking at attitudes to immigration of a portion of the British population and there’s always a place for that in my book, even as out of place as it felt against the rest of the film.

It is a film that absolutely does all the things it says on the tin and if that’s the tin you want then you won’t be disappointed.

Worked for me enjoyable with enough laughs and charm for a bit of early Christmas cheer.

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Stuber

Comedy is a very subjective thing, one persons comic genius is another’s laugh vacuum, I’m sure then somebody out there thinks this is comedy gold, for me I’m pretty sure 90 minutes in an Uber would have been funnier.

The film fails on pretty much every level, the normally reliable Kumail Najiani doesnt have a hope of rescuing it, there’s a bizarrely short cameo from Karen Gillan, doing a favour for Dave Bautista I guess, who himself fails to bring any of his Guardians of the Galaxy wit and warmth.

It really fails from the outset with a ridiculous premise that brings our two central characters together and it never really recovers. The action scenes seem overly violent and misjudged and the comic scenes are few and far between.

There were one or two wry smiles but no more than that. I did watch it on a long haul flight so maybe thin air dulled my comedy senses, or maybe it was just a bit rubbish!

I’ll get an Uber when I land and imagine it will be more fun (It was).

Zombieland: Double Tap

Let’s begin with a quick confession, I’d not seen Zombieland before watching Double Tap (I put that right and watched it afterwards). That said, if you’ve not seen Zombieland it doesn’t really matter, you’ll still be able to get along just fine with the zombie based fun that ensues.

For me the main criticism of Double Tap is that it lacks some of the heart and story of the first film. That said it still provides 90 minutes of Zombie slaying humour and Emma Stone, Woody Harrelson and Jesse Eisenberg are as watchable as ever.

There’s regular laughs to be had and a wide range of entertaining Zombie deaths.

Overall it was fine while it lasted, but that’s it, it’s really no more than a bunch of zombie killing set pieces with not much of a story arc.

That’s Ok though as it was entertaining enough to fill it’s shortish run time, but it’s not going to rock anyone’s world and you’ll probably have forgotten much of it by the time you get home.

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Gemini Man

Ang Lee, double Will Smith, what’s not going to be great about that? Well Gemini Man it would seem!

Don’t get me wrong it wasn’t terrible and Will Smith continues to be an engaging screen presence, but this was a film that never really got beyond an average action adventure.

It really felt more of an excuse to show off the technology behind recreating an early 20’s Will Smith, a Fresh Prince after a few workouts and a slightly less comfortable up bringing!

This technology is moving on really quickly, if we compare it to the slightly jarring recreation of Carrie Fisher in Force Awakens, you can see its clear evolution. It works pretty much all of the way through, there are a couple of scenes that struck me as very CGI, especially the final one, but beyond that you don’t get overly caught up in admiring it.

However, maybe that’s the films problem, you don’t get overly caught up in any of it, it’s pretty standard a film you’ve seen a hundred times before, the plot, the villains and ultimately the outcome are all pretty obvious and generic and Will isn’t surprising (in either guise) he’s standard Will Smith, likable with the occasional quip.

Enjoyable enough, but beyond the technology, nothing ground breaking or original. If you’re happy to leave your critical brain at the door, crack open the popcorn and not expect too much, you should be just fine.

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Joker

One of the problems of films that come with a lot of hype is the inevitable disappointment when you finally see them. It’s the reason I try to avoid reviews until I’ve seen a film. However, the buzz around Joker has been tricky to miss and most of that has hyped this up into something special.

Inevitable disappointment then? Not a bit of it, what an incredible film this is. If you are expecting a comic book film then that’s not really what you get, instead you get a dark and brooding portrayal of a man on the edge, desperate, depressed, deluded and as he pointedly says later “what do you get when you cross a mentally ill loner with a society that doesn’t care?”.

It’s fantastically shot, with a brilliant musical score, well paced and well timed at 2 hours, never letting itself get distracted by long ponderous diversions and although it has graphic violence, it is limited to moments.

But most of all what it is, is an incredible performance by Joaquin Phoenix constantly and menacingly close to the edge, as life persistently chips away at him, one crushing disappointment at a time. His balance between control and unhinged madness is fantastic, delivering a film that keeps you on the edge of your seat from start to finish.

While some critics seem to have taken this film as some kind of cynical and manipulative exercise, for me it’s an incredible piece of work which owes a bit of a debt to American Psycho. It is not a comic book origins film, but a really well made portrait of someone descending into psychotic madness, an incredible film with an outstanding central performance.

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