Category: Released in 2016

Wanna hear something crazy? One of the best actors of all time (and one of my icons), Viggo Mortensen, has not been in a film I’ve seen in a cinema since 2003 and The Return of the King. Well the King has returned once more!

Captain Fantastic is a dramatic comedy written & directed by Matt Ross. Viggo is Ben Cash, a man with a head full of philosophical unconventionality who raises his children in the forest them rationalism and survival skills. Things get complicated when the children’s mother dies and they are forced by a duty to their philosophy to stop her funeral.

In every aspect of this film’s construction, something sublime can be found. The direction is smooth and crisp. The comedy is truly hilarious. The young actors playing the children are fantastic without exception. On top of that we get a near career-best performance from Mortensen.

With that said, a film is more than the sum of its parts.

This is a fascinating character study of someone whose philosophy is well-read, rejecting society for its many flaws. In several scenes he is proved to be right when we see how bright and athletic his kids are, particularly when compared to other kids.

However, what stops Captain Fantastic from going into pretentious territory deriding parents for the way they raise their children, is the clear admission that this form of living does raise significant problems. These kids have nothing to work with when they grow up and rejoin the imperfect world the Captain protected them from.

Overall, a quirky, moving and thought-provoking little hipster drama.

Recommended Scenario: If you want a more overt version of Little Miss Sunshine with the always brilliant Mr Viggo.

Nearly two years on this job and I am only now reviewing a Woody Allen film? Also this review is very, very late. Sorry.

Café Society is Allen’s take on a love story between a young man and woman in late 1930s Hollywood. The only hitch? The woman is in love with the man’s big-shot Uncle!

Quick Question: How many films of a certain filmmaker does it take to see before someone can legitimately call themselves a fan of the filmmaker?

There’s always a certain group in any fan-base who act as gatekeepers, to make sure you have to be “this tall to ride” with the “real” fans.

How big a fan of Woody Allen can I say I am? How do you measure my legitimacy in devotion? Is it quantitative? Have I seen enough of his extensive filmography? I’ve seen 3 of his 47 directorial efforts, including this one. Is it qualitative? Have I seen the Allen classics? I’ve seen good ones, but they’re not on anyone’s list of influential films. Have I seen a good variety of what he’s capable of? The films I’ve seen all came from after 2010. Am I a fan? Technically no.

I do love those two other movies, though. I like Allen’s style for all the little I’ve seen of his annually increasing filmography.

This film is no exception in its skill to delight me.

Jesse Eisenberg and Kristen Stewart are the couple of this piece and, like in their surprisingly brilliant performances in the underwhelming American Ultra, their chemistry is electric. Allen’s dialogue bounces between them like a playful rubber ball thrown to pugs. I love it.

The rest of the supporting cast are excellent as they fill their parts. Steve Carrell as Eisenberg’s Uncle is of course hilarious and brilliant as is Ken Stott in a shining small role as Jesse’s father. There’s a lot of banter, film references and the old New York Jewish humour which Allen appears to specialise in. Woody even cameos as the narrator to this film which is structured in a similar way to a novel for further comedic impact.

I’ve said before that it is easier to write reviews for films that don’t work than films that do. This film just works.

Recommended Scenario: If you’re in the mood for a genuinely funny and lovely 30’s romantic comedy.

The trailer for Sausage Party was one of those advertisements which shall define a good part of the internet landscape when we look back on 2016, or at least the happy internet. It’s a clever trailer, even though it actually does what internet sketch videos have been doing for ages. The only difference being these guys actually MADE F-D Up Toy Story!

Sausage Party runs under the premise that all food items are sentient and anthropomorphic. In a Supermarket, food lives under the assumption that people take it home to “The Great Beyond”. In actuality, of course, we eat them! What follows is a raunchy, gory, sexually perverse comedy from the eyes of produce.

The most fascinating thing I find about Sausage Party now that I’ve seen it is that this well-written, clever comedy has all its best humour in the lowest common denominator kind of humour. I’ve seen some pretty screwed up stuff in movies, but this might have the most hard-to-watch imagery I’ve seen in a long time. And somehow it works and is hilarious.

This is this year’s The Lego Movie. An animated film which looks so one-note and low-brow upon initial inspection but through sheer force of will, translates the extremes of its vision into a smart, dumb comedy.

Smart dumb comedy is a bizarre phenomenon when it is only through lowering the bar to which humour can aspire and sticking with it so hard with such intelligence that something awesome comes out.

