For It Is Man's Number

Wednesday, 20 September 2023

Prime Time: Kandahar (2023)

Although I sometimes pick movies with absolutely no idea of what I am about to watch, it is nearly impossible to watch as many movies as I do without some awareness of the content of them (whether it is due to their genre categorization, the main star name, or even just the thumbnail/poster, not to mention the various ads and trailers). So I don’t go into a recent Gerard Butler movie expecting a masterpiece. I did hope that Kandahar would be better than this though.

Butler plays Tom Harris, a CIA operative working undercover in Afghanistan. He is due to head home after another successful mission, allowing him to spend some quality time with his daughter and move his stuff out of the home he used to share with his due-to-be-ex-wife, when he is asked to take part in one more mission, and it is one with a huge payday. Unfortunately, Harris has his cover blown, which leads to a number of people desperate to capture him as he tries to get to an extraction point in Kandahar with his translator, Mohammad (Navid Negahban).

Let’s get to the point here. The biggest problem with Kandahar isn’t the cast, although they’re not doing their best work. Director Ric Roman Waugh is also not dire, but not helping as much as he could. The biggest problem lies with the confused script by Mitchell LaFortune, and it’s no surprise to see that this is his first feature. Where Kandahar could have been so many things, depending on the focus on action or drama, it ends up trying to be a bit of something for everyone. That wouldn’t be so bad if LaFortune isn’t also distracted by the idea of showing how people aren’t always easily placed into the category of hero or villain, with everyone given a chance to show how the circumstances dictate their thinking and actions. What that means is that we get a film with a runtime padded out by many scenes that feel completely unnecessary, and sometimes laughably bemusing.

Butler is showing his years nowadays, age catches up to us all in the end, but he still Carrie’s himself with the confidence of someone happy to face overwhelming odds with his strength, intelligence, and skillset. Negahban is perfectly fine, and at least benefits from one of the many coincidences folded into the script, and our two leads are easier to root for throughout simply due to them being played by Butler and Negahban. Elsewhere, Travis Fimmel is the employer/ally, and both Bahador Foladi and Ali Fazal play two main characters aggressively pursuing our heroes (although the latter is given a motorbike that is superfast for some scenes and then seems to be capped at a top speed of 5mph when trying to follow the desert-traversing truck commandeered by our leads).

Some may prefer the fact that this is an action film trying to explore ideas beyond the boundaries of most standard action films, but I would have much preferred this to get the basics right. None of the geography, timing, or choreography feels good enough, and there isn’t enough breathing space for the half-assed ideas lumped in alongside the poor action moments.

Ultimately pleasing nobody, apart from maybe the biggest Gerard Butler fans. Even they might find this one much easier to ignore than some of his other vehicles.

3/10

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Tuesday, 19 September 2023

Talk To Me (2023)

I cannot help being wary every time a new horror movie comes out to great acclaim from both critics and fans alike. The fact that Talk To Me is directed by a pair of brothers who made their name making numerous YouTube shorts also had me wondering if it could be as good as the praise it was getting would suggest. It is. Talk To Me is probably one of the best original horror movies of the last decade, and a fantastic debut from two talented individuals I may now start having to explore on YouTube (where they have their RackaRacka channel). Interviews with them suggest they have always used the platform with a view to moving to features one day, and not to simply become internet celebrities, as I had, perhaps slightly snobbishly, assumed.

Mia (Sophie Wilde) still seems in a period of grieving for her dead mother. It has been two years, the death was an apparent suicide, but it still feels like an open wound. She doesn’t really feel connected to her father (Max, played by Marcus Johnson) any more, but she has a surrogate family unit in the form of her friend, Jade (Alexandra Jensen), Jade’s younger brother, Riley (Joe Bird), and their mother, Sue (Miranda Otto). When they find out about a new “party trick”, involving holding on to a ceramic/embalmed hand that allows you to speak to, and be temporarily possessed by, the dead, Mia, Jade, and Riley end up curious. Not sure if it is even real, they soon find out that it is. And it can turn into something addictive and dangerous.

Based on a concept by Daley Pearson, Talk To Me is written by Bill Hinzman and Danny Philippou (the latter also sharing directing duties with his brother, Michael Philippou), and it is a very smart update of traditional horror movie ideas without ever coming across as too annoying or “too cool for school”. It has some great commentary layered throughout almost every scene (whether it’s about grief, addiction, or those who will endanger themselves while having their actions filmed and/or live-streamed on mobile phones) and there’s a depth and heart to the material that keeps you rooting for certain characters even as you see them heading towards what is most certainly a cliff edge at the end of their brief lifespan.

The Philippou brothers have helped themselves enormously with some great casting. Wilde is brilliant in the lead role, and it is a difficult one that needs viewers to sympathize with her as she starts to slide inexorably down an ever-darkening path. She is convincingly warm and lovely when we first get to see her in the company of her good friends, but also sad and vulnerable in a way that is exploited by certain malevolent forces. Jensen is also very good, a believable friend who has her patience tested, to say the least, when things start to go from bad to worse, and Bird is sweet and believable in a way that makes his own journey even more painful and difficult to watch than it otherwise would be. Otto is a great movie mum, delivering at least one line that should produce a solid laugh from most viewers, and Otis Dhanji does well as his character, Daniel, floats in and out of the proceedings just enough to stay involved, and provide some extra tension between our two central females. Johnson doesn’t get too much to do, but he does everything well enough, and Alexandria Steffensen veers between caring a creepy in her small, but pivotal, role.

Although the emphasis is on an enjoyably creepy atmosphere and characters being scared by a growing inability to rely on their own senses, Talk To Me also has one or two moments of stomach-churning brutality. It is a dark and disturbing film, but one that is made by people who know how to keep the tone well-balanced throughout and keep it as something palatable to mainstream audiences. That is reflected in the success it has already had.

A front-running contender for horror film of the year, and one I can’t envision being beaten by anything in the near future, Talk To Me is a hell of a wild ride, and one hell of a feature directorial debut. Near-perfect.

9/10

Monday, 18 September 2023

Mubi Monday: Rotting In The Sun (2023)

Although it's not entirely correct to label it thus, Rotting In The Sun is a film you could describe to others as a darkly comedic riff on Blow-Up for the Instagram and TikTok generation. If that sounds horrible to you then you should be wary of going into this, but I hope you give it a chance. Despite my attempt to create a shorthand description, there's a lot more to this, both serious and thoughtful and brilliantly comedic.

Writer-director Sebastián Silva plays a movie version of himself, spending most of his time disconnected from life going on around him while he ponders suicide. He ends up encountering an online influencer/celeb named Jordan Firstman (played by . . . Jordan Firstman). Jordan is keen to work with Sebastián, but Sebastián isn’t all that interested. And then he disappears, sort of, in a strange chain of events that is only fully known by Sebastián’s housekeeper (played by Catalina Saavedra).

