Event Cinemas, who are now running the Embassy, are having a season of old movies which screen on Sunday afternoons and are the repeated on Wednesdays. One Wednesday recently, I decided to give The Gay Divorcee a whirl, thinking that, since it stars Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, at the very least there'd be some good dancing to watch.
It turns out I under-estimated the entertainment value. This splendid movie, made in 1934, not only has great dance sequences but is funny as well - witty dialogue and the kind of mistaken-identity/situational humour which I'd expect from a French farce or a Shakespearian comedy.
Buoyed by having fun on Wednesday, I persuaded Ian and two other friends to try Shall we Dance on a wet Sunday afternoon. It was made in the same mold, but I thought it even better than The Gay Divorcee. In both cases Fred Astaire plays a self-deprecating hero who falls in love (or at least gets infatuated) at first sight. Ginger Rogers plays a slightly aloof woman in each case who eventually becomes as enamoured of Fred as he is of her. Edward Everett Horton (who seems to have been in more movies that you could comfortably count) plays Astaire's sidekick in both films and Eric Blore plays a member of the hotel staff in each.
I can see that the American comedy convention of men being lovable but stupid and woman being smart and good-looking (think I love Raymond, or Gary Unmarried, or Modern Family or... ) started a VERY long time ago. The 1930's slant seems a little difference in that Fred's characters can sing and dance whereas the modern male comedy character has fewer redeeming qualities. Comedy aside, the song and dance numbers in these two movies are superb and Fred and Ginger look like they're enjoying themselves hugely which is just so appealing to watch. There's tap and ballroom and ballet (Harriet Hoctor bent over backwards while dancing en pointe is unforgettably wierd)and even a number on rollerskates. There's good singing, fabulous frocks and great cars and its all so good humoured you can't help but enjoy yourself.
I've read that Shall We Dance isn't one of Fred and Ginger's best movies so things like Top Hat and Show Time must be fantastic. Do I wait for a screening somewhere, or try and track down a DVD?
Anne's rating 4/5
Saturday, September 04, 2010
Tuesday, August 03, 2010
Award Ceremony NZ International Film Festival 2010
This is really just a personal summary of this year's Film Festival, in a style I have used before.
This was a year of political films. A year when directors couldn't help themselves from playing with time lines, and they often couldn't be bothered with the traditional cinematic conventions to signal flashbacks. It was also a year of superfluous final scenes.
In summary, this year's...
Best Film: Cell 211
French Farce: The Concert
Classic Film: Once Upon a Time in the West
Special Mention: A Prophet - educating us on how prison educates
Best Comedy
Nominations:
All good, but The Concert just beats Four Lions, but I wouldn't like to pick a third place getter from the other three.
Best Thriller
Nominations:
My pick is Cell 211 - tense from beginning to end.
Best Mystery Film
Nominations:
The best told, yet simplest mystery was The Double Hour.
Triangle was the most mind bending,
while The Ghost Writer was the 3rd most entertaining mystery.
Best Political Film
There were plenty of films with a political theme or drama based on political conflict this year.
Nominations:
Four Lions was the most irreverant, Russian Lessons was the most thought provoking, Kawasaki's Rose and Agora also made me think, while White Material, Ajami and Scherezade did a good job of presenting consequences of political conflicts.
Best Horror
Nominations:
My pick is Triangle. Usually people take a cruise to escape, but these people want to escape from the cruise. Stylish Splice was my next pick, with The Loved Ones as the best of the splatter movies.
New Zealand Films
In order from best to worst:
The acting in the Kiwi films was often better than the films. In particlar Kate O’Rourke and William McInnes were outstanding and Jemaine Clement was delightfully spooky.
Disappointments
Time Travel
This was a year where directors used non-traditional techniques jumping around in time.
Superfluous Final Scenes
In addition Splice ran out of inspiration near end. The Time that Remains had superfluous scenes in 2nd half even though the final scene was great. While the final scene of The Killer Inside Me was full of problems.
Best Actors
In order
Eye-candy
Previously I have noted the unrealistic or unjustified use of a sexy actress. I didn't notice any blatant eye candy this year. Even Kim Cattrall and Rachel Weisz were looking restrained and aren't all female violin soloists beautiful?
But I have it on good authority that there were two pretty boys in The Hopes & Dreams of Gazza Snell.
One offs
Western: Once Upon a Time in the West - the best of the West?
Animation: In the Attic - junk having fun
Documentary: Russian Lessons - eye openning
Science Fiction: Splice - shock and humour
Surreal: Wound - amazing acting, pity about the film
Silent: Marvellous Corricks - weird and wonderful pre-1910 silent films
This was a year of political films. A year when directors couldn't help themselves from playing with time lines, and they often couldn't be bothered with the traditional cinematic conventions to signal flashbacks. It was also a year of superfluous final scenes.
In summary, this year's...
Best Film: Cell 211
French Farce: The Concert
Classic Film: Once Upon a Time in the West
Special Mention: A Prophet - educating us on how prison educates
Best Comedy
Nominations:
- Predicament - the beginners guide to blackmail.
- The Concert - have conect booking, need orchestra.
- A Somewhat Gentle Man - adjusting to the madness of life on the outside
- Cyrus - the perils of dating a solo mum
- Four Lions - don't shoot the Wookie
All good, but The Concert just beats Four Lions, but I wouldn't like to pick a third place getter from the other three.
Best Thriller
Nominations:
- Predicament - blackmail is such a dirty word.
- Animal Kingdom - you can trust granny, can't you?
- Cell 211 - let me tell you about my first day on the job.
- Farewell - how the French won the Cold War.
- The Ghost Writer - ghost writers are kittens, don't know.
- How I Ended the Summer - two men, one mistake, one short fuse.
- The Killer Inside Me - stylish, but flawed.
My pick is Cell 211 - tense from beginning to end.
Best Mystery Film
Nominations:
- Once Upon a Time in the West - why are they killing each other?
- Kawasaki's Rose - is Pavel Josek a hero or a traitor?
- The Ghost Writer - who is pulling whose the strings?
- The Double Hour - noises off.
- Triangle - why didn't they go straight to the bridge?
The best told, yet simplest mystery was The Double Hour.
Triangle was the most mind bending,
while The Ghost Writer was the 3rd most entertaining mystery.
Best Political Film
There were plenty of films with a political theme or drama based on political conflict this year.
Nominations:
- Kawasaki's Rose - who chooses the heros and the traitors?
- Four Lions - more dangerous to themselves than the public?
- Scheherazade, Tell Me a Story - is everