Category: movie-reviews

With almost twenty academy award nominations to her name, Meryl Streep is once again in Oscar territory again with a film about a woman struggling with a particular defect in her abilities who also happened to exist and have a posh accent. Oscar breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Florence Foster Jenkins tells the story of a socialite of New York of the same name who had dreams of becoming a singer. With the help of her husband, she was able to become an enormous hit. The only trouble was that she couldn’t sing.

When I say that she couldn’t sing, don’t just take my word for it. Foster Jenkins was quite possibly the most famous bad singer of all time. And yet famous she was. For reasons ranging from possible bribery to the fact that people just loved to ridicule her, tickets to see her perform were in enormous demand.

Enough about the truth for now, let’s talk about the art.

The highlight to this film are the performances. Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant steal the show as Florence and her husband St Clair Bayfield.

Streep, of course, is brilliant. As someone who can actually sing well, she can perfectly capture singing badly. And I mean on purpose, not like when she completely destroyed The “Winner Takes it All” in Mamma Mia.

The build up to the first scene in which she sings is utterly perfect. I already knew what was coming as I’d heard about Jenkins before this movie, but the laws of comic reveals dictate to the audience that all the talk of her being a great performer may consist of a lot more hot-air than she might think.

When the scene finally does happen, I was properly snickering. I don’t even do that sort of laugh in movies. I was feeling a little guilty as I almost felt part of the moment, in a room with an old woman giving her all and in a delusion of brilliance, but failing at a catastrophic level.

Hugh Grant as Bayfield gives the best performance I’ve seen from him. He still does his overly polite British stereotype routine, but it is touched with an imperfection that you rarely see in the characters he most often plays.

This film, I’d say should feature in a double-bill with The King’s Speech. Both meld comedic and tear-producing scenes with pretty much flawless energy. Both are pretty much perfect, though obvious Oscar bait and completely unchallenging.

It is definitely a good film. Like I said I did laugh when it was trying to be funny and call me an old sop but I did end up crying on a few occasions. Whether certain private details about the story were indeed wholly accurate is something I cannot prove. History, of course, is something to be put in textbooks while film is where you put drama and this is a really good little drama.

However, there is something that has been niggling at me since I saw this movie, but if I write about it, I’ll risk some spoilers. So in order to go into it I’m going to have a “spoiler-section”.

<BEGINNING OF SPOILER SECTION HIGHLIGHT THE AREA BELOW>

Florence performs at a concert at Carnegie hall, giving away 1000 tickets to the soldiers who have been fighting in the Second World War which is still raging.

Of course when she starts to sing, the soldiers, being already inebriated, begin to jeer before being put in their place in very Hollywood style.

The problem I have, and this is might well be a personal thing, is that the soldiers, the boys that Jenkins is constantly praising throughout the film, are portrayed uncomplicatedly as rowdy monsters.

I’m perfectly fine with them being rowdy, after all these are young men on leave trying to have a good time, but it would have been fitting to have at least one of them, perhaps a wounded Private offer some appreciation to Jenkins. I mean, we’re already in Hollywood cheese country, so why not?

They do have a scene where an Officer thanks her for the tickets, but I just don’t think it was respectful enough to the soldiers.

<END OF SPOILER SECTION>

Despite any small niggles, this is a genuinely good movie and I really think it deserves a viewing.

There was a fascinating video released by John Green on the vlogbrothers YouTube channel discussing FFJ. In it he discussed what it means when someone is famous for being terrible at what they are passionate about. He concluded that in a bizarre way Jenkins is an inspirational figure to all of us summarising the whole thing through the now famous quote from the amateur opera star:

“They may say that I couldn’t sing, but nobody can say that I didn’t sing.”

Recommended Scenario: When you want an Oscar bait film, that is good, outside of Oscar season.

After my glowing review of Civil War, Disney appears to be able to do no wrong. Well let’s see if that’s true with their latest live-action remake.

The Jungle Book, is a remake of the classic Disney film (the last Walt actually had a hand in) which was in turn an adaptation of the works of Rudyard Kipling. It is the tale of a human boy called Mowgli who lives in the jungle.

 

Let’s get this straight, this is a remake of the Disney movie. One cannot pull the old True Grit re-adaptation of original source material argument. Practically every element of this film is taken from the cartoon, with alterations, of course.

A major alteration from the original is its overall theme. The original was pretty much set in the idea from beginning to end that Mowgli’s place was with his own kind in the “man-village”.

Since the sixties, cultural forces have made us consider the possibility, at least in the fantastical world Kipling created, that even with all the obvious dangers, more prevalent and scary in this version, of the jungle, in a way, Darwin’s harsh laws apply even more in the communities of man.

This logic may or may not hold up to us, but at least in this movie, which is told through the eyes of an animal, it holds up surprisingly well.

Speaking of how this story is told, Bagheera, the panther who watches over Mowgli, is, like he was in the other film, the narrator. I do understand where the filmmakers were coming from with the decision to include narration, particularly since it comes from Sir Ben Kingsley and this is the Jungle Book, but I feel it could have been cut in favour of visual exposition.

What has been cut is the idea of this being a musical. Don’t worry, those two insufferably brilliant songs which make you remember the original still remain. The other ones, with the exception of “Trust in Me” (sung by Scarlett Johansson, the new voice of Ka) which is added as a second end-credits song, are completely gone.

This was both a good and a bad decision. Good because hardly anyone actually remembers any of those cut songs and this movie becomes more streamlined without them. For one thing, the Elephants which formed a poor Dad’s Army routine in the other movie are dignified and grand in this one thanks to the fact that they shut their blooming mouths!

On the other hand, when the two songs do show their faces we are reminded with a veritable Klaxon that this is indeed a remake. I was able to tolerate Baloo’s “Bear Necessities” because:

1) It’s a great song.

2) It was able to blend relatively well into the situation in which it was placed.

3) Bill Murray kills it as singer and actor.

However, when Christopher Walken, who is perfectly cast as an enormous and scary, Col. Kurtz like version of King Louie, starts singing (pretty well) part way through a dramatic sentence, it is distracting beyond belief. What’s worse is that he is sitting down while singing the small portion he does sing, making it just really, really awkward.

Moan, moan, moan. What did I like about this film? Actually a few things popped out and not just the excellent 3D.

Firstly, the casting is sublime. From the trailer, when I first heard the animals’ voices, I knew that each of those characters were MADE for their celebrity performers.

Mowgli is played by newcomer Neel Sethi and this kid is going places. He brings this character, who was dumb to an astonishing degree in the original movie to a strong, smart and yet not unrelatable re-interpretation.

Shere Khan, the baddie tiger, is played amicably by Idris Elba. While the original portrayal was on par with Disney’s history of often effeminate and possibly homophobic villains, Elba plays this character with some menace. Khan’s motivation is explained a little too much, I feel, and it’s a bit too specific, but I’ll let that slide. The effect is the same. He hates man. Mowgli is man. He wants Mowgli dead.

The main thing though, the thing that almost makes be able to forgive everything else in this movie, is the way it looks. Every animal is photo-realistic and totally convincing as a character. The jungle looks awesome, particularly in 3D. Mowgli is able to sit in a tree next to a fake Bagheera and a fake Baloo and the uncanny valley is traversed with ease.

Now, one can say that if you’re looking for realism, the cartoon has you covered as the immersion into animation he medium provides let’s all elements be equally and 100% real to the audience.

While I do subscribe to that belief, all I can say is that I walked away from the 2016 Disney version of The Jungle Book with a couple of tunes in my head, a couple of things annoying me (which I have mentioned) and a relatively satisfied feeling of having just been on a Disney ride.

Overall, a good job. Now I’m just going to have to wait till 2018 for Andy Serkis’ version of this movie!

Recommended Scenario: If you want an immersive jungle adventure and Uncharted 4 is too expensive.