As with a lot of Seth Rogen’s comedies, the crux of the clever satire wise on religion. The theological statements presented by Sausage Party (boy is that sensors you don’t hear every day) are not the most subtle or layered. There are also not the most well founded as some of the allegories just don’t work with the modern world, but upon reflection there are two things which make this film sat out a cut above others of its kind.

For one, is incorporated into the narrative rather well when the main sausage shout about God not being real (God in their world being the people buying them) it works, since his lack of subtlety matches the movie’s lack. Look at the Simon Pegg and Nick Frost film Paul also co-starring Seth Rogen. Without film went into anti-religion mode it felt out of place and mean.

Secondly, the movie presents rationalism not atheism. There is nothing wrong with promotion of atheism when using rationalism, but at times filmmakers become like the way Bob Dylan saw his past self in as masterwork My Back Pages, immature lay screaming about things they don’t fully understand.

This review might seem a little serious for a film with Edward Norton playing a Woody Allen style bisexual bagel, but you know what, f**k it!

Recommended Scenario: Anyone can see this film as long as you’re an adult and appreciated dumb genius. But the watch with your kids or your mum.

Before I begin this review, I must warn you that my experience in the cinema was soured much by having to sit 3 rows from the screen. I know some of the cinema going public love being that close, but my policy ever since watching movies six feet above me when it was “movie0time” in Primary School has been always to sit Centre-Centre.

Hell or High Water is a West Texas set bank heist drama directed by David Mackenzie. We simultaneously follow two bank-robbing brothers and two cops who are after them.

 

 

In all truth, this movie seems very similar to Ben Affleck’s terrific film The Town. It focuses on a theme of brotherhood in harsh circumstances, one of the bank heisting brothers is a loose cannon and both are more interested in the drama between heists than heists themselves.

This film surpasses The Town though, by a big margin.

Chris Pine and Ben Foster play the two brothers. My problem with Pine in the past has been that his characters are pretty much always either too egotistical and obnoxious or they put across a hero charm that is not earned by his performances. This is the first time I’ve seen him act in a role which had more than one layer to it.

Ben Foster plays a kind of Joe Pesci character and is pretty good at it.

What stands out here is the relationship between Jeff Bridges as a retiring State Trooper and his partner, a half-Native American, half-Mexican played by Gil Birmingham. Their scenes together are genuinely hilarious at times. The entire theatre was laughing more during this film than in Bad Moms, which I promise you is not a bad comedy.

I wouldn’t call this a comedy, though, in the same vain of Fargo or other Coen Brothers movies. That’s what’s strange about dark comedy. Some films like the fantastic Slow West is less funny than Hell or High Water yet I would still consider that a comedy in its construction.

This film is more mature than The Town which for all its technical excellence felt like a lesser version of Mean Streets (I’m name-dropping like crazy). The thesis of Hell or High Water is not quite the bleak absurdism of No Country for Old Men though it does come close at times. This film is a little more specific in its target, blaming the hardships of the Deep South on Big Banks.

However what elevates this film above some other films with this level of “fight the power” in them is that for all the philosophizing about the modern age being no different from the past (cycles of violence being another theme in No Country) the events of the movie are pointed out to be the fault of bad people’s actions, not just the bankers, but to a greater extent our heroic bank-robbers.

David Mackenzie has made a truly excellent modern western. Well-directed, superbly written and acted, if this film doesn’t go on my top 10 films of the year list, this has been a great film year.

Recommend Scenario: If you want No Country meets The Town. That’s a good cocktail.

Finally, I can have a look at a film so divisive that some called for the takedown of my old enemy, Rotten Tomatoes!

Suicide Squad is a DC Superhero Movie focusing on a band of bad guys from the DC roster who are recruited by the U.S Government to be superheroes.

Going into this film so late in its theatrical run may have been a mistake. I’ve already, by osmosis, been exposed to competing, strong opinions on both sides of criticism of this film. People seem to range in opinion between, “piece of fun” and “this is insufferable garbage”. Now its time to give notes on what I thought about it.

I’m going to start, as I do as a kind human being in most scenarios, by talking about what worked well. Mainly the casting. Will Smith as deadly assassin Deadshot, Margot Robbie as the Joker’s girlfriend Harley Quinn and all the others seem to have been born to play their respective roles and I genuinely see a lot of effort being put into capturing their interpretations of their colourful characters.

On top of that, these colourful characters interact in a premise straight out of a western or an 80s TV show. This should be a lot of fun! Right?

