For It Is Man's Number: jessie buckley

Showing posts with label jessie buckley. Show all posts

Tuesday, 14 April 2026

The Bride! (2026)

On the one hand, kudos to Maggie Gyllenhaal for taking such a bold approach to what you could arguably classify as the full-bodied legacy of Mary Shelley. On the other hand, maybe she should have taken some more time to ensure that her bold approach and mix of ideas could be bundled up into something that would work as a satisfying and cohesive movie experience. This absolutely fails, and the bigger failings help to obscure any of the more praiseworthy elements.

Christian Bale plays Frank (the monster, having taken the name of his creator). He walks into the workplace of Dr. Euphronious (Annette Bening) and asks for her help in creating a companion. He's desperately lonely, and so unique that only another creation similar to himself will offer him any hope of a relationship. Enter the corpse of Ida (Jessie Buckley), a woman who ended up being shot by horrible gangsters mere moments after she was possessed by the spirit of Mary Shelley (also portrayed by Buckley). While struggling to figure out whether or not they can have any kind of proper relationship, especially when trying to accept how it has all begun, Ida and Frank quickly become a notorious pairing, for their unique look and their behaviour. Seemingly unable to stop calling attention to themselves, although often due to calling out the behaviour of others, Frank and The Bride soon find themselves pursued by strangers, determined police, and some gangsters who are very surprised to see that Ida has somehow not stayed dead.

While a very divisive movie, I know there are some people out there who have really liked this. I don't know many of them, but I know one or two. So it works for some people. And I can see some of the appeal. It's very admirably bonkers, almost punk in the way that it makes use of some famous genre archetypes to crash through some other archetypes, all while commenting on misogyny and the constantly overlooked misbehaviour of men. Just typing out that sentence has made me wonder if I am about to be too harsh on the thing. But, alas, no. The ingredients aren't mixed together well enough, and the social commentary is picked up and dropped so casually that it may as well be a toy discarded by an over-stimulated child.

I guess that some of the visuals work, and the cast is full of considerable talent and/or people that Gyllenhaal knows well enough to get on board, but the overriding feeling is that this is a feature barely shaped into a tolerable form by someone seriously overreaching.

Some people appreciate the performance from Buckley, especially when considering the variety of personas that she ends up portraying, but I thought it was never nailed down. Perhaps that is the fault of the screenplay and direction, but Buckley certainly suffers most from the material given to the leads. Bale is okay, if a bit disappointingly low-key. The most interesting main character is actually portrayed by Bening, which makes it all the more frustrating when she is so underused. Jake Gyllenhaal brightens things up a bit with his role, playing a movie star from the era, but I cannot say the same for either Peter Sarsgaard or Penélope Cruz, who are disappointingly weighed down by the fact that their characters are more avatars carrying around some of the central themes than proper characters.

Some may love this, and I am glad that the movie exists for them. I suspect that most will dislike it though, and many will absolutely hate it. I find myself closer to that last grouping, and it's only the ambition and confidence of Gyllenhaal, however it was improperly channelled, that has me rating this just a bit higher than I otherwise would.

4/10

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Thursday, 26 February 2026

Hamnet (2025)

For all of the praise heaped upon it, and all of the love it has already received, I found myself not enjoying Hamnet, for the most part. I was impressed by the lead performances, both Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal are excellent, but I wasn't particularly invested in it, or moved by the painful core of it. Or so I thought. Then something happened near the very end of the film and I was in tears, the entire essence of the film unfurling in front of me like some flower coming into bloom. I don't know if others will feel the same way, but I encourage you all to have patience with this until the very end.

Buckley plays Agnes, a woman who weds a certain William Shakespeare (Mescal). After an intense and secretive start to their relationship, things must progress quickly when Agnes becomes pregnant. Agnes is eventually left for periods of time to look after their children while Shakespeare spends time in London seeing if he can make any kind of living from this writing lark. Not present for the death of his son, Shakespeare seems unable to console and support his wife, and she's not even sure how impacted he is by the event. But it turns out that he is devastated, and tries to convey his emotions in a play that explores grief and family, and also happens to be one of the best ever written.