Once again I am the victim of harsh, continuity based, circumstances. Since my Avengers: Age of Ultron review last year, I have not made much of an attempt to watch more of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I can make the excuse that this makes me unique amongst those who review this film, but either way, thanks to the internet throwing information in my face, I wasn’t lost really. On with the review.

Captain America: Civil War is a continuation of and possible conclusion to the Captain America saga. Cap and Iron Man have a disagreement over a government action to restrict superheroes in their activities, due to extensive and obvious collateral damage.

If that sounds like a familiar plot summation, then it should. It is obvious even from the poster that this film is in direct competition with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, in the niche two-superheroes-differ-over-their-opinions-as-to-their-responsibilities-to-reduce-the-levels-of-mayhem-they-cause-while-superheroing genre.

I recently re-watched BvS out of curiosity to see whether a second viewing might change my perspective on that film. Upon much reflection, my level of tolerance for that film has dropped significantly. The elements are there for a great movie, the execution unfortunately was unfocused, rushed and cynical to a quite literally comic degree. Upon a second inspection, those parts become far more apparent. Cool in a purely superficial manner.

So it’s down to this film to recover the superhero genre back to the way I thought of it a few weeks ago when I reviewed Deadpool. Thankfully it does so, and some.

Robert Downey Jr returns as Iron Man and Chris Evans returns as Captain America. They along with the rest of this literally marvellous cast are perfectly suited to their roles and appear to have a deep understanding of what makes their characters tick.

Unlike in that other hero-fight film I mentioned, what’s awesome about this film is that we understand both sides of the argument entirely. Whether you end up becoming #TeamCap or #TeamIronMan you will at least be able to see whether the other guy is coming from.

On either side of this fight are superheroes with understandable goals and reasons to pick their sides. On top of that, they are all incredibly likable and often utterly hilarious. And yet, and this is the bit that really makes my jaw drop, the film is perfectly balanced in terms of screen-time and weight. (But seriously, when is the Black Widow movie coming out?!)

(By the way, those keeping up with the marketing will note a particular face among these guys who makes his “surprise” entrance in this movie into the MCU. Rest assured this version of the guy is fantastic. I’m withholding full judgement until they stand in their own movie again, but this little guy is going places. Funny, charming and kickass, this guy has the potential to the best there’s ever been in this role!)

What is really interesting in this film is that for all the fighting between the good guys, there is barely a moment in which they fight a bad-guy. Not only does this extend their opportunities for creative demonstrations of kicking ass and clever quips (which they do and it really is awesome), but it adds to the drama of the situation. Drama is based on conflict and conflict between friends is conflict between you, your friend and yourself. That’s 50% more conflict before you get onto actually making the conflicts make sense (which is more than I can say for some movies <cough cough>).

Like I said at the start of this review, I was never lost while watching this film. I knew who each of the characters were and their motivations. I didn’t know the entirety of their backstories, understandably, but I’m pretty sure that for the most part, people will be able to watch this film standing alone. Though of course, for the full experience enjoyed by the more learned amongst the midnight screening I watched this with, I would highly suggest watching the previous films in the MCU.

This is the most perfect superhero film I have seen since The Dark Knight. The Marvel Cinematic and Televisual Universe, according to a recent calculation I found online, is around 127 hours. While that would be an enormous undertaking and not every part of that is considered “essential” by the fans, this movie seriously makes me consider taking a stab at it. Certainly better than some other things I can stab associated with 127 Hours. (Little movie reference to end on.)

Recommended Scenario: If you’ve seen Captain America 1 & 2, Avengers 1 & 2, Ant-Man. But if you’re and ignoramus like me and your friends invite you to see it, don’t turn them down.

This movie is supposedly based on real events. I’m guessing that statement is as awash with veracity as if it applied to Shrek.

Bastille Day, named after the French national holiday in commemoration of the storming of the Bastille (a big Parisian prison) in 1789 essentially starting the French Revolution, is an American action-thriller starring Idris Elba as a CIA agent trying to thwart a terror threat in Paris with the aid of a pick-pocket who has managed to get stuck in the middle of it.

I have to immediately praise this film for some aspects of the way it’s directed. Like other action films of recent years, there is of course plenty of shaky-cam (when the camera is shaken to add intensity to a scene) but it is never overused, which is more than I can say for most other films of this type.

I also couldn’t go without giving some props to Richard Madden, the guy who plays the pick-pocket I mentioned at the beginning of this film, whose character could so easily have been incredibly unlikable throughout this film, due to flaws in the way he is written, but he does a pretty good job with the material.

Unfortunately, however, there isn’t much else to praise to that level in the film. It’s a pretty standard thriller romp, with some pretty good action sequences and some actually rather nice comedy.

The only thing I had I hopes for in this film was Idris Elba, who I know to be a great actor and the pinnacle of cool. Sadly, while he does a good “grizzled agent” performance, the decision to have this film centred around the CIA rather than MI6 works to the detriment of this whole film as we have to hear his attempt at an American accent.

A brief aside, often I can’t figure out whether an actor is doing a bad accent because I’m used to their original voice coming out of them or whether they are just bad at the accent. Either way, I couldn’t take this film’s protagonist, Briar or Bryar (I’m not looking it up), seriously.

Taking itself seriously is not really this film’s priority I feel, however. This is a 90 minute film in which some seriously silly plot-conveniences could have been avoided to cut 20 minutes off of it. Heck, a man is able to escape an interrogation room, simply because the door was unlocked!

To call this film silly might put you in mind of Olympus Has Fallen or this film’s real name-sake Independence Day, but this film’s tone is more along the line of Die Hard, but with considerably less skill in its execution or charm. Some not so good writing and clichéd storytelling comes in bounds here.

Alright, now I’m going to address the elephant in the room. This is a supposedly true story about an attempt by the CIA to thwart a terrorist attack, of all places, in Paris.

I’m in no doubt that the recent tragic events in France’s capital influenced at least some of the filmmakers involved in this project to be involved or inspired the creators.

I’m not going to be the guy who says you can’t make art about something current and I honestly believe the concept of “too soon” is extremely subjective. I also don’t mind it when an artist makes art that falls under the not-so-serious genres which covers something current and/or controversial, see Django Unchained.

Don’t expect a rant about this from me, I just think that some people might cross their legs through the runtime of this film. The only political message this film seems to spread is “France’s government might not totally be blameless in this whole terrible situation and America is great”. Two messages which are not nothing, but two messages we have heard before from pretty much every action movie set in Europe ever made. I just feel it’s luke warm.

That’s about it. This film’s not great, not even that good. But not bad.

Recommended Scenario: If you want a reasonable action film this year.

Midnight Special is a sci-fi film about a father trying to protect his son from the U.S Government, a strange cult and a former electrician. Why do those people want this eight year old kid? Because, like every child character in the history of cinema, he has weird supernatural abilities.

I have a feeling that this is going to be a shorter review than some of my other recent reviews. This is partly because I generally find more to talk about when reviewing a movie I didn’t care for rather than one I did, but also because there’s little I’m willing to say about this pretty good movie since any more would contain spoilers.

This is a film thriving on the mystery. One could easily think of this as an extended episode of The X-Files or The Twilight Zone. I appreciate in a time where we get 2 hours of one act and about 30 minutes of stuff happening (cough, cough Batman v Superman), that this film pretty much starts where you’d expect any other writer to start this film’s second act.

We are already in the process of following this escaped kid and his father escorting him to safety. The involved characters are introduced to us in an organic way that weaves its way pretty nicely through the plot. I know who each of these people are and what they want at a good pace. On top of that, the mystery’s solution is trickled This is pretty darn good screenwriting.

The father in this story is by Michael Shannon and the son by . Both play these roles with deft skill, getting across the love and respect they have for one another in a relatively short amount of time.  also impressed me for his ability to balance the “powered kid” cliché with actually acting like a kid. He feels definitely more like Haley Joel Osmond from The Sixth Sense by his terrific director rather than whatever those kids from Signs were being told to do by their talentless hack.