I’m going to start small with my complaints. My first is with Jared Leto as the Joker. Like I said, nobody in the film delivers a truly bad performance and Leto is no exception. I just wish he had more time to do threatening stuff. On top of that, I’m sorry, I know there would trying something new which is always welcome but he just looks awful! He’s got these silly, silly tattoos all over and a ridiculous gangster grill and he appears to be 18. It’s not a good look.

Okay, almost a back complaint was superficial. I need a complaint that really makes me mad!

What are the fact that the people controlling the suicide squad are all morons! Every single action (and not including the formation of the squad itself, which the actually explain okay, considering) that these people perform is idiotic with a capital “J”. I know “idiotic” begins with an “I”, but these people’s decisions I think have made me dumber!

I can’t go into too much detail as to in what way these people are idiots, but involves an uncontrollable “controlled” Witch in the Squad. This witch also is a relationship with the guy the government put in the squad to keep them in check, which may have given drama to the situation if they were, say, married or siblings before she became cursed. Now he’s just a moron.

I’m sorry if this review is too fast-paced and makes no sense because that’s like the movie. Much has been talked about DC’s problem with their editing and is no more evident than here. I will remove several members of the suicide squad just so we could focus more on the genuinely interesting developed characters.

This film had all sorts of trouble in the editing room, but I say the problem is script level. There just isn’t a consistent tone at all in this piece. I suppose the studio wanted it to become lighter to combat the 911 feel of their other works, but it really feels forced.

I really think that the concept of a superhero film from the perspective of the villains is an absolutely brilliant one. Even with the whole Ghostbusters style finale and villain, if this film had more focus and more laughs it could have been cool. What there was a movie like the Arkham Asylum game? Wouldn’t that be badass?

If you remember I gave a mixed, but overall slightly positive review of Batman v Superman earlier this year. I later re-watched set film and discovered that I had been the victim of what I shall now call “surface cool”. This is when a terrible work of art tries to hide its lack of substance or style with stuff that is just really cool, like Ben Affleck as Batman or Wonder Woman.

I can’t lie to you and say that Suicide Squad is worse than BvS. Squad, for all its flaws, is not a dishonourable failure. It tries for something and failed without being pretentious or insulting (except for a bizarre scene in which Batman kisses Harley Quinn for no damn reason). Also, I can say I was bored.

Recommended Scenario: I can’t recommend this a set so that aspiring filmmakers can learn what not to do when writing or editing.

P.S. This film was written and directed by David Ayer. Fury is SO much better. You should watch that.

When I saw the trailer for this movie, a funny thing happened. I laughed a little.

Bad Moms follows Mila Kunis a mother of two kids stressed due to the huge amount of work they make her do. She decides to act she decides to try not to be the “Perfect Mom”. She decides to be a BAD MOM.

The comedy dynamic of three best friends is so tried and tested that I could see where this movie was going from a mile away. This going to be a party scene, is going to be a villain who’s stuck up and snooty, is going to be a speech hammering in whatever message the film is making etc.

What’s quite cool about Bad Moms is that there are no elements to the story or theme which made me wholly uncomfortable. It’s actually got a pretty good message about motherhood. Compare that to Horrible Bosses and Jennifer Aniston’s ha-ha-rape-is-funny-when-a-woman-does-it-to-a-man character. I’m not one of those PC police guys read it, one has to acknowledge when the movie’s message is damaging and not in a smart way.

Another nice thing about bad mums is it actors. Kunis in the lead and while she does do that thing where she lives on screen at her fellow cast members clearly improvise lines a bit too much, she does at least have good chemistry with them and they do get good laughs. That and a rather good villain performance by Victoria Applegate makes for a really well-rounded cast.

Overall though what’s important is that this film did make me laugh on a few occasions. I’m not going to be quoting this movie in a few years from now, but it is at least good for a chuckle.

I apologise for the formulaic and short form of this review, but I suppose that’s kind of what movie. It’s good, or at least okay and it says a solid chick flick way above the insulting standards of many of those. I will admit though that while the recommend it to the sort of general audience this film aims for, this like many others following the formula, might not be worth more than a Netflix showing.

Recommended Scenario: If you want a pretty decent comedy on Netflix.

“Life isn’t about endings. It’s a series of moments.” These words were said by Tim, Martin Freeman’s character on what we must now call The UK Office. This the mantra of The Office when it works at its best. And since life has no endings, (except for the final one) it might seem quite fitting for the story of the former boss of Wernam Hogg to continue.

David Brent – Life on the Road is another mockumentary following the titular near mythic creation of Ricky Gervais. This time it is 2016 and Brent is trying to go on tour as a musician with his band “Forgone Conclusion”.

