For It Is Man's Number: July 2024

Wednesday 3 July 2024

Prime Time: The Covenant (2023)

Guy Ritchie has had a decent run of movies in the past decade, helped by writers Ivan Atkinson and Marn Davies. He definitely needs Atkinson and Davies though, which makes it all the more odd to see The Covenant also listed as Guy Ritchie's The Covenant. Okay, Ritchie has a certain style, a sensibility that pervades most of his movies, letting you know that you're watching a Guy Ritchie film, but he can also work on certain projects that don't feel as if they have been given any stamp of authorship. This is one of those movies. It's good, sometimes very good, but it just doesn't feel as if it needs sold on Ritchie's name.

Jake Gyllenhaal is John Kinley, a soldier trying to stay alive during his time serving in Afghanistan. Having lost his interpreter in a bombing, Kinley ends up being assigned a new man, Ahmed (Dar Salim). Ahmed is viewed with mistrust by some, as are many of the interpreters in Afghanistan, but he repeatedly proves himself a valuable asset as he keeps Kinley and his team safe from a number of traps and tricky situations. In fact, Ahmed ends up saving Kinley's life on a daring mission that sees both men struggling to get back to safety while being hunted by Taliban soldiers who view them as top-priority targets. Can Kinley get a chance to return the favour, or will he be safely back in the USA while his interpreter/lifesaver ends up trapped in Afghanistan with a large price on his head.

A modern spin on a boy's own adventure film, although there's a worthwhile point being made about those who helped soldiers in Afghanistan before being left to languish there and suffer the consequences, this is a surprisingly effective and tense action thriller that does well to balance the issues at the heart of the whole thing with the visceral moments of fighting and gunfire. Ritchie works very well in service of the script, which ultimately helps to turn the film into something much better than it could have been. It’s a bit of a tightrope act, and kudos to him for walking it well.

Gyllenhaal is a big plus in the lead role, as expected. He can do well in a military role, being convincingly sharp and fearless, and he does well in showing the emotional toll that is taken as he figures out how to repay a huge debt. Salim is equally good alongside him, and his character is shown to be just as smart and fearless, arguably even more so, despite being initially viewed with suspicion. The supporting cast all hang back, for the most part, but there are decent little moments for Emily Beecham, Jonny Lee Miller, Antony Starr, and Alexander Ludwig.

You can view this with cynicism, especially if you feel that there’s a bit too much jingoism running just below the surface, but I think it avoids the worst potholes it could have stumbled into. Or maybe I should have used a minefield metaphor, if that isn’t in bad taste. Which I guess depends on your view of this being made in the first place.

7/10

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Tuesday 2 July 2024

Boy Kills World (2024)

It always happens. One great success leads to numerous imitators. That can lead to other successes, as has happened in recent years with a certain kind of action cinema. It can also lead to the occasional mid-step, at best. Boy Kills World is a mis-step, although it’s one that I know plenty of people enjoyed more than I did.

Bill Skarsgård plays our main character, a mute man who narrates his own life in an inner voice (H. Jon Benjamin) that he used to enjoy hearing in one of his favourite videogames. He is living in a strange dystopian world, one in which the rulers occasionally just pick people to kill/sacrifice, and his own loss drives him on a wild and bloody quest for revenge.

What you get here, when it works, is an enjoyably creative killing spree centering on a main character who is skilled and fortunate enough to deal with waves of disposable villains. The action is certainly fun and energetic, and everything is underlined by a streak of hunour that many will enjoy (although it didn’t work for me).

Director Mortiz Mohr, making his feature debut, feels like someone making a feature debut. This has a great idea at the heart of it, it’s trying to boil down a pure and simple action movie aesthetic into something even more pure and simple, but the end result is too messy, with a muddled plot, clumsy tonal movement, and characters that you don’t ever care about, even if Skarsgård has an innate likability to him.

The script, fully fleshed out by Arend Remmers and Tyler Burton Smith, is a mess. I never once believed the world depicted onscreen, and the attempt to add some twists and turns were altogether unsuccessful. Either keep things rooted in pure action madness or try to deliver plotting that people will care about. This moves between both, and that caused it to leave me unsatisfied with both aspects.

Skarsgård makes up for many failings though. His wide-eyed turn is very enjoyable, and he looks more than capable when in full-on rage fighting mode. That’s a good thing indeed, because almost everyone else here is wasted. Michelle Dockery, Sharlto Copley, Brett Gelman, Famke Janssen, all wasted. It should be a crime to waste Janssen this badly. Jessica Rothe is also wasted, as is the fantastic Yayan Ruhian, although he gets a few good moments throughout, and it’s at least good to see him in a fairly central role.

I really wanted to enjoy this. I expected to enjoy it. While I didn’t hate it, I was surprised by how poor it was. Is it worth a watch one evening when you want some bloody entertainment to accompany snacks and drinks? Yes. Is it worth a rewatch at any point, and will it stay long in your memory once you go on to many of the other action movies from the past few years? Absolutely not.

4/10

Monday 1 July 2024

Mubi Monday: The Delinquents (2023)

A good heist movie is usuaully something that I can easily enjoy. The Delinquents is a good "heist" movie, and it succeeds by focusing on the consequences of robbery, allowing the job to be the focus of the film without it actually being the focus of the film. Does that make any sense? I hope so, but any confusion you feel now may be on a par with some confusion you could feel at the end of this movie. That's not a bad thing. I'm just highlighting how things play out in the film.

Daniel Elías plays Morán, a bank employee who sees an opportunity to steal hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash. He doesn't want to be a millionaire. He just wants to give himself the opportunity of a better life. He's done the maths, and he knows that the money will amount to whatever he would have earned if he stayed working for the bank. His plan is to hide the money and then confess to the crime, to be arrested and serve his time in prison while, hopefully, a good friend, Román (Esteban Bigliardi) helps to keep the money hidden until it will be split between the two men upon Morán's release.

Written and directed by Rodrigo Moreno, The Delinquents is a clever and entertaining exploration of morality, relativity, and the value of friendship. The main character doesn't seem unreasonable, whether you agree with his approach or not, and the central premise is really just a way to show someone attempting to use the system, and society's rules, in an impressively unorthodox way. It's a thought-provoking work, whether you're thinking about Morán's position, Román's position, or the emotions of other characters caught up in the whole mess (including a Norma, Morna, and Ramón).

Elías is very good in one of the main roles, although he's justifiably sidelined once he fully sets his plan in motion. He still gets plenty to do though, whether it's time enjoying his freedom before he hands himself in to the authorities or navigating the new rules and bartering system of prison life. Bigliardi is equally good, and he plays his character with enough subtlety and nuance to make it hard to predict exactly what he will end up doing at any given moment. He may be a very good friend, but he's suddenly been entrusted with a very large amount of money. Margarita Molfino also deserves praise for her performance as Norma, a standout from the selection of supporting characters all given names that are anagrams of our leads, and she provides an important point of a triangle that ultimately turns into itself and expands into something much more complicated and intriguing.

There are issues here, but viewers can decide whether or not they are problematic enough to spoil their viewing experience. The "heist" itself isn't a big deal. It doesn't require a load of planning or specialised skills. It's essentially a snatch job, the real skill being the plan for the aftermath. There's also a lengthy runtime over three hours. It didn't feel overlong to me, but some will definitely have their patience tested. Then there's the ending, one that allows for a variety of interpretations. For as much as I liked the approach to the material, satisfaction is far from guaranteed.

I really liked this, and I'd be very keen to watch it again and see how I might view certain scenes differently. I recommend it heartily to other film fans, but with a fair warning about the runtime and the open-ended structure of the whole thing.

8/10