Force Majeure

Ask any self-respecting group of Seinfeld fans what the show's antiheroic everyman George Costanza's worst act in the history of the show was, and it won't be long before someone mentions "The Fire", the episode where a fire breaks out at a kids' birthday party and George pushes his way through kids and even pensioners to ensure his own safety. It's heinous, despicable, and morally inexcusable... And funny, because it speaks to our own basest self-preservation instincts and the way we cannot govern how we act in a crisis.

Force Majeure is basically a remake of that episode of Seinfeld, if it had been written by Michael Haneke. Director Ruben Ostland has crafted a wonderful two hour exercise in virtue ethics based around the conceit that, upon seeing an avalanche whilst eating lunch with his family, patriarch Tomas (Johannes Kuhnke) panics, grabs his phone, and runs away, as opposed to sticking around to ensure his family's safety. After the initial shock has settled, his wife Ebba (Lisa Loven Kongsli) begins to take stock, and starts to think, "is this the man I married?", "is this the man I chose to protect me?".

Fittingly, the film has the structure of an avalanche, starting as a slow rumble, not enough to comment on, and building in momentum until before you know it, it's too big to ignore and too late to run away. The film cleverly dissects Tomas's psyche in the wake of the incident, and the effect it has on his family. By extension, the film shrewdly asks questions about what it is we expect of our protectors in life, what that role entails, and the way in which society fosters those roles upon us.

This is exemplified in what was, for me, as opposed to the avalanche itself, the film's centrepiece, a conversation between Tomas and Ebba, their friend Mats (Kristofer Hivju) and his much younger girlfriend Fanni (Fanni Metelius). In it, all the parties air their various grievances, and it becomes clear to everyone in the room (and the audience) that Ebba is not simply going to let this slide. She delivers, masterfully, a monologue where she describes her version of events, while Tomas stares blankly, taking the words like silent punches. Mats and Fanni look on, but eventually Mats sides with Tomas, and Fanni with Ebba. The conversation reveals itself to be less about the incident itself, but about gender roles. Mats tries to justify Tomas's actions by saying that he simply escaped so that he could later return and rescue his family safely; nobody buys it.

Ostlund's direction spells out these lines cannily. He has a habit of exaggerating the frame so that what is presented to us, and what we are hearing, are often at odds with each other. In the aforementioned sequence, Fanni is talking about herself, but all we can see is a closeup of Ebba's face; this is held for a couple of minutes before Ebba begins her monologue, and it leaves the viewer uncertain where Fanni is in relation to everyone else. A lot of scenes occur in this manner, and it's effective, because it forces the viewer into the same state of disassociative confusion that the family has found themselves in.

If it all sounds very clever-clever and heavy-leaden, it isn't. Hidden amongst the flashes of portentousness (cannons firing to control the avalanches punctuate sequences like individually aimed gunshots, or the 1812 Overture), the film has an almost gleefully sadistic, satirical bent, protecting itself against favourable MRA readings by painting Tomas out to be, in some scenes, utterly pathetic. A sequence where he finds himself uncontrollably bawling outside his hotel room, claiming to be held captive by his own instincts, is uncomfortably pitched but hilarious for Ostlund's refusal to look away, and Kuhnke's commitment to character.

Ostlund, in an interview, talks about how typically in films, "man as hero" is the most common trope, and how that doesn't match up to the statistical reality of how men act in an emergency, and how they're usually much more selfish. This is clearly of great interest him, but he cleverly refuses to take one side or another, and acknowledges both realities. Men, yes, are put under a great amount of pressure to provide for those around them, but men also have a tendency to play the victim and expect a great deal, perhaps too much, in return.

This is a dense, knotty, shrewd and refreshingly doe-eyed film, hilarious and a little scary in places, and it doesn't back away from the questions it's asking. As such, it's a moral thriller of the highest calibre, that invites readings on a number of levels, and it engages the viewer on a philosophical level as well as a real-world, practical level. Not many films can do either of those things, let alone be funny on top. It's something of a marvel.

Air Doll

All those people all those lives, where are they now?

With loves, and hates, and passions just like mine,

They were born and then they lived and then they died,

Seems so unfair,

I want to cry.

*****

Hirokazu Koreeda's film "Air Doll", based on Yoshiie Goda's manga, has a synopsis that, at face value, could inspire titters, which is a great shame considering the end result produces anything but. It tells the simple story of a man, Hideo, (Itsuji Itao) and his sex doll, Nozomi, (Doona Bae), who comes to life and develops a "heart" of her own. The initial scenes juggle pathos, as Hideo looks bereft in a supermarket, and comedy, as Hideo addresses Nozomi as if she were alive and makes love with a startling tenderness.

But one day, as Hideo leaves for work, Nozomi's eyes move. She looks around the room, and gets out of bed. She places her hand underneath a railing which is dripping with rain water, and she goes from being completely plastic to something approaching human. She does this slowly, and initially its clear that its an animatronic doll, but at some point the doll becomes the actress. This is cleverly handled, and establishes the quiet physicality that Bae maintains for the remainder of the film; stiff limbs, slow jerky movement, a head that never quite moves comfortably.

Soon Nozomi finds herself on the street, and it's here that the film turns from a curious piece of magical realism into a broad and pondering metaphysical exploration of the meaning of human existence. This is not exaggeration. Scene after scene follows Nozomi as she does things like interacting with children, getting a job, talking to that old dishevelled guy on the bench who you just know probably has an interesting life story, taking her first trip to the restaurant, to the beach, learning what it means to cling onto someone on the back of a motorbike.

The film is basically a parable on learning what it means to be a part of this world. Doona Bae is the perfect actress for this; her eyes are endlessly wide, drinking in the sights of the world with all the fervour of a parched man in the desert. The film transports you back to when you were a child, and calls to mind Wordsworth's idea that heaven lies about us in our infancy. This is an unfussy film that asks little of the audience, other than to take in what Nozomi takes in, as she takes it in.

The film is unconcerned with the specifics of her status as an ex-sex doll. There is a moment midway through where she cuts her arm on a hinge, deflates, and has to be blown back to life by her co-worker, but even this isn't handled as a piece of comedy of the kind one might expect with a sex doll, but instead (and later on in the film also) as a metaphor for the way we want to breathe life into the people we love (and that these attempts can often be so ruinous).

There is just so much to observe with this film. It's crafted with all tenderness of a soft kiss, from the gentle sound design by Yutaka Tsurumaki, to the dreamy and creamy urban cinematography from Ping Bin Lee, which finds a kind of visual poetry amongst the small local shops and big skyscrapers stacked high up past our field of vision, and the streets with black washing lines dangling like bars on sheet music. It is a subtle exercise in empathy, as we find ourselves marvelling at the world in the same way Nozomi does.

The score, from World's End Girlfriend is a blissful affair. There are several moments where Koreeda leisurely gives way to a montage, flitting from person to person that Nozomi has observed as they face either joyous elation or downtrodden despair, that feel like they were edited to the music after it was composed.

Of course, after the initial rush of giddiness, we develop notions of unfairness, cruelty, and sadness. As Nozomi eventually observes, "having a heart has been so heartbreaking". But even these revelations are observed gently, and with little force. Compared to Under The Skin, another film about an outsider reacting to humanity for the first time, this is much more hopeful, and optimistic.

This is a film that understands what it means to exist. Koreeda's eye for detail is unrelenting, and he has turned what could have been a forgettable comedy into a film I doubt I will ever forget. Like the works of Alain De Botton, it configures everyday truths into miniature works of art. As Nozomi quietly observes, "why is it that the world is constructed so loosely?"

It's a question that we'll never know the answer to. But it's healthy to ask things like that every now and again, and the act of asking, of recognising these truths, constitutes some form of an answer all on its own. This film, along with everything else, gets that.

Wiener-Dog

Todd Solondz is cinema's architect of miserabilism, but never have his powers been put to such disquieting effect in his latest film, Wiener-Dog, a film that runs through misanthropy in the first ten minutes, and continues at breakneck pace towards sadism, cruelty, and outright nastiness. It really is a piece of work, even more so than "Happiness", his established masterpiece, a film which juggled themes of child sex abuse and the futility of marriage quite deftly.

But whereas the content of that film was objectively more shocking, Solondz imbued his screenplay with enormous empathy, which elevated the material into something great. There is very little empathy here, and the work is all the more dour for it. It's interesting, because the plot is one that could be ultimately heart-warming; it tells the tale of a sausage dog (hence the title) who passes through four different owners over the course of its life. It's sort of like Au Hasard Balthazar directed by a suicidal Aki Kaurismaki.

The first owners are a big tip-off; the dog is bought by two chilly parents (Tracy Letts, Julie Delpy) for their young son (Keaton Nigel Cooke), who has recently (we gather) survived a bout with leukaemia. The conversations between parent and child are not devoid of warmth, but the impression we get is that reproduction definitely was not for them. Delpy botches the explanation of why the dog has to be spayed, and then later has to spin a yarn about how a dog of hers was "raped" (by a stray called Mohammed!), all because it wasn't spayed. It's the only truly hilarious scene in the whole film, and Delpy plays up the white panic to brilliant effect. Letts is much more aggressive, his maxim with the dog being "heel, motherfucker!".

