The Descendants - DM Review

What a lovely film. A tender performance from George Clooney, full of restraint and subtlety, genuinely moved me. What could have been an immensely annoying film (essentially a tale of the problems of a millionaire white man) had me in tears. I think this was done by forsaking melodrama and hysterics. This paid dividends for me in this perfectly paced film. Masterfully and confidently constructed, the relationships forged on screen were believable and won me over.


It is between George and Jean for the Best Actor Oscar...my money is on George


Score: 7.5/10

Coriolanus - DM Review

As neither a huge fan nor aficionado of Shakespeare, I think I was always going to struggle with this one. Ultimately this bored me. Strong performances all round (especially Jon Snow!) were not enough to hold my interest. I have enjoyed previous modern adaptations of Shakespeare (Romeo and Juliet, Richard III with Ian McKellen) but this failed to hit the mark with me. I can see why this isn't one of his big hitting plays...the plot is light. I guess it is more of a character assessment but I didn't get that from this film.


Definitely one for true Shakespeare lovers


Score: 4/10

Touch of Evil, what a shame...

It’s official: Touch of Evil is no touch of genius. Geoff and I saw it at the Greenwich Picturehouse the other night and I think overall we both came away disappointed by it. A few good scenes here and there, the expected camera angles, shadowy bits, all the tried, tested and loved clichés of the noir genre, but considering the stellar cast, it didn’t really add up to much. You’d have to watch this through pretty rose-tinted spectacles to call it a masterpiece. All the talent in the world can’t make up for a sub-par script, I suppose. Even the famous opening extended sequence, seen through the haze of the many subsequent homages and imitations, came over stagey and unconvincing. All those ‘extras’ waiting for their cue to walk into frame at exactly the right moment, took me out and I never fully got back in. I suppose some things are best left to the realm of sweet twisted memory where anything and everything is possible (star wars, I’m talking to you).

I do think it’s worth a remake though. I’m thinking the Dardennes? Something gritty and French, anyway. Give Depardieu the Welles role (c’est évident, n’est-ce pas?), rewrite the Marlene Dietrich character and, yeah, Marion Cotillard (I’ll watch anything she’s in). Francois Cluzet can take on Charlton Heston, and his wife (Janet Leigh) goes to Kristen Scott Thomas - French law stipulates that she has to appear in every French film made now anyway. So, sorted.

On a side note, my favourite Orson Welles moment is a TV advert he did back in '81 or '82 for the Milton Bradley board game “Dark Tower”. I’ve got it if any of you guys fancy a game!!

Score: 5/10

Shame - DM review

I fucking loved this film!

On the surface a fascinating and brutal study of an individual afflicted with addiction. But unlike drugs or alcohol, the substance craved is held in the power of other people thus adding an interesting layer of complexity. A flirty encounter on the tube, which is beautifully crafted and acted with no words (much more effectively than The Artist!) frustratingly leads to nowhere. The "score" is never certain. 

The film is extremely stark, cold and the protagonist deliberately detached. I have heard this as a criticism of the film but I believe that this is its major asset. The atmosphere of the film perfectly reflects the condition Brandon occupies. He cannot physically function (quite literally) when any emotion or human relation is present. We want to understand him but he won't allow us. The coldness of the film also allows the moments of emotion to come hurtling out of the screen. The moment where Brandon breaks the fourth wall with a look of pure pain and anguish, at the supposed moment of ecstasy, electrified me.

The direction is bold, beautiful and brave. Scenes are intentionally strung out...and they do go on. A lot of the camera shots are steady frames (except with the stunning and much talked about "running scene" which is breathtaking). This entrusts and allows the actors to go free and the benefits are reaped. Fassbender and Mulligan give outstanding and totally believable performances and the messed-up relationship between the two is a wonder to watch. In my screening (as with Mark's) people were leaving the theatre...McQueen has prolonged the sex scenes, daring us to turn away, making us confront our own ideas of sex. 

I found this film truly thought-provoking and affecting. I have kept returning to question it and the more I do so the more I love it. I could easily go on and on and on (much like a scene from this film) but I shall refrain.