I am a huge fan of The UK Office. It is a landmark TV show in several ways. Not only did it revamp the mockumentary and sitcom simultaneously, but Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant wrote a TV show that was funny, poignant, cringey and commented on aspects of the human condition and the modern world we hadn’t really seen before.

Note, I’ve not seen much of the US office or any of the other Britons you can find around the world. From what I’ve seen of the US one, it’s fine. I’ve no intention of watching every episode of that show any time soon. Nine seasons is a better commitment. I feel like I can recommend the UK office to anyone though. But some don’t like the level of cringe we get to in the Brit version, it does at least cut the chase on the various storylines in its two series and double Christmas special (which I’d say is the best Christmas special ever made).

A big part of what made the show a work of genius was the character David Brent. He was the boss of the small team in Slough working for paper merchants Wernam Hogg. He is a man with a pathological desire to be liked. In his attempts to be Mr popular he tries to be funny and fails he tries dancing and fails even makes friends with some of the most revolting people I’ve seen portrayed on TV and somehow succeeds there.

Regardless of what you might think of record surveys, is acting in this role is simply Oscar worthy. He shows of all the pathetic nature of such a man and is able to shake as the core when we see moments of honesty as Brent a side of cool and funny fall apart and it becomes a human being. The scene where he begs not to be made redundant still makes me cry.

Fast forward over a decade later and David is a salesman at another company. He still trying to be a life of the party and is still after the dream of being a rockstar.

Within a few moments, I was already laughing. This is an excellent comedy.

Watching Brent drive his band, made up of session musicians and a wrapper played brilliantly by comedian Doc Brown is a pleasure of cringe.

Rent obsession with getting accepted has made him write utterly terrible songs that he over explains every time to avoid people getting offended. These include such classics as “Equality Street”, “Native American” and “Slough” which should all get into the charts.

And yet what marks out this film is its exploration into Brent’s mind. Now that he is the undisputed front and centre of the runtime, one would think that without characters like Tim and Dawn we would easily fatigue of David. Which of these does with this extended time with this character whom, if you knew him in reality you might want to smack, is given release ability without pulling the jokes.

We are all David Brent sometimes. I know I am.

Recommended Scenario: If you’re a fan of The UK Office. Otherwise go watch that show, become a fan and watch this.

I’m gonna just say this, Toy Story 4 is a terrible idea. 3 ended on a near-perfect note and the short films on Sky Movies (now Sky Cinema) that have come out showing what happened after that ending are fine, but I just don’t care enough to watch another movie that will almost certainly disappoint.

In other news, Finding Dory is the sequel to the classic Pixar film Finding Nemo. It has been a year since little Nemo was found by his father (spoilers) and now the attention switches to Dory, the Blue Tang fish suffering from short-term memory loss. She wants to find her family, a hard thing to do with her condition.

Dory has to be one of the top two characters of all time to suffer from short-term memory loss. Ellen Degeneres plays her and she exhibits some genuinely great voice acting. She conveys so much love, comedy and pain from her condition. Dory never feels sorry for herself, she is always upbeat and funny. In the first movie, she was treated entirely for laughs, now though, despite a lot of the comedy is still there, the audience feels a great deal of sympathy toward her. Her song “Just Keep Swimming” never felt so poignant.

It’s good news that Dory is able to carry a film so well as that is always a difficulty when making a sequel to a film following a side-character from the original. It’s not a hard and fast rule, but for every The Simpsons there’s an Even Almighty.

This good starting point gives way to a truly excellent Pixar film. Pixar have a trick of putting you through the entire spectrum of emotion while you’re under there spell and that’s by design. You get there because Pixar at their best make truly special and brilliant movies.

The side-characters are delightful too. Of course we have Marlin, Nemo’s Dad and Nemo himself (who sounds like he’s the fish equivalent of a teenager though how these fish survive so long is a mystery to me) back and while their relationship is not as dynamic as it once was due to their big emotional arc being solved in the previous film, they do get some nice scenes together.

On top of that we continue to get a great cast of supporting players who are all utterly hilarious. I won’t spoil who they are or what they’re up to, but they are awesome.

What I think makes this film feel like an organic continuation to the Finding franchise is that it isn’t really a road movie like the last one was. Granted the previous movie involved swimming rather than driving, but the structure was that of a central character going a considerable distance to achieve a certain goal and the meeting of several brilliantly done characters

It’s at this point where I make a confession to you guys. I never loved Finding Nemo. I liked it, definitely. I couldn’t think of anything wrong with it, I just didn’t connect with it as a kid the way I did other films. Upon reflection though, it was technically a perfect story. And this film is an excellent follow-up.