Quite brilliantly summed up by the title, Rotting In The Sun is a film that works hard to push viewers away before drawing them right in again, bringing you closer to the heart of something you now better identify with after having seen it from a distance. It’s a film about distraction and depression, in a few different forms, and shows how even the most unique and bemusing circumstances can remain boring to someone who has already decided to keep away from anything that could be seen as positive. This is clarified in a scene that is as hilarious as it is transgressive, and one that is bound to turn off more conservative film viewers.

Silva, having co-written the screenplay with Pedro Periano, delivers his most satisfying feature yet, from those I have seen. Despite seeming unfocused and shambolic for a lot of the runtime, there’s always a point being made. This is a film that makes a few strong statements, but you could be forgiven for getting to the end credits and assuming that you’ve wasted your time. I would argue against that, and I think the third act is a particularly brilliant blend of commentary, wit, and heart, but each to their own.

Aside from his writing and direction, Silva has fun in his pivotal onscreen role, and helps himself by his own disappearance at, or just before, the halfway point of the film. Firstman also seems to be enjoying himself, doing a great job of portraying a personality who is used to getting people in line with his thinking until ideas become fully-formed active plans. Saavedra is fantastic throughout, effectively portraying the only one of the three who always feels like a real person. She isn’t trying to put on an act to impress or bluff others, for the most part, and when she does have to lie to people she does so in a way that seems uncomfortable and clumsy.

Fun, funny, and yet brilliantly on the nose when it comes to dealing with some serious points tucked underneath the dark comedy overcoat, Rotting In The Sun is a real treat for those who are not easily shocked. And if you are not sure whether or not you consider yourself easily shockable, this has a hilarious “test” for you.

8/10

Sunday, 17 September 2023

Netflix And Chill: How To Blow Up A Pipeline (2023)

While this is only the second film from director Daniel Goldhaber, he's already marked himself out as someone I am always interested. Cam was a fantastic feature debut, and this shows a consistency of form while he moves comfortably from the horror genre into more dramatic, but no less thought-provoking, territory.

In case the title of this film hasn't already made you aware of the content, this is all about a group of people endeavouring to blow up a pipeline. That may seem like a foolhardy mission, and one likely to end in failure, but certain scenes are shown in non-chronological order to illustrate the many extra provisions put in place by activists determined to succeed against overwhelming odds.

Based on a book by Andreas Malm, adapted for the screen by Goldhaber, Jordan Sjol, and Ariela Barer (who also stars onscreen in a main role), How To Blow Up A Pipeline feels like a film that is very much needed right now. Goldhaber definitely picks a side, which you might say is obvious from the fact that he even made the film at all, but we're at a point in our lives when picking the right side seems like the obviously right thing to do. The planet is burning (sometimes literally), profits are being put ahead of health and safety on a scale that is frankly horrendous, even if that isn't a problem inherent to modern life, and a lot of the news articles and coverage of this situation, and the protesters who have been ramping up their disruption and exposure, tend to frame it as yet another issue in which both sides have valid points to make about the climate change crisis. The data points to only one side being correct, and anyone who wants to deny the catastrophic events of climate change going on around us should do us both a favour now and stop reading.

Anyway, apologies, back to the film itself. While not exactly lauding the characters as saints, Goldhaber and co. do a fantastic job of using the non-linear narrative to show the motivating factors here, and to make you view their actions as more naive and potentially damaging than they actually are. The clear visuals (from cinematographer Tehillah De Castro, working on only their second feature in this role, I believe, having done numerous music videos and short films) are accompanied by a very good score from Gavin Brivik (who also worked on Cam with Goldhaber), helped by a script that reflects the conviction of our leads while also conveying the attitudes of those who view them as criminals and ignorant pests.

Barer is very good in her role, but I wouldn't feel right singling any one person out from the others. Kristine Froseth, Lukas Gage, Forrest Goodluck, Sasha Lane, Jayme Lawson, Marcus Scribner, and Jake Weary play the core activists, and each and every one of them has a different, but equally important, part to play in the grand plan. They are also working together for a number of different reasons that all happen to stem from the one big issue, and the performances effortlessly show the different types of relationships within the central group (whether they are lifelong friends or newly connected by the requirements of their mission) and why they are so determined to strike a blow for eco-terrorism.

There's a famous Albert Camus quote that more of us should remember on a daily basis: "The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion." That applies more and more nowadays to people who are striving to correct the balance of a world that is being shifted so far off its axis as to be unrecognisable from what it once was. How To Blow Up A Pipeline reminds us that, despite the headlines and opinion pieces, a lot of people you may view with disrespect and disdain are actually risking a hell of a lot to benefit all of us in the long run. You can apply that to the many people currently taking strike action around the world as easily as you can apply it to the eco-terorrism featured here, and I hope this film succeeds in reframing the mindset of at least a few people who sit down to watch it.

8/10

Saturday, 16 September 2023

Shudder Saturday: Blood Flower (2022)

AKA Harum Malam.

The last time I watched a movie revolving around any kind of blood flower it was the second Anaconda movie. While I enjoy that film a bit more than most people, it's not exactly fantastic. So I went into Blood Flower with a bit of trepidation. How scary can a flower-based movie really be? Even triffids don't terrify me like they used to.

Idan Aedan plays Iqbal, a young boy who we soon learn has a special gift. He can see spirits, which allows him to help his mother in healing those who are afflicted by them/possessed. Unfortunately, and this is very early on in the film, his mother dies, leaving Iqbal alone with his father (Bront Palarae), who would rather not battle any supernatural entities. Nobody has much say in the matter, however, when an evil spirit is let loose in their building, claiming a number of victims while Iqbal tries to figure out how it can be defeated.

Directed by Dain Said, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Ben Omar and Nandita Solomon, this Malaysian horror is a real treat for those who want something that manages to be both spooky and gory, with the third act full of impressive and disturbing moments. Although the backstory revealed will have many thinking of the kind of thing we've seen many times before (usually in the films from Japan or Spain), everything is given a dark twist by the ferocity and scheming of the evil spirit at the heart of things.

Aedan is a good lead, and carries most of the movie on his young shoulders, whether he's being terrified, confused, or gathering the courage needed for a confrontation that anyone would want to completely avoid. He's believably vulnerable, yet also believable as the only one who might be able to put an end to the unfolding horrors. Palarae is decent support, although the film works better when scenes are full of children who are either more aware or more in danger than some of the adults. Remy Ishak plays Jamil, a pivotal character for a number of reasons, and also does a very good job, as do the likes of Nadiya Nissa, Eriza Allya, Amanda Ang, Nabila Huda, and Arnie Shasha, making up a decent variety of people directly affected by the horrific events.

With great pacing throughout (the runtime is a decent 102-minutes) and a lot of memorable imagery that will remind you of classic demon/possession movies without the film rigidly adhering to the way those elements have been presented in the past, this is a great viewing choice for horror movie fans. It gets very bloody and uncomfortable at times, so more casual viewers should be warned, and it's a completely satisfying work that puts a slightly different spin on familiar fare.