The "Top 10 Films of the Year" list is 12 months away, but I think I have found my winner within the 1st couple of weeks.

Score: 9/10

The Artist - DM Review

No pun intended but I am struggling to find the words for this one!


Light, fluffy, charming and mildly comical in parts but it ultimately left me cold. I guess the film was harking back to a more innocent and naive period but I felt the plot/performances/direction weren't strong or entertaining enough to warrant my approval. I certainly don't understand all the praise and hype it has received....but Hollywood will adore a movie about Hollywood and so Oscar success is guaranteed.


Not charming enough for me


Score: 4/10 

The Iron Lady - DM Review

First, let me start with the positive (never a good start to a review)...

Meryl Streep is astounding in this role. This is not only a piece of superb technical mimicry but she goes beyond mere impersonation to fully take on the character of Thatcher, right to the ends of the blow-dried bouffant. As a Thatcher in power, the voice (and not an easy one to get right) was pitch-perfect. This performance will deservedly reap all the gongs this awards season.

However, this is where my enjoyment ends. My main problem is that I do not understand the intent of this film. It is impossible to make a biopic about a politician as controversial and divisive of opinion and not to include a political slant. This film seemed to attempt just that. The setting of a large proportion of the film in the present day was an interesting but poor decision. For me, the portrayal of MT as a senile old woman (which is all speculation) bored and frustrated me. Much more interesting to me was the stuff we know...her time in power, the influence of this time on the people of the UK and the international stage, the betrayal by her inner circle and her downfall was where the drama was at. However, this was glossed over in a few minutes (aided by the appalling use of a newsreel style montage) in favour of watching a doddery old woman put clothes into bin bags. If this film had picked a specific time in her premiership and stuck with that, it may have fared better.

Meryl saves this film.

Score: 4.5/10 

Shame

It’s gratifying to see Carrie Mulligan getting a BAFTA supporting actress nomination for Drive and it could have easily been for Shame, which feels like a companion piece to Nicolas Winding Refn’s movie. Both cast Mulligan as the foil to a complicated and monosyllabic protagonist whose single-minded dubious pursuit is the manifestation of their own alienation.

As Brandon, Fassbender strides this movie like a Colossus - in every way - but it is Mulligan that powerfully contextualises the nature of Brandon’s underlying addiction, his own self-aggrandising isolation.

Steve McQueen directs with flair and minimalism making NYC the third major character - the pusher who always has something on offer and readily available. This is Woody Allen on benzos. A single-take night time jog, and an interpretation of New York, New York that captures more about the city than a thousand overhead sweeps ever could, are both majestic. Abi Morgan’s screenplay is a framework that allows the characters to find the words for themselves - a remarkable achievement after her cloying signposting throughout The Iron Lady.

Fassbender shows the despair of addiction and inability to countenance support, therefore perpetrating the devastating fallout for those around him. We have to want to believe in Brandon for this story to work; and Fassbender gives us a performance that is truly believable.

In the screening I watched, five people walked out during the third-act sex scenes, demonstrating why Shame is such a powerful and vital film. Using the most human of instincts as its catalyst it hypothesises a version of our individual isolation in an ever more disconnected world and offers very little in the way of potential redemption, and that can be hard to take. Shame tells us how it is with naked honesty and panache.

Score: 9/10

BAFTA Nominations

Whaddya think guys? Very conservative choices. for me the British Film category stronger than the overall Best Film, and that's without nominations for Weekend, Tyrannasaur and Submarine. Not seen The Descendants, but always found Alexander Payne underwhelming, Election the exception.

The Artist - GM Review

For me a real lost opportunity, am pleased that someone came up with the idea but displeased that the director of the appalling OSS movies got to the helm.

Bland, conventional, lacking in originality, little use of in-jokes given the opportunities available, hackneyed screenplay and gutter poor humour. It didn't have to be this way. Uggie the dog is Eddie from Frasier, the plot is A Star is Born but give me James Mason and Judy Garland any day and nothing of originality arises from the mire - you can pay homage and be clever.