Based on the novel by Maggie O'Farrell, who helped to adapt it into screenplay form with director Chloé Zhao, Hamnet is a decent enough film, for the most part, until it sneaks up to you and delivers a one-two gut punch in the third act. Hearing very familiar quotes completely reframed by new context that the story focuses on makes everything feel more emotional and resonant, and the destination makes the uneven journey completely worthwhile. I still wouldn't consider this quite as praiseworthy as many others would, but it's certainly worth watching at least once.

Mescal and Buckley are both as good as you'd expect, the latter being recognised for her performance with a number of awards already. The character isn't a million miles away from others that she tends to play though, but she's consistently great, particularly when it comes to the moments that require her to be wracked with real heartache. Mescal has to work around a couple of moments that deliver "Shakespeare 101" soundbites, but certainly looks and feels absolutely right playing such a literary icon. Emily Watson and David Wilmot both excel as the senior Shakespeares, with Watson becoming warmer and more considerate as she accepts her son becoming his own man, and Joe Alwyn is welcome in his small role, playing Bartholomew (brother of Agnes). All of the younger cast members also do well, although the focus is on Jacobi Jupe in the titular role.

Very good, but not great, yet it has one truly memorable moment that moved me more than anything else I have watched in the past year. I could see other people sneering at it though, which would leave the film with very little else to offer them. I have to figure out if that one moment is enough to elevate the entire film, but I don't think it is. The feature is decidedly okay, if a bit overlong and lacking any decent flow, so it all averages out to still being very good. And still being not great.

7/10

Sunday, 4 August 2024

Netflix And Chill: Wicked Little Letters (2023)

Based on a true story, one that scandalised at least parts of the UK, Wicked Little Letters is all about, well, exactly what the title says. It's the 1920s, and people in the Littlehampton start to receive anonymous letters full of choice insults and hatred. Edith Swan (Olivia Colman) is the pious spinster who seems to be targeted by these letters, which makes her foul-mouthed neighbour, Rose Gooding (Jessie Buckley), the number one suspect. The police believe they have their criminal, although one officer (WPC Gladys Moss, played by Anjana Vasan) thinks there may be cause to look elsewhere.

Having been documented in the press of the time, and subsequently in a couple of books on the subject, writer Jonny Sweet has a good central premise to work with. I don't know how close to the truth this gets, it may be as far removed from it as we are from the moon, but there are many moments that certainly play out as you can imagine, reflecting prejudices and behaviours as sadly prevalent today as they were decades ago.

Director Thea Sharrock knows the value of her talent pool, in both the writing and the cast, and everyone involved knows the value of some cracking swear-words sprinkled liberally throughout every scene. I am not saying that swearing is big or clever, but it can be bloody funny, especially when the words are being uttered by people seemingly unable to comprehend the flavour of the language being used.

Both Colman and Buckley are very good, as you would expect. The former gets to act very still and oppressed for the majority of the runtime, the latter is an enviable free spirit looking to enjoy a new life that should make things more comfortable for her daughter (played by the very talented Alisha Weir). Vasan is on par with the two leads, her expressions often showing her true reactions to the prejudice she has to deal with on a daily basis. There are also wonderful performances from Timothy Spall (being entertainingly loathsome), Hugh Skinner and Paul Chahidi (as unimaginative members of the police force), and Eileen Atkins, Lolly Adefope, and Joanna Scanlan, playing women who also want to help uncover the true identity of the letter-writer. Malachi Kirby also does well, and has some surprisingly sweet moments amidst the rudeness, and viewers will spot familiar faces such as Gemma Jones, Tim Key, and Jason Watkins joining in with the profane fun.

While it is all about letters filled with rude words, this is a film also all about the danger of jumping to conclusions, and just how easily someone can use their position in society to demonize and ostracize someone they view as being a lesser member of the community. It shows how little it takes to turn people against others, while using some truth, some half-truths, and a whole lot of lies. Sound familiar? Because it does to me, especially during a time when the UK has seen such rioting and disruption caused by almost the exact same tactics. Wicked little social media posts, you might say.