If I were to mark any flaw in this film is that there are a couple of moments, particularly those close to the end, that I feel could have been cut. This problem extends at certain points to the strangely elongated feel to some of the reactions. Maybe, I’m wrong about that latter point and just need to go to another screening. The former complaint I feel strong in its founding.

Overall, however this is a fine little science fiction yarn with plenty of mystery and wonder in a small place and surrounding a small boy.

Recommended Scenario: If you’re into small-scale science fiction.

Some of the best magic tricks are when you know what it took to pull off the illusion but you still have no idea how it was done. Victoria, directed by Sebastian Schipper, is one of those.

It tells the story of a young woman from Madrid on a night out in Berlin. Upon leaving the club, she meets a group of Berliner men who “show her the real Berlin”, eventually involving her in a bank robbery. Oh, and this is done in ONE TWO-HOUR LONG TAKE.

There is a sense that there is some one-upmanship in cinematographic circles at the moment. Your film has a three-minute unbroken take of a guy going into a club (Goodfellas), well ours stages an entire conversation for 17 minutes with no movement (Hunger).

With a digital filmmaking revolution, it was only a matter of time before someone would pick up where even Alfred Hitchcock failed in Rope and make a movie that appears to be shot in one take, last year’s Bird man being a perfect example, with the exception of a couple of scene transitions.

The most major example of what this film attempts to pull off is Alexander Sokurov’s masterpiece Russian Ark, which I believe should go on the watch list of all film students.

Both films are full length motion pictures done in one continuous shot. Both took three attempts to get right. Both are technical marvels.

There are notable differences between Victoria and Russian Ark which allow it to be placed in as high regard in cinematic history. While Ark is simply a tour of a museum and through Russian history (which became so beautiful at times that I genuinely wept) this is a more traditional movie. Think Reservoir Dogs, The Town or any other heist movie and you could put it there. Like all great technical tropes, the one-shot style is a means of telling the story rather than just showing off, though no doubt this is definitely a show off as well.

The first half hour of this movie introduces us to the titular Spanish woman on her night out and to the men that she has a fateful encounter with. Laia Costa plays Victoria and she is a revelation. We know everything we need to through her mostly improvised dialogue. On top of that the character she reveals is not one I would have expected to be in this position. I would have expected her to be more passive and victimised by the situation she eventually finds herself in, but Costa and the narrative that the filmmakers have given her shows her to be a far stronger and more interesting character than first appearances suggest.

The entire cast deserves serious kudos. I mentioned that dialogue was improvised through this movie, which is understandable since Schipper couldn’t exactly get them to go for another take every time they messed something up. It is often said that theatre is an actor’s medium while cinema is a director’s medium. A movie like this blurs those lines.

Through the 138 minutes that the camera rolls, we hear every line through sound design and editing so good it boggles my mind, and through each one we learn more about the characters and care about them more. I felt like I was among them, unable to leave them and not wanting to.

The fact that the story remains as tight as a one act play is a marvel in itself, though I will admit to finding some elements of the plot to be implausible. I will not state what those elements were, should I spoil the movie for some, but they certainly didn’t for me.

On the whole, this is an excellent movie. I can’t say that I would put it amongst the very best movies of all time, but I would put it amongst the most important technical achievements. And what’s more of an achievement is that it goes beyond an exercise of technique and becomes a highly effective human drama, amplified by astonishing technical skill.

Recommended Scenario: Whether you’re a technophile or a lover of good drama, you’ll find something in this movie.

NOTE: I must give a health and safety warning about this film. There is some severe strobing at the beginning of this movie which may affect some viewers negatively and unlike Russian Ark which glided through corridors on a smooth steadycam, this camera is quite shaky and that may be an issue for some of you.

Is that seriously what they’re calling it? Yeah, I’ve still not stopped saying it. That is a title written by an 11 year old. In a bad way. I mean either they didn’t read it out loud or they are grasping at straws to prove that they’re serious about making Justice League.