An ill-advised granola bar leads the dog to be put down (leading to a funny musing on the randomness of death, delivered by Delpy to her son), but events transpire and the dog is saved by Dawn Wieners, from Solondz's debut "Welcome To The Dollhouse" (now a vet, here played by Greta Gerwig). Dawn hasn't changed; she thanks ex-bully Kieran Culkin when he says she looks like the dog, and then takes up his invite of a road trip to Ohio.

This is the segment with the most pathos, where Solondz embraces some genuine sincerity, particularly in the scene where Culkin tells his brother Tommy (Connor Long) that their father has passed away from alcoholism.

From here, the dog passes into the arms of Danny DeVito, playing a failing screenwriter, out of place and ignored in his position as faculty member of a film school. The film dabbles with culture shock here (and has the least to do with the dog), and mines effective fodder from having DeVito deal with a young upstart who wants to make a film exploring gender identity, for example, and being told by faculty leader to be more positive.

Finally (after quite the turn of events), it lands with Ellen Burstyn, playing a blind woman on the close to death, receiving pleas for money from her granddaughter and living with a carer/friend.

This is a film with a great eye for detail; take Culkin's order for Gerwig to "wait", in the car, or DeVito's students assuming him to be a homophobic dinosaur, or the way the ending lampoons with remarkable effectiveness the old maxim of achieving immortality through your art. Typically, Solondz is very good at directing the children in the film. It is also composed with an understated formality by cinematographer Edward Lachman, and it's amusingly self-aware, replete with interlude and opening credits.

Ultimately, though, this film is something of a zero-sum game. It piles on cynical observation after cynical observation to the point where, after a time, it just stops landing. There's no denying Solondz's talents, and this is by no means a bad film, it is consistently well-written, but nobody would forgive you for deciding that it's just not worth the effort.

The Soft Skin

“I don't think you can be dealing
With the situation very well
You take a lover for a dirty weekend, that's ok
But when it's over
You are looking at the working week through the eyes of a gigolo”

Stuart Murdoch of Belle and Sebastian sang these lyrics on their 1996 album “If You’re Feeling Sinister”, and I thought of them as I watched Francois Truffaut’s 1964 film “The Soft Skin”, which is also about someone, married, who takes up a lover, and even attempts a dirty weekend with said lover, although only the most forgiving of people wouldn’t call it an unmitigated disaster.

But while these lyrics describe the film, they are also a tip-off to its problems, because whilst Murdoch lyrically describes the guilt and shame that can often follow a sordid tryst, when we try and zero in on protagonist Pierre Lechenay (Jean Desailly)’s emotions, we find ourselves drawing a blank. The same, too, can be said for the object of his desires Nicole (Francoise Dorléac), an air hostess whom he spots on a flight to Lisbon to deliver a talk on Balzac. And the less said about his wife Franca (Nelly Belledetti) the better; if Pierre and Nicole can at generously be described as wilfully enigmatic, Franca is a blank slate you can’t even draw anything on.

The central issue is that we cannot genuinely conceive of a single concrete reason why Nicole and Pierre go together. Well, I can on Pierre’s part; Nicole is an exceptionally beautiful woman, with a gentle voice that is at once caring and striking, and yes, she does appear to have exceptionally supple skin, or we must gather as much, from the sequence where she is lying supine in a little bed and breakfast, and Pierre undoes her stockings with all the care and precision of a technician rewiring a motherboard. But Pierre, unfortunately, seems like a stuffy bore, scared, imprecise, and not as though he’d make the most exciting lover.

Perhaps this is unfair speculation on my part, but the film gives us regrettably little to go on. A film like this lives and dies on the strength of the conveyance of the mental states of the central characters, and it seems to fail in that regard. It occasionally felt a little bit like certain scenes were missing or dropped; we just accept that Nicole loves Pierre, after a night where he talks about his work almost non-stop (he’s a literature professor), when I was wondering how she managed to stay awake. I was genuinely expecting the film to reveal her to be a femme fatale, but alas (although you could argue that the final scene of the pair in an apartment is an inversion of that trope). And the ending, perhaps startling for its days, is overwrought nonsense.

The film even gives us clues, to no avail; for example, a fair portion of the film concerns Pierre giving a talk on Andre Gides, which is acting as cover for the aforementioned dirty weekend. I believe this was no accident or random author, since Gides famously wrote “The Immoralist”, about a young man slowly doing away with conventional morality and succumbing to his most base desires; it cleverly frames the regression into incumbent ethical murk as the climactic victory for the protagonist.

If this theme is meant to be a counterpoint to the film, then it is ill-defined; if the book is meant to be a thematic bedfellow, then it is unconvincing because we do not know what Pierre is really thinking, whether he is enjoying his descent into immorality.

I realise now that I have spoken negatively throughout this entire review, and yet if pushed, I would recommend the film without question. Why is that, since it fails at everything it tries to do, and what it is trying to do is questionable? Truffaut, even when his canvas is half-baked, is a master of cinematic form. His innate sense of the frame and what to put in it is second to none. Even when we cannot buy into what is going on under the hood, on a scene by scene basis and from a cinematographic level, the film is compelling enough as it is. The film would work well watched alongside Shoot The Pianist, Truffaut’s unequivocal masterpiece, where emotional content and cinematic form coexist harmoniously, and The Man Who Loved Women, where Truffaut’s thematic motives are questionable, but nowhere near as muddled as here. In all three films, Truffaut shows a preternatural ability for what should be on screen and what shouldn’t, and how to edit in rhythm to a music that the audience just feels as the film goes along.

It’s just a shame he couldn’t conceive of an emotional base to match his stunning filmmaking. 

Le Pont Du Nord

Jacques Rivette's "Le Pont Du Nord" from 1981 is an interesting film, not least because it defies categorisation in any way you try and read it. I think it works best when viewed as an example of guerilla film-making, since that's effectively what it is, some years before that cadre of American filmmakers (Larry Clarke, Robert Rodriguez) took their cameras to the streets to film what their vision, and some years after Melvin Van Peebles arguably invented the genre. And yet it stands outside of those examples, since whilst those filmmakers resolutely worked within a genre and tried to emulate a genre, Rivette only uses his genre (the conspiracy thriller) as something of an afterthought, secondary to the process of guerilla film-making itself.

Rivette was, after all, all about method, and that seems to take preference within his films. In the liner notes he speaks of an inner juxtaposition, of the almost documentary-style nature of his film, and the highly strung plot. And yes, there is a plot, despite all this tedious stuff about methods and juxtapositions and all that. Mother and child Pascale and Bulle Olgier play two unrelated women, Baptiste and Marie, whose paths cross three times in one day, and whom Baptiste argues their being together must be fated. From there they explore a shady and ill-defined conspiracy involving a map modelled on a child's game, a briefcase containing... Something, and several men labelled as "Max" by Baptiste and hence deserving of scorn. Marie has just been released from prison; we have no idea where Baptiste has come from.

There's also Marie's partner Julien (Pierre Clementi), owner of the coveted briefcase, and seemingly the original Max (Jean-Francois Stevenin), who both cycle through benign and threatening at any given scene in the film.

What does it all mean? I don't know, but looking for meaning in a film like this seems counterintuitive. It seems to purposefully defy all meaning. In a Hollywood film, it would be a high-stakes affair with lots of scenes of Tom Hanks running through rooms looking for clues, but here, it is simply what Rivette presents it to us as. And it does contain an eerie, otherworldly beauty, mainly as a result of the on-location shooting in Paris, nearly devoid of interiors, and the rhythmic, simplistic editing.

I realise I have largely described this film instead of actually reviewing it, but this is no simple work. I loved it. It was quietly compelling, and culminates in a final sequence, with Baptiste and Max sparring opposite each other on a bridge, framing a Parisienne canal that's glimmering in the late evening sunlight, that has an indescribable lo-fi pulchritude, like the hazy neon glow you get from a Daniel Johnston record.

Odds are, if you know of this film, you know about Rivette, and already have an opinion on his methods and aims. If you've bought into his vision (I have), this will be an immensely rewarding venture. If you've never heard of him, this isn't a bad place to start. Look past the wilfully enigmatic style and engage in the beats, and the style.

The Duke of Burgundy

Peter Strickland's "The Duke of Burgundy" is a surprisingly linear, straightforward love story that explores an element of BDSM that has remained relatively unexplored in the movies up until this point; the perspective of the person who desires to be dominated. We've had (most famously) the man who desires to dominate (although most people would rightly discredit that), and we've also had the union of one who must serve, and one who must dominate (Steven Shainberg's "Secretary"). Here we have someone for whom the desire to be dominated is an all-encompassing hole in her very being; she can't live without it.

The film begins in the expected manner; Cynthia (Sidse Babett Knudsen) arrives at the house of her lover, Evelyn (Chiara D'Anna), who in a series of stilted and terse conversations, orders her to perform actions of servitude, such as cleaning her study, rubbing her feet, washing her lingerie, and so on. Cynthia is young, impish, somewhat reminiscent of a young Audrey Tautou; we can't initially tell if she's enjoying this treatment, but she complies nevertheless. Evelyn is stern, approaching the stereotypically cross schoolteacher.