8/10

Friday, 15 September 2023

The Little Mermaid (2023)

I have been wanting to see The Little Mermaid ever since grown adults started crying and spitting their dummies out over the fact that the lead role had gone to a young black woman. Because, apparently, mermaids can appear onscreen in various incarnations, but making them non-white is an affront to the firmly-held beliefs people suddenly claimed to have about fictional citizens of the sea. Despite wanting to see it, I didn’t make time for it while it was at the cinema because I just cannot work up any enthusiasm for the ongoing Disney remake factory (some may claim this is less a remake, more a reworking of the source material, and I have to politely disagree).

People should already know the story, but here is the very basic summary. A mermaid named Ariel (Halle Bailey) keeps spending her time thinking about humans and the world above the surface of the sea, much to the chagrin of her father, King Triton (Javier Bardem). She then falls in love with a human, Prince Eric (Jonah Hauer-King), and ends up signing up to a Faustian pact with the scheming Ursula (Melissa McCarthy). Ariel gets to walk on land, giving her a chance to meet the Prince, but she has her lovely voice removed, as well as the memory of the deal made with Ursula.

Directed by the very capable Rob Marshall, The Little Mermaid has a number of pleasantly surprising positives. The casting of Bailey is one of the biggest, with the actress proving to be a wonderful choice for the lead role, presenting herself as believably lovely and tuneful (when she has her voice). The production design throughout, the overall look of the film whenever showing the underwater world, is very good, and there are a number of fairly realistic CG creations accompanying our lead character on her journey. It’s also worth mentioning that there are supporting roles for the excellent Noma Dumezeni and Art Malik.

The script isn’t particularly great, with David Magee responsible for the thankless task of updating the animated film while trying to balance the familiar and the fresh. He doesn’t succeed, sadly, with the familiar moments just ensuring that viewers will remember how much they love the earlier incarnation, and he’s also hampered by the fact that things have to come crashing to a halt at one point for a horrible and lifeless song to be sung by the bland Prince Eric. A few other songs work better, but they’re mostly the ones lifted from the earlier film (although Awkwafina, who voices the seagull named Scuttle, gets a very fun number).

Dull Prince aside, I enjoyed almost everyone else here, whether just in voice form or more fully shown onscreen. Daveed Diggs is a decent Sebastian, Jacob Tremblay is a good fit for Flounder, and Awkwafina is a lot of fun. McCarthy is someone I always tend to enjoy onscreen, and I am happy to say that her portrayal of Ursula is as entertaining as I expected it to be.

All in all, despite this feeling just as unnecessary as every other time that Disney does this kind of thing, The Little Mermaid is enjoyable enough. It has a better variety of representation and cultural texture than the animated film, but it suffers from the inherent disadvantage of turning cute cartoons into “real-life” imagery.

6/10

Thursday, 14 September 2023

Meg 2: The Trench (2023)

I like nonsense. Anyone who knows me can tell you that, and many people who know me actually assume that I tend to choose to watch nonsense over anything else most days. That isn't true though. But I can be easily entertained by films that others don't want to waste their time on. Nonsense has to hit the right spot though, and that ties directly to the logic contained within a movie. If a film is full of magic or sci-fi elements that throw the rules of our world out the window then that's fine. If there are monsters on the prowl then that's fine. Unbelievable fights that look great and feature people who at least look as if they can handle themselves? Again . . . fine. Meg 2: The Trench is not the right kind of nonsense though. It's bad nonsense. The kind of nonsense that shows someone imploding when they have a problem with their suit deep underwater moments before it shows someone exiting a structure to swim elsewhere to open an airlock . . . at a depth of 25,000 feet. Yes, Meg 2: The Trench asks viewers to accept that a human being can swim around, however briefly, at a depth of 25,000 feet. I gave up at that point, saddened by a film that seemed destined to alternate between making me balk and making me bored.

While the first film was based around the appeal of watching Jason Statham versus a giant shark, Meg 2: The Trench moves away from the simplicity of that idea. There’s one trained shark in the mix (maybe, but maybe it’s not possible to train a shark), there are more megalodons, there are a few land creatures, and a huge octopus-like people-eater (shown via the huge tentacles that grab “snacks” and cause carnage). Statham is still present, of course, but he is wasted, alongside the rest of the human cast, for most of the runtime, stuck in a very dull plot about corporate treachery and sabotage.

Written by the same writers who delivered the first film - Dean Georgaris, Jon Hoeber, and Erich Hoeber, all once again working from source material by Steve Alten - and directed by Ben Wheatley, it’s clear that the main aim here is to revel in silliness. Unfortunately, the silliness doesn’t work, and it doesn’t fill up as much of the runtime as it should. Seriously, who wants a Meg movie with so much time devoted to a sub-plot about scheming business folk?

Statham gets to do what he does well enough, but not often enough, and he remains a good fit for this material, delivering awful dialogue with ease and jumping around between sea monsters that we know he will need to defeat in battle. The other main stars worth mentioning are Cliff Curtis, Page Kennedy, and Wu Jing. The former two reprise their roles from the first film, with Kennedy being a lot of fun whenever he gets to show how he has learned to try and protect himself more from the danger of ginormous sharks, while Jing lends his name to a project that sorely mistreats him (fans of his work may be disappointed by how he is ultimately sidelined in favour of the Statham versus sharks plotting. There are some others in the cast, there to either be kept safe or turned into food for the big beasts, but I don’t want to spend time complaining about bad performances from people who aren’t given anything decent to work with.

The Meg was a disappointment, but it had enough fun moments to still make it worthwhile, just. This sequel is an awful mess, arguably something that the film-makers assume is saved by some of the special effects and ridiculous moments packed into the finale. I disagree with them. I stopped caring about anyone onscreen very early on, and I certainly couldn’t muster up any enthusiasm when it seemed as if the film finally remembered what it was supposed to be for the last 15-20 minutes. I hope Wheatley is satisfied now that he’s got this out of his system (although it has brought in some big bucks thanks to the way it pandered to the Chinese market for a box office win there), and I hope any future instalments in the series avoid boring me as much as this one did.

3/10

Wednesday, 13 September 2023

Prime Time: Bill (2015)

If you enjoy the Horrible Histories series, or movie (which uses the brand, but doesn't use the same people), and if you enjoy Ghosts (the British incarnation, which features a lot of the same people both behind and in front of the camera), then you should find Bill an very enjoyable and amusing slice of hysterical historical entertainment. Okay, it may not be hysterical, but that sentence was too tempting for me. It IS very funny though.

