Netflix And Chill: A House Of Dynamite (2025)

Whatever I end up thinking of them, a new Kathryn Bigelow film is always something I look forward to watching. She tends to make films that refuse to provide easy answers for people. She tends to make films specifically for adult viewers. A House Of Dynamite is very much of a piece with the rest of her filmography.

The plot is quite simple. People in the White House Situation Room are soon made aware of a very worrying situation. There's apparently an ICBM heading towards the USA, due to hit Chicago in about 20 minutes. After figuring out whether it's real or not, everyone is out on high alert as they come up with various scenarios, and maybe even one or two ways to take the missile out of action. The main people involved in some frantic conversations are a duty officer, Captain Olivia Walker (Rebecca Ferguson), the Secretary of Defense (Jared Harris), a Deputy National Security Advisor (Gabriel Basso), General Anthony Brady (Tracy Letts), and, of course, the President (hidden away for most of the film, but most will be able to recognise the voice before seeing him appear onscreen).

While he was a number of other screenplays under his belt, this is a marked step up in quality for writer Noah Oppenheim, who feels as if he has recently found his sweet spot with fictions based on many real scenarios he would have been very aware of during his tenure as president of NBC News. Teaming up with Bigelow, who has excelled in recent years with films that often feel like docu-fiction, but without ever losing that movie magic, is a win win for both.

It's hard to pick any individual highlights from the fantastic cast assembled here, but the final scene for Jared Harris certainly underlines his emotional turmoil as things look to go from bad to worse. Ferguson is great, as ever, and Letts is superb, seeming to relish the structure of the whole thing (we watch things play out, then jump back about 20 minutes to watch them from another POV, and then jump back again to follow someone else, learning a bit more each time while the missile continues to fly through the air). Basso is fine as the younger man trying to convince everyone to let cooler heads prevail, and there is room for many familiar faces throughout the supporting cast, including Anthony Ramos, Moses Ingram, Greta Lee, Jason Clarke, Willa Fitzgerald, and Kaitlyn Deaver, not to mention the star who plays POTUS.

It may not be as good as her last feature, the phenomenal Detroit, and there will be many who dislike the ending (one designed to keep you discussing the film for some time after it has finished), but this shows Bigelow handling busy and dark material with her usual steady hand and mastery. Whether or not you want to make it a priority on your viewing schedule just depends on whether or not you're in the mood for a drama that looks at what would happen if someone decided to launch a surprise attack on the USA. Considering the recent news cycle, it's hard to decide on just how far-fetched that idea is nowadays. 

8/10

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The Great Gatsby (2013)

It feels like a lose-lose situation when it comes to adapting The Great Gatsby into film form. Often in the conversation when people are considering the “great American novel”, it’s a fantastic tale that means many different things to many different people. I have read it, amazingly enough, and what I remembered most about it was the feeling of ennui and boredom that seems to cover the central characters like an umbrella, underlining the idea that money can’t buy happiness. There’s also a commentary on permitted behaviours in different social classes, and the fluidity of Gatsby’s personal history, a story people keep gossiping about, feels very much about the bemusement of those who have always had money and wealth reacting to someone new to their particularly privileged strata.

While the story is interesting, it’s also one that superficially appears to be one long sequence of parties that go on for a bit too long. Thinking back on The Great Gatsby, I think of those parties. I think of a feeling of haziness, that moment in between pure joy and paranoia, when the time seems too early to leave but you already know you have stayed up too late. You’re going to be in trouble the next day, but that doesn’t matter right now. Right now is all about the music and dancing and good company.

So who better to convey that feeling than Baz Luhrmann, the master of the numerous loud and brash cinematic equivalents of a party megamix? 

Leonardo DiCaprio is Gatsby, the enigmatic figure who changes the life of Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire). Their relationship is the heart of the film, although Gatsby has a yearning for Daisy Buchanan (Carey Mulligan), who is already married to the rich, but unrefined, Tom Buchanan (Joel Edgerton), and tension builds between all four characters as the story hurtles towards a finale that may change the lives of everyone forever. Or may prove merely a small bump in the road for those who can speed away from their problems in a fancy sports car.