We find out a little about the pair; they live in the countryside, and Evelyn is a lepidopterist who gives talks at a local institute. Then, we see the opening sequence again, but bookended  by Evelyn's preparation; she is wearing a wig, and is following orders written on a piece of card, given to her by Cynthia. Evelyn is, in fact, much more nervous than she appears to let on. Her face is a picture of the concealment of panic and discomfort, her eyes flit, her mouth is drawn.

From here the film explores the true nature of their relationship, with Evelyn doing her very best to accommodate all of Cynthia's desires. Where the film is a triumph is in its refusal to shy away from the true nature of their union, and the way Cynthia's need to be dominated seems to come from an insatiable place deep inside her. To this end, this is the most honest film yet made about BDSM, and anybody who finds themselves with a lover into kink, or who is into kink themselves, should watch it, because it will inspire the right conversations, and it asks just how far you can, or should, go for someone you love. It understands the rituals and routines that people in the lifestyle fall into. To someone who doesn't have the desire for kink inside them, the acts can seem cruel, unusual, and impossible to enjoy. It is this truth that the film understands deeply, and explores with insight and verve.

It helps that the film has a real technical calibre; Peter Strickland, who impressed with Berberian Sound Studio, here cements his place as a British director with vision, a more humanistic Ben Wheatley, He creates a world to live in with this film, a spacious house with luscious overgrown greenery adorning the outside, and musty closets and old leatherbound books adorning the inside, and a vast forest surrounding them. Pater Sparrow's production design and Zsuzsa Mihalek's set design are a triumph in themselves. The score from the band "Cat's Eyes" works as though the film was made around it, which is the highest compliment you can give to a film score. And the cinematography is sumptuous, a fantasia of rich colours and stark, moody lighting.

And at the centre are the two performances, from Knudsen and D'Anna, as two people desperate to please, and even more desperate to be pleased. They are, at their core, two people who are deeply in love, much like everyone else. I was not being contrarian when I said the film was a love story; look at the structure, and it becomes apparent how conventional it is, with the exception of the nightmare sequence beginning with the zoom between Evelyn's legs (you'll know it; a little on the nose, but still spellbinding).

More than anything, it understands that just because you're the one with the whip doesn't make you the person in control; people who need to dominate are actually much rarer than the other way around, and reaching some kind of equilibrium on the topic requires negotiating, empathy, and understanding. In turn, the film understands this, and it follows this theme with logic and remorselessness. This is a classical work of great technical and emotional mastery, deeply rewarding, perversely beautiful, and above all, honest.

Review of "Son of Saul"

If László Nemes' film "Son of Saul", set in Auschwitz in 1944, is ultimately a success, it is because before anything else it understands that a conflict spanning the entirety of the universe can be depicted on a canvas no bigger and no smaller than the human face; in fact, it understands that the human face is the perfect setting for such things. If it falls short of triumph, that's because it follows its own methodologies a little too closely to their ends, and seems slightly too preoccupied with itself as a film as opposed to what it seemed to me to be; a document, a hymn, a paean.

Opening text informs us of the "Sonderkommando", a group of Jews chosen in Auschwitz to work for a few months, before being killed. Saul (Géza Rohrig) is a member of the Sonderkommando; a startling and upsetting opening shot presents him front and centre, ushering in a new truck full of his kin, to be disposed of by the cruel guards. This opening take is remarkable for two reasons, firstly because it's an ambitious long-shot, and secondly because it establishes Saul's character in a way that fundamentally doesn't really change for the remaining 100 minutes. Red cross on his back, hollowed out sunken eyes, mouth slightly twisted, blank expression; he doesn't give anything away.

This creates a paradox which sustains the whole film; just how does Saul remain so emotionless in the face of such unspeakable horror? How can he, for example, not even give a sign of disgust as he drags corpses across a blood-streaked gas chamber floor, or as he is forced to dance for a room full of sneering Nazi guards?

In this sense we do not get to 'know' Saul in the sense that we would typically come to know a protagonist. But there are some clues thrown our way; a passing reference to a conversation from a less hellish time, a couple of moments where we sense his mind has gone blank, and the prevailing sense of his determination. And the driving mechanism for the film is a clue also; Saul becomes steadily more obsessed with a young boy who comes coughing out of the gas chamber and dies shortly after, seeking a proper burial for him. This is the plot in its entirety.

Stanley Kubrick once stated that the problem with "Schindler's List" was that it took a moment of despair in the human race, and turned into a story of hope. Kubrick no doubt would have strongly approved of this film, for it is hopeless (although not nihilistic, thankfully). It stares into the horror and does not ask us for an opinion, or a reaction; instead, to simply observe. It is a fearfully convincing recreation, and I had to look away in all the obvious places.

This is mainly due to the cinematography from Mátyás Erdély, which adopts Saul's perspective and immerses us in it, and the production design from Lászlá Rajk, which is sharp and brutalist, all dingy concrete underground rooms and long off-white corridors leading round into nameless horror (as it should be, as it was).

As the story goes on, we realise that the Saul's journey can be taken either as a Biblical attempt at redemption, or something more mundane, the last grasp of a man facing death attempting to salvage something, and going insane as he does so. In the end, ultimately, it does not matter; he is here, he is doing this, and this is what is. The chaos surrounding him is scary, but he is on a mission. The classical 1:33 aspect ratio is perfect for this, with its intimidating black bars at the side; it mirrors Saul's tunnel vision. The sound design is vast, overbearing, industrial, imposing. The final moments are staggering in both their power and their logic.

However, when I said that the film has a mechanism, I do not mean this in a positive way. For a film staged so excellently and so thematically powerful, being reminded that we are in fact watching a film is one of the last things you want; we should be immersed completely. But there are moments here and there; shots left too long out of focus, as if to say... Well, what? Technique is left to creep in where it shouldn't have done. And when the film breaks its predominant focus on Saul, as it does in a couple of scenes, I felt pulled out of it.

This is a dark and powerful piece, meticulously composed and unlike anything I've ever seen, especially on this topic. That it is so great makes its flaws that bit more jarring. Nevertheless, this is vital, devastating stuff, a film that feels like it needed to be made. And, well, good. Because it did. And, consequently, it needs to be seen too.

Review of "45 Years"

For a film about a marriage slowly but surely tumbling out of control, it's astonishing, and something of a coup, how assured and precise Andrew Haigh's "45 Years" is. It's a film which doesn't so much ape as embody the spirit of a cinematic mathematician like Haneke, where every shot feels fine-tuned for effect, every angle maximising some important aspect- or throwing us a red herring. A work of some kind of mastery, basically. 

All this would be for naught if it was in service of nonsense, or worse, something meaningless, but luckily "45 Years" has an emotional reach to meet its technical precision, and is mining deep thematic wellsprings of ambiguous but bold feeling. 

Kate (Charlotte Rampling) and Jeff (Tom Courtenay) have been married for 45 years. We start the film on a Monday- their anniversary party is on Saturday. Their events organiser observes how that's an odd number of years to celebrate, and Kate informs him they would have had it five years ago but Jeff was unwell. You feel that waiting until the 50th anniversary wasn't an option. There's a lot to celebrate.  

In that same scene, the organiser also points out that the room in which they're celebrating has a rich history, like any marriage. It was even home to the celebrations of the Battle of Trafalgar. "Didn't Nelson die in the Battle of Trafalgar?" Kate knowingly probes. The organiser replies yes, but a victory like that is worth celebrating. 

This is a clever piece of offhand dialogue that in a lesser film would simply set the stage for the upcoming jaunt, but here outlines and echoes the entire themes of the film. Earlier that day, Jeff had received a letter from Germany saying that the body had been found. "My Katia", he says. Kate looks on in worry. We find out that Katia was somebody Jeff was with many years ago. They were climbing a mountain, and one day- she was gone, with nothing but a scream (Jeff's description of that scream is one of the most evocative and perfect pieces of perfectly delivered dialogue you could choose to hear). 

But now her body has been unearthed, frozen, and perfectly preserved, which is fitting, because her presence is felt by both Kate and Jeff for the remainder of the film.

There's not much more to the plot itself, and the film explores the ways in which this revelation impacts them in the run-up to a party in honour of their love. 

Jeff responds by becoming distant and vague. Not there. He starts to research climate change and becomes intensely interested in how people can be preserved in ice. Kate expresses interest in all of this (with reservations, such as her gentle dissuading of Jeff going to Switzerland to see the body), but soon it seems like this has impacted her in more ways than even she thought. Is she jealous? She can't be jealous of something that happened before (although, we learn, not too long before) Kate came into Jeff's life.  

However, Kate knows Jeff, and we can see she senses something's off. Why is he being so mournful over something that happened so long ago? The narrative screws are inevitably tightened and whilst there are late in the day revelations, they are delivered subtly, for us to consider for ourselves, instead of being told how to feel. 

The film succeeds so brilliantly because of many reasons. Haigh's screenplay, in a very short space of time and in some quite restrictive conditions (about 85% of the film is just conversations between the pair, or Kate on her own), manages to draw the outline of an entire marriage. We sense their love through small conversations only old married couples can have, such as Kate's quiet surprise that Jeff is reading Kierkegaard again. "You have three editions of that book, but I don't think you've ever got past the final chapter." 