Matthew Baynton plays the Bill of the title. William is his proper name, of course. William Shakespeare. Shakespeare wants to become a celebrated playwright, of course, but doesn’t seem to have the skillset required. That doesn’t stop him from persevering though, and he is soon tasked with writing “the greatest play ever performed” for an Earl (Simon Farnaby) who has himself oversold his own talent to a demanding Queen Elizabeth I (Helen McCrory). The play will be the backdrop for a very important meeting between the Queen and King Phillip II of Spain (Ben Willbond), the latter arriving on the shores of Britain with a band of schemers and killers he hopes will help him take over the reign of the country, and pressure keeps mounting on Shakespeare. Pulled in numerous directions at once, our writer at least has the help of one Christopher Marlowe (Jim Howick) to get the play finished.

Co-written by Laurence Rickard (who also features onscreen) and the aforementioned Willbond, Bill is a lively and lovely collage of silliness, mixing smart and sly gags with wonderful absurdity and cheesy puns. Those who know a bit more about the main characters will find the film slightly more rewarding, but almost everything is designed to allow newcomers a near-equal amount of enjoyment. Director Richard Bracewell doesn’t do anything special, but he makes the savvy decision to work perfectly in service of the script and performances, resulting in something that is more focused on being entertaining than being stylish and cinematic.

Everyone involved tends to take on multiple roles, giving the whole thing a wonderful “let’s put on a show” atmosphere throughout, but Baynton, Farnaby,Willbond, and Howick are consistently excellent in any one of their varied roles (although it should be said that Farnaby remains a top scene-stealer, particularly when playing a Spanish assassin). Martha Howe-Douglas does a good job in the role of the exasperated Anne Hathaway, worrying about the career prospects of a husband who seems to have his head in the clouds, and also has fun portraying other characters, and McCrory gives much-needed weight to the pivotal role of Queen Elizabeth I, wisely delivering the most serious performance amidst the unfolding chaos and gags.

I had a great time with this, but I know I am pre-disposed to this kind of thing (having enjoyed the work of all the main performers in similar works). It’s hard to imagine anyone actively hating this, especially if you’re after something inoffensive and eager to please, but I know that some may roll their eyes and groan at the many moments that had me grinning and chuckling. It’s a comedy of errors that some will dismiss as much ado about nothing. I hope more people side with me though, and you should definitely check out the shows mentioned in the first paragraph if you do enjoy this.

7/10

Tuesday, 12 September 2023

The Boogeyman (2023)

Urgh. That's the best way to start this review. Director Rob Savage made such a great impression on horror fans when he released Host, arguably the best use of Zoom ever, with the exception of that one short clip of the man who accidentally made himself look like a cat (check it out if you don't know what I'm talking about, it's hilarious). Unfortunately, it is starting to look more and more like Host was an exception, with Savage following that up with the horrible Dashcam and now this. The Boogeyman isn't as bad as Dashcam, but it's a surprisingly lazy and inept movie that delivers a polished package of everything that exemplifies the worst of modern mainstream horror.

Springboarding from a short story by Stephen King, and that's more worthy of your time than this is, the very simple plot summary for this is that it looks at a family terrorised by a boogeyman. Still grieving the death of their mother, there's teenager Sadie Harper (Sophie Thatcher) and younger sister, Sawyer (Vivien Lyra Blair). They both live with their father, Will (Chris Messina), a therapist struggling to help his children through this difficult time. Anyway, once the boogeyman enters their home, and once they start figuring out exactly what is going on, people are warned not to spend too much time alone in the dark . . . and they then spend most of the movie wandering about alone in the bloody dark.

I really don’t want to spend too much time discussing this, it annoyed me so much for almost every minute of the runtime (although the opening sequence is impressively dark and disturbing, which makes the sharp slide downhill all the more disappointing). It might be a bit more polished than the 2005 movie that covered some similar ground, but I would struggle to say this is better. It’s so carelessly thrown together, but has a couple of elements in the story that are supposed to give it some weight it never maintains, and I blame Savage and the writers, Scott Beck, Mark Heyman, and Bryan Woods. Having read the original short story, one of the many little gems written by Stephen King, I assumed that everyone involved was drawn to the material because of a twisted ending that could be expanded into a feature full of paranoia and constant unease, but it appears that they just wanted the title so they could then deliver a few jump scares and mediocre scenes we have seen hundreds of times before.

The cast aren’t bad, with Thatcher and Blair capably carrying the whole thing on their young shoulders. Messina is sidelined for a lot of the movie, of course, but does perfectly fine work in his role, and David Dastmalchian is sorely underused in what amounts to little more than a cameo. Having said that, at least he doesn’t suffer the fate of Marin Ireland, stuck playing the standard grizzled survivor who thinks she knows how to finally kill the boogeyman and drags Thatcher’s character into her scheme. LisaGay Hamilton is enjoyable in the role of Dr. Weller, another therapist, but suffers from the fact that her screentime alludes more to the aforementioned short story ending in a way that fails to then deliver any decent pay-off.

I saw a lot of love for this when it was in cinemas, which meant I was keen to see it as soon as it hit home media, but I am glad I didn’t rush along to see this on the big screen. I don’t know what others saw in this, and maybe a fair few people left cinemas disappointed after being hoodwinked into buying a ticket, but there was nothing here that worked for me in terms of the horror content. I might have even preferred a straightforward drama showing the main characters dealing with their grief. Or, and here’s a radical idea, a creepy horror film that actually felt in line with the source material.

3/10

Monday, 11 September 2023

Mubi Monday: Raining Stones (1993)

While Raining Stones was released thirty years ago, it's yet another film with a plot that could very easily be transposed into the here and now. I wish I said that about more optimistic and happy pictures, but this is a Ken Loach film, which should let you know how far away from optimistic and happy it is. Having said that, however, there IS a silver lining or two glimpsed amidst the many grey clouds that gather above the main character.

Bruce Jones plays Bob, a poor man who just wants a chance to earn enough money to support his family. He has a loving wife, Anne (Julie Brown), and a young daughter, Coleen (Gemma Phoenix), who is in need of a nice, but certainly not cheap, dress for her upcoming First Communion. He also has a friend, Tommy (Ricky Tomlinson), who is also mired in a poverty trap that he's desperate to escape.

Having been familiar with Bruce Jones from his stint on Coronation Street, I forgot that he also starred in a number of movies. I also forgot how good he could be, delivering a brilliant performance here that makes you forget that this is his feature debut (Loach has a knack for getting those performances from his cast). Brown and Phoenix may not be the focus of the film, shown front and centre when endangered by the lengths that Bob goes to in order to get some cash ASAP, but both deliver excellent supporting turns. Tomlinson may provide some comic relief, but he's also asked to deliver the kind of emotional punch that he has been able to deliver throughout his career, whether in dramatic or comedic roles.

Writer Jim Allen had worked with Ken Loach numerous times over the years, collaborating with him on "The Wednesday Play" TV series and a "Play For Today", and this was the second of the three feature films that they created between them (sandwiched between Hidden Agenda in 1990 and Land And Freedom in 1995, Allen's final screenplay). It also feels like the most typical "Loach-ian" of the three, considering what movies come to mind when the director's name is spoken, and this would make a perfect start to a triple-bill that would also include I, Daniel Blake and Sorry We Missed You.