Have a look at L'Atalante re-released this week, City Lights, The Gold Rush and especially Sunrise, romantic witty movies made ninety years ago that have more thought, humour, charm and art in any one scene than in the entire ninety minutes of this fraud.

Silence needn't signify staleness.

2/10

Iron Lady II

Very generous Conor. Whilst not expecting any great political insight from the team behind Mamma Mia, the Abba inspired frivolity felt like Citizen Kane against this mess of a movie. Yes there was way too much dotage and prosthetics, and the recurring Jim Broadbent in amusing 80's leisurewear was beyond tedious. What was the point in using such a potentially interesting protagonist if the filmmakers want to tell as story about old age and loss. The exquisite fifteen minutes in Up was far more poignant than anything offered here. The direction was ponderous and the editing was at times bizarre. It was Mags Headroom.

Most annoyingly the neutrality of the film removed any sense of reality and interest in the politics. And, regardless of our own political viewpoint, where was any representation of the real impact on British people through her premiership. Apparently we spent 11 years rioting and protesting; and took a few hours to stick the flags out after a dodgy bit of warfare.

With an intelligent script, a director of movies not musicals and, crucially, a position to take the Iron Lady should have been a provocative tale of the rise and fall of one of the 20th Centuries most enigmatic characters. Instead it was a risible and tiresome lost opportunity. I doubt I will see a more poorly judged and badly directed movie this year.....although Madonna's take on Wallis Simpson is just around the corner.

Score: 2/10

Iron Lady

Streep's stellar performance is trapped within a less than stellar film. For me, too much focus of Thatcher's mental decline whilst they rushed through and squandered the dramatic potential of many key events in her tenure. Streep's transformation into Thatcher is incredible and holds the film together but only just about.

Props to Olivia Colman for the dodgiest prosthesis I have seen in some time.

6/10

The Artist

Amid the cacophony of noise and clarity of image it's rare that modern cinema takes the time to consider what an audience might feel rather than what it experiences . The masters of (e)motion picture history have used simple and the sophisticated devices to make us feel and care; and in 2011 a number of filmmakers plundered cinematic roots trying to rediscover its heart and soul. Hugo, Drive and Super 8 revisited genre almost sycophantically, though not always successfully, and The Artist crackles into 2012 with a most literal homage.


Whilst focussing its (1:33 ratio) vision retrospectively The Artist posses modern questions about cinema. As new trends in cinema emerge what happens to the exponents of the old? Does a great story require additional flourishes of innovation to make an audience want to engage?


The Artist begins with protagonist George Valentin adored but far from adorable - despite his four-legged personality appendage - at the top of his game at the height of silent cinema; and charts his downfall and potential resurrection. Its a simple story with flourishes of the reverential and the innovative. Set pieces pay homage to the time but also reference contemporary classic scenes; it take liberties with the music and its 'silentness' (in a great sequence) and there are some fab wipes and fades. It's engaging from the off, and its initial naivety and peppiness (no pun intended) a joy. There's a point midway where Valentin begins to lose empathy and whilst we can understand the complexity of the relationship with prodigy turned nemesis Peppy Miller, its much more difficult to understand why Mrs V has bothered to stay around as long as she has.


However, just when it is in danger of losing itself, the third act brings it all round; its terrific. Dark, emotive, fun, heart-warming and just staying the right side of melodrama. That The Artist is silent and black and white is irrelevant. That it allowed me to 'feel' (and has a stunner of a pay off comparable with Some Like It Hot) makes it a worthy addition to the art form it so wonderfully pays homage to.

Score: 8/10

Our Top Ten of 2011

The collective scores are in.....and the winners are

Joint 1st     Drive
Joint 1st     Submarine
Joint 3rd    Blue Valentine
Joint 3rd    Weekend
5th             Senna
6th             Animal Kingdom
7th             We Need To Talk About Kevin
Joint 8th    Bridesmaids
Joint 8th    Tyrannosaur
10th           Black Swan