Adapting F. Scott Fitzgerald’s work for the big screen, writer Craig Pearce and Luhrmann (who have collaborated on almost every other film that Luhrmann has directed) allow themselves plenty of time to unsurprisingly lead viewers into a world of indulgence and excess. That really is Luhrmann’s M.O. A lot of The Great Gatsby is as stylish and beautiful as you would expect from a film set in the 1920s, but Pearce and Luhrmann both do a great job of letting viewers sense something unpleasant beneath the polished veneer. It’s a grand hotel suite, full of flowers and pleasant scents, but one with a decomposing body hidden under the floorboards.

Maguire and DiCaprio are perfectly cast, with the former acting wide-eyes and easily manipulated by those around him while the latter simply embodies what you think absolute charm and charisma wrapped immaculate clothing should look like. Mulligan and Edgerton aren’t as natural a fit in their roles, but both do well, and it’s always believable enough when Mulligan plays someone beloved by those around her (she has had amazing screen presence in every single role of her career). Jason Clarke and Isla Fisher do decent work in their roles, but the real star amongst the supporting cast is Elizabeth Debicki, who I wanted to see much more of. Debicki feels the most at ease in the trappings of the time period, and her character sits nicely in between the extremes of the other personalities in her circle of friends.

I haven’t seen any of the other film versions of The Great Gatsby (I THINK there are about 4 or 5), but it’s hard to imagine them rivalling this. As usual, Luhrmann creates a complete audio and visual blend that both bombards and immerses viewers. He directs his movies like he’s presenting a magic show, plenty of misdirection and distraction delivering straightforward fun in between the moments that show what he was really up to all along.

This may not be one of THE great American films, but it’s a damn fine adaptation of the source material. And it’s a damn fine film. I recommend it to everyone. If you don’t enjoy it then all I can do is apologise, old sport.

Note - I HIGHLY recommend seeing this in 3D if you can. I have the 3D Blu-ray and it was even more brilliant and bedazzling than expected. Although, knowing Luhrmann, I should have known he would have a blast with that format.

8/10

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Noir-vember: Serenity (2019)

Serenity is, in a way, kind of wonderful. It's terrible, and I really can't think of anything I've seen with worse plotting that hasn't been buried in the recesses of the darker pockets of the internet, but it's the kind of terrible that makes you wonder why nobody took people aside at any stage in the film-making process and said "look, this isn't working, we need to start over".

Matthew McConaughey is Baker Dill, a fishing boat captain who enjoys a fairly tranquil life on a small island. He's obsessed with catching a large yellowfin tuna, which he names "Justice", and sometimes even moves paying customers out of his way when the fish comes within catching distance. Things take a turn for the worse when Baker's ex-wife, Karen (Anne Hathaway), approaches him with an offer. She wants him to kill her abusive new husband (Jason Clarke), an act that would improve the life of both her and their son.

Written and directed by Steven Knight, who previously surprised me by making a film about a man driving his car and planning a major concrete transporting job (Locke), this reflects poorly on him, and also everyone involved with it. The script is a mess, with the best moments coming from the scenes that provide unintended laughs, and the direction complements it perfectly. Knight doesn't settle on any style. If you want something dark and shady to match the mystery at the heart of things then you're going to be disappointed. Similarly, anyone hoping to at least get a hot and sweat-soaked thriller reminiscent of Body Heat and The Mean Season will also end up disappointed. In fact, it's hard not to think of anyone who won't be disappointed by this.

The cast at least look as if they're having fun, for the most part. Hathaway is the one with the least to do, despite how she sets the chain of events in motion, and suffers from a script not savvy enough to either drag her down to a sleazier level or keep her above it all. McConaughey is enjoyably over the top, more invested in catching one big sea creature than anyone else I can think of (aside from Ahab or Quint, obviously). Clarke's character is so awful that it's fun to watch him swagger about onscreen and act oblivious to the immediate dislike that others have for him. Djimon Hounsou works well in a supporting role, he's the first mate to McConaughey's character, but the same cannot be said of Jeremy Strong or Diane Lane, who is completely wasted in the couple of scenes that she has.

There may well be individual aspects of this movie that some people end up enjoying. Maybe you like the standard noir idea at the heart of the plot. Maybe you just like McConaughey and/or Hathaway. Maybe you like seeing footage of people on a boat as they wait for a fish to take some bait. Whatever you find to enjoy here, I defy you to hold on to that enjoyment as everything gets sillier and sillier in the second half, leading to a finale that it's pretty much impossible to care about.

I have spent a lot of time since watching this movie trying to think up ways of how I could have turned it into something worse. I am so far drawing a blank.