Before I go into full “internet-backlasher” mode, let’s look at what this movie is. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, follows on from 2013’s Man of Steel with the story of how that steel man, met Gotham’s Dark Knight and got into a fight. Something that I have been wanting to see for a long, long time and those properly into comics, a lot longer.

With this film being announced back in distant 2014, we have all had a lot of time to speculate and pre-criticise. My family made the excellent point that the very title brings us images of the That Mitchell & Webb Look sketch, Angel Summoner & BMX Bandit, in which two superheroes of those respective names try to co-exist as a crime-fighting duo, yet find a challenge in keeping the latter relevant when the former can “summon a hoard of celestial super-beings”.

Such jokes have been circulating for years, ever since the comic industry, particularly the super-hero sub-genre, first made demands to be taken seriously, with the release of Alan Moore’s masterpiece Watchmen, in the 1980s. The rest of our culture, found it difficult to get past the very clear logical flaw in having Superman, an alien who is basically Hercules with laser-eyes (which would have made taking on the Hydra a little easier, no doubt), either collaborate or fight the insane billionaire genius Batman.

So, the very basic idea, to those unfamiliar with the comics and their glorification of Batman and his American Dream “mortal who becomes more” idea (even though Bruce Wayne is still a man who inherited much of his fortune and thus is less representative of the common man than he is of the current ruling classes), Batman v Superman sounds silly beyond belief.

Well, I can say with confidence that this movie does actually make it make sense. Not only does Batman’s ability to go toe-to-toe with the Man of Steel make sense, the opening few scenes and some of the more philosophical moments later in the runtime, give us a dark and convincing reason why the Dark Knight would find the presence of this Kryptonian Boy Scout in red and blue, offensive to his very core.

What is less well-explained is some of Superman’s hatred for the Bat and why I should wholly sympathise with Supes. This guy often comes across as a vandal who cares only for himself or those he’s already met. We are given a brief montage of him doing good deeds, but not enough for me to think he is anything other than something Batman should probably beat a lesson into.

I suppose that the audience is supposed to sympathise with him because he’s Superman. We’ve had 80 years and 6 major live-action films to get to like this guy. Trouble is, I have never liked him. While I have gotten used to the idea of a hero with near-unlimited power (which I used to think made him more boring, but I feel now gives him simply another way the guy can be complex), we more often than not get someone who irresponsibly causes problems than solves them.
Let me put it this way, while everyone says that “Superman doesn’t kill people”, I have never once heard him explicitly state that as a rule, not even after snapping Zod’s neck at the end of Man of Steel. And the death toll climbs.

What’s good though about this, is that we have an excellent cause to sympathise with Ben Affleck as the new Batman. Despite the whines of the Internet, the man is an excellent protector of Gotham. Given more time in his own movies, I feel that he can prove himself to be possibly, dare I say it, the best actor to don the cape and cowl I’ve ever seen! (Except Kevin Conroy and Adam West, because they were and continue to be perfect!)

Speaking of casting, it’s all pretty solid. Henry Cavill, though his character lacks literally any fun or camp that the great Christopher Reeve bestowed unto him, does make a convincing Demi-God. Maybe he’s a little too good. Affleck when playing Bruce Wayne, works in a little of that dumb playboy act that the character puts on to make him more invisible. Cavill as Clark Kent certainly puts on the glasses (which I’m so glad doesn’t stop Amy Adams’ Lois Lane from recognising him) but he never appears to play the nerd that Metropolis deserves. I suppose with a jaw-line like that, nobody can possibly direct him to be geeky.

I always thought that Jesse Eisenberg would make a good choice for Lex Luthor and I feel I was right. However, and I never thought I would say this, tone it down Jesse. I get that you’re trying to be awkward yet confident, but take a few more notes from yourself in The Social Network and a few less from Jared Leto in the new Suicide Squad trailer! Also, he should not be Lex Junior, just saying.

Zack Snyder is back as the director, having helmed Man of Steel. I think that Snyder definitely has some talent,, just look at 300 or Watchmen. For all those movies’ problems, of which there were more in the former than the latter, at least the style worked for the most part as it captured their source materials in a superb way.