The people who had their lives made so much worse by the poor economic situation of the late '80s to mid-'90s are the exact same people who are currently having their lives made so much worse by the poor economic situation right now, and that poverty is created and maintained by a social support system not fit for purpose, communities left to rot while the forgotten/hidden residents bravely struggle to keep their heads above water, and rich people getting richer by exploiting the situation to their advantage. There's not a great different between the bankers making bonuses while claiming homes from people who have fallen on hard times and a loan shark demanding ever-increasing repayment amounts as they inventory a home for any goods worth taking in lieu of cash. The tactics may differ, but the end goal is the same.

A difficult watch (again . . . the fact that it's a Ken Loach film should have already made you aware of that), especially during a horrible and hugely uncomfortable main scene in the third act, but just as moving and relevant as so many other features that make up Loach's extensive filmography.

9/10

Sunday, 10 September 2023

Netflix And Chill: The Old Guard (2020)

Based on a graphic novel series written by Greg Rucka (and illustrated by Leandro Fernandez), who adapted his own work into screenplay form, The Old Guard is a fantastical action movie that is helped immensely by the casting of the ever-reliable, and believable, Charlize Theron in the lead role.

Theron plays Andy, one of four immortal warriors who spend their time trying to help the human race. The other members of her group are Booker (Matthias Schoenaerts), Joe (Marwan Kenzari), and Nicky (Luca Marinelli). There have been one or two others fighting alongside them at times, but at a certain time, undefined and unpredictable, the gift of immortality can simply disappear, leading to the opportunity for a standard death. I describe that as an opportunity because it is a better option than their biggest fear, being trapped and imprisoned. Andy and her group have to move fast when they realise that someone else, a soldier named Nile (KiKi Layne), has just discovered their own immortality. Nile needs to be educated about her new role, and the group need to avoid the stretching grasp of a big pharma company that is wanting to make use of them for experiments in modern medicine. The pharma company is headed up by Merrick (Harry Melling), but his dirty work is done by a squad under the command of Copley (Chiwetel Ejiofor).

Directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood (note to self, I am still very keen to see The Woman King), what you get here is a well-paced and fun film that also puts a slightly different spin on the standard trope of the melancholy vampire while also exploring how fluid the concepts of morality and courage are when it comes to fighting for the good of humanity. While the early scenes may have you questioning just how brave our main characters are (yes, this particular concept had me thinking of a certain confrontation between Batman and Superman that crystallised this concept), the third act shows how the potential threat of mortality doesn't have our cast wavering for a moment, which underlines how much the villains misunderstand the guft bestowed upon our heroes.

Everyone gets a handful of good moments, with Kenzari and Marinelli a real delight as the warriors who have found long-life-partners in one another, but it's unsurprising to find that the focus keeps moving back to Theron, Layne, and Schoernaerts (considering they are arguably the two biggest names in the cast, and Layne's character allows her to receive exposition helpful for viewers), and all three have great onscreen presence. The same can be said of Ejiofor, who gets a nice little character arc here as he starts to debate whether or not he is doing the right thing, which makes up for the blandness of Melling and those playing his heavies (Joey Ansah being the main disappointment, providing no real sense of menace or capability in the face of The Old Guard).

I was advised to give this a chance by a friend (Christianne, her excellent/superior blog is here) after bashing the last movie I watched with Greg Rucka's name attached to it (the dire Heart Of Stone), and I'm glad I was prompted to give it a go. It's a film that feels fresh and fun, despite taking on some serious themes and working with characters we've basically seen as archetypes in many other movies, and it's clear that those behind the scenes knew how to make the most of the concept. It's technically sound throughout, and the stunt work is often excellent, and I happily recommend it to anyone else who kept dismissing it as readily as I did.

7/10

Saturday, 9 September 2023

Shudder Saturday: Perpetrator (2023)

While pretty odd from start to finish, you might even say defiantly so, Perpetrator is also a film that makes complete sense once viewers are caught up on each and every plot development.

It all starts off normally enough. Jonquil AKA Jonny (Kiah McKirnan) isn't really flourishing under the parentage of her father, Gene (Tim Hopper), so she is sent to live with a relative, Hildie (Alicia Silverstone). This is when things get weird, although there have been one or two moments of weirdness before this full shift into darkness. Hildie lives in an area where a number of young women have gone missing. While she sometimes seems as if she doesn't care about Jonny, especially if any of her house rules are broken, Hildie is also ready to prepare her to survive in an environment that is full of constant danger, including the pretend "school shooter" drills conducted by the strange Principal Burke (Christopher Lowell).

Written and directed by Jennifer Reeder, Perpetrator is a film that had me worried for the first act. I didn't know quite what was going on, I wasn't sure I would care about anything, and then Silverstone comes onscreen with a performance that was obviously requested from the director to emphasise something being off. Thankfully, as ever, I stuck with it, and was rewarded by a unique and satisfying horror film that delivers an excellent commentary on identity, the female experience, and how often extreme measures are needed to push back against those who have become far too used to indulging in their worst desires without fear of any consequences.

McKirnan is really good in the lead role, a solid anchor even as the waves around her roil and crash and threaten to drag her out to sea, and she is ably supported by a young cast that includes Ireon Roach (a friend), Vic Kuligoski (a suspect), and Taylor Kinkead, Casimere Jollette, Avery Holliday, and Ilirida Memdovski as various schoolgirls/potential victims. Silverstone is also good, although that won't be apparent from her first appearance onscreen, and Lowell has a lot of fun in his role. There are also very good performances from Hopper, Audrey Francis, Josh Bywater, and Melanie Liburd, with some of them providing one or two surprises while others provide exactly what you think they will.

I can easily imagine certain viewers hating this, it's too strange and "toothless" (the irony) for some, but I hope that those who are patient and open-minded feel as rewarded as I did. Perpetrator might seem a bit muddled and confusing from the opening act, but Reeder has a strong point to make, from the title onwards, and she does so with a good bit of style and imagination.

8/10

Friday, 8 September 2023

Crater (2023)

Like many other people, I first heard about Crater when people started to report on how it had been quietly removed from the Disney+ streaming service, commenting on how it was a decent little film that now had no platform (certainly for the time being). Intrigued, and keen to fight back against this insidious form of complete censorship, I endeavoured to seek it out and give it a fair shake. And I'm glad I did. Crater is a really good little movie, surprising and surprisingly poignant in equal measure.

Isaiah Russell-Bailey plays Caleb, a young boy who lives in a mining colony on the moon, but is due to head to the colonized planet of Omega. You can normally get to Omega after working for decades to pay for your opportunity, but Caleb is being allowed to go there after the death of his miner father, who died in a mining accident. He doesn't want to go to Omega though. But he does want to visit a crater that his father always told him he should see when he was old enough. Enlisting the help of his friends, Dylan (Billy Barratt), Borney (Orson Hong), and Marcus (Thomas Boyce), as well as a girl named Addison (Mckenna Grace) who has some valuable information that could ensure the success of their "mission", Caleb heads out to the crater. On the way, the children share secrets with one another, and various jeopardies strengthen their bond.

