Films of the year- 2018

Due to a current hectic life schedule and my writing for Film Inquiry, my blog has now become severely neglected and redundant however for my few readers who have asked (thank you and I love you), I will continue to do my films of the year.

As always there are some that I may have missed that could have made the cut (such as awards favourite Roma) but again hectic times in my household mean that, despite a healthy lot of cinema viewings, I haven’t always managed to see everything I wanted.

So here is my round up of what has grabbed my cinematic sensibilities this year

10) I, Tonya (Craig Gillespie)

It shouldn’t have been that much of a surprise that the story of disgraced figure skater Tonya Harding would make for an intriguing film but still I,Tonya was a bombshell blast, a spiky mockumentary biopic with knockout performances. Margot Robbie gives a gutsy uninhibited performance as Tonya Harding, the scrappy skater who worked her way from the wrong side of the redneck tracks to outperform her privileged competitors. But she was always considered the outsider, her homemade costumes and unorthodox style at odds with the stuffy snobbery of the elite skating world. So, when she became embroiled in a violent attack on fellow skater Nancy Kerrigan in 1994, the establishment, and more notably, the press found their villain and Harding’s career became a car crash, played out on the world’s stage.

Craig Gillespie’s film uses the chaotic events surrounding Tonya’s life and career to present wildly varying sides to the narrative from the key players involved and which creates a wildly entertaining film, as jagged and barbed as the ice and blades around it. Whist the stories may conflict and whilst the audience’s preconceptions of Harding may differ, the film makes it clear, that despite everything else she was a fighter, an underdog who was hit by life (and literally by most of her family). I Tonya dazzles with its intense skating sequences and eccentric characters, particularly Harding’s force of nature mother LaVona (played in towering fashion by Alison Janney) so when the fallout of the Kerrigan incident hits, it hits hard. Beyond the outrageously entertaining antics, we see the price that Harding paid for her role as skating’s bad-girl. In one scene Robbie sits waiting to perform on the ice rink, her face made up in cartoonish fashion, she alternates between grinning and grimacing as she realises her fate as the crowd’s court jester. Whatever your take on Harding before the film, by the end Robbie’s fearless performance will make you rethink it.

9) Hereditary (Ari Aster)

Whilst the UK was experiencing some of its hottest weather in years, Hereditary came along to chill us to the bone and take us to some very dark places. Toni Collette, who already has had a rough time cinematically in a variety of put upon roles, had her most brutal part to date as Annie, a woman trying to keep her family together after the death of her suspiciously secretive mother. To say she goes through the ringer is an understatement in a film so intrinsically unsettling, it clings to every fibre of your being, enveloping you in a wrath of dread and doesn’t let go, even after the credits have rolled. Owing a debt to Rosemary’s Baby is never a bad thing and Hereditary evokes the paranoia of the 60s classic with its suffocating, all-consuming nightmare, where the scares come from knowing everyone is out to get you and there is no escape, no matter what you do.

A uniformly excellent cast commit to their parts so well, particularly Collette whose face belies the gauntlet of terror she is faced with and Alex Wolff as her son Peter whose teenage façade quickly crumbles in the wake of impending and sustained panic, reducing him to a simpering child. It also features one of the year’s most shocking scenes, one that escalates quickly to a moment that you can’t quite believe just happened. With Hereditary horror continues its ascent to be regarded again as a genre with merit, way past just cheap frills and easy frights, to grip hold of an audience with a disturbing presence. Long may its comeback continue I say, though I am not sure my nerves agree.

8) Mission Impossible- Fallout (Christopher McQuarrie)

I have said it before and I will say it again, no one gives you more bang for your buck than Tom Cruise, he is your bone fide movie star and the Buster Keaton of blockbusters. But even he outdid himself with the latest instalment of the Mission Impossible franchise, which was this year’s stellar standout actioner. It deserved to be seen on the biggest screen possible to witness the multitude of set pieces and stunts that Cruise and director Christopher McQuarrie had the balls to think of and then actually execute. From a car chase through the streets of Paris, to rooftop pursuits and culminating in a helicopter chase that has a literal heart in the mouth moment, you can feel every crunch and crack as Cruise pushes the limits of what is possible in terms of practical stunts.

But this is not all just flash and showiness, there is an intelligent script with narrative twists and turns and the interplay between the actors shows the emotional depth that these characters have been drawn into as each Mission progresses. Mission Impossible Fallout succeeds in both feeling slightly retro with its cinematic sensibilities but also thoroughly modern with its approach, where grown up clever action films are perilously in short supply, it is a welcome franchise that has produced one of its best films so far down the line. The only impossible part may be topping Fallout and if they do, I am not sure the audience’s anxiety levels can take it.

7) You Were Never Really Here (Lynne Ramsay)

Lynne Ramsay’s long-awaited return to cinema after her gut punching adaptation of We Need to Talk about Kevin (2011) is an equally dark and nightmarish tale, with echoes of Taxi Driver but also with a murky beat of its own. Joaquin Phoenix plays Joe, a war veteran who is sleepwalking through a life of pain and violence and who is now a gun for hire, retrieving missing children for those that will pay for his brutal services. When he is hired to find the daughter of a senator, it draws Joe into a sinister world which will have repercussions to his own sparse but personal life.

Make no mistake that this is feel-bad cinema at its best, with Ramsay creating a series of disturbing and cruel scenes that build upon a world filled with dread and despair. The narrative may sound like something for a Liam Neeson actioner, but this is not a redemptive revenge tale where everything will be made right in the end. Phoenix’s Joe is a man that feels like he is already dead and is just living in his own tortured purgatory, he is a physically and emotionally bruised shadow that walks the earth. The only warmth in his life is with his mother, a scene where they sing to each other whilst polishing cutlery is tender and becomes even more devastating after the reverberations of Joe’s course of action. The film is set to a pulsating score by Jonny Greenwood that clings to the sides of the frame, heightening the jet- black menace that is found around every corner. You Were Never Really Here is not an easy watch but it is a fascinating piece of work by Ramsay, a strangely hypnotic experience where you may want to turn away but can’t bring yourself to.

6) Widows (Steve McQueen)

Following his Oscar winning epic 12 Years a Slave (2013) with a film based on an 80s Lynda La Plante miniseries seemed like a very odd choice for director Steve McQueen. But it’s a left turn idea that paid rich rewards, creating a barnstorming crime thriller with strong performances across the board. Whilst the idea of a heist job being pulled off by an all- female crew must have been progressive in the 1980s, there is still a sense that we are watching something new, fresh and crucially exciting. Lead by a commanding Viola Davis, each member of the team is allowed time to flesh out their interesting characters and motives for taking part in a job that they are not ready for. With a screenplay by Gone Girl writer Gillian Flynn, the interplay between the women, at first cagey and cautious and then finding some form of bond in their enforced situation, means the audience care and invest in their lives.

Whilst the female characters rightly dominate the screen, there is strong support from the all the rest of the cast, Colin Farrell encompasses both charm and callousness in equal spades as a morally corrupt politician. Daniel Kaluuya meanwhile is terrifying as the brother and henchman to Brian Tyree Henry’s criminal turned politician, his pursuit of Davis and co is nail biting stuff and every time he is on screen, there is an air of unpredictably akin to Javier Bardem’s Anton Chigurh. McQueen relocates the action from London to Chicago, which allows for some social commentary to flow into the narrative, the divides of the haves and the have nots clear to see on the streets of the city, where the wealthy continue to line their pockets while others struggle to keep afloat. The director also shows he is as equally adept at dealing with action sequences as well as dramatic arches with an opening scene that skilfully combines both, throwing us headlong into this world without a moments pause. Despite a long running time, the film flies along without a single frame wasted, each one building and escalating the stakes higher to a tense finale which still combines depth and emotion amongst its chaos. Where McQueen goes next from here may be anyone’s guess but after nailing another genre, it will be a tense and anticipated wait.

5) Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri (Martin McDonagh)

Storming out of the blocks to herald the start of a new year came Martin McDonagh’s blistering, bruising and blackly funny Three Billboards. We already knew that Frances McDormand was a fearless actress but even she outdid herself with her towering performance as … a mother taking the law into her own hands after her daughter’s murder continues to go unsolved. It is a sucker punch of a role, a melting pot of rage and grief, raw and rousing and it felt like a call to arms right at the height of the Me Too movement, proving that women can command the screen with the fire and fury that is usually only reserved for men.

McDormand dominates the screen yet also allows her co-stars their moment to shine, particularly Sam Rockwell, who confirms what many of us have known for a long time, that he is Hollywood’s unsung MVP. Three Billboards wasn’t for everyone though, some were uneasy with the brash brushstrokes it created, and its award sweeping run up to the Oscars was dashed on the big night by Del Toro. But for those who got McDonagh’s groove, there was much to admire, his ability to turn the narrative from fist pumping vigilante antics to the silent ache of a mourning mother is a masterclass in modern storytelling.

4) A Quiet Place (John Kransinski)

In a world where information about a film is accessible to our searching fingertips and when the hype machine builds up a release, months before it lands on the screen, one of cinema’s greatest remaining pleasures is the sleeper hit. A film that seemingly comes from nowhere without any burden of sequel, reboot or remake and that captures the imagination of an audience ready for something that feels fresh and new. This year that accolade went to John Krasinski’s barnstorming thriller A Quiet Place which gave its viewers a silent, nail biting, nerve shredding experience and also took cinema screens back to their intended state- noiseless and free of phone screens as all were engrossed in it’s almost wordless narrative. In a post-apocalyptic world, survivors must remain silent  to avoid attracting the attention of giant predators that, whilst blind, have advanced hearing and will attack at the slightest sound. We follow a family, Lee (Kransinski) and Evelyn (Emily Blunt) and their two children who live in a countryside house, adapted and kitted out to withstand a world that must be quiet at all times. They have managed to create a survivalist form of living, but they will soon be confronted with a new challenge as Evelyn is about to have a baby where she must remain silent during childbirth and where they must find a way to keep their new-born hushed.

A Quiet Place delivers an almost unbearably tense cinematic ride, with Kransinski showing he can direct taut set pieces that would make Spielberg proud and reduce cinemagoers to anxiety ridden messes by the end of its running time. But amidst the silent chills, the film also raises questions about our humanity and what life we would have to live if we were denied a fundamental part of our existence, our ability to express emotions through sound. And at its very core, it is a film of hope and love, with one particular scene showing the heart-breaking paternal instinct that a parent will provide no matter what.

3) Leave No Trace (Debra Granik)

Debra Granik’s second and most prominent feature Winter’s Bone (2010) dealt with characters leaving on the fringes of society, cut off from the wider world and who create their own microcosm of rules and ways of life. Her new film Leave No Trace shares its DNA with its central narrative about an army veteran Will (Ben Foster) suffering from PTSD who lives in the vast forests of a national park in Portland Oregon with his 13-year-old daughter Tom (Thomasin McKenzie). However, their self-contained world is shattered by a small mistake and they are thrown into the guidance of social services and a reintroduction to society that Will is unable to adjust to but where Tom begins to discover the pieces of life that she wants.

Leave No Trace is a film of beautifully judged and subtle moments, there is no overdramatic teenage acts from Tom as she begins to pull away from the world that her father had created for them. Instead it’s a culmination of tender moments that embed like whispers on the wind, making you want Tom to have those that she cannot and quietly devastated when she is pulled away from another chance of home. But the film doesn’t paint Will as the monster, his reasons for his way of life are valid and his love for his daughter unwavering, both Foster and McKenzie portray their parts magnificently so you are on both sides of the coin, able to see each other’s actions and motives. So much so that the final scene between father and daughter is all the more heart-breaking, the pull for both of them to another way of life will the catalyst to break their unified bond. Ironically for a film titled Leave No Trace, it is a film that will linger in your thoughts long after, its trail of human emotion leaving a footprint in your memory.

2) Ladybird (Greta Gerwig)

There have been many coming of age films but none that have struck a chord with me as much as Greta Gerwig’s fabulously observed Ladybird. Set in Sacramento in 2002, Saoirse Ronan plays Christine but who insists to be called by her given name Ladybird (when questioned by a teacher she declares ‘It was given to me, by me’). She clashes with her mother Marion (a stellar Laurie Metcalf), particularly on her desire to go to college in New York to experience culture, her lofty ambitions are in opposition to the family’s ability to pay the tuition fees. Ronan is superb as the self-assured teen, even in her brattier moments of behaviour, she still manages to charm with her unwavering conviction that usually eludes many awkward adolescents.

Indie darling Gerwig directs with confidence and a keen eye for all the small details that makes the film soar with heart and spirit, period touches feel authentic and every character has the chance to shine. Whilst the narrative deals with the familiar coming of age milestones- prom night, losing virginity, fallouts with best friends, it also puts as much emphasis on the mother-daughter relationship and this is where its depth and painful familiarity emerges. In one scene, as they shop for prom dresses, Ladybird asks her mother if she likes her, her mother is quick to reply with ‘of course I love you’. But Ladybird presses the matter and replies ‘But do you like me?’ The air hangs with uncertainty and the realisation that, whilst the love between parent and child is undeniable, our attitude as teenagers often puts a strain on our parent’s ability to connect and actually like us at certain times. It is a bitter pill to swallow and holds a mirror up to how we acted in our teens, I myself squirmed recalling past encounters with my parents when I was loaded with a youthful know it all arrogance and I felt the strong urge to hug my mum after watching the film. Gerwig has created a modern classic in the underrepresented female adolescence pantheon, one that feels deeply personal but also will feel entirely relatable for many. It is a funny but bittersweet memory to a time filled with joy and anticipation of what life holds ahead but also to the reality that is waiting to clip our wings before we have even taken flight.

1) American Animals (Bart Layton)

Bart Layton followed up his blistering documentary The Imposter (2012) with another film based on true events but whose lines became significantly blurred between fact and fiction. American Animals tells the true crime story of four college students in Kentucky, who in 2003, boldly and foolishly attempted one of the most audacious art heists in US history. Layton combines both factual reconstruction and documentary style with the action cutting to interviews with the real people involved, which adds depth and differing versions to the unfolding drama. The effect is a fascinating portrait of a bunch of kids who became bewitched by an idea, without thinking of the consequences and it is also a riveting heist movie whose players are themselves influenced by iconic crime films. In one scene the gang wade through a ton of DVDs including Rififi and Reservoir Dogs, seduced by their air of coolness but oblivious to how these tales actually end, a precursor to how ill-conceived their plan actually is.

The actors playing the real-life students all bring a different energy and conflicting stances to the heist, Barry Keoghan and Evan Peters particularly excel as the two main protagonists Spencer Rheinhard and Warren Lipka. Keoghan waves the line between a cautious unease and an entranced abandonment, all etched on his intriguing face, his need for something to bring greater richness to his art leading him away from his intended, resolute path. Peters meanwhile gets the showier role as the erratic and unpredictable Lipka, his misplaced confidence and maddening behaviour is somehow transfixing in Peters hands, the actor’s hypnotic swagger recalling a young Malcolm McDowell. Layton’s direction flits between playful homages (the boys imagine their intended heist to resemble a cheeky Oceans 11 slick operation) and authentic realisation, with the actual plan turning into a confused, frantic mess, the arrogance of youth held up directly on scene. But for all its slicks and tricks, American Animals never feels gimmicky or exploitative, instead it is a fascinating portrait, brilliantly constructed look at how a hair brained scheme promises, but ultimately fails to lead your life to a better outcome.

 

 

 

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Review- The Shape Of Water (directed by Guillermo Del Toro)

Guillermo Del Toro’s career has been one of flights of fancy, a director with big ideas and big imagination. He has been heralded with acclaim for past fantasies The Devil’s Backbone (2001) and Pans Labyrinth (2006) but he has also missed the mark for many with the big budget bombastic Pacific Rim (2013). And whilst his last film Crimson Peak (2015) was a deliciously dark gothic tale, it failed to find an audience for Del Toro. However his latest film arrives on the back of winning the Golden Lion at the Venice film festival and a haul of 13 Oscar nominations, signalling a return to form and one that encapsulates many Guillermo hallmarks.

