Mubi Monday: Orlando (1992)

Written and directed by Sally Potter, adapting the book by Virginia Woolf, Orlando makes use of the androgynous form of Tilda Swinton in a lead role that allows her to command the screen for the majority of the runtime.

Swinton is the titular character, commanded by Queen Elizabeth I (Quentin Crisp) to always stay as he is. "Do not fade. Do not wither. Do not grow old." Remarkably, he manages to obey this command, with one major change happening many years later. On a journey that takes in love, art, politics, and more, Orlando wakes up one morning as a woman, which brings another viewpoint and some extra problems.

Difficult to review, Orlando is a well-made, intelligent, and interesting film. But it's also one that, much like the main character, just seems a bit too aloof, slightly disconnected from anything else (it certainly didn't connect with me, I'm afraid).

The script is full of enjoyable lines, as fans of Woolf would expect, and Potter does a great job of wrestling what could have been a troublesome sprawling narrative into something surprisingly straightforward, despite the gender change that occurs about halfway through. Although I am unfamiliar with the source material, a phrase I am aware that I use all too often nowadays, but the episodic structure, whether from the book or decided upon by Potter, feels like the best way it could have been done.

Swinton is as good as ever in the main role, although it's still harder to find her convincing in the male role than it is in the female role, something that could have been improved by some more work on the hair and make-up. Not to insult fans of her performances, but she plays up the androgyny better than she plays up any perceived male traits, as silly as that may sound. Crisp is wonderful in his royal role, a fitting one for someone of his stature in the LGBTQ+ community, and singer Jimmy Somerville (arguably best known for the hit song "Don't Leave Me This Way" when he was the front man in The Communards) pops up to impress with his vocal range. Charlotte Valandrey is a potential love interest for male Orlando, Billy Zane is a potential love interest for the female incarnation, John Wood is good value in the role of an Archduke who thinks very highly of Orlando, and there are small roles for Heathcote Williams, Toby Stephens, and more (including Toby Jones, although his appearance is fleeting).

This is a good film, in many ways, and there are people who will find more of value in it than I did. It just didn't ever fully click into place for me, despite the sure hand of Potter and the many solid performances from her assembled cast.

6/10

Buy the movie here.
Americans can get it here.

Hunter Killer (2018)

Gerard Butler. Gerard bloody Butler. I have been a fan of his for quite some time now, but he seems intent on making it harder and harder for people to say that aloud. His movie choices are often problematic, at best, and some could say that he seems to deliberately pick some of the worst scripts around when he gets his name in the hat for potential blockbuster material.

In this submarine-based action thriller, Butler plays Captain Joe Glass, a slightly unorthodox type who is trusted by the men around him because he may seem a bit odd but he gets results, dammit. He's given a crew and immediately sent off to Russian waters, where there has been an incident involving the sinking of both a Russian and an American sub. Knowing just what is at stake if the wrong move is made, Glass is determined to do whatever he can to get to the bottom of the situation and avoid an all-out war.

Written by Arne Schmidt and Jamie Moss, two men without too many scripts already under their belts, Hunter Killer is just about as lazy and incompetent as you can get, at least without descending to the level of the laughably bad. I'm not sure if the source material (a novel named "Firing Point") is any better but this certainly doesn't have me in any rush to check it out. Almost every line of dialogue is a cliché, and director Donovan Marsh doesn't think he should do anything in his role to help distract viewers from that. He adds to it all, if anything, with every decision made, taking his cues from the back catalogue of Tony Scott and Michael Bay when it comes to moments that show slick and powerful military action but forgetting to keep things orderly when it comes to the geography of the action sequences.

While there's supposed to be tension under the water, there's also supposed to be some tension on land, as a small group of soldiers (led by Toby Stephens) attempt to get in and extract a Russian president being held against his will by the individual who wants to start the war. One decent sequence aside, involving an enemy sub hidden under a large ice glacier, no tension is to be found once the plot starts to unfold. There are also no characters to care about, and the ending is laughably bad.

Butler is still a decent onscreen presence, making this just about bearable, and the cast is rounded out by Stephens, Michael Nyqvist (also a highlight, playing the rescued captain of another submarine), Common, Gary Oldman, and Linda Cardellini. I like all of these people when they're in half-decent movies. This isn't even a half-decent movie.

The submarine movie subgenre isn't the biggest one around, by far, but I guarantee you that almost any other film you can think of featuring periscopes, men getting tense while standing quietly in a floating chunk of metal, and radar screens that go ping and bloop, will be better than this. That even includes Down Periscope.

3/10

Dive in here.
Americans can buy it here.