Written by John Griffin, and directed by Kyle Patrick Alvarez, neither man being an obvious choice for this kind of material, Crater is a real treat for what you get onscreen alongside all of the expected plot beats. Yes, there are the usual ups and downs, and a lot of the third act plays out exactly as you think it will, but there are also one or two revelations that feel genuinely unexpected, especially couched within a standard Disney movie. I certainly didn't think the film would also comment on the idea of modernised indentured servitude, using the life of a lunar miner to show how the odds are stacked against anyone working hard throughout their entire life to make a better future for their children. It's a brilliantly-crafted look at the overhwelming odds stacked against anyone seeking a "golden ticket", yet offsets the bitterness with a look at how we can always have so much else enriching our lives in a way that money itself cannot (although I do enjoy the push back against the awful "money can't buy happiness" line with the rebuttal that it sure doesn't hurt).

The cast aren't bad, in line with what you need for the material, and Russell-Bailey is strong enough in the lead role to deal with the wide range of emotions that he goes through. Barratt, Hong, and Boyce are also very good, and Grace changes the group dynamic beautifully without having to overact or be the party-pooper, which she so easily could have been. They're not the most memorable bunch of film characters I've ever seen, but that's due to the script trying to keep them grounded and real, as opposed to turning each character into one amplified defining feature, and that makes them all worth spending time with, especially during a third act that had me struggling to stop the sniffles and tears that were brought on by the bittersweet ending.

I wish I'd seen this when it was on Disney+, but I just wasn't aware of it when it was on that platform, but I'm glad I decided to seek it out now. I encourage others to do the same, even if I wouldn't normally recommend such dubious means of watching recent movies. Shame on Disney+ for getting rid of something that everyone should have been able to stumble upon, a gem of a film that would have only grown in popularity if given the chance, and I hope that film fans can seek it out and, whether you end up agreeing with me or not, rebel against the mismanagement of titles that deserve to retain their very small patch of streaming platform space.

8/10

Thursday, 7 September 2023

The Barn (2017)

There's a good film buried somewhere deep inside The Barn, a film that could easily be a Halloween favourite for horror fans, but writer-director Justin M. Seaman spends a lot of time ensuring that nobody will ever see that film. Instead of working to the strengths of the central premise (the three main killers, the Halloween atmosphere, the gleeful fun of some of the kills), he pads everything out with lacklustre conversations before delivering a finale that is so poor that it undoes any of the good work that preceded it.

Mitchell Musolino and Will Stout play Sam and Josh, respectively. They're out and about on Halloween night with Michelle (Lexi Dripps), as well as Chris (Cortland Woodard), who happens to own his own vehicle, and his partner, Nikki (Nikki Howell), and it's not long until they end up near the titular barn, a cursed place that houses three monsters. There's the boogeyman, Hollow Jack, and the candy corn scarecrow, and they soon set out to cause panic and death in town, much to the dismay of Sam and Josh.

Written and directed by Justin M. Seaman, The Barn is a typical debut feature, complete with pacing issues, an unsatisfying script, and good ideas threatened by poor execution. It's not Seaman's debut feature though. While there's an obvious love for the horror genre, the Halloween atmosphere, and spooky iconography, Seaman doesn't seem to know how to put everything together into a wholly satisfying package. He has an excellent vision for his central killer creations, but doesn't manage to write a plot that can sustain interest for even 3/4 of the runtime.

Musolino and Stout aren't great, but they're okay, and okay is better than we see in quite a lot of horror movies. Dripps is disappointingly underused (correct me if I'm wrong, she just seems to disappear before the third act gets going), while Woodard and Howell may as well come onscreen with badges that say "most likely to die in order to underline the deadly threat to our leads". There are cameos from both Linnea Quigley and Ari Lehman, with the former much more fun than the latter, and everyone else just wanders in and out of the screen, killing time until the time for killing begins.

Although numerous issues made it seem as if this film wouldn't ever be completed, Seaman managed to get there in the end, and deserves some praise for persevering. There's even a sequel released by now, and I know I'll get to it one day. I also know that a few horror fans will enjoy this more than I did, but I suspect many will share my view. Seaman tries hard to get some good stuff onscreen, up until a finale that seems as if he stopped trying altogether. Maybe the sequel greatly improves on things, but there's not enough here to make people rush to see it.

4/10

Wednesday, 6 September 2023

Prime Time: Greatest Days (2023)

A feature adaptation of a popular musical, originally titled "The Band", Greatest Days is all about female friendship, the moments that take you away from one another as you move from childhood to adulthood, and the music of Take That (with the band represented here by generic boyband types just collectively referred to as The Boys). You may already know whether or not you want to see it, but I hope this review might sway those undecided. It Only Takes A Minute or two to read.

Aisling Bea plays Rachel, a nurse who ends up stunned when she finds out that she's won a competition. The prize is a trip to Athens to see The Boys reunion concert live. She's allowed to take a number of friends with her, and she knows exactly who will want to enjoy the experience with her. But that means talking to them all again. It's been a long time since she spoke to those who used to be her firm childhood friends, and who shared her love of The Boys, but maybe it's time to reconnect and move beyond whatever made them so happy to lose touch with one another. Moving between the past and the present, we see how Rachel, Heather, Zoe, Claire, and Debbie once had their Greatest Days all planned out ahead of them. But something happened to take the Shine off things. Can the women relight their fire? Everything will be revealed by the third act, and viewers will just need a little Patience as the plot unfolds.

Written by Tim Firth (who wrote the stage musical and has helped write a few different highlights of British cinema, mainly Calendar Girls and Kinky Boots), Greatest Days is predictable and emotionally manipulative stuff, and I'm not saying that as a criticism. Once you get used to the style of the film, the leads often slip into fantasy sequences in which The Boys sing and dance around them to help them escape their more depressing thoughts, it's easy to enjoy the characters, the dialogue, and the songs. Because, like them or not, Take That have a good selection of songs that people of a certain age will always have seared into their brains.

Director Coky Giedroyc has a large number of TV credits to her name, but she's no stranger to feature films. She does an excellent job here, having fun with the warmth and camaraderie of the characters, as well as nicely juxtaposing the song and dance moments with the more mundane reality being interrupted. There's a sprinkling of something special over the whole thing (Could It Be Magic?), helped by a winning cast who all seem to enjoy interacting with one another, even when the characters aren't staying on friendly terms.