The Shape of Water is brimming with his love for fantasy and for cinema itself; it is the stuff of B-Movie horror but wrapped up in the styling of a classic Hollywood melodrama, offering both the beauty and the brutality that often inhabit the same space. The film begins in the 1960s with a look into the sweet but simple life of our heroine Elisa (Sally Hawkins), a mute woman whose days are filled with practicality but also a sense of wistful imagination, alluding to the loneliness she feels. Elisa works as a cleaner in a government laboratory, a routine that allows her to go almost unnoticed until one day she comes across the scientists latest and most dangerous discovery- an amphibious but human alike creature (played by long time Del Toro collaborator Doug Jones). Elisa begins to bond with the creature; their mutual inability to communicate through spoken language allows them to connect through music, eggs and their own sign language and which makes their resulting against all odds romance, wholly believable. However the political climate means there is Cold War era paranoia afoot with the soviets trying to acquire the ‘asset’.

And there is a menacing government agent named Strickland (Michael Shannon) who appears to have a personal vendetta against the creature and wants it to be destroyed, thinly veiled in the name of science. So it falls to Elisa to hatch a plan to rescue the creature from a terrible fate and find a way to keep their burgeoning relationship afloat.

The marvel of The Shape of Water is how it takes a supremely odd premise, one that shouldn’t work yet weaves it into a fantastical and credible love story, one that feels like a fairytale that has been told through the ages. It plays to Del Toro’s strengths as a director, he simply does not paint pictures but he creates worlds, ones that promise to show us the mythical but also pull us back to harsh sadistic realities. Whilst the film is full of enchanting imagery, of old movie theatres, overflowing baths, stolen moments and dream sequences, it also takes us to the dark side, mostly through Shannon’s evil agent. He may be dressed in a suit but Strickland is the real monster of the film and creates flashes of violence that permeate the narrative, a tool often deployed in the Del Toro cannon. Michael Shannon uses his bug eyed intensity to create a true villain of the piece, you can almost hear the audience want to hiss (and cower) whenever he is on screen.  The rest of the cast sell the oddball premise with class and conviction, each supporting member brings something to the table. Elisa’s loyal best friends Zelda (Octavia Spencer) and Giles (Richard Jenkins) both carry the character arch of being on the fringes of society in the 60s but both are fully realised characters, rather than just serving the purpose of affirming their alignment to Elisa. Michael Stuhlbarg meanwhile is the wavering compass of the film, his (secret soviet) scientist wrestles with his conscious of doing his duty for his country and finding compassion for the creature he is to steal.

But at the heart of it all is Sally Hawkins, a woman who often seems fragile and used to being put upon but who transcends her exterior with a steely determination, she is a woman who may appear delicate but who has desire in her heart, sexually and emotionally. Hawkins carries the film with her expressionistic face and her unearthed strength for that what was missing from her life and for what will now make her feel whole. It is a slight shame then that the end of the film seems somewhat rushed, when it’s allowed to breath in so many other areas that our love story’s conclusion is given short shrift but this is a minor damp squib when we have already been delivered so many riches.

Whether Del Toro’s big bold fantasy will make waves at the upcoming Oscars remains to be seen and its unique cinematic vision may be too diverse for some audiences but then the director has always marched to the beat of his own screen drum. It is a delight to see such a piece of work that is clearly a passion project, one that has not been compromised by the powers of the studio. It is also a timely fable for our troubled times, a reminder of those living on the outside, whose voice is often not heard, of those wanting to rise above what is unsaid and to break above what is seen on the surface.

Review- Films of the Year

I love film, I really do. But like most things you love in your life, sometimes those you take for granted become neglected, you depend on them being there so you try a little less and with the pressures of modern life, they can fall to the backburner. So this year I thought the unthinkable for me, I was not going to do a review of my favourite films of the year, my poor blog has seen less writing over the last 12 months than ever before and my passion for film has taken a battering, I began to feel like Llewyn Davies where the universe is trying to get him to give up the one thing he loves. Sometimes it is easier to try and ignore the thing you are most passionate about because acknowledging it brings pain when you are not able to do it more. But then one night over dinner with one of my dear friends, she asked me when I would be doing my review of the year, I was taken aback, mostly due to the fact that I didn’t think anybody really read this (I’m not trying for a sympathy vote here) and that it was just one more end of year list to be glanced and forgotten. I told her I wasn’t sure I would write one this year but when she said that she used my review as a tool to choose what films she would then watch.  I was, to say the least, touched and a little teary (I had a cocktail with dinner so I blame that) and I thought, if just one person reads my review, and that may well be true, and then gone out and discovered films to watch as a result then I had done my job.  So Helen this is for you and in a way for me, as even though I may not be doing the thing I love most in the world all of the time, I should still give it the love and attention that it warrants. It may just be a list of the year’s best films but to me, what it represents, means so much more, it signifies the times this year that I have been able to spend time with one of the greatest loves of my life, the cinema and that is something I should not take for granted.

15) Logan Lucky (directed by Steven Sodenbergh)

Steven Sodenbergh continues to have the best post retirement career of a director, who really never retired in the first place, with his hillbilly heist Logan Lucky. Somewhat overlooked at the box office , there is much to enjoy in this assemble piece that deserves another reprieve. Blue collar worker Jimmy Logan (Channing Tatum) is laid off from his construction job due to an existing condition so he devises a plan to pull a job during the NASCAR Coca Cola 600 race. Enlisting his brother Clyde (Adam Driver) who lost an arm in Iraq and his straight talking sister (Riley Keough) they set out on a job that is not fuelled by greed but by necessity, Jimmy merely wants to provide for his daughter and he represents the fatalities that have befallen many workers in the current American economic climate. Sodenbergh peppers his film with nods to this changing landscape, where jobs are scarce and the divide between the have and have nots grows wider everyday but he also injects verve and his trademark crime caper pizazz so the proceedings are not weighed down. Riffing on his previous films, a clever in joke describes the resulting heist as Oceans 7/11, Logan Lucky has some familiar beats but also a great sleight of hand pay off, aided and abetted by a uniformly excellent cast. But the films real ace in the hole comes in the form of a certain James Bond, the magnificently monikered Joe Bang, a bombs disposal expert played by with giddy aplomb and bleach blonde hair by Daniel Craig. Though he is incarcerated in the film, Craig seems to be relishing the opportunity to shake off the shackles of 007 and has the time of his life playing the egg loving mischievous inmate, giving us a reminder of what a great character actor he can be and he alone, is enough reason to give this shaggy heist story a spin.

14) Thor Ragnarok (directed by Taika Waititi)

Taika Waititi has said that nobody leaves the cinema with a smile on their face anymore and so it appears that he is on a crusade to bring back the fun and cheekiness to multiplexes, for which he has succeeded with his previous films What we do in the Shadows and last year’s Hunt for the Wilderpeople. And now he brings his unique blend of Kiwi quirk and abundant humour to the superhero world, managing to have his cake and eat it by delivering a stonking blockbuster Marvel movie but one that is overflowing with charm and oddball goofiness. Chris Hemsworth gets not only to flex his muscles but also his comedic chops in the most bonkers outing for an Avenger yet. Struck out of Asgard by his long lost evil sister Hela (a minxy Cate Blanchett), Thor must first escape the day glo planet of Sakaar where he is forced into gladiatorial combat with the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and then assemble a rag tag crew to get back to his homeland and save his people. This plotline allows Thor and the Hulk to play out an off kilter buddy movie, with Hemsworth and Ruffalo bouncing off each other in a way that is so fun, you wish for a spin-off of just these characters. They are also aided by the feisty but boozy badass Valkyrie (a fabulous Tessa Thompson) and estranged brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston ramping up the devilish side that must is so fun to play). Jeff Goldblum meanwhile camps it up as The Grandmaster of Sakaar in a role never more suited to his acting style and Waititi himself steals every scene he is in as the talking rock Korg whose revolution failed due to a lack of pamphlets. The film is awash with retro/future design that recalls the style of Flash Gordon and whizzes of electro beats which all enhance the playful edge that the franchise has so welcomingly taken. Quite simply just about the most fun you can have at the cinema this year.