8/10

Friday, 3 March 2023

Women Talking (2022)

Written and directed by Sarah Polley, based on a book by Miriam Toews that was based on a real-life incident, Women Talking is the heavy-hitting Best Picture nominee that I was least looking forward to watching. It felt like the subject matter would be too grim, and the presentation of the premise (summed up by the title, it is essentially just women talking for most of the runtime) didn’t cry out to me as something cinematic. But I have been wrong before, and I suspected that Women Talking would be worth the time and emotional investment, even if it wouldn’t be high up on my “best films of 2022” list.

I may have to wait until I one day muster the strength to revisit this, but the obvious “surprise” that I should reveal now is that Women Talking WOULD actually end up on my “best films of 2022” list. It’s an incredible and impressive work, and easily the best directorial work yet from Polley.

I should provide a bit more information about the plot. The setting is a small, isolated, religious community. The women in that community are horrified when it is revealed that many of them have been drugged and raped by the men. They have to gather together to discuss their options. They can stay and do nothing, stay and fight, or leave. And they only have limited time to decide, while the men of the community are away to help the rapists avoid any serious repercussions. The rest of the film shows the women debating two of the three choices, whether to stay or leave, and they are helped in their debate and discussion by one man who is still trustworthy and supportive.

Although showing a horrific situation specific to a certain setting, Women Talking uses the premise to inevitably show the difficulties that face any woman stuck in an abusive situation. The variety of viewpoints, all from women considering their own situations, show the full range of emotions and thoughts that would probably go through the mind of any one woman finding themselves in this awful situation.

The focus is very much on the dialogue here, in terms of both individual lines and exchanges between people of opposing views, and Polley helps herself no end by assembling a cast of talent who all rise to the challenging material. Jessie Buckley, Claire Foy, Rooney Mara, and Judith Ivey (my personal favourite of the nominal leads) are all given at least one moment to metaphorically punch viewers in the gut, Ben Whishaw is very lovely and sweet as the man helping them to gather their thoughts and make a final decision, and there’s a small role for Frances McDormand that allows her to make a strong impression with only a few minutes of screentime. Others worth mentioning are August Winter (playing someone transgender who provides yet another interesting nuance to the ongoing conversation), Michelle McLeod, Sheila McCarthy, and Shayla Brown, all helping to show more and more ways in which the lives of the women have been impacted over the years by the behaviour of the men.

As weighty and dialogue-heavy as this is, Polley excels at knowing how to treat the material onscreen. We’re shown the aftermath of horrific events, not the abuse itself, and there’s enough movement to stop it from feeling like a stage play, which could so easily have been the case. A lot of scenes are visually drab, as you might expect with a film about this kind of community, but moments of sunshine make infrequent appearances, providing welcome respite from the pain and sadness. I would like to read the Toews book one day, but this feels like a great achievement in how it has been moved from the page to the screen.

Women Talking may not be a film that you want to rush out to see, but it’s a strong and confident work of art. And you might find yourself considering a repeat viewing of it as soon as the end credits roll. I certainly did.

9/10

Sunday, 25 December 2022

Netflix And Chill: Scrooge: A Christmas Carol (2022)

It can be hard to decide on your favourite ever movie adaptation of A Christmas Carol - there's the lure of Alastair Sim, the lure of Albert Finney in a musical, and the lure of muppets, of course - but it's quite easy to identify the less impressive examples. The ones that feel more like a serving of lumpy gravy than a mix of the gravy and the grave, if you will. Excluding the most low-budget and independent movies, my own personal least favourite is Christmas Carol: The Movie, with the 2009 Jim Carrey vehicle sitting not too far above it. And now they can be joined by Scrooge: A Christmas Carol, a film that commits the crime of feeling even more lifeless than the spirits that visit the central character, despite the fact that it is, apparently, an animated remake/reworking of the 1970 Albert Finney movie (although that maybe explains the main problem with it, I have never been the biggest fan of that film either).

Luke Evans voices Scrooge. The ghost of Christmas past is voiced by Olivia Colman, a highlight, while Trevor Dion Nicholas voices Christmas present (and the third spectre says all that needs to be said without speaking aloud). Jonathan Pryce is Jacob Marley, James Cosmo is Mr. Fezziwig, Jessie Buckley is Isabel Fezziwig, and Johnny Flynn is Bob Cratchit.