3/10

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Pet Sematary (2019)

You probably already know all about Pet Sematary. You may have already seen this movie. Or you saw the trailer, that gave away one big twist that the film used to distance itself from the 1989 original. Or you saw the 1989 original (lots of people view that one with fondness). Or maybe, just maybe, you read the book before any of the movies appeared. I was in a peak Stephen King period at that point in my life, devouring many of his works, and read it as soon as I could. I was old enough to enjoy it and still young enough to somehow miss the obvious fact that it was the ultimate way for King to rework one of his favourite ever tales, "The Monkey's Paw".

Jason Clarke and Amy Seimetz are Louis and Rachel, a married couple with two children, Ellie (Jeté Laurence) and Gage (played by twins Hugo and Lucas Lavoie). They have just moved in to a new home, somewhere that seems potentially idyllic for them. If it wasn't for that road nearby that sometimes has large trucks hurtling down it. There's a friendly neighbour (Jud, played by John Lithgow), at least, and he is the one with some extra information when they discover that somewhere on their land is the titular "pet sematary". Tragedy strikes. The nearby ground has powers. Sometimes dead is better. All of those three things will converge in the second half of the film.

It's a shame that Matt Greenberg helped to write the screenplay for 1408, one of the better Stephen King adaptations in the last fifteen years. A shame because that may lead you to believe that his work here, fleshed out by Jeff Buhler, will be good. It's really not. In fact, it's ridiculously lazy in places. Whether making changes to the source material that don't seem to be for the better or failing to shake off the spectre of the original film, Pet Sematary shambles from one bad decision to the next. It's telling to say that some of the better moments here feel so enjoyable because they could easily have come from any late '80s/early 90s Stephen King movie adaptation.

The casting is the best thing here. And that's working around the fact that the lead actor is Jason Clarke, a man who surely owes his career to being occasionally confused for Joel Edgerton by harried casting agents. I've seen him do decent work onscreen but he's rarely the best choice for any lead role, and doesn't have much charisma that you expect to find in most leading men. Fortunately, Seimetz is much better, and you have Lithgow doing the best he can to put his own spin on the character of Jud (no small feat when you remember how great Fred Gwynne was in the original). The children are also very good, with Laurence given more opportunity to shine than either of the Lavoie twins. And kudos to the cats involved (oh, animal lovers be warned, the death of a cat is the real turning point in the plot).

Directors Kevin Kölsch and Dennis Widmyer have done some great work together. Starry Eyes remains a film I will happily recommend to any horror fans after something different. Seeing them churn out something so ill-judged and poor is slightly depressing. It made a profit, although I am not sure if it was a good enough profit to please those who keep count or just enough to ensure people kept their jobs, so I am sure that they will get more work after this. I just hope they go back to doing something of their own creation.

The original novel or the 1989 movie, take your pick. Both of those options are much better than sitting through this. And I couldn't even be bothered to mention the new incarnation of Zelda (played this time by Alyssa Brooke Levine), all too familiar to fans of the original, but also with another pointless change that adds nothing to this empty experience.

3/10

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Winchester (2018)

The more I have thought about Predestination, the more I can overlook the flaws. It's an interesting film that is easy to forgive mistakes in because of the story it is trying to tell. I mention it now because in my review, written after my first viewing, I claimed that it was the weakest film from the Spierig brothers. That may still be the case, but that doesn't mean it's a terrible film, by any means. Actually, I should say that it WAS the weakest directed by the Spierig brothers. That title has now been taken by Winchester, and taken fairly easily.

This horror movie is all about the famous Winchester mansion, a sprawling home that was always being developed and enlarged at the request of troubled owner, Sarah Winchester (Helen Mirren). Mrs Winchester was the widow of the man who manufactured the Winchester rifle. Believing herself to be cursed by the spirits of the many people who died at the hands of that gun, Mrs Winchester would come up with bizarre ways to confuse spirits (stairs that lead nowhere, decoy rooms, doors and windows in odd places, etc) and this film explores the house, and her character, by depicting a visit from a doctor (played by Jason Clarke) who is to determine the mental state of the widow.

There's a great story to be told about Sarah Winchester, her life, and the mansion that she wanted to keep adding more and more rooms and features to, and I encourage everyone to check out the wonderful Sarah Winchester, Phantom Opera, a short film from 2016 that mixes the story with ballet in an effective and beautiful way. This film, sadly, feels like it doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of things.