13) Good Time (directed by the Safdie Brothers)

A film that pulsates like a beating heart, the Safdie brother’s crime caper grabs you from the outset and doesn’t let go through its frenetic, exhilarating running time. After a bumbled bank robbery lands his mentally ill brother in prison, Connie (Robert Pattinson) spends a frantic night trying to free him before he is sent to Riker’s Island. Using every ounce of hustle and quick wits that seep from every fibre of his being, Connie lunges from each new desperate scenario with breakneck gusto which leads to dangerous consequences. Throbbing with an intense electro soundtrack, the film pounds with a forceful nature, the high stakes of each decision leaving the viewer on tenterhooks and causing repercussions for everyone Connie scams or crosses paths with. The camera veers through the long long night with off the cuff verve; at times shot with obtuse close ups, documentary style vigour and a delinquent aesthetic. Scenes are saturated in neon hues and the streets become an additional character, vibrant, unrelenting and in a constant state of motion. Pattison, who surely has shaken off the teen heartthrob moniker and is now just seen as the great character actor he is, turns in another stellar performance as Connie, he is impulsive, often repulsive but never anything but mesmerising. As he fires from each hairbrained plan to the next, often with surprising dark humour, his motives for his brother’s safety and release keep the viewer as the passenger on his crazy delirious journey. The Safdie Brothers have created one hell of a calling card to Hollywood, evoking the 70s new wave and New York crime dramas but also feeling vibrantly fresh, one that is impossible not to get carried along by.

12) Logan (directed by James Mangold)

There was a worry at one point that Logan the film would not live up to Logan the trailer, such was the goose bump inducing trailer with its haunting use of Johnny Cash’s afflicted cover of Hurt. But the trailer merely paved the way for James Mangold’s meditation on the superhero movie, enhancing its sense of melancholy. The film wears its influences on its sleeve, particularly classic western Shane, which is referenced by Charles Xavier in one scene and thematically it feels akin to the John Ford era as Hugh Jackman’s Logan is living a self exiled life in Mexico. But what looms largest over the film is the burden of time, even more threatening than the government stooges that infiltrate Logan’s safe haven and this is what sets it apart from the comic book stylistics of the previous X-Men outings. This is the first time we see superheroes age, we see Logan’s body ravaged and unable to heal itself as quickly and we see Xavier, now frail and wheelchair bound, riddled with medication to keep his mind afloat and to keep his powers in order. They are relics of a past time, a stark realisation that the world will not always be saved. There is still action to this story however and the arrival of a new mutant, a young girl and the first in decades, gives Logan the vigour to have one final show down to lead her to safety and gives Mangold the chance to inject some ferocious violence to the scenes. In fact it was at the insistence of Jackman that the film was more adult and brutal than the studio would usually allow and he offered to lower his actor’s fee to secure that the film was made how they wanted it to. It was a gamble that paid off, a fitting and realistic farewell to Jackman’s biggest character and it is all the better, and sadder, for it.

11) The Beguiled (directed by Sofia Coppola)

Sofia Coppola returned triumphantly to the screen off the back of her best director win at Cannes with a Southern pot boiling melodrama. As the Civil war rages on, a wounded Yankee soldier (Colin Farrell) is found in the grounds of a ladies’ seminary and is taken into their refuge to be nursed back to health. But at what first seems like paradise to Corporal McBurney, being cared for and fawned over by beautiful young women, his presence begins to stir dangerous rivalries and set a course of irrevocable consequences. Coppola has always been a director who creates mood and The Beguiled is no different, shooting on film and using her trademark dreamy cinematography, the seeping of gauzy light filters into their world of starch upper collars and southern belle decorum. The air is thick with repressed desire, a clinging heat that threatens to engulf and destroy the microcosm that the ladies have built in their isolation from the outside world, evoking shades of Black Narcissus whose remotely stationed nuns begin to question their vows of celibacy upon the arrival of a government worker. The cast embody their characters beautifully with Nicole Kidman sharing the screen again with Farrell this year to great effect, this time as the headmistress of the girls whilst Kirsten Dunst is the heart and heartbroken of the film whose prim teacher is tempted by the promise to escape with McBurney. Though the film’s best moments occur when the ensemble comes together, the interaction used through subtle airs and graces and telling glances speaks volumes of their internal cravings. A candlelight dinner scene in particular, where the girls fawn over McBurney and try to outdo each over an apple pie is a master class in thinly concealed jealousy and proves that Coppola has lost none of her bite and sly humour and whose cinematic output is always welcome at the table.

10) God’s Own Country (directed by Francis Lee)

Dubbed the ‘Yorkshire Brokeback Mountain’ upon its release, director Francis Lee’s debut film carves its own path of poetic subtlety and yearning heartache. Young farmer Johnny is stuck in both his daily grind of life and a succession of meaningless hook ups with local lads in the village (where a night out in Bradford is seen as glamorous). When Romanian migrant worker Gheorghe comes to help on the farm, Johnny’s world is turned upside down and awakes a longing for change in his life that refuses to be neglected anymore. There is a real sense of beauty to Gods Own Country, where the smallest acts (Gheorghe offering his gloves to Johnny atop the cold landscape, keeping a newborn lamb warm during the harsh conditions) reveal the heart and fragility of life. Newcomers John O’ Connor and Alec Secareanu both impress, with O’Connor’s Johnny starting as an insular young man unable to convey emotion and go beyond the motions of his stilted life. His transformation when Gheorghe pierces his dispirited bubble is agonisingly nuanced, his hesitance to let his barriers fully down leads to a heart stopping showdown, where Johnny’s inability to convey his heart’s desire may lose him the one thing he truly wants. Alec Secareanu meanwhile creates captivating warmth as Gheorghe and a relationship to truly root for. They say that it’s grim up north but Lee brings lyricism and grace to his surroundings and tenderness to a way of life that is often unforgiving and stuck in the past. But ultimately his greatest strength is creating an understated majesty to two men traversing the rugged terrain of love.

9) Star Wars- The Last Jedi (directed by Rian Johnson)

They say that some of the best films are those that divide us and this certainly seems to be true of Rian Johnson’s instalment into the Star Wars saga, with critics hailing it one of the best additions to the sci fi universe but many fans up in arms with the direction it has taken. Whilst Abrams produced a crowd pleasing greatest hits with The Force Awakens, Johnson goes down the Empire Strikes Back route with something darker and more fractured. This allows one of the films greatest strengths to come to the forefront with the inner (and outer) turmoil of Kylo Ren as he battles between power of the First Order and the redemption of the resistance and showcases Adam Driver’s complex and riveting portrayal of an intriguingly flawed character. There is also the conflict of Daisy Ridley’s Rey who is struggling to find her place and how to control the force that has awakened in her, with a reluctant to say the least teacher in Hamill’s jaded Skywalker. But it’s not all doom and gloom in the galaxy and Johnson injects some wit, furry delights (hello Porgs!) and verve into the proceedings, allowing more screen time for the charismatic Oscar Isaac and the welcome addition of spunky new character Rose (Kelly Marie Tran). He also allows time to tug at the nostalgic heartstrings with the return of a certain green wise one, thankfully in his original guise and not a soulless CGI incarnation and a scene between Hamill and the late Carrie Fisher takes on a deeper poignancy. The Last Jedi manages to seep the old into something new, with bold strokes and battle scenes that take on an operatic ambience, with striking hues of red and white. It takes the saga into unchartered territories, one that may struggle where to go next but will be all the more exciting for it.

8) Call me by your name (directed by Luca Guadagnino)

Director Luca Guadagnino made an even bigger splash with his third film in his ‘desire’ trilogy which left critics in raptures and ending up on the top of many best of year poll lists and it is easy to see why. The film casts a seductive spell and plays out like the best summer you never had, in the landscape of 1980s Italy with a coming of age and coming of passion drama. 17 year old American-Italian Elio (Timothée Chalamet) spends his days rather precociously in and around his parent’s villa, reading, transcribing music and hanging out with the local kids. But the arrival of American intern Oliver (Armie Hammer) who has come to Italy to assist his professor father (Michael Stuhlbarg) Elio’s charmed life suddenly is awakened with a desire which will change him forever. A film that is a feast for the senses, Call me by your name is draped in visual splendour and a burgeoning palatable sensuality that by the time Elio and Oliver kiss you are almost left breathless with anticipation. Filled with tender moments, where the slightest touch sends ripples that will last a lifetime in their hearts, it is anchored by tremendous performances from Chalamet and Hammer who convince in their passion and break your heart with their wordless final embrace. Though the pair keep their romance a secret, it is not perceived because of a fear of Elio’s parents reaction, in fact in the film’s most affecting scene Elio’s father shares a moment with his son full of compassion and understanding. He tells Elio that he envies him and that he should find pleasure in the grief as the love between him and Oliver is something so rare. Stuhlbarg’s delivery is so delicately beautiful but carries a weight and wisdom of words that many would have longed to hear from their own father. It also sets up the final scene of the film to be loaded with bittersweet heartbreak; a lingering shot of Elio’s face signifies the end of a beautiful summer and the enormity of the emotions that have spoken their name.

7) Moonlight (directed by Barry Jenkins)

With Moonlight director Barry Jenkins delivered something truly special and genre defying, a film of immediate relevance but also of startling beauty. Its chronicle of a young black man growing up in Miami details three defining periods in his life(know through the chapters as ‘Little’ ‘Chiron’ and ‘Black’) and is portrayed by a trio of outstanding actors who all bring verve and soul to their depictions. The film traverses the myriad representations from a scrawny bullied boy to imbalanced teen to a bulked, gold grilled man but all carry the same desire that goes unspoken. What is remarkable about Jenkins’ film is how he swerves the traditional method that may be used to present a narrative whose nature is rooted in poverty, drugs and gritty streets and instead of using a gritty realism, he saturates his film in sheens of colour and dreamlike elegance. Hues of blue bath the screen, enhancing the recurrent theme of water that peppers the chapters; it represents the constant flow of this boy’s life, how his soul is swept through the ever changing waves and how his sexuality is simmering on the surface. Alongside the stunning cinematography, the use of music elevates Moonlight favouring an operatic score, filled with yearning strings and afflicted piano that transcend its setting. Scenes of Little being abandoned by his crack riddled mother (a blistering Naomie Harris) to Chiron erupting to his high school tormentor take on a higher plain by its crescendo of sound and stirring visual palette and the film builds to an aching symphony of love and longing. Moonlight may be remembered by those who have not seen it for its blundered Oscar glory however its legacy is there to behold and to admire, within its resplendent frames.

6) The Killing of a Sacred Deer (directed by Yorgos Lanthimos)

Cinema’s leading purveyor of feel bad cinema Yorgos Lanthimos returned with his second English Language film and reteamed with his Lobster star Colin Farrell for a deeply disturbing morality tale. Farrell plays Dr Steven Murphy, a cardiovascular surgeon who conducts an ill advised relationship with a young boy named Martin (an eerily good Barry Keoghan), the son of one of his former patients. As Martin’s behaviour becomes increasingly sinister, Steven’s idyllic life is shattered beyond recognition and he has to make an unspeakable sacrifice. Lanthimos’ previous films appear to live in their own universe and The Killing of a Sacred Deer is no different, he has created his own genre where rules and logic barely register and are inconsequential. He also creates a dialogue that is jarring and whose matter of fact nature brings a sense of comicalness to the proceedings, to break up the engulfing bleakness. And boy is it bleak with the film posing an abhorrent situation that has no other outcome than utter destruction; its journey to its shocking climax carries an almost unbearable sense of dread, heightened by its obtrusive and imposing score. Lanthimos’ cast sell the premise with conviction, something that may crumble in lesser hands with Farrell continuing his career reinvigoration, Nicole Kidman bringing an icy determination and Keoghan is the revelation, his previous incarnation as the sweet boy in Dunkirk is obliterated with his menacing compelling turn. The film asks many questions, notably where will Lanthimos go next and how much more can he put his audience through? Whatever it may be, there are many film lovers, myself included, who are ready to take that voyage, no matter how dark and twisted the path may be.

5) The Handmaiden (directed by Park Chan Wook)

Park Chan Wook delivers a tantalising adaptation of Sarah Waters’ novel The Fingersmith transporting the Victorian setting to 1930s Korea with the tale of a con man and pickpocket who embark on an elaborate plot to seduce and dupe a countess out of her inheritance. But things are not as they seem and the film becomes a serpentine puzzle of who is conning who. By retelling the same events of the narrative but from different angles, it creates a devilishly tricksy journey for the audience , keeping us on our delighted toes. As you can expect from the director of Oldboy, Chan Wook’s proclivities for exposing peoples twisted persuasions continues as he weaves in a disturbing subplot of fetish book reading and tentacle keeping and involves one of cinema’s creepiest uncles. The film itself is a stunning visual feast for the eyes, where every frame is brimming with intrigue and dripping in seduction with captivating performances by its two leading ladies Kim Min-hee (whose face I found mesmerising) and Kim Tae-ri. They run the gauntlet of emotions- victim, predator, innocent, conniving, duplicitous yet romantic and it is impossible to take your eyes off them. One scene in particular involving a tooth and a thimble becomes so loaded with sexual tension that it is almost too much to take. It also sums up the feeling of watching The Handmaiden, it is a heightened giddy rush, best consumed in the all the glory of the director’s cut, to bask in its sumptuous erotic melodrama and be consumed by its wicked wicked charm.

4) Get Out (directed by Jordan Peele)

A massive hit for Blumhouse (alongside M Night’s triumphant return Split) and something of a horror phenomenon, director Jordan Peele made audiences turn out in their droves and squirm in more ways than one by delivering one of the year’s most talked about and most critically acclaimed. Daniel Kaluuya plays Chris, a young black man getting ready to meet his white girlfriend Rose’s (Allison Williams) parents for the first time, whilst we hear the sound of Childish Gambino’s lyrics ‘stay woke’ in the background, a subtle warning to what lies ahead. Her parents seem pleasant enough, though they are somewhat overly keen to present themselves as progressive and open, awkwardly throwing in their support of Obama in clanging fashion. But alarm bells start to ring, the air is filled with a tense unease, the black employees of the house carry feigned upbeat expressions and Rose’s mother is quick to jump on the opportunity to hypnotise Chris. As the real intentions of the family weekend transpire, Peele exposes horror not just in the actions, but in the attitudes of white liberal America, something that is never more timely and present in the times of Trump et al, exposing the uncomfortable undercurrent that lies behind the white picket fences and freshly cut lawns. But what makes the film so outstanding is that it stakes its social commentary into a wildly entertaining film, full of tension, scares and with its ‘sunken place’ creates a terrifying evil, worse than any recent monster or serial killer. The film also carries some well timed humour, Peele drawing on his comedic background to counterbalance the mounting dread that builds with every scene. Get Out never forgets to satisfy the audience with a thrilling cinematic ride, you may just get a little more woke by the end of the journey.

3) La La Land (directed by Damien Chazelle)

And so as the Hollywood dust has settled we can look back at cinema’s tempestuous love affair with La La Land. It burst onto the screen in January to beat away the winter blues and won over audiences with its golden age nostalgia and snappy tunes. But it faced an inevitable backlash, becoming the easy target for critic bashing and its time at the Oscars was marred by that infamous presenting cock up. Upon revisiting the film, La La Land still holds up to the test, its Technicolor pizzazz lights up the screen in a wash of delightful dance numbers and spirited singing. Ryan Gosling infuses his struggling jazz pianist with the right levels of charm and cynicism whilst Emma Stone nabbed her way to Oscar glory with her portrayal of an aspiring actress, still in love with idea of Hollywood but brow beaten by a string of failed audiences. Their romance plays out amidst the city of stars but the bittersweet reality of following your heart means theirs may break in the process and the smitten audience have to swallow a melancholy pill. La La Land is a true delight for movie lovers, old and new, yeah the haters are gonna hate but here’s to the ones who dream.