The acting is another reason why the film is successful. Where others might play it with an eye to melodrama, Rampling and Courtenay do the opposite. If this is the tale of a marriage falling apart, and I leave that up to you to decide, it's a marriage imploding as opposed to exploding. The sense of routine and order brilliantly established in the first two scenes doesn't dissipate throughout the whole film. Nobody shouts, and lines are delivered with the true emotions implied, not stated. Only two masters of their craft could convincingly pull this off, and there's enough evidence here to suggest that that's just what these two are. Talk has been had of an Oscar nomination for Rampling; she deserves it. Every aspect of her performance is controlled, and studied, to perfection. Every pause, intonation, and look seems utterly natural but tells us something words can't. 

Then there's the filmmaking itself. Largely composed of static shots just observing the dialogue being spoken, the film plays with placing and framing to tell us things and give us clues. Look at how Kate tends to be placed nearest the camera, or how many shots there are that show Kate side-on, looking left or right. The film is studying her. It wants us to feel her feelings, in close up. It's an extraordinary example of cinematic empathy. Her feelings become ours. 

That's it. There's music, but it comes from characters playing it, as opposed to a non-diegetic soundtrack. There are no fireworks, no drama, no explosions. Just a gentle thawing, like the ice that has preserved Katia, and a trickle that becomes a stream that slowly becomes a jet of feeling. The characters try their best to contain it, but it's there. Whatever happens by the end of this film, and it's left open to debate, things have been altered in unforeseeable ways. Haigh, Rampling and Courtenay are masters of their craft. 

Review of Star Wars: The Force Awakens

*THERE COMES A POINT WHERE POTENTIAL SPOILERS BECOME A PUBLIC SERVICE WARNING, SO JUST TO SAY THAT I'LL BE DISCUSSING THE PLOT AT A SYNOPSIS LEVEL BUT I WON'T BE MAKING DIRECT REFERENCE TO ANYTHING THAT YOU'LL WANT TO EXPERIENCE DIRECTLY FIRST*

JJ Abrams "Star Wars: The Force Awakens", probably the most anticipated film this decade, is a familiar thing, with the usual abundance of spectacle, dogfights and derring-do. It reminded me, in a good way, of John Peel's maxim regarding his favourite band, 'The Fall'; this new Star Wars film is always different, but always the same. The most immediate frame of reference for most people is going to be whether it's better than the dreadful prequel trilogy, or as good as the canonised original trilogy, and my answer is that it is probably good enough for us to forget the prequel trilogy, and if the next two films in this go around the fountain are as good as this one, then there could well be longstanding debate as to which trilogy is better.

What makes it more than just a new Star Wars is that it has a blistering immediacy and deep currents of emotional verisimilitude that for me were lacking from any other aspect of the saga. This is entirely the work of three new lead actors, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, and Oscar Isaac. Ridley is Rey, a scavenger on a lonely planet called Jakku who spends her days raiding the corpse-like shell of the fallen Imperial Star Destroyer; Boyega is Finn, a Stormtrooper from birth who, after being instructed to destroy a village, finds himself disillusioned with killing and escapes from his ship to Jakku, where he meets Rey. Isaac is Poe Dameron, the best pilot in the Resistance, who are this film's updated Rebel Alliance.

All three of these actors have charisma and charm; Isaac in particular, after Drive, Inside Llewyn Davis, and Ex Machina, is turning into one of those actors that Philip Seymour Hoffman was; magnetic, captivating, willing to transform himself for each role. Every time he was on screen I cheered for him, not just because it was him, but because he brings exactly what is required for each performance, and in this it was enough that we wanted him to survive.

But his character is the least developed, and the real weight of the film hinges on Ridley and Boyega, who make a fantastic central leads and without whom the film would fall apart. They are broadly working types, Ridley is Hermione-esque, uptight and guarded, but hiding deep inner-pain, and Boyega is eager to please, brave, and with a dash too much bravado. But within those types they find contours and modes in which to paint entirely new pictures, and we end up caring deeply about them. For me, the pair felt as well-drawn as any characters from a serious drama. I was deeply rooting for them, and I wanted them to succeed, and in an age where there is nobody to root for and too many special effects, that was the most pleasant surprise of the whole film.

The plot is, as I say, familiar, and is simply the Resistance attempting to defeat the new First Order, who have been set up to continue the work of Darth Vader. The name "The First Order" screams "Reich", and there is indeed a moment where Domhnall Gleeson's General Hux mobilises troops in a way that is reminiscent of Reifenstahl's propaganda films, and Gleeson, all but spitting into the camera, seems to be channelling his inner Adolf.

But the main big bad this time is Adam Driver's Kylo Ren, who has been painted in the promotional material as the new Darth Vader, but in reality comes across more as the new Anakin, his story not quite complete yet and there's plenty of material left to work over in the next two films. As Tom Hardy says in Bronson, "I wasn't bad, I wasn't BAD bad- not yet". But he is a convincing and watchable screen presence, and as various people have noted already, he does in this film what Hayden Christensen failed to do in three, which is give some sense of inner moral conflict and make us believe in him.

And, of course, there's the factor of Harrison Ford's Han Solo, Carrie Fisher's now General Leia, and Mark Hamill's Luke Skywalker, who do just what they did thirty-odd years ago, and bring the required grit and glint to make us believe in them, as we have before, as we will do forever. So much has been speculated as to each character's prominence and role in the film, so I'll keep it brief, other than to say that you won't be disappointed, and the fact that as a collective consciousness, we've come to care so much about these characters, goes respected.

It's fun. That's the big draw, here; it is tonnes of fun. The film reassures you from the opening scene that it's going to be what you'd expect, but done well, and with care and love. I felt like everyone involved had put their all into it. John Williams' score fits alongside the others; cinematographer Daniel Mindel has clearly studied the old films and replicated the look well; Abrams, Lawrence Kasdan and Michael Arndt's script gets the tone, balance and weight right, with an almost mathematically precise formula for what to get right.

It works on an immediate level and on a subtextual level (along with the Nazi parallels, there's also some good feminist and post-colonial stuff in there that I may write about later). It's a film that works for all people, and has been crafted immeasurably well. It won't satisfy everyone and it probably doesn't live up to the hype, but nothing was every going to. This is far better than we could have ever had reason to expect, and I already cannot wait for Episode Eight.

What a masterful piece of blockbuster film-making this is!

Review of Carol (2015)

Todd Hayne's "Carol" is a remarkable film, remarkable because it is sensual, sad, sorrowful subtle and supremely stirring, simultaneously emotionally complex and rich and yet telling a very simple story. Composed almost entirely of shots that take place outside of the rooms where the action is, with the viewer peering in, it is remarkable how immersive a film experience it is. A close friend remarked how it resembles a painting by Edward Hopper, and I think this is fitting; it is the principally a mood piece, that in any scene you are watching transports you to that scene. It draws you in on a profound, and not a superficial level. 

Therese (Rooney Mara), pronounced "Teh-rez", (which immediately indicates something of the wilfulness about her character), works on the toy floor of a large department store, stuck to her counter, as she puts it. After a prologue which serves as framing device, the first ten or so minutes of the film are spent observing her behaviours. She lives alone, but a man named Richard (Jake Lacy) calls on her each morning. At her workplace, she is henpecked and ordered by her boorish staff. Her mind wanders, and she often has to be called back into the task at hand by others. You immediately sense her lack of fulfilment; she needs more than this. 

One day she spots Carol (Cate Blanchett) playing with a train-set on the other side of the store; Carol approaches her, asking Therese's opinion of what is a good present for a young girl. There is a richness to their interaction in this scene, something unspoken, a harmony in between the words which technically constitute their exchange. They are at once, palpably, in tune. It is the first great scene in a film which has several. Therese recommends a train set; Carol immediately, almost without thought, buys it. It will be delivered to Carol's house in the next few days. 

Upon leaving the store, Carol leaves her gloves behind; Therese posts them to her, Carol rings the store thanking Therese and inviting her for lunch, and from there, the central love story begins to blossom.

But there are other factors, and this is no easy love story. Carol is going through a divorce with her husband Harge (Kyle Chandler), and there's a nasty custody battle looming involving their daughter Rindy. Harge clearly is deeply, deeply in love with his wife, and whilst some might interpret his actions later on as those of a selfish, piggish man, whilst he's no saint I think everything he does is because he does care for his wife, and is incredibly hurt by her refusal to be with him. The central portion of the film is essentially a road trip, as Carol and Therese trek across America throughout Christmas and New Year, going from hotel to hotel, escaping Therese's mundane life and Carol's difficult divorce proceedings.

What makes the film great is in the composition. This is a delicate piece in theme and in how it's been made, and there are five or six individual moments which transcend the film itself and become transportative. The central love scene between the pair is the most prominent example; it is a profoundly erotic scene that works not because of lurid detail, but because of sensitive detail. The way their hair almost fuses together into one; the way they break their kissing to place their faces into one another, like they want to become one; the way they communicate to one another about what they both want from this exchange. 