However, these Superman films are dreadfully directed. The camera shakes in places it shouldn’t, the colours are all smudged all over the shop, reaction shots go on for way too long and the tone remains at Saving Private Ryan levels of sad. The action is really good, but you don’t have to zoom in and shake the camera in every dialogue scene. You’re not making a found-footage movie, you’re making Batman v Superman!

Once this expanded universe, which this movie, with hits and misses, sets up, gets into gear, it would be cool to see the vision of some other directors and cinematographers. What if Allejandro G. Inniritu took on a movie version of Teen Titans, or David Lynch did something at Arkham Asylum?! Long shot, but you never know! Heck, before Citizen Kane, Orson Welles wanted to make a The Phantom movie!

This movie currently sits at approximately 29% with critics on Rotten Tomatoes. While these aggregators should never be the basis of one’s assessment of a movie’s quality and are one of the signs of our world’s lack of interest in reading actual criticism and desire to place a number on something, this should act as an indication that it’s reception from the critical class has not been the warmest.

You know what? For all of Jesse Eisenberg’s occasional Mark Hamilising, Superman’s terrible actions, a dozen moments which make no sense and directional and writing decisions that genuinely made me turn around and ask what the hell I was watching, I think this movie’s pretty good.

There is some epicness about the fight between these two giants of pop-culture. Some of the philosophy involved is actually pretty thought-provoking, indicating at ideas that, with a little script polish could have elevated this flick into a proper classic.

If you hated this movie, I get it, I really do. However, if you will indulge me, I can’t deny that there were enough moments that made me smile at how cool it was that I can’t say that I feel entirely the same way.

Plus, this really isn’t the low-point of either of these film franchises. Not to sound like every other internet film commentator ever, but I didn’t see a single bat-nipple or Nuclear Man anywhere in sight!

Recommended Scenario: It doesn’t matter, you’re probably going to see this anyway. It’s Batman v Superman!

 This might be the weirdest film I’ve ever seen in a multiplex. That may be a reflection on my choices of films to review rather than anything else. I’m not going to argue that this is some Lynchian labyrinth or some dog from Andalusia, but this is one bizarre picture. (If you got both of those references, give yourself a pat on the back, you’re a true cinephile!)

Based on the J.G Ballard novel of the same name, this is a satirical near-fantastical movie about an area of Britain in an unknown period where there are high-rise flats which implement a social hierarchy which leads to life there being “prone to fits of mania, narcissism and power failure.”

When it comes to “artsy” films, with a lot of metaphor and hidden meanings, I believe that as long as the movie is at least competent, pretty much everyone in the cinema will broadly “get it”.

It’s pretty clear that this film is a satire on humanity’s desire to return to tribal warfare, even in a modern, polite era.
I feel, however, that there are layers to this film that would require whole articles of analysis, which would go into spoiler territory, which is entirely not my domain.

Before I get into the stuff that is a little more difficult to go over in this story, let’s look at the way this film is put together.
Tom Hiddleston is our lead, a doctor who lives in the high rise and wants to live a peaceful existence and yet gets tangled up in the mess of those around him. We have seen characters like this before in other near-fantastical stories about man’s base nature. He is us, looking into the abyss of other people’s depravity.

What’s great about this character, though, is that he is not entirely passive. We actually see him fall into the madness as well. What results is us empathising with those who get sucked in. We get sucked in. The madness is more real than originally thought.

Jeremy Irons plays the architect of the high rises. His involvement in the spreading of the ensuing anarchy becomes more ambiguous, though you cannot deny that the very creation of these towers were the seeds of chaos.

The stand-out performance for me comes from Luke Evans (you know, Bard from The Hobbit). He is the rebel. The representative of the lower floors who tries to fight his way to the top in the hopes of creating a more equal society.

It is not surprising to me that the book on which this film was based was written only a few years after the film adaptation of A Clockwork Orange was released. Evans’ character to me is very reminiscent of Alex from that book and film, doing some unspeakable things in the name of human freedom, but ultimately gaining our sympathy. Is his revolution in vain? Even after seeing the movie, you might not be so sure.