2) The Florida Project (directed by Sean Baker)

Piercing through the winter winds and transporting us to a sun soaked backdrop was director Sean Baker’s second feature, this time swapping Tangerines for the oranges of Florida. Though this was no holiday destination and instead showed us the lives of the inhabitants of a purple hazed motel, living in the shadows of the commercial utopia of Disneyland. The film focuses on six year old Moonee and her spirited mother Halley as they live by the skin of their teeth each week, just managing to scrap together rent money to stay in the motel. Moonee’s days are filled with joy and adventures as she creates mischief with her friends in a fantasy filled world, the motel’s names of Magic Castle and Futureland and the vivid colours of the surrounding buildings enhancing the childlike microcosm. But as Moonee plays within this absorbing universe, Halley struggles to keep her daughters fantasy from crushing down around them and the reality of their situation threatens their insulted existence. Sharing a slither of DNA with Andrea Arnold’s American Honey where those living on America’s poverty line cultivate their own world out of the world that doesn’t want them, The Florida Project manages to find heart and verve out of this desperate situation. The film is brimming with vibrancy and feels alive and in a constant state of motion, the innocence of childhood is infectious, reminding us of a time when life was one big playground and wonder could be found in the simplest of pursuits. Newcomers Bria Vinaite and Brooklynn Prince play mother and daughter with natural ease and bucket loads of naturalistic charm whilst cinematic stalwart Willem Defoe delivers one of his best performances. He is quietly devastating as the motel manager whose everyday annoyances with his tenants give way to a warmth and compassion as he becomes protector to Halley and Moonee despite their wayward behaviour. Baker’s film allows us a warm snapshot back into the world from a child’s point of view, and in our jaded and troubled times, however fleeting that may be, like the passing of one great summer, it is a thing of wonder to behold.

1) A Ghost Story (directed by David Lowery)

On paper, the premise for A Ghost Story sounds like it really shouldn’t work- A recently departed Casey Affleck is cloaked in a bed sheet (though some people may welcome this) and wanders around his former life and watches over his widow (Rooney Mara). But director David Lowery transforms the childlike demeanour of a crude Halloween costume and makes it into something incredibly soulful. As Casey’s ghost traverses time, the film encapsulates the devastating feelings of loneliness and loss and what happens when a loved one finally moves on and it manages to convey some much emotion from a sheet with two eyeholes. It also contains one of the year’s best scenes as Mara’s widow eats a pie in an extended shot that epitomises the numb, brutal nature of grief. Set to a swelling tear jerking soundtrack, the film navigates through life’s heavy themes, the ebbs and flows of humanity are captured with simple but wholly effective scenes. Its narrative builds and builds to a sweeping, heart bursting abrupt conclusion that stays long after the credits have ended and leaves A Ghost Story lingering in your thoughts for days after. Every now and then a part of the film will pierce into your subconscious and make your soul ache, its stark visuals act as a reminder about how precious and flitting life is. Quite simply I could not shake this film from my mind and nothing else affected me as much at the cinema this year. Truly haunting.

Review-The Beguiled (directed by Sofia Coppola)

 

It is a brave move to put an Independent film against the might of the summer blockbuster brigade and the potential rays of sunshine that dampen the crowds of the cinema. But a new Sofia Coppola film will always rear the heads of the critics and her ardent admirers who will help form an audience in the face of adversity.  It also helps that her latest, The Beguiled, is coming off the back of rave reviews at Cannes and Coppola’s win as best director, the second female to ever to win the accolade.

Based on the 1966 Thomas P Cullinan novel, The Beguiled begins in 1864, three years into the Civil war, where we are thrust into the heartland of the southern Virginia. A young girl walks between the weeping willows of the forest, a hazy beam of light piercing between the trees whilst the sound of cannon fire is heard in the distance. As she gathers mushrooms in a basket, a figure appears from behind a tree, a wounded Yankee soldier who begs for her aid. She helps him back to the large, white pillared plantation looking ladies’ seminary, a place of refuge and restraint for a group of young girls who seemingly have nowhere else to go and who are under the charge of headmistress Martha Farnsworth (Nicole Kidman). Following Ms Farnsworth’s lead who warns the girls to be wary of the soldier Corporal John McBurney (Colin Farrell), they at first treat him with caution and distain, but are all able to demonstrate Christian charity by nursing him back to health before turning him over to the confederate troops.

As McBurney embeds into their hospitality and tends to their flowerbeds, his presence begins to affect the girls and the women of the house, bringing buried emotions to the surface in some and stirring the emergence of sexual awakenings in others. McBurney’s intentions appear to be focused on Farnsworth’s subordinate Edwina (Kirsten Dunst), but as his gaze lingers on the younger Alicia (Elle Fanning) who makes her desires crystal clear to McBurney, he begins to stir dangerous rivalries and set a course of irrevocable consequences.

Coppola’s southern melodrama is a melting pot of sexual repression and tension, where emotions teeter on their repercussive brink. A scene where Kidman’s tightly browed headmistress baths the wounded McBurney simmers with languid desire, which by its end; the audience may well be wiping their own brow. Echoing the themes of her previous film The Virgin Suicides, where a group of girls become imprisoned within a world which becomes their own microcosm, it also evokes shades of Black Narcissus whose remotely stationed nuns begin to question their vows of celibacy upon the arrival of a government worker. Shooting on film and using her trademark dreamy cinematography, the seeping of gauzy light filters into their world of starch upper collars and southern belle decorum. Surprisingly for a director whose work is synonymous with cleverly crafted soundtracks, The Beguiled features minimal music, even the presence of French electro band Phoenix does not pierce the air with contemporary sounds.

The cast embody their characters perfectly, shifting their tones as their burgeoning desires materialise. Kidman is a droll delight as the authority figure whose upturned brow can belie her sly intentions. Farrell veers from wounded sensitivity to a roguish charmer and then to emasculated anger with ease. His hairy, darker complexion contrasting with the milky porcelain skin of the women who he thinks are his heavenly creatures under his spell but soon comes to realise that he is the prey. Dunst is quietly affecting as the prim teacher who wants to escape the seminary, her down turned demeanour temporarily lifted by the promise of a getaway with McBurney whilst Fanning has mischievous fun as the gym slip temptress. Though the best moments of the film are when the ensemble comes together, the interaction used through subtle airs and graces and telling glances speaks volumes of their internal cravings. A candlelight dinner scene in particular, where the girls fawn over McBurney and try to outdo each over an apple pie is a master class in thinly concealed jealousy.

Cullinan’s novel has been filmed before, a 1971 version directed by Don Siegel and starring Clint Eastwood leaned more towards horror and fed on male paranoia. Coppola has said that she has not remade the film version but adapted the original source material. However it is hard for some not to compare the two, particularly as this time we see things from the female perspective. Coppola brings a stripped back, nuanced air to the proceedings, one that may not create new converts to her world of cinema and which may alienate fans of the Eastwood version. But to those well versed in the Coppola canon, there is much to relish in her seductive southern tale. As Ms Farnsworth tells the girls ‘the enemy is not what we believed’.

Five of the best….looks in cinema

They say the eyes are the window to the soul and that a face can launch a thousand ships but in cinema it can do this and much much more. A look can convey something better than pages of dialogue ever could, it can tell us things about a character, some we may want to know and some we wish we didn’t know and all with a flicker of the eye or the glimmer of a smile. At the dawn of cinema, the actor’s face was their greatest tool and then the advent of sound came in and changed the landscape of film forever. Acting became just as much about the conviction of the dialogue as well as the conviction of expression and many of Hollywood’s biggest stars fell to the wayside as they failed to make the transition into the sound age, they became relics of a bygone era.

Script writing gave us another dimension on cinema and has been responsible for many memorable lines that live on in people’s hearts but it’s sometimes good to remember where it all began, with the actor’s face. Though the pen may be mightier than the sword, looks can kill and here are five times in cinema where for me, I have been stopped in my tracks, mesmerised by a look and where the words have fallen by the way and the face has given me all I need to know.