It is cinematic poetry, and the film sings. Every technical aspect is perfect, and I mean perfect; Judy Becker's production design is exemplary, and every location feels in service to the theme; Edward Lachmann's creamy and dreamy cinematography conjures up a magnificently immediate sense of place; Carter Burwell's score is unobtrusive but delightfully mood-setting, rising to the occasion of each scene and placing a perfect stamp on it; Phyllis Nagy's script, working from Patricia Highsmith's novel, is an unfussy delight, with some of the richest and most understated dialogue I've heard in an American film for some time. 

The acting on all sides is magnificent, but Cate Blanchett's performance goes beyond even the highest expectations you could have of her (and will likely net her an Oscar). The control she displays in her posture, placing and inflexion is masterly; it's the kind of performance you can picture drama students studying years down the line. Her near constant sense of hurt, and longing, are within arm's reach for the audience at all times, and she walks a thin line between desperate and needy, and someone with a lot of love to give. Her courting of Therese is believable, and you can believe this pair as a couple, the kind you can't picture not being together. The way they reach out for other is a most beautiful thing, and little details, like the gifts they buy for each other, left me with an unashamed lump in my throat (and, indeed, I quietly cried through the credits).

Most thankfully of all, the film seems reticent to peddle a trite or patronising pro-LGBT line, or to make a comment about how things "back then" weren't so great, and how much better society reacts to non-hetero people. There are maybe two brief discussions of homosexuality in the film; ultimately it is about nothing more than Carol and Therese's relationship and the surrounding plot, and it is not serving a higher agenda or making a point about anything else. As a result the film feels pure, and this is what, I think, gives the film its greatness.

Ultimately, "Carol" represents a triumph of the melding of form and content; a film of the highest craftsmanship servicing a love story that runs deep and has rich multitudes. It does not proffer a cheap or an easy outcome, and understands that things involving people don't tend to really resolve themselves for the movie's sake; it relies on character motivations, and thankfully we are given two characters here who will endure, in a film that will no doubt go on to be a received and respected standard classic in so many years time. I cannot fault it, and I cannot wait to revisit it. 

Review of Last Orders (2001)

"Last Orders", Fred Schepisi's 2001 film about a group of very old friends travelling to Margate to scatter the ashes of their friend Jack (Michael Caine), based on the novel by Graham Swift, is an accomplished, good looking, verbally expansive film, acted to perfection, that suffers from near-terminal preciousness. I loved so many aspects of this film, the performances, the look, the stunning dialogue, but it is sentimental to the point of suffocation, and it feels hermetically sealed. Nothing can get into this film.

The performers involved are almost like a who's who of the top brass of British acting talent; Bob Hoskins plays Ray, who we sense was probably closest to Jack; Ray Winstone plays his son Vince, who always disappointed Jack by not going into his butchers business; Tom Courtenay plays Vic, who's the most peaceable member of the group; and David Hemmings plays Lenny, the one of them all who's the biggest sucker for a pint.

Helen Mirren also plays Jack's wife Amy; she doesn't come with the boys to scatter his ashes, instead staying at home to visit their severely disabled daughter June, who Jack has never wanted anything to do with. Theirs was not an unhappy marriage, but we sense that at some point after June's birth their marriage forked, and they spent large parts of it walking side by side but down two different roads.

The whole film is told through an interplay of flashback and the present day, but with flashbacks sometimes leading back to different flashbacks and the flashbacks coming forward not always to the present. Any narrative ambiguities are quelled by good makeup work and well-chosen younger actors who resemble the main stalwarts in motion and gesture if not in the face itself. So we see this old group meet each other, fight in the war together, get married together, and so on. It's a lovely if astoundingly obvious setup.

And it is in the flashbacks that the films preciousness begins to drag it down. There is nothing revealed in them that one could not attempt to decipher simply by watching the first 20 minutes and figuring out the relationships between the characters. For a film dealing ostensibly with grief and the measurement of what your life has been worth in its sum achievements and relationships, it all feels hopelessly safe, more than a little staid. There are the requisite reveals, the conflicts, the ultimate reconciliation with peace, and... What then? It just ends.

Perhaps I am being too harsh on the film;maybe I am expecting more; but I honestly cannot stress the calibre of the technical qualities enough, and the acting alone almost warrants watching it. But they are all in service of a flimsy piece of fluff that has nothing much to say about the subjects that its dealing with; it's almost as if it was directed to Radiohead's maxim of "no alarms and no surprises, please".

Review of A Girl At My Door (2014)

July Jung's 2014 film "A Girl At My Door" is many things at once; it is simultaneously a partial police-procedural, an exploration of two very different types of alcoholism, a story of a mother-daughter type relationship, and the tale of a young girl escaping her abusive father (with time to address issues like illegal immigration and LGBT rights in the workplace). It also has a philosophical bent, and is one of those rare films that is content to leave the viewer with more questions than answers (and not because it wasn't intelligent enough to know the answers, but instead because it was intelligent enough to understand that audiences can actually think for themselves).

For a film, looking back, does so much, it is remarkable how mannered it is and how unfussily it moves forward in the act of watching it. The core of the plot is essentially a three-hander; Young-Nam (Doona Bae) is a recently disgraced police officer who has been relocated to a small seaside town after an unspecified incident. After establishing herself as a steely, determined and stoic piece of work (one awkwardly effective scene sees her refusing to participate in office karaoke), she finds herself drawn to a young girl named Do-Hee (Sae-Ron Kim), who is being brutally abused by her father Yong-Ha (Sae-byeok Song).

Do-Hee keeps turning up at Young-Nam's door in ever-increasing states of distress and dishevelment until Young-Nam is forced to take her in, not entirely to her chagrin but not to her great pleasure either. But eventually a warmth comes to pass between them, and a maternal relationship of sorts is formed.

There are various late-in-the-day revelations, and the plot builds to a conclusion that isn't so much tense as just messy, one where sympathies slide and motivations can only be guessed at; and this is a good thing. Jung's writing and direction is so surehanded that any attempt to have actually explained anything would have been cheap and forced. This is a film with a commitment to reality such that it understand that some motivations are hidden even from those performing the action.

It's also, technically, a very accomplished piece of work with a visual style to match the fairly bleak subject matter. The score from Yeong-gyu Jang is sparse, with strings and piano chords flaring up quietly and very occasionally, only really coming dominating the soundscape for the finale. And the cinematography from Hyun Seok Kim is wonderfully understated, grim, grey and bar maybe two shots, expressly unvibrant, capturing the sense of place in this town, framing the washing lines, the docks, the stone pier, Do-Hee's red house. It might not be a nice place, but it's a place we come to know.

It does all hinge on the acting, however, and thankfully all three performances work very well; I was particularly impressed by Doona Bae, who gives a composed, dignified performance even as her life, seemingly, falls apart, and she keeps pouring the alcohol. Contrasted with Song's performance as Yong-Ha, also an apparent alcoholic, I was reminded of the maxim from 2005's Capote that two characters grew up in the same house, but one left through the front door and the other through the back.

What's ultimately so effective is that the film consistently trumps audience expectations without every coming across as exploitative or smarmy; every twist seems rooted in what these characters might actually do, and that's the kind of intelligence which is uncommon in movies like this. It might not be a happy film, but it is rewarding, thoughtful, morally cogent, and doesn't disappear after you've left the theatre. It dares to ask, "who do YOU feel sorry for?"

Review of Mommy (2014)

Xavier Dolan has long been one of the premier auteurs working in the cinema, a Quebecois maestro whose films are often barnstorming, bruising, blistering achievements of emotional content married to extremes of stylish form. Ever since his debut in 2009 with the tour-de-force "I Killed My Mother", one of the great, and most devastating, portrayals of parenthood that I've seen, I've approached each Dolan film afterwards with an almost spiritual expectation such are the depth that his films seem to reach into my soul and stir my innermost feelings.

His films are so soulful, and come from a place of such sincerity and feeling, that each successive effort hasn't failed to transport me to a world that only the greatest films can, where every action on the screen holds you in rapture, where the characters fill you with love and contemplation, where the visual style is so in tune with the themes and thought; his films are whole, they are events, and they transport the viewer, this viewer, to a world that is often painful to leave. They are the cinema working in full force.

So for me to say that Dolan's latest film, "Mommy", is by far his most emphatic work to date, his most alive and vibrant, and his most mature and complete, then, is a compliment of the highest order. But few films have enraptured me so, even including films of his own oeuvre. From the very opening, in which we are introduced to Anne Dorval's Diane ("Die") in a car crash which doesn't leave her injured so much as leave her swearing and angry, we can immediately sense her irrepressible spirit.

She's on her way to a meeting with a counsellor in a detention centre who tells her that her son, Steve (Antoine-Olivier Pilon) has set fire to a canteen, causing another child to be hospitalised. A faulty walkie-talkie reveals a barrage of crude cursing, insults, swearing. Die smiles; this is her mother's son.

The following scene was one of the best of the film, because it did what it was trying to do so simply, and with such skill in the writing; as we follow Die and Steve on their way home, their relationship is drawn out in full. He is a profane, almost violently exuberant young man who is nevertheless filled with a love for his mother that is almost overwhelming. She, equally, loves his son to the end of the world, but there is tragedy to how she is regards his energy; she knows this is him, she accepts him, but she is also scared of how that energy can sometimes overflow into violence. His actions, loving though they are, have a roughness to them, a force, which comes directly from his overabundance of feeling.