Another thing that struck me was the direction and editing of this film. A lot of POV shots, epic silences, slow motion, this feels like a big film. Certainly larger than the tall building in which it takes place. There is an understanding that the themes at play here go beyond the surroundings.

There is also an understanding that the audience doesn’t need much convincing that bad stuff is about to go down, evidenced by the editing. Much of the descent into madness after the turning point is portrayed through montage as the behemoth block of flats crashes in under the weight of the petty human beings residing therein. We don’t need to be spoon-fed this change.

Like I’ve said before, I would like to go deeper into this film, though I fear spoilers would be a result and of course, I have seen this movie only once.

As is evidence from this, I like this movie a great deal. It respects its audience and whether or not it is a faithful adaptation of the J.G Ballard novel that I’ve not yet read, I’m at least glad that we ended up with a film nuanced enough to follow in the footsteps of great British 70s speculative fiction.

Recommended Scenario: If you want to be depressed at the nature of the human animal while being thoroughly confused by it.

Ah the Coens. Two of my filmmaking icons. Let’s see if I can get beyond my rampant fanboy-ism of these brothers and deliver my first, totally unbiased review of a film they’ve directed.

Hail, Caesar! is their eagerly awaited latest project centred around the fictional Golden Age Hollywood studio Capitol Pictures in the 1950s and a “fixer” played by Josh Brolin, a fixer being basically the guy that solves problems facing the many movies being shot on the lot, whether they involve kidnappings, extra-marital pregnancies or even tap-dancing Channing Tatums!

I am a huge Coen brothers fan. Their writing, their subtle yet affecting direction which generally goes partnered with the wonderful cinematography of Roger Deakins, their characters and their bizarre stories feel like something just altogether wholesome as a film experience.

That style is here in full swing, though like with most of their best work, there is definitely a twist. Since this is a movie partially about the making of movies, we get a tantalising glimpse at what films of that era would look like if they were still to be made in the same style today.

The title refers to swords and sandals epic which is basically Ben-Hur with a couple of details changed and it is really cool to see George Clooney as this buffoonish parody of Charlton Heston. Clooney, in my opinion, makes a phenomenal idiot.

Josh Brolin as the fixer is definitely the centre of this film, within its cast of big names. His presence to me is proof that for all the nihilism you could accuse them from some of their previous works, the Coens have a love of the ordinary individual and a respect for the Spielbergianly whimsical.

The rest of the cast are excellent in their little Coeny roles. I define “Coeny” as an adjective describing a role small enough in overall effect of the story to be counted as small, but having an effortless charm that stays with you for far beyond their screen-time.

What’s interesting with this story is that it definitely has all the fingerprints of a Coen brothers piece while the well-rounded and relatively uncomplicated edges of Golden Age Hollywood have rubbed off on them.

While we do have oddball characters appearing and disappearing in bizarre ways and a mixture between the quite dark and the wholly light and good like most of their best stuff, when the film ends, you feel like it’s an ending to a movie rather than just a perfectly, though strangely placed full-stop. This is not selling out by going more mainstream, in my opinion, this is simply adapting to the setting they’ve provided themselves.

If I had one complaint, it would be a technical nit-pick. The Coens and Deakins are clearly replicating the direction, editing style and cinematography of films from the 1950s, particularly in sequences where we see those films being made, and it is nice to see Deakins returning to film stock. However, for those aforementioned sequences, it would have been pretty cool to see the film look like a little more like it was shot back then, perhaps with a little more grain or something.

But that’s the film nerd in me talking. All I can say is that this is the purest fun that I’ve had in a cinema so far this year. I love this little tribute to the pros and cons of old Hollywood. It’s funny, colourful, brilliantly written and, if you don’t mind me sounding like an old man, bounding with an energy you don’t see in films much these days.

Recommended Scenario: When you’re ready for a good time with a film by a couple of masters.