Tom Cruise- Magnolia (1999)

There are no two ways about it; Tom Cruise is a movie star, a bone-fide archetypal movie star and one of a dying breed. He dominated the box office for a long period of time and such was his star wattage that all a poster for one of his films needed was a silhouette of his head with his name emblazoned above it.  He is also an actor that still consistently gives the most bang for the movie payer’s buck, routinely hurling himself from explosions or hanging onto the sides of structures and planes, doing his own death defying stunts. However one thing that is not often attributed to Cruise is his actual acting muscles, that he is an undeniable star but rarely is there praise heaped upon his dramatic delivery, perhaps because most of the time, he is too busy flying off the side of buildings. But when he does pick a project that offers less action and more acting, Cruise reveals hidden depths and never more so than in Paul Thomas Anderson’s narrative sprawling opus Magnolia.

When the film was released much of the attention on Cruise’s performance came from his character’s outlandish mantras, he plays Frank Mackey who is a motivational speaker.  But the real moment comes when Frank talks to an interviewer post seminar, pumped from his on stage high,Frank is all charm and chat at first, riffing on the persona that he has created. However when she begins to probe Frank about his family history, he at first dodges the questions, his slickly trained character dancing like an animal evading capture but then as she hits his weak spot and confronts the lie that he has been portraying, Frank’s whole facade comes crushing down.

The way Cruise’s face immediately changes, the brutal snap that the image he has depicted is now being called into question is a masterful moment, one that is summed up wholly in his expression, the cocky smile is literally wiped from his face. Cruise’s juxtaposition is one of Magnolia’s greatest scenes, which says a lot for a film brimming with spectacle and revelations and it is all down to Cruise’s emotive nuances. The scene encapsulates the inner turmoil that Frank refuses to acknowledge and surrender to and the narrative plays with the connotations of Cruise himself as a ‘star’ and the baggage that comes with his persona. It is hard to think of someone who could have played the role better and it suggests that perhaps Cruise should continue to show us a different kind of money shot.

Al Pacino- The Godfather (1972)

I must confess that for me The Godfather films are not quite my bag, as a cinephile I can appreciate their craftsmanship and the legacy that they have had on cinema but I do not revere them like many film fans do. And yet there is one moment that stands out for me when I think of The Godfather and it is not the iconic horse’s head moment or the method mumblings of Brando. It is the scene where Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) kills Sollozzo in the restaurant and in particular the moment just before, when he is deciding what to do.

This part of the scene is the definitive narrative point for Michael’s character, it tells us what kind of man he was before and the type of man he is going to become. It tells us that everything that came before will be erased by this act and from then on there will no going back, this fork in the road will define the path he will take. And all of this is simply conveyed within Pacino’s eyes. As a train is heard hurtling over it’s tracks in the background, Michael’s eyes dart back and forth, weighing up the consequences of the action he is about to commit, you can feel his inner turmoil as he wrestles with his conscience. It is one of the purest moments of acting from Pacino that he is able to say so much with the mere expression of his face.

I didn’t grow up watching The Godfather films and came to them later in life so my experience of Pacino as an actor was during his shouty phase and the almost caricature version of himself that he has become in his latter day films. Witnessing this scene in The Godfather reveals why Pacino went on to be heralded as one of the greatest actors in the history of cinema and a timely reminder that there was pathos and subtlety to his craft that  sadly went awry later down the line.

Jean Seberg- A bout de Souffle (1960)

Jean Luc Godard’s Breathless is the movie equivalent of Rock n Roll; it’s vibrant, playful and doesn’t need to say a lot but instead its more how it makes you feel. It burst onto the screen in 1960 and played with the conventions of cinema, creating jump cuts, using natural lighting and unnatural sound, things that were not the norm and that were a world away from the ridged studio backdrop. Godard’s fast and loose style extended to his characters, they were drifters, rule breakers, society’s riff raff.

Jean -Paul Belmondo plays Michel, a petty thief who at once encapsulates the style of Bogart but in the same instance despises it, he is our anti-hero who is on the run after killing a cop and who hooks up with old flame Patricia (Jean Seberg) in Paris. The achingly cool pair spend the rest of the film wandering the Champs Elysees or sharing intimate moments in Patricia’s small apartment before she ultimately betrays him to the police. Michel is shot and he staggers the streets of Paris taking his last breaths, at first it appears Patricia regrets her decision as she chases after him and in any other Hollywood film this would be the moment where Seberg’s character would profess her love for Michel.

But the chance of some sort of redemption or regret for Patricia’s act is fleeting, she appears to shrug it off with Gallic nonchalance. As she stares down at Michel in his dying moments, there is no real sense of sadness in her eyes and you could argue that he does not deserve any sympathy, he is after all a womaniser, a thief and a cop killer. But Patricia’s look of indifference simply adds to Godard’s groundbreaking slice of cinema and became one of the most iconic moments of the French New Wave.  As Seberg looks directly at the camera and moves her finger across her lips, this unconventional ending heralded the birth of a new style of film-making that would influence many directors throughout the years and would create an unforgettable look whose ambiguity would linger in the consciousness.

Kathleen Byron- Black Narcissus (1947)

It goes without saying that Powell and Pressburger sure knew how to compose a shot and they sure knew the power that colour could have upon a scene, in particular the use of red. In their 1948 masterpiece The Red Shoes, the vivid colour was used to symbolise passion and the impending danger that would engulf Moira Shearer’s ballerina as she danced her way to death, torn between love and her love of dance.

In Black Narcissus the use of red lipstick signifies the desire and passion that overtakes nun Sister Ruth (Kathleen Byron) whose faith and sanity becomes tested when local British agent Mr Dean (David Farrar) arrives at the nun’s remote Himalayan convent. Though it is not just the use of red in one particular scene but the lead up to Sister Ruth’s application of the scarlet make up that produces a sinister and memorable look, her face is a dangerous melting pot for all that she is feeling.

As sister Clodagh (Deborah Kerr) does her nightly rounds, she sees a light in Sister Ruth’s room and enters, where she is met with a woman’s unwavering, self possessed determination. Sister Ruth has decided to leave the order and her face contorts with the greed and lust she is feeling, the time isolated away in the mountains has driven her mad and she takes on the demeanour of a villain. Her face is lit in a luminous glow however as a smile creeps up her entire face, it is a wicked grin of evil; she has become consumed by a sensual desire, one that will lead to terrifying consequences.

The scene is smouldering with tension from Sister Ruth’s face and by the time she applies the crimson colour to her lips, she has conveyed everything to the audience.  This act of defiance is the final element in her journey of no return; she has left the path of faith and is on course to self destruction, one that is not only written, but painted on her face.

Grace Kelly- Rear Window (1954)

Grace Kelly’s arrival in Alfred Hitchcock’s classic Rear Window (1954) is problematic for a number of reasons yet it also is one of the greatest introductions of a character to the screen. Hitchcock was well known for having a fascination for his blonde leading ladies and none more so than Grace Kelly, she was the epitome of the ice cool woman that he would become mesmerised by and for a time he couldn’t imagine needing another actress.

Her appearance in the film plays like a fantasy, her face lit in the most beautiful way, she envelopes the frame like a stunning mirage, in the way that Hitchcock would see her in his own mind but also for the character L B Jefferies (James Stewart). As Jefferies stirs from sleeping, Lisa (Kelly) appears as if he is still dreaming, she is like a vision, one that is unobtainable for him and for Hitchcock. As the narrative progresses Jefferies finds reasons why his romance with Lisa won’t work, that their lifestyles are too different and he feels that marriage will be like the cast that his broken leg is in, constricting on his nomadic way of life. By Jefferies reluctance to settle down with Lisa, she seems confined to be the fantasy girl and the glamorous way she enters the screen would suggest this.

