Mubi Monday: Bird (2024)

I've seen all but one of the shorts and features directed by Andrea Arnold, although she has yet to helm anything better than her bleak and brutal feature debut, Red Road. There's never a guarantee that I will enjoy her work, but I am always hoping for something else that will blow me away. Maybe that's just the effect of those childhood years when I had a crush on her roller-skating persona of Dawn Lodge on the children's TV programme called No. 73.

Bird is a good film, anchored by a flawless performance from young newcomer Nykika Adams, but it's also one that has forced me to consider what exactly Arnold wants people to take from her films, and what exactly her motivation is. Because Arnold seems to write and direct characters that she doesn't fully understand.

Bailey (Adams) is not having the best time. Her father, Bug (Barry Keoghan), is too busy trying to plan his upcoming marriage to Kayleigh (Frankie Box). Her mother (Peyton, played by Jasmine Jobson) has ended up in a relationship with the violent Skate (James Nelson-Joyce). Bailey doesn't seem able to control anything around her, even her older brother (Hunter, played by another newcomer, Jason Buda) has a change in his circumstances that may grow the distance between them, but she might end up being able to help a man she encounters who says his name is Bird (Franz Rogowski). Bird is looking for his childhood home, hoping to find out some information about his mother and father.

Before I say anything critical here, I think it's important to praise those in front of the camera who deserve praise. Adams is the star, and she surely has a great career ahead of her, but both Keoghan and Rogowski are actors who rarely put a foot wrong, both doing more good work here, while Jobson, Box, Nelson-Joyce, and Buda all do exceedingly well to even just hold their own alongside such talented performers. There's nobody here I can complain about, which helps to make up for the strange and weak script from Arnold, who I'm not sure understands her own characters in the way that she should.

Bailey is great, and her character and actions seem nicely consistent with who we learn she is, at her core, as the film unfolds. I'd also say that Kayleigh is just as good, and perhaps this shows Arnold having a natural instinct towards writing her female characters so much better than the males. Peyton is a bit confused, but she still feels like someone who is a natural part of the world we're being shown. The men, on the other hand, all have big problems. Bug has some daydream about using slime from a toad to make enough money to pay for his upcoming marriage, which is a plot point apparently dropped in favour of a third act that just expects everyone to stop being invested in the outcome, and he's also interested in impressing his bride with the kind of song and dance number that feels absolutely pulled from some other movie. Maybe I have just never met enough people like Bug, but I've met a few in my lifetime, and none of the men cut from that particular cloth would even think of trying out the singing and the moves that Keoghan's character works on. Bird isn't as bad, helped by Rogowski being an even better fit for his role, but he's also the typical quirky interloper who brings about some education and change in the life of our lead. He feels quirky for the sake of being quirky, and I'd once again say that the central friendship between Bailey and Bird wouldn't be allowed to last longer than an afternoon once people around her saw the age difference and started to ask questions. As for Skate, he's a panto villain from his very first scene. He's believable though, scarily so, but his placement within the film doesn't really deliver the satisfying journey for anyone that Arnold must have been aiming for.

There are moments here that impress, and I enjoyed one turn in the third act that many others may find completely off-putting, but they never feel part of a satisfyingly cohesive work. Perhaps Arnold would have been better taking various characters and strands to weave into an anthology format, or perhaps spread everything over the kind of runtime afforded by a limited series. She opted to helm another feature film though, and it's her most disappointing work since her adaptation of Wuthering Heights.

6/10

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Mubi Monday: Wuthering Heights (2011)

I have some issues with the tale of Wuthering Heights, that classic moors-set tale of love and psychological torture written by Emily Brontë. My biggest problem with it is that I sometimes confuse it with the superior Jane Eyre, the great gothic romance written by Charlotte Brontë. I know, I know, entirely my fault, but I can't ever just let go of the fact that this is the weaker of the dark works from any of the Brontë sisters, despite it giving us a bloody great Kate Bush song.

There have been many TV and film adaptations of the tale, and this time around it is the turn of Andrea Arnold, who directed and reworked the material with Olivia Hetreed. It got some awards, some critical acclaim, and probably doesn't stand out to anyone as an embarrassment to her filmography. Unfortunately, I really didn't like it.

We first meet Heathcliff and Cathy as youngsters, played by Solomon Glave and Shannon Beer, respectively. It is then up to James Howson and Kaya Scodelario to portray them in adulthood. There are other people involved in the plot, but it's all about Heathcliff and Cathy. The main twist given to the material here is that Heathcliff is played by a black actor (close to the source material, but separates it from many other adaptations), and he is allowed to use the word "cunt".

Perhaps I wanted something more traditionally cinematic, or perhaps I felt that the new twists on the material felt disappointingly like someone desperate to shock viewers (I'm on about the language and one or two sexual scenes here, not the casting). Maybe I am just sick to the back teeth of films that shove the realism in your face by having far too many scenes of characters getting their fingers caked in mud, delivering ugly and irritating camerawork, and, of course, having the soundtrack feature a lot of heavy breathing. Because nothing says "critically-adored cinema verité" like murky cinematography and a lot of breathing sounds.

The leads don't do a bad job in their roles, considering what they're given to work with, but they're hampered by the script and shooting style. Howson, who was not acting before this (and has done nothing since), is admirably confident throughout scenes of growing intensity, and Scodelario makes an appealing Cathy, with both leads certainly selling chemistry between them as they take turns to treat one another with love and apparent loathing.

I am sure a lot of people will love this. My own reaction to it is simply based on the fact that I know showing some bleak, ugly scenery doesn't mean your film has to necessarily be bleak and ugly throughout. Arnold made a stylistic choice, and it's one I disliked intensely. Add the "try hard" elements to that, and this just really wasn't for me. The strength of the source material still manages to barge through at times though, so there's that.

3/10

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