I am not sure if I can do much more here, naming the main cast members seems to be the closest I can come to being nice about this film.

Directed by Stephen Donnelly, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Leslie Bricusse (who also provided the songs dotted throughout the narrative, or wrote them back when the 1970 movie was being crafted, and who sadly died just a couple of months before the film was released), this is a flat and dull retread of a story that viewers can watch in at least a dozen better movies. Easily. As much as I like many of the cast members, very few of them get to do anything that helps their performance stand out. The notable exception is Colman, who has a voice and manner that turns out to be a great match for her character.

The animation throughout is nice enough, it's clean and neat, but there's a lack of real artistry, and the same can be said of the songs, unfortunately. I dare anyone to get to the end of this and then relay one of the musical numbers back to me. Not exactly, just hum a rendition at me. I doubt anyone could manage it, even if you tried while the end credits were still rolling, because they are so unmemorable.

As disappointed as I was with the visuals and the songs, I was much more disappointed by the script. I can only assume that Donnelly wanted to present a film that felt like a mix of the fresh and the familiar, but he omits all the best phrases that fans of the story will be waiting for. Either use the animation to complement a beautifully traditional adaptation or use the bare bones of the tale to give viewers an enjoyably fresh new spin on it (love or hate Spirited, at least it tried the latter), but don't land smack bang in the middle. That just ends up pleasing nobody, although complete newcomers may find just enough here to enjoy.

Maybe I'll revisit this one day, and I might view it a bit more favourably, especially if it just stays available to stream while I'm full of hot chocolate and mince pies, lazily browsing for something that won't require me to overthink anything. That's a big maybe though.

3/10

Tuesday, 30 August 2022

Men (2022)

Men. Men, men, men, bloody men. Some might rush to say "not all men". But it is. It is all men. We know that it's all men. Not all the time, and perhaps not all with bad intentions, but, yes, all men. It is, I hope, a situation that is improving over time, but I would suspect that many women might disagree with me there. The best we can hope for is that attitudes continue to be checked and adjusted in ways that just weren't even considered a generation or two ago. There will still be those who just can't accept change, but they can wallow in their tar-pits and wait for extinction like the dinosaurs they are.

Now let's get to this film. Men is the story of a woman (Harper, played by Jessie Buckley) trying to enjoy some vacation time in a small English village. Unfortunately, she cannot seem to escape the main problem that she is trying to forget. Men. And, just in case you didn't understand the size of the problem, writer-director Alex Garland has nearly ever male character in the film played by Rory Kinnear (assisted by either make-up or CGI trickery). What unfolds is a nightmarish journey through a landscape plagued by awful men. Even the ones who don't seem overtly awful are quite awful.

Although not entirely successful throughout, and I think the central conceit is just a bit too clumsy and obvious, there's so much to enjoy and admire in Men that I am surprised by the opinions I have seen from people who have claimed to be pretty disappointed by it. I knew what to expect, pretty much, as soon as the film began (the trailer certainly made the premise obvious), but it was still able to surprise me, from the increasing level of dread throughout to the moments of wince-inducing gore. And when I started to wonder if we were being shown a reality or a vision filtered through the fevered brain of the central character, as I wonder often with horror movies full of such startling imagery, I realised what a wonderful extra little button Garland had put on his material. Accept the horrors, empathise with the lead, and consider the implications of every awkward exchange and encounter . . . or doubt the lived experience of the woman who is suffering in the midst of various problematic men.

Buckley is superb in her role, giving her best performance so far (although I am basing this on my own exposure to only a few of her movie roles, some), and she is more than up to the task of plumbing the depths of pain that her character has gone through, and carries around with her. It would seem rude to praise Kinnear more than Buckley so I will try not to, but he certainly deserves a lot of credit for allowing his visage to be used as a universal symbol of patriarchal problems and the predatory male gaze. Paapa Essiedu has a small, but pivotal, role, and he's very good, and Gayle Rankin allows viewers an occasional sigh of relief whenever she is onscreen, being a friend to Harper, despite having to settle for being on her phone screen as opposed to physically being there to provide extra comfort and support.