The script, written by the directors and Tom Vaughan, is decidedly . . . limp for most of the runtime, with uninteresting character moments punctuated by well-signposted and ineffective jump scares. That would be easier to overlook if the brothers were once again working with their usual cool visual style, but even that side of things proves to be disappointing. Everything is competent, which saves the film from being unwatchable, but flat and unimaginative. In fact, it's the combination of the weak script and surprisingly weak and uninspired direction that undermines the handful of decent moments you get throughout.

Cast-wise, Helen Mirren is fine in the lead role, Clarke is adequate, and Sarah Snook (playing the niece of Sarah, named Marion MArriott) does okay, I suppose, but every single member of the cast is ill-served by that script, a creation that seems to have been dashed together with no real care or thought given as to how the story could be made more interesting and more focused without having to lead viewers to a cliche-ridden and preposterous finale.

As a horror movie fan, I know not to put too much stock into the words "based on actual events". I know that it's a licence to scare people even more, allowing them to think that something really happened when the only grain of truth in a film might be, for example, that the family living in some supposedly haunted house did once have a milkman named Terry, but it's frustrating when a story as good as this one is mishandled so badly.

4/10

You can buy Winchester here.
Americans can get it here.

Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes (2014)

The continuation of the franchise that was superbly rebooted with Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes, this is that rare thing indeed - a Hollywood movie sequel that stands toe to toe with the preceding movie. It is, no pun intended, a slightly different beast, yet it still mixes the same smarts and eye candy that the film before it had in abundance.

About ten years have passed since the events of Rise, and that decade has seen many humans die out from a nasty virus while the apes have grouped together and developed their societal structure to best keep themselves safe in their brave new world. Caesar (Andy Serkis) is still the leader, which is all well and good until the camp is unwittingly trespassed upon by a group of human survivors on a recon mission from a nearby base. Led by Malcolm (Jason Clarke), the humans are hoping to fix a power system that resides within a large dam. Unfortunately, that large dam resides within the territory of the apes. Malcolm determines to show that humans can be trusted, once he gets over the initial shock of meeting these intelligent apes, and this leads to a fragile truce. Koba (Toby Kebbell) sees the truce as a sign of weakness on the part of Caesar, and hatches his own plan to ensure that apes are kept safe from humans.

Matt Reeves has taken over the directorial duties for this instalment, and he's quick to show that the franchise is in safe hands. An opening sequence, showing the spread of the virus that appeared at the end of the previous movie, gets everyone up to speed before things settle down as we get to see the heirarchy and day to day workings of the ape community. This also allows everyone to adjust to the amount of CGI onscreen, which I have to say feels quite flawless for about 95% of the time. There are wobbly moments here and there, but the computer-generated characters and visuals on display here rank up with the best that I've seen. Reeves complements the CGI work with smooth, and sometimes vertiginous, camerawork, perfect pacing and a nice sense of restraint.

A lot of the good work starts with the script, by Mark Bomback, Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver, which takes time to show main characters and dynamics, translating a lot of the ape communication that is in the form of sign language (which means, impressively, that this is a mainstream blockbuster that also forces people to read during quite a few scenes). Every step is taken to ensure that there's a touch of realism at the heart of everything.

Serkis and Kebbell may not be visible onscreen in human guise, but it's their work that should be praised above anyone else. The two men give fantastic physical performances that make their lead characters just as real as anyone else onscreen. Clarke does a great job as the good man who may win Caesar's trust, and he's ably supported by Keri Russell and Kodi Smit-Mcphee. Let's not forget the fact that they were probably acting out most of their scenes alongside actors in motion-capture suits, or even just props that allowed them to maintain eyelines, so the full integration of CGI and non-CGI characters here is testament to the hard work from everyone involved. Judy Greer, Nick Thurston and Karin Konoval also get to monkey around, while Gary Oldman is the other notable human performer (and he's as good as ever).

Smart, touching, often tense, this is a real treat. There are one or two mis-steps, including a disposable human character who may as well just have "stubborn ass" tattooed on his forehead, but if the next movie maintains this level of quality then we may just end up with the greatest ape-centric movie trilogy of all time. Not that there's much competition, mind you, but it will still be a great achievement.

8/10

http://www.amazon.com/Dawn-Planet-Apes-Blu-ray-Oldman/dp/B00MH8DU9Q/ref=sr_1_2?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1418937298&sr=1-2&keywords=dawn+of+the+planet+of+the+apes

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