The younger cast members have the better moments, helped by the fact that they aren't weighed down by the problems and responsibilities of adulthood, but there's no weak link in the chain. Bea and Lara McDonnell take on the lead role, the latter a highlight as the younger incarnation of the former, but Alice Lowe, Jayde Adams, Amaka Okafor, Carragon Guest, Nandi Hudson, Eliza Dobson, and Jessie Mae Alonzo are equally well-suited to their roles. Despite the film being focused on women, and the stronger bonds and strains of female friendship, it's a pleasant surprise that Marc Wootton gets to play arguably one of the nicest movie boyfriends ever. He makes a couple of mistakes, but generally tries to do what he thinks is best for the woman he loves, and it may be the first time I have actually liked Wootton onscreen for the entire duration of one particular performance.

I had heard some good reviews of this already, and I am always willing to watch Alice Lowe in anything, but this was much better than I expected it to be. I laughed, I was tapping my toes along to the tunes, and I even shed a tear or two before the end credits rolled. If I convince anyone to give this a try, and if they react as I did, then I only hope that they Never Forget where they get the best movie recommendations.

7/10

Tuesday, 5 September 2023

Cruel Jaws (1995)

It's amazing to me that it took me until now to actually watch Cruel Jaws, but it's also not quite true. Because I had seen Cruel Jaws many times before now. It just wasn't called Cruel Jaws. It was called Jaws. And Jaws 2.

Infamous, and rightly so, Cruel Jaws is a film from director Bruno Mattei that basically rips off Jaws for almost every minute of the runtime. Every main plot beat feels familiar, even if it's moved around to laughingly make it seem less like an exact copy (e.g. the girl heading into the water at night while a guy is unable to keep up with here . . . that happens here, but it isn't the opening sequence). And if it's not taken from either of the first two Jaws movies then it's taken from the source novel. Mattei may have a writing credit, alongside Robert Feen and Linda Morrison, but it's really Peter Benchley who should be named as the main creator here. Whether or not he would want to be is a different matter.

I'm not going to mention the plot. It's pretty much the plot of Jaws. Seriously. The whole thing is very familiar, which makes it somehow more endearing and goofy than it otherwise might have been, and the scenes that most closely rework the iconic Jaws moments tend to be the scenes that feel the most fun. If there's one thing to say about Cruel Jaws, it's fun.

As for the cast, Richard Dew and Gregg Hood are two leads (the former an aquarium owner, the latter a fish expert), there's a wheelchair-bound girl named Susy (played by Kristen Urso) who is one of the most irritating wheelchair-bound characters, and one of the most irritating children, I have ever seen in a film, and other main characters are played by Scott Silveria, Richard Dew, Norma J. Nesheim, and, of course, a large fake shark. None of them are great, but they're all impressively ready to emulate famous moments from Jaws (my personal favourite being the scene in which a shark is caught and Hood's fish expert character argues that it might not be the same shark they're after . . . and there's only one way to be sure).

It seems unfair to give Mattei any praise for his direction so I won't. He spent a large part of his career making Italian rip-offs of successful American movies and I don't think many people would ever rush to celebrate him as a great auteur. He does deliver something unforgettable though, even if it's in the form of a cinematic collage of other movie moments, and I know a lot of movie fans who will enjoy this film as much as I did, as long as they're already aware of its reputation.

I've already spent more time on this review than the credited writers spent working on the script. There's nothing else I can say that hasn't been said already, although I will remind anyone about to watch this to keep their ears open for the part of the music score that seems ready to deliver the full Star Wars theme. Hey, why stop at pilfering dialogue and movie moments if you can also use a ready-made bit of memorable music to soundtrack things?

Awful . . . but also kind of brilliant.

5/10

Monday, 4 September 2023

Mubi Monday: Incredible But True (2022)

There are certain words you could use to describe writer-director Quentin Dupieux. Unoriginal isn't one of them. Nor is mundane. This is a man who has given us a movie about a sentient rubber tyre (the quite superb Rubber), a coveted deerskin jacket (Deerskin), a giant fly that others want to exploit (Mandibles), and other very odd central ideas. I still have so many of his movies to watch, and each one I finally get to just reminds me that I should prioritise his entire filmography.

Incredible But True is all about a married couple, Alain (Alain Chabat) and Marie (Léa Drucker), who are looking to buy a new home. Although unsure about the latest place they are viewing, their opinions change when they are shown an unbelievable Unique Selling Point. The house has what looks to be a ladder-accessed basement that actually takes people 12 hours into the future while reversing the ageing process by a few days. That might be enough weirdness for one movie, but there's more. It turns out that Alain's boss, Gérard (Benoît Magimel), has had his manhood replaced with a piece of impressive technology that can do everything you'd expect it to do, plus a bit more. Gérard's partner, Jeanne (Anaïs Demoustier), is very happy, but Gérard starts to fret when he feels that neither Alain nor Marie were as impressed by his revelation as he expected them to be.

Like every other film from Dupieux, the emphasis here is on the ideas beating at the heart of the movie, ideas that have much more intelligence and depth than any plot summary might signify. The writing and direction are good enough to convey the bizarre plotting, but Dupieux also knows exactly where he is taking viewers. Viewers may not necessarily realise that there's a point to it all, and they may wonder where it will all end, but Dupieux is an assured helmer, and he uses the film to explore themes of vanity, mortality, and, well, the pros and cons of having a robo-penis fitted (okay, that's the vanity again, but I wanted to write the term "robo-penis").

Chabat and Drucker do very good work in their lead roles, playing everything as straight as they have to while things start to get stranger and stranger. Magimel and Demoustier, on the other hand, get to overact slightly and lean more into the comedy of their strange predicament. One or two others move in and out of the frame, just enough to remind us that this is an unreal tale taking place in a reality akin to our own, and everyone is well-served by Dupieux's direction.

I suspect that I say this every time I review a Quentin Dupieux movie, but those who are familiar with his work will already know whether or not they want to explore more of his filmography. For those who do, like myself, then it's full of constant surprises and delight. For those who don't, well, I doubt there's any one feature that could change your mind. Incredible But True is perfectly in line with everything else he's done. I loved it.

8/10

Sunday, 3 September 2023

Netflix And Chill: Hidden Strike (2023)

What a combination we have here. The director of Need For Speed and the writer of Grace Of Monaco, working together to deliver an action comedy that pairs Jackie Chan with John Cena. What could possibly go wrong?

If you're assuming that my opening paragraph is dripping with sarcasm then you'd be right. Not that I want you to think that Hidden Strike is a complete waste of time. It's just that, knowing the people behind the camera, I can see why it feels like such an odd feature.

If I summarised the plot of Hidden Strike then I suspect it would make the whole thing sound either too complicated or too dull. Basically, John Cena plays someone who ends up working alongside Jackie Chan to take on an oil-thieving villain (Pilou Asbæk) in the desert environments of Iraq. Obvioiusly, Cena and Chan don't immediately trust one another, but their friendship grows as they work together against increasingly growing odds of mission success.