Recommended Scenario: If you want a good Pixar Sequel that isn’t anything about Toys.

Spielberg and Dahl? Surely this should be wholesome.

The BFG is based on Roald Dahl’s children’s classic involves a girl as she is taken by big friendly giant to magical place where dreams literally grow on trees.

Steven Spielberg directed this film, teaming up once again with bridges by supporting player Mark requirements, who plays the BFG here. His role is brought to us through motion capture and astonishing visual effect, is bodily proportions stretched out to perfectly resemble the illustrations of the source Tory.

The best effect regarding the scatter is Rose himself. Here he is charming, silly, funny and just adorable all at once.

Yup this is what people will remember most about this film, but the girl I mentioned earlier, named Sophie (played by Ruby Barnhill) is a real fight to. She has all the marks for a child an adventure story. She’s wide-eyed and charming, but is able to do stuff herself. A good little performance.

Story -wise this film is properly stripped down. This no other kids no hiding from grownups storyline. It knows exactly what it is and 60 is a story of a lonely girl befriends a belief giant the narrative is how they stop those things.

In this way is very reminiscent of stupidly film. Once again to act to, things just start happening. Moments of character, fart jokes, humanity. It is all rather sporadic, but it works thanks to the strength of the characters.

The film also looks fabulous. The fantasy locations remind me of the better parts of Tim Burton and Peter Jackson’s worlds under real-world setting is satisfyingly like Harry Potter.

This movie was so lovely and wholesome, timely grades I have in their inconsequentiality, are need of highlighting.

In act three certain things that are stripped back would have benefited from remaining there. Untidiness would be a bit more intimidating if we saw all the evil things they do. However, that may be part of the big joke.

That’s what I can put some of this movies issues down to. A bit of a joke on the pathetic villains of this piece. Who cares that the final conflict is short? The baddies are morons!

So is this a kids film with which does all the right things, no more and no less? Yes. Yes, it is.

Can properly say that my recommended scenario.

Recommended Scenario: See my penultimate paragraph.

Interesting trivia, this is the first time ever Spielberg has worked for the Disney Corporation!

You thought he was gone forever, but you can’t keep the writer of Good Will Hunting down!

Jason Bourne follows the titular amnesiac assassin from the first three Bourne films as he is wrong to get into the world of cartridges running and fistfights as the people he once worked for come after yet again.

I have to be honest, I have not seen The Bourne Legacy. I didn’t want to waste my time with a film I’ve been told is bad and I heard has all sorts of nonsense about gene manipulation or something.

It doesn’t matter though as this film has literally nothing to do with that fourthquel. This is a follow-up to the Bourne trilogy. If you not seen those, don’t watch this one.

Matt Damon is back as Jason and once again he’s awesome. Not awesome in a particularly layered sort of performance, but also in that he is totally settled into his role and he plays it simply but effectively.

in this film there are a couple of changes to the Bourne formula. There’s a lot more hacking than there was in the previous movies before Snowden. It has open some new ideas for storytelling which is cool and is handled well for a hacker movie. However, a character does say “Use SQL to hack the database”, which made me laugh or weep it as a computing student.

Also new is Bourne’s motive and arc. In previous outings, his motives were fear, love, vengeance and the pursuit of answers for a spouse. Here we have a new motive, possibly doing some good. Possibly stopping the government from doing something bad.

Is arc from “leave me alone” to “I’m here to do something” is possibly not complete by the end, but it is organic enough, thanks to the writing partially done by Paul Greengrass.

Greengrass is in the director’s chair again and the film is gloriously handle under his lead. Action scenes are shot shakily but coherently and each of the excellent set pieces develop a character.

So to good Bourne film.

There are problems, though.

Firstly, a couple elements feel cut and paste from the previous films. I will say what they are but let’s just say that no matter how well they’re done, it reminds me too much of what came before.

Secondly, the title. It’s so boring. I can think of three better ones right now. The Bourne Totality, The Bourne Boogaloo, The Bourne Again.

Thirdly, and this is the big one, you can have the feeling this film should not exist. Ultimatum was a perfect action movie, amongst the very best that he will has given us so far. A rounded off Bourne stories so well.

At least with the latest Star Wars film, the story is an unexpected continuation with new characters and ideas. Here, the ideas are cool, but a little unnecessary and the new characters are duplicates of all ones.

This series will only work if Damon does two more Bourne films and dies at the end doing something heroic, which so far, he’s barely done.

That would be a proper conclusion.

Recommended Scenario: If you’ve seen the Bourne trilogy and one more, but I don’t demand you see this.