I agree with some who have mentioned that it may have been even better for Garland to write this script and then hand it over to a female director, but he certainly handles everything with an effectiveness that makes up for the lack of subtlety. And maybe the time for subtlety is long gone, so why not put together a collage of potent horror imagery that gives just a hint of the many micro-aggressions and 24/7 nightmares that women go through every single day. And if you're rolling your eyes and wanting to yell "not all men" at this review then you're part of the reason WHY subtlety had to be thrown by the wayside. Because it is. It is all men. We know that it's all men. Even if a lot more are trying to change for the better. I'm qualified to say that, being a man who has worked hard on changing my own language and attitudes over the years, and there are billions of women around the world even more qualified than me to correct your wilful ignorance.

8/10

Sunday, 9 January 2022

Netflix And Chill: The Lost Daughter (2021)

Marking the feature directorial debut of Maggie Gyllenhaal, who also adapted the novel of the same name by Elena Ferrante into script form, The Lost Daughter is very much a film looking at an experience common for most of the female population. It's about motherhood, the expectations placed on women to be the main care providers for children, and the thoughts that people process when they see those expectations being dismissed, either intentionally or unintentionally.

Olivia Colman plays Leda, a professor out to enjoy a bit of a working holiday. She will do some reading and writing, but most of her studying can take place on a sunny beach. Potential peace and bliss is spoiled, however, when a large family take over part of the beach. They aren't nice people, apparently, but Leda refusing to give up her own spot on the beach makes her a curiosity. In turn, Leda cannot stop watching young Nina, a woman struggling with her own daughter. When Nina's daughter goes missing one day, Leda saves the day by finding and returning her. But the child is unhappy, her favourite doll having gone missing while she was on her wanders. Different tensions rise, within Nina, within the extended family, within Leda, and there's a sense that things may go very badly. Perhaps the present is connected to the past, which we see as a younger Leda (played by Jessie Buckley) struggles with motherhood while trying to develop her learning and career.

The first thing to note here is the superb cast. Although I wasn't as won over by Buckley as some others seem to be, she's fine, this is generally a cast of great actors delivering great performances. Colman has been consistently superb for a long time now, way before any awards were handed over to her, and she continues to be arguably flawless in her main roles. Johnson has also been delivering great work over the past few years, outwith her work in the awful "Fifty Shades" movies, and she's excellent here. Ed Harris is a delight, playing the landlord/porter/islander who sees something in Leda that he responds to, and Peter Sarsgaard is enjoyable enough in a few scenes showing his character forming a strong connection with Leda over a shared love of linguistics. There's also a good supporting turn from Paul Mescal as Will, a young man who works at the sunny resort to earn some money in between terms. It's Will who warns Leda about the true nastiness of the people she got away with crossing once, and his character becomes more important in the third act. The story stays with Leda though, meaning most of the scenes focus on either Colman or Buckley.

It's the performances and the ideas in the script that helped to make this bearable. I'm afraid to say that very little else worked for me. Gyllenhaal does well in her choice to not spoonfeed the audience, allowing characters to behave erratically at times without making their motives obvious, but she indulges herself too often with an artistic and "breathy" approach to the shooting style that detracts from the bittersweet core of the film. Everything that isn't the actual acting, from the Dickon Hinchliffe music to the cinematography by Hélène Louvart, seems to be trying hard to undermine the acting. The film is a well-cast piece of work almost entirely undone by the pretentious errors of an earnest first-time feature director behind the camera.

As hesitant as I am to recommend this to people, it also remains just about worth your time. For now. There's a better film to be made about this, a film for anyone who has ever felt the urge to throttle someone saying "any children?" or "never mind, plenty time yet to start a family". Images of women defined only by motherhood are everywhere, it's a societal bias that I don't think will ever disappear, and art that fights back against that is important. It gives a voice to those who don't have that maternal urge, for whatever reason, and it reminds people that women are more than JUST wives and mothers.

The Lost Daughter could have easily been called The Lost Mother, The Lost Years, The Lost Love, The Lost Chances, or any of a dozen other titles. But it could also be referred to as The Lost Opportunity, subjectively speaking.

5/10