The second half of Hidden Strike is quite good. There are some enjoyable fights, although nothing comes close to the prime Jackie Chan work of yesteryear, and occasional moments in which the leads work well together. You have to get through the first half though, and that's a bit of a slog. There's a big action set-piece that takes place in an artificially-created sandstorm that isn't as thrilling or impressive as it should be, and the script isn't witty enough to help viewers warm naturally to Cena's character from the beginning. The lack of wit, or lack of great wit, remains a problem throughout the whole film, but it's easier to overlook when Cena and Chan are complementing one another in the busier fight sequences of the second half.

Aside from our leads, Asbæk is good value as the baddie. That's a relief, especially with nobody else making much of an impression. Chunrui Ma and Wenli Jiang are the two main females, both there to serve a script that wastes their presence, and everyone else is onscreen to be a generic fighter or placed in jeopardy. Okay, you get one other "boss level" opponent, but that is it.

Arash Amel's script seems to think that viewers will want time spent alongside Cena trying to be funny (emphasis on the word "trying" there). This isn't the right approach, but nobody figured out how to improve the material. Scott Waugh's direction is competent enough, even when making use of some wildly varying CGI, but nobody here is at their best.

Fans of Jackie Chan will already have a dozen films they know they can rewatch ahead of this, but it's worth noting that this IS a film boosted by his presence. He may not get to deliver the kind of hijinks he used to, due to a flat script, as well as his advanced age (the man is one year away from turning 70), but he is still an undeniable star when given even the briefest opportunity to shine. It's because of Chan that I didn't hate this, but almost everything else here ensured that I didn't love it either.

5/10

Saturday, 2 September 2023

Shudder Saturday: Eyes Of Fire (1983)

While it could be said that Eyes Of Fire didn't exactly set the world of cinema alight when it was first released, this American folk horror has now been rediscovered and reappraised by those with a preference for that particular sub-genre. That is thanks in no small part to the work of Kier-La Jannise and anyone else who worked on the impressive "All The Haunts Be Ours" boxset, released a couple of years ago by Severin Films. I own that boxset, but I have yet to make the time to fully dive into it. Seeing Eyes Of Fire was on Shudder, however, gave me a small kick up the backside to at least make a start through something I rushed to purchase.

The year is 1750, the place is the American Frontier. Dennis Lipscomb plays a preacher named Will Smythe, using his position to cavort with a couple of women. This doesn't go down too well with other members of the settlement, leading to Will and a number of followers leaving to find a new home elsewhere. While figuring out the best place to resettle, the group are attacked by Native Americans, and eventually stumble into a valley that they realise their attackers won't enter. That seems good, but there's obviously a reason why the Native Americans don't want to go near the place. While this is all happening, one female member of the group (Leah, played by Karlene Crockett) is working to develop her witchcraft, protecting those around her and seeing the truth about the valley they find themselves in.

An astonishing feature debut from writer-director Avery Crounse (who followed this with, ummmm, The Invisible Kid five years later), Eyes Of Fire is a perfect mix of grounded dangers and imagery pulled directly from dark fairytales and folklore. The artwork, the cinematography, the makeup (rarely have I wanted to spend so much time praising makeup artists, the work here is phenomenal), and even the music (by Brad Fiedel, who kept himself very busy before delivering some of his best work over the next few years) all combine to great effect. I may be preaching to the converted here, no pun intended, but this film feels as impressively unsettling today as it would have felt when first released.

The performances are impressively odd, and I don't mean that as a criticism. The people onscreen are almost constantly veering close to, if not staying in, a fugue state, taken there by manipulation or fear, or both, and everyone manages to convey that perfectly. Lipscomb excels in the kind of role you could easily imagine being perfectly-suited to a prime Jeffrey Combs, Crockett gets to enjoy being dismissed as insane by those around her, giving her time and space to stay ahead of whatever danger may be heading their way, and Rebecca Stanley, Sally Klein, and Guy Boyd play the other key figures who have their fates intertwined with that of the preacher.

The framing device - the story is narrated by characters shown in scenes that bookend the main part of the plot - is a slight mis-step, and the first act is weaker in comparison to everything that comes along after it, but there isn't anything else here that I would single out for criticism. Crounse may have only written and directed three feature films, but at least one of them is very close to being a masterpiece.

9/10

Friday, 1 September 2023

Gunpowder Milkshake (2021)

The first feature directed by Navot Papushado without sharing those duties with Aharon Keshales( the two made quite an impact with their first two films, Rabies and Big Bad Wolves), Gunpowder Milkshake is a well-paced and fairly enjoyable action movie that boasts an excellent cast and some fun fights. It suffers in comparison to many other films that have been released in recent years though, ending up as something ultimately too insubstantial to be anything more than disposable fun.

Karen Gillan is Sam, a talented assassin who, as so often happens, ends up becoming a target when a job goes slightly awry. We find this out after watching some backstory showing us that her mother (Lena Headey) was an equal shining star in the same profession. Sam ends up looking after a young girl (Emily, played by Chloe Coleman), and she needs to enlist some help, in the form of weaponry and more assassins, to have even half a chance of staying alive for more beyond the next 24 hours.

I like pretty much everyone in this film. I'm saying that now because I think that's why I ended up liking this as much as I did, despite the clunky editing and ridiculousness undermining most of the set-pieces. Gillan is good in the lead role, and she looks capable enough while fighting off numerous enemies. Headey is equally talented, and the fact that she's never been given a lead film role worthy of her considerable talent is always bemusing to me. I would have been happy enough if Gillan and Headey were the two characters kicking ass here, but they're joined, albeit all-too-briefly, by Carla Gugino, Angela Bassett, and Michelle Yeoh. That's a hell of a selection of badass women, which boosts the movie, but also makes things slightly disappointing when sequences don't feel planned around their star power. Michael Smiley is fun in his supporting role, and Paul Giamatti adds another entertaining baddie to his rogue's gallery of villainous characters. Coleman just has to look young, cute, and vulnerable, and she does that perfectly well.

Having spent that much time listing, and praising, the cast, it's a shame that I can't find a lot of positives elsewhere. Papushado's direction is disappointingly straightforward, and the script, co-written by Papushado and Ehud Lavski, feels a bit too lacking in confidence (it's unsurprising to see this as a first feature from Lavski). The violence never seems truly threatening and the quirky comedy is clumsily shoehorned in, making you wish that the film would either ramp up the action or strive for more comedy, as opposed to positioning itself awkwardly between the two.

Technically, everything else is fine. Not great, not awful. Just fine. Nicholas De Toth may not do his best editing work, but it's in line with standard action movies that don't have the choreography and fluidity of the recent high points of the genre, and there's decent enough production design, music, etc. to keep everything simple, clear, and moving along at a good pace to make the 114-minute runtime go by quickly enough. Ironically, considering the two movies share Giamatti in a bad guy role, this might pair up nicely with the whackier Shoot 'Em Up. That film had the confidence to revel in some moments of inspired lunacy, however. This film, with one brilliant highlight that stands out as notable exception, doesn't.

6/10