But this is Hitchcock and whilst his proclivities may manifest onscreen, he was also unafraid to poke fun at himself and to play with the audience. So whilst Lisa may appear to be a fantasy, she also defies expectations and turns out to be more resourceful than Jefferies, and perhaps the audience, imagined. Her entrance into the film, as she looks straight at the camera, may carry connotations with it but it can also simply be seen as a moment of pure cinematic magic, Kelly’ s face epitomises the golden age of Hollywood, the glamour of the bygone era.

It is sometimes hard to study cinema and separate the implications with the act of purely enjoying a film and to enjoy the beauty of one of Hollywood’s most dazzlingly iconic women. It is also hard to not see that Hitchcock has us all pegged, that in a film about voyeurism, from a director that was known for his voyeurism, pointed out the voyeuristic nature in all of us. And that seeing Kelly’s face coming towards the camera would prove alluring to not just him or to Jefferies but to all of us.

Review- Fifty Shades Darker (James Foley)

Contains spoilers and quite a bit of ranting

It almost feels like a pointless exercise writing a review for a film that clearly is not meant to be aimed at the critics, that the point of the Fifty Shades series is to please the crowd of the excitable fans of the book and it is not trying to make a form of artistic statement. Yet it is also hard to ignore the need to expel your feelings when you have witnessed a film that has left you aghast at how awful it is.

Fifty Shades Darker, the second instalment in EL Jame’s bonkbuster trilogy, continues straight after the first film Fifty Shades of Grey, where Anastacia Steele (Dakota Johnson) has left the dashing/mental unstable (delete as appropriate to your preference) Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan).  Unable to understand and accept Christian’s sexual demands, Ana has forged a new life for herself, with a job at a publishing agency. Yet there is a sense of malaise to her daily life and when Christian shows up at her friends, somewhat creepy, art exhibition and buys every photograph emblazed with her image, she agrees to dinner with him. They rekindle their relationship but this time there will be no rules and no secrets between the two of them but Ana soon discovers that old habits die hard and the past has a way of resurfacing.

The film tries to shoehorn in a variety of subplots to add conflict , from a jilted ex submissive to the introduction of Christian’s Mrs Robinson, the woman who took his innocence and awakened his sexual preferences, yet nothing can disguise the fact that Fifty Shades Darker has no strong narrative, it simply meanders from one scene to another. The dialogue is excruciating and is delivered with no conviction or emotion and each sex scene is presented with a bombastic pop song to try to create some form of tension and fission but every one falls flat, undermined by the glaring omission of no form of chemistry between its leads.  And therein lies the rub as Fifty Shades is a film that needs more than anything a sense of attraction and heat between its central characters to make up for its narrative shortcomings yet it has nothing in its arsenal and even more damning is the lack of any positive qualities in this couple’s relationship for the audience to believe in.

Christian Grey is a terrible terrible character whose behaviour is irritating, alarming and appalling and should be a clear as day indicator that this man needs many years of therapy before embarking upon a serious relationship. Apart from being young, rich and looking like Jamie Dornan, Christian displays no warmth and appealing behaviour to warrant Ana’s devotion to him or her perseverance on helping him battle his demons. Meanwhile Anastacia Steele (it pains me to write her full name almost as much as it pains me to hear Christian say it) is constantly told by various characters and Christian himself that she is different to his previous female partners/his submissives, that she is an independent spirit who will not yield to his more intimidating methods. But this point is routinely thwarted by Christian’s and her consequent behaviour as every time she protests his actions, the next moment she (literally) bends to his will. Ana is also denied any function beyond her sexuality, her boss at the publishing agency, who at first appears to be genuinely interested in her literary opinions, soon turns out to be a lecherous creep in a plot device to also excuse Christian’s overzealous behaviour and when she takes over her boss’ role at the company, this is undermined by the fact that Christian is now in his words ‘her boss’ boss’ boss’.

Johnson and Dornan have shown promise elsewhere however in this tripe series of films, they are saddled with badly drawn characters whose actions are irritating and annoying and afford no chance for an acting range beyond wooden and whimpering. On second thoughts perhaps they do show some acting promise as how they manage to keep a straight face delivering the appalling dialogue is a feat of sheer tenacity.

There are those that may be reading this that say Fifty Shades is just fantasy and not to be taken seriously, that it is just titillation and I would agree that it is fantasy, that I would find more realism in a CGI crammed Marvel movie. But it is just a fantasy that I find repugnant and unnerving, not that a woman would subject herself to those bedroom antics, but would tolerate the actions out of the bedroom. And to my eyes there is no romance to be found in the films (or the books, well I gave up after the first) to justify Mr Grey’s demeanour. And beyond the fantasy, in the real world that I want to live in women want to smash the glass ceiling and not settle to live in the penthouse apartment.

Review- La La Land (Damien Chazelle)

 

We all know the score, its January, its cold and miserable, we are carrying post festivity pounds yet our wallets are feeling considerably lighter and to top it all off, we are still licking our wounds from the previous year’s constant assault of bad news, piling one brick after another in a Jenga onslaught that threatened to topple us. Oh and we have to prepare ourselves for the Trump presidency. So La La land has picked just the right time to come into our lives, Damien Chazelle’s modern day musical has come to whisk away the cobweb cynicism, to bring a sense of hope to proceedings and to bring Technicolor joy to the silver screen.

Emma Stone is Mia, a struggling actress in LA who is working as a waitress in a coffee shop on the Warner Bros studio lot, where she daydreams of a starring role and endures humiliation and rejection from one bad audition to another. Between her daily grind, she crosses paths with Sebastian (Ryan Gosling), a jaded jazz pianist who is trying to keep his beloved dying medium alive. At first its less a meet cute than mild annoyance with each other, however as they continue to run into each other, it seems to be fate, their mutual passions for performing gives them a kindred alliance and as the seasons change from winter to spring and through summer their love blossoms. Sebastian has plans for a jazz bar and with his coaxing, Mia decides to stage a one woman play to kick start her acting career, by writing a role for herself but it is their dreams that begin to divide them, their success (and lack of it) comes between them, a bitter pill must be swallowed and they have to follow their hearts and break them in the process.

From its opening gambit, a Fame style musical number amidst an LA traffic jam, you will know whether you will go along with La La Land’s ride, it’s an unashamed homage to the musicals of yesteryear and may not appeal to modern mainstream audiences who are not used to seeing their lead characters burst into song or break out into a freewheeling dance routine. However for those of us that do, will be charmed by its infectious spirit and optimistic energy, it lays its cards out on the table in brightly coloured verve and is an irresistible concoction of gusto performances and beautifully bittersweet storytelling. Both leads bring their game, throwing everything into their roles, Emma Stone uses her hugely expressive eyes to convey an emotional range as Mia, from wide eyed wonder to welling up as life hands her many blows, meanwhile Gosling brings his sardonic wit as Seb, his tendency for acting goofy guards his true feelings of falling hard for Mia and for losing sight of his true passion.  The decision to not pick actors who are known for singing and dancing proves to be La La Land’s ace in the hole, whilst Stone and Gosling learnt to sing and dance competently, it is their shortcomings that makes the film all the more endearing, the fragility in Stone’s voice makes her connection to the audience more resonant and Gosling is charismatic in a limited range. Both actors charm, particularly in an early song and dance routine, against the backdrop of the fading LA sun but also within the film’s more sombre moments, an argument over a romantic dinner, framed close up on their faces, is heartbreaking as reality hits home and their optimistic bubble is fractured. Director Damien Chazelle follows up the intense, almost claustrophobic feel of Whiplash with a film dripping with colour and virtuoso cinematography, the camera soars in the opening sequence and continues to impress with one take wonders and culminates in a stunning montage of a life less glimpsed.

La La Land has garnered an abundance of praise but there is also the inevitable backlash in the wings, almost alluded to by Stone’s Mia who, after showing her play to Seb says ‘I think it’s too nostalgic, people might not like it’. Seb simply replies ‘Fuck them’. Fuck them indeed, there will be the haters who say there is a reason they don’t make them like this anymore, but colour me smitten because I fell for it in all its glorious, (old) fashion. Like The Artist before it, it crystallises a moment in time, a moment of pure cinematic joy, one that is hard to repeat (and may not attain repeat viewings) but which doesn’t matter because you will never forget that blissful moment.