This is all down to Pilon's performance, which is a masterclass in movement. His whole body is his own puppet, and he is in complete control over it. You sense he has gone away and thought about his character, reflected on him, and then inhabited him completely. The performance, and hence the character, is organic, real, home-grown. His violence is not a tic or a cheap acting trick; it feels so real, and hence the tension between them also feels incredibly real.

And on, and on, their relationship, incredibly intimate, almost Oedipal (Steve doesn't shy away from his masturbation habits in front of his mother) is carefully defined before us. On an afternoon where Steve and Die's play-fighting becomes something more serious, however, a neighbour, Kyla (Suzanne Clement) from across the street who has only waved at Die before now enters the house, and almost instantly has a calming and embalming effect on their dynamic. She dresses a cut on Steve's leg, reveals her quiet, stuttering nature, and leaves. Die is in awe; someone like this is sorely needed in this loving but volatile environment. She takes a bottle of wine over as thanks (poured from a cardboard carton in the fridge), which is received by her taciturn, enigmatic husband.

Soon, Kyla is a regular fixture in their house, a teacher on Sabbatical (we sense a breakdown, but Dolan doesn't paint this out) who is drawn in by the pair's energy and enthusiasm.

From here, the film is nothing more and nothing less than one of the most whole, funny, touching, heartbreaking character studies I have seen, observing the behaviours of these three misfits through highs and lows, peaks and troughs. If it all sounds very soap-opera ish, then maybe there is a case to be made that it is, but this is elevated soap-opera, with every frame imbued and embellished with feeling and care; Dolan wants us so deeply to love these dysfunctional people, and we do. Their pair have such rapport, and care so deeply about us, that our feelings are stirred and we too become involved in their fates; we want nothing more than for them to be okay. Think about the last time you cared about characters in a film to this extent.

A word must go to frames, however, as this is easily, on a technical level, the most audacious film Dolan has yet made. Shot in a 1:1 aspect ratio (the film is a square), what could have easily been a gimmick is the film's coup-de-grace. In isolating each character, it is as though they are singled out whenever they are on screen. It allows us to focus on them and consider them untouched by others, and so on whenever each character is placed centre-forward. It's a daring trick, but it works brilliantly.

This is also the most visually beautiful and direct of Dolan's films, a smorgasbord of colour, action and activity, where almost artificially blue skies meet never-ending grey roads, and character bounce along the middle on bikes, skateboards and with shopping trollies. There is an almost cartoonish sense to the film, as if heightened reality, allowing the emotions to take on a palpably prescient quality. This is amplified through the cheesy songs on the soundtrack; even Oasis's Wonderwall is used well. (yes, the most overplayed and over-rated song maybe of all time is used effectively).

And that's the film. I have no flaws, nothing to pick apart. I laughed and cried with ferocity and in equal measure, and I didn't want to leave this world. This is a fairly long film at over two-hours, and Dolan uses that length to startling effect. It is a whole and complete work, and one that lingers in the mind and the spirit for some time afterwards. I am grateful that Dolan made it, because it is more than a film, it is a lesson in empathy and a treatise on the irriducibility of the human spirit.

I, as ever, await the next work by this great master, and if he manages to top this towering piece of work, then he may just cement himself in the pantheon of masters for good; that is, if he hasn't done so already, and I'm certainly arguing his case.

Review of Whiplash (2014)

"Whiplash" works because it is a film about understanding. It places us in the company of two very different characters and by the end, we feel as though their arcs have been fully drawn, and an understanding, or acknowledgement of sorts has been reached, where another film may have settled on base Mannichean motivations. It also works because the writer/director Damien Chazelle has created a piece of primal, almost tribal film-making. It is about a young jazz drummer studying at Shaffer Music Conservatory, Andrew (Miles Teller), who yearns to be "one of the greats", as he puts it. He practices alone in a room. returns alone to his apartment at night, and seemingly does not do much else, until one day Fletcher (J.K Simmons), a seasoned and spiteful music tutor, spots him and gives him a place in his band. Andrew has waited his whole life for this.

Fletcher, it is revealed, is a creature of pure malice. Simmons' (sure to be Oscar-nominated) performance reminded me of Peter Capaldi's spin-doctor Malcolm Tucker from the TV series "Thick Of It", although R. Lee Emery's drill sergeant from "Full Metal Jacket" may be the more recognisable comparison. Every other word from his mouth seems to be a profanity, a sexual exclamation, or a combination of the two. He quickly browbeats Andrew, brings him to the brink of tears, playing malicious mind-games. It is here that one should pay attention to the dialogue; look at how sharply the exchanges are worded, and how Fletcher so incessantly picks apart what Andrew says.

Fittingly, this is Simmons playing new notes, a sort of fleshed out version of the kind of persona he hinted at in his work in Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy. It's also the kind of performance that tends to overshadow a film- as I say, it will likely net an Oscar nomination, and rightly so. But the core and heart of the film is Andrew. Aside from his performance in Project X, he is an actor I am unfamiliar with, but I truly felt like he bared his soul for this film, emotionally and physically. The nature of the drumming he does is brutal and intense, and as best I could tell it was his drumming and not the work of a stand-in or CGI.

But more than this, the film is the most wonderful example of the Bildungsroman, and it all hinges on the fact that Teller is a supremely drawn character. I was reminded of Patrick Fugit's intrepid Rolling Stone report in "Almost Famous", and the eponymous Jack in A.M Home's masterful debut novel; two beautiful, believable characters. He navigates the pitfalls of early adulthood with as much confusion and guile as the rest of us did, but he also carries at his core and undervalued characteristic in American films; determination. I believed that he wanted to be the best drummer he could possibly be, and he carried me along with him. The fantastically drawn scene where he tells his potential love interest Nicole (Melissa Benoist) that he cannot be with her because he must prioritise his drumming almost seemed like an affront to all those films where the principle interest of the teenage characters is sex. He even has a loving relationship with his dad (Paul Reiser). How rare is that in a film about teenagers!

This determination also creates an unusual dynamic with Fletcher. Andrew, understandably, resents the barbaric treatment Fletcher dishes out, but almost against himself he can't help but be drawn in by how Fletcher pushes him into being the best drummer he's capable of being. As I have said, the film is about the pair trying to understand each other, and this is principally a film about understanding. When we do learn about Fletcher's philosophy, we nod along with Andrew.

The film is also as physical as the drum solos Andrew puts himself through. It has a constant, under-lit, high contrast look throughout which has the effect of making us feel like we're constantly in the backrooms, rehearsing, and never in the limelight; a nice mirroring of Andrew's feelings throughout. It is also the work of a director who knows how every single scene, every single shot, should play out, whether it's by shaky-cam, or mounted tripod, or with a shot arrangement to match the throbbing drum solos (in the magnificent, nine-minute finale). Were this not the year of "Birdman"'s one-shot tour-de-force, this would be a lock for best editing and perhaps best cinematography.

Finally, the film has a commitment to credibility and character which is unusual in American underdog movies like this. There is the feeling that at any point, the film could have turned into a thriller, or aped the Rocky structure with the "will he win the final concert?!" tropes. To its credit, it does not. Two-thirds in, it completely abandons structure and instead pursues the course of action that would have followed, instead of egging the audience into anticipation. As a result, it's far more tense and taut (I was wriggling in my seat in places) than if we were being dragged along by third-act revelations and the like. And it most certainly does not settle on some hokey epigram like "follow your dreams".

I believed this film completely. I believed the characters, the scenarios, the relationships, how it was made, and the things the film stood for, and it was a joy to believe in them. It moved me, exhausted me, touched me and thrilled me. It's a faultless exercise in technical and emotional content, and a supreme piece of entertainment, one that will, if there is justice in the world, go on to become a modern classic.

Review of Kelly + Victor (2012)

Kieran Evan's "Kelly + Victory", based on the book of the same name by Niall Griffiths, opens with a sequence in which the eponymous Kelly (Antonia Campbell Hughes) watches a moth fly against a window. She is passive. does she empathise with the moth? Is she torturing it? Enjoying it suffer? We don't know, and will never know. Already an ambiguous tone is set here, in which we are shown the actions of characters without being told what they symbolise. The next scene, where Kelly meets Victor (Julian Morris) in a night-club on his birthday also highlights perfectly a certain poetic realism the film tries, and succeeds, and juggling throughout. Deep, romantic cello music plays, signalling a romantic union, but it also fades into the thumping 4/4 beat of traditional club music. The scene is also shot in a way that recalls a similar scene in Xavier Dolan's "I Killed My Mother", all red-lighting and smoke. In a sense, we are being given a real view and a romanticised, stylised view.

This, bravely, does not let up throughout the entire film, this expert balance of feeling and description, the simultaneous poeticisation and commitment to realism. It works brilliantly.

We follow Kelly and Victor home. They flirt. Talk. There's a certain spark here, and it's testament to the actors that we feel it ourselves. They are even comfortable enough around each other to take drugs. As sure as night follows day, they are making love, in a wonderful, beautiful scene. And before we know it, in the throes of their love-making, she has slipped her hands around his wrist and is strangling him. Wordlessly. There's something at the outer fringes of communication going on here, a mutual bond happening before us.

I've described up until about ten minutes into the film, and won't describe much more other than to say that, as you have probably guessed, their relationship is charted from this point onwards, and that the film is equal parts dual-character study and wonderfully rendered love story. I was impressed at the length to which Evans allows us to come to know the pair, and as a result the length to which we come to care about them. I have rarely become so invested in the fate of two characters, and a great, quivering, fragile emotional intensity is achieved by the final frame. There's a master's touch at work here, and it surprises me that this is Evan's first feature. This is the kind of masterpiece a director can only really dream of achieving.

What it hinges on, primarily, is its presentation of human sexuality, and whilst you may be thinking from what I have described that this is a document of an S+M relationship, this is no British '50 Shades of Grey'. Look at the scene where Kelly goes to an actual dominatrix's dungeon, and is visibly uncomfortable, where surely she should be in her element from how she's treated Victor. Instead of being about sadism and masochism in the traditional sense, the film is a document of two people who happen to satisfy each other in the most peculiar ways. The film is more of a rumination on the ways we psychologically medicate and express ourselves through sex.

It also, lovingly, describes British life in a way I greatly related to. I loved the scenes set in pubs, pub gardens, art galleries, and the countryside. Victor so adores the countryside is a lovely little touch that draws out his character and inspires awe in the viewer; we almost feel as one with nature as we watch it. Cinematographer Piers McGrail, who had worked in short films before this, has drawn a picture of the world as sensuous as the kind found in a Malick film, and as sensual as the kind found in a Marquez novel. And he has composed two masterful shots which will stay with me for some time; I won't say what they are, but they are climactic scenes in more ways than one, and focus on the solitude of the characters at respective points. Even picturing them in my head stirs deep emotions in my heart.

This is a rare, rare film. It's a cruel, harsh, wonderful, tender piece of work that with skill and precision uses two actors and their bodies to highlight the minutiae and great wonder of human sexuality. I was reminded of a number of other masterpieces of sex; Crash, Secretary, Shortbus, Shame, and in fact this film stands among them. It is a poem, requiem, hymn, soliloquy to the human body and the things we are capable of doing to ourselves and others.

It could even be one of my films of the decade come 2019, and believe me reader, that is not something I say lightly.

Review of Tyrannosaur (2011)

"Tyrannosaur", a sophomore directorial effort expanding a short film made four years prior, from that most gifted of British actors Paddy Considine, is principally a film about dichotomies. It presents two visions of hell, one terrifying, and one sad, and almost seems to let them battle it out against each other. It also concerns a man with a fractured psyche who has a deep wellspring of rage within him, but enough of a conscience to know that his actions are abhorrent. There's something Nietzschean, or perhaps Freudian, to his character, such is the intensity of the war ongoing between his id and his ego.

This man is called Joseph and is played by Peter Mullan in a naked, brave performance. The very first scene sees him stumbling out of a pub, drunken and rambling, angry at some trivial thing or another. It doesn't take much to set him off. His dog whimpers at him, and he kicks it. The dog dies. The next day, he buries it in his back garden.

Described here, one could very easily hate Joseph, but Considine seems to be telling us that to do so would be taking the easy way out. There's something to his grief, and tenderness, the way he caresses his dogs' paw after the event conveying a deep regret at his actions, and a deeper regret at his inability to stop himself from performing them.

Joseph's world is the sad vision of hell.

Events place him in the company of the timid, Christian, charity shop worker Hannah (Olivia Colman). There is no easy rapport between them to begin with, and theirs is not some love story. Her innate goodness results in her trying to console him, but he lashes out and deeply insults her. Later she returns home to a pleasant suburban house, quietly drinks a lot of wine while sat on the sofa, and when she has passed out her husband James (Eddie Marsan) returns home and urinates on her.

Olivia's world is the terrifying vision of hell. A wedding photo of the pair hangs large in their living room, almost as a reminder of how dire her situation has become and how much has been lost in her life.

Indeed, for me the film's strongest and most affecting writing came in the presentation of their abusive relationship. James decides to beat her up, and when Hannah comes into work the next day, her assertion that she "slipped in the bath" feels as well-rehearsed as an old stagehand performing the role of Banquo. Without ever, really, saying so Considine conveys the rise and fall and stagnation of an entire relationship. James' pitiful apology to Olivia, a scene I had to look away from, is so devastating because it implies a vicious ongoing cycle, and also because it subtly shows James wheedling Olivia into the perpetrator, and him the victim.

These two worlds are presented side by side, with Joseph and Olivia's relationship the focal point in the centre. They are both so hurt, and so wounded, that they see a little of themselves in each other, and hence against their natures get drawn towards each other.

They key to the film's success is that it is so accurate and rings to true about the characters and situations it depicts. I have met people like Joseph, whose lives revolve around rage, alcohol, and self-pity, with just enough humanity to know that if he really, really tried they could turn it around a little. I have met people like Hannah, who carry inside them a small glow of goodness which touches all they speak to. I have even, from afar, observed the actions of people like James, who defy understanding, in the way we can understand Joseph, and appear to have been born into this world as just pure evil.

A vision of the world this bleak needs an accompanying visual design, and thankfully Considine hired cinematographer Erik Wilson, one of the best working today, and he creates an oppressive and dreary atmosphere greyer than the M5. A couple of outdoor scenes I assumed were set indoors; that's how overcast the film is.

At this point you may be wondering why you'd want to see a film like this. A not entirely invalid question, since although this is a first-rate production it is in the service of a miserable plot. Yet... I can't say it transcends the misery, but there's so much artistry surrounding it and so much essential human truth at the centre of the film, and it conveys the themes so cogently and effectively that I can't help but recommend it most highly.

Films like this, I think, are best for allowing us to observe worlds which we may not come into contact with, and hence it deserves respect. Bad things like this do happen, and just as we should not ignore them when they do, so, too, I don't think we should ignore this film.

Review of Stranger By The Lake (2013)

Stranger By The Like is as much about loneliness as it is about lust, which is a key to understanding it amidst the un-simulated and frankly shot sequences of gay lovemaking. It could not be a simpler film, taking place at the eponymous lake which doubles as a cruising spot for a number of gay men. We are introduced to a man called Franck (Pierre Deladonchamps), who is perhaps in his mid-to-late 20's, who frequents the spot. In the first scene, he walks up to a larger, older man called Henri (Patrick d'Assumcao) and starts chatting with him. We learn that Henri is recently divorced, with an ambiguous sexuality, but content to sit and watch the lake as the days go by.

The film has an eerie, voyeuristic tone to these opening scenes which simultaneously puts the viewer at ease, with its' gentle and luscious depiction of the tranquil lake and the surrounding woods, and also unnerves, as the various men lie undressed on the beach, go up into the woods to get it off with each other, and make idle chit-chat around this. It's an effective juxtaposition which underpins the entire film.

I was immediately reminded of Ulrich Seidl's "Paradise: Love", the first part of a trilogy, which saw an older woman travel to Africa to have sex with younger African men. They share a lot of stylistic choices; that film had a number of scenes set on a beach, and they both share a prevalent use of shallow focus photography, meaning that everything is on the screen in clear view. There's no lighting. It's as frank as can be, and shot primarily in long-shot and tableaux.

This idyll is somewhat shattered when the mysterious Michel (Christophe Paou) turns up. Franck is instantly attracted to him, but Michel has another lover. Franck silently stews, transfixed, and occupied with his conversations with Henri, until one evening after it has got dark, Michel drowns his lover in the lake. Instead of doing the sensible thing, Franck finds himself further drawn towards Michel, replacing his previous lover, and even being so bold as to name their love-making love, instead of simply cruising.

The events above are presented in such a placid, manner-of-fact way that as a viewer one has to constantly remind themselves of the true nature of the story being told. This is the stuff of pulp, elevated to what appears to be high-art. It's also, for me, a pitiful study of loneliness. As well as morbid curiosity and fatalistic lust, Franck's actions belie an intense loneliness. He's desperate to feel something with someone; look at how he says "kiss me" just as he is about to climax. This also explains his growing bond with Henri, who is also incredibly lonely but in touch with himself enough to admit it; he is a complicated character, but brutally honest, which Franck lacks.

The film does uncoil, slowly and then very quickly in a notably tense sequence, and comes off ultimately like a Hitchcock film directed by Bruce LaBruce (and shot by Haneke's regular cinematographer). This is not a bad thing; it's a b-movie with arthouse trappings, and this too does its' bit to unnerve the audience. Its' depiction of male sexuality is among the more overt examples of male (on male) gaze I've seen, and far from being exploitative we are forced to genuinely contemplate the male body in the same manner as looking at Michaelangelo's David forces us. Director Alain Guiraudie is fearlessly formal in framing his compositions around this remit, and he knows how to gain the most from shooting a sex-scene.

I do, however, have reservations. Whilst I cannot fault the manner of its telling, the story itself is dragged down by a couple of bits and pieces. The dialogue in the early scenes is a little heavy-handed, and one encounter with a man looking for women feels like it's establishing that this is a gay cruising spot; well, duh. There are a couple of clanging moments like that. And there's something to the disintegration of the sunny, peaceful tranquillity which is a little too complete for me; there's nothing in particular left to think about, or contemplate, and it doesn't go wider than the film itself. This seems like a bizarre criticism, but there's something to be said for the sadness I feel when I think I'm watching a great film which is going to endure and grow in the mind, and it turns out to be just a good one.

And yet, as I am wont to say, this is still a good film with a lot to recommend it. There's something marked about the restrained performances and lolling pace in service of the nasty plot which left a distinct impression on me, and a film willing to present male sexuality this bravely has to be commended. It's a shame it didn't do more, but then maybe I'm just asking a bit much.

Review of Sightseers (2013)

It reads like some kind of bizarre story you'd get in the back pages of a shady pulp magazine; or perhaps more like something you'd find plastered on the front pages of one of those glossy, grotesque "True Life Stories" magazines you assume no-one buys, yet someone must. A happy couple, in their mid-30's, on a caravanning holiday, which would end in a string of senseless murders.

He is Chris, played by Steve Oram, an amiable, bearded man, the kind of bloke you'd happily chat to down the pub. Bearded and opinionated in that way that British men in their mid-30's often are, he seems sensible, friendly, and almost remarkably normal. She is Tina, played by Alice Lowe, and her character is a bit more complicated. She's cute, pretty, but we sense a supreme loneliness inside her. Perhaps Chris is the first guy who's paid attention to her in a while. That she lives with her demanding, overbearing mother Carol (Eileen Davies), feels like a clue.

The very first scenes, with Tina preparing for the holiday, are like Mike Leigh on downers, as Carol bitterly spits in Chris' face "I don't like you" after he promises to bring back Tina safely. It's an odd opening, lacking any big laughs to hook the audience in, but funny enough to let us know we're watching a comedy, and it does set up the characters very well. The early scenes with the holiday itself work too; Chris and Tina are genuinely in love, and seem to complete each other in quite an endearing way. I liked them both throughout.

But all is not quite right; a man drops a Cornetto wrapper (a nod to the Cornetto Trilogy, I imagine, since Edgar Wright produced this film) on a tram, and Chris gets unduly enraged. Later he runs the man over with his caravan, in front of the man's wife and child, in what appears to be a terrible accident, although you can't help but notice Chris' little smirk...

Perhaps you can see where this is going. It is not long before Chris has pushed a man called Ian (Jonathan Aris) off a rock-face, seemingly for no other reason than Chris really didn't take to him. Tina finds out, but seems nonplussed at Chris' confession; "You can't do that... You'll ruin our holiday!." The bodies begin to mount up after that, but this is not some caravanning slasher flick. It's quite a hard film to peg, actually, but certainly a very intelligent one, and that's what I loved about it. Think a British "Badlands", where the characters have doubled in age and are prone to worry about not finding the right pasta sauce in a different town..

The film has a commitment to mundanity which is quite remarkable. It was quite uncomfortable to watch in places, actually, because it skewers a number of things which are very accurate about British life. Buying mints at petrol stations; holiday itineraries; the National Trust; the Daily Mail; the way some people get really, really funny about dog crap. Again, Edgar Wright's influences are writ large, but where his Shaun of the Dead poked fun at British life, director Ben Wheatley seems to dissect it and lay it bare. The film is so effective because you could probably edit out the killings, and you'd be left with quite a touching, romantic little love story.

But the killings are there, and this marriage of the macabe and the mundane becomes more pressing as the film goes on. It would, weirdly enough, make a fantastic double bill with John McNaughton's "Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer", a film I admire very much, which intercut scenes of brutality with scenes of the killers shooting the breeze and drinking coffee. I watched this film with my father, who made a fair observation halfway through that this is, probably, what a fair few serial killers live like. Certainly, the perverse normality of it all made me relate to Chris and Tina, which made me creep-y and crawl-y, and there's something to be said for Chris' complete and utter lack of guilt, or remorse, and the way he treats all this as just a fact of life.

The film goes to some darker and deeper places later on, and I won't ruin how, but I will say to keep a very close eye on Tina and her behaviour in the final act. The film itself retains a mordant, unrepentant eye on the pair's actions, and as an audience we almost feel like accomplices ourselves. It is also very funny, never in a particularly laugh-out-loud way (although there are some good laughs), but it's more... Amusing. Constantly dancing on that knife-edge between discomfort and hilarity. And that works quite well. Perhaps if it had been too funny, that would have distracted from the bigger things at work under the surface.

A final note must also go to Laurie Rose's brilliant cinematography. She worked on Wheatley's "Kill List", which was a cultish, psychedelic hitman movie, and utterly unforgettable, in no small part due to her downright freaky shot arrangements. Here she keeps the creepy compositions down to a bare minimum, but allows for a few moments of beauty. The moment where Chris kills Ian has the most effective use of chiaroscuro, and is just fancy enough to let the audience know that the rest of the films' look, which has a kitchen-sink, warts-and-all feel to it, was a conscious choice.

This is a subversive, discomforting film, hilarious in the right places, gruesome in others, and has that quality that means it grows in the mind as you think about it. The script, credited to the principal actors, has that very British ad-libbed feel to it, which is perfect here. It's just vague enough to interpret, but overt enough to let you know it knows what it's doing, and it has a peculiar mood which is hard to describe but very easy to feel. In short, it's just right, and if that sounds like damning with faint praise then think about how many films you've seen which don't put a foot wrong from the first frame to the last. This is one of those films, and it's a rarity, and it deserves to be seen.

Review of Horns (2014)

There’s a passage in Milan Kundera’s famous and wonderful novel “The Unbearable Lightness Of Being” where the notorious philanderer and protagonist “Tomas” reveals that he enjoys sex with the less conventionally attractive women. The women with something distinctive and memorable to mark themselves with are the ones who make more of a lasting impression; the ones who are distinctly themselves. If I remember correctly, the passage involves a woman who is compared to a giraffe with her proportions.

Stretching this quite far, I often find the same applies, for me, to films. There are some films which are all very well and good, masterpieces maybe, but on occasion I am drawn to the rougher films which bear a more personal hallmark, or are just so odd and juxtaposed that they make a stronger impression that something more professional.

And so, we arrive at Alexandre Aja’s “Horns”, a film based on Joe Hill (Stephen King’s son)’s novel, concerning a young man Ig Parrish (Daniel Radcliffe) who, in the wake of the death of his girlfriend from childhood, starts to grow a pair of horns. The small American town he lives in is adamant that he is the guilty, he is desperate to plead his innocence, and we are uncertain for about two-thirds of the film what’s really going on, aside from that it involves Daniel Radcliffe slowly embracing his dark side.

There is an element of narrative trickery here, as extended flashbacks (rather in the style of Stephen King’s novels, it must be said) reveal, slowly, bits and pieces regarding what happened to Ig’s girlfriend. We get to know a few key players, such as Ig’s brother Terry (Joe Anderson), and Lee (Max Minghella), the lawyer defending Ig. James Remar and Kathleen Quinlan play Ig’s parents. We even get to know, kinda, Ig’s girlfriend Merrin (Juno Temple). And then there’s the two policemen convince of Ig’s guilt, the waitress who wants Ig, Merrin’s father, the bastard Vicar…

This is a bloated film, chock-full of characters who probably could have been edited out. But that’s what I liked about it. And as the various narrative strings are pulled, tweaked and manipulated, the film digs itself into so many holes (and so many plot-holes) that to try and view it as a coherent story is futile. It instead has that quality of an old legend, passed down so often and through so many people that little elements here and there have been skewed, distorted, and come into contradiction with other elements. It’s hokum.

Why am I being so forgiving? A few reasons. Firstly, I’m warming to Daniel Radcliffe, post-Potter, immensely. Following his wonderful turn in “What-If” where he conveyed low-self-esteem and guilt so convincingly, it’s a relief and almost a miracle to see him turn on the “creep” factor. He is, at times, a legitimately chilling presence, and his eyes can truly bore into you. He has an intensity to him which is hard to forget.

The second reason I’m being so forgiving is that the film has such a keen and endearing visual style that, even when the “what” is in doubt, the “where” is right there in front of us. Filmed in Vancouver, Mission and Squamish, the film is painted large with greens from the forests, earthy ochres from the treehouse a number of flashbacks are set in, and generally there is the feeling that considerable work was done in post-production to make the reds more red, the blues deeper, the browns earthier. Uniformly excellent cinematographer Frederick Elmes deserve true commendation for his work here.

More superficially, the film has an excellent soundtrack, and any film that namechecks David Bowie’s “Heroes”, and then finds two opportunities to play it, gets a free pass in my book.

Some, understandably, will be more off-put by the jarring script than I. And while there’s one big-reveal that is quite moving, admittedly because it’s largely played off Daniel Radcliffe’s face, even I must concede that it arrives so unexpectedly and from out of nowhere that for it to have any meaningful emotional resonance is a big ask, even for someone as forgiving as this viewer.

It’s odd. It’s gawky. It jars. It’s bereft of ideas. By golly it makes no sense. But, forgive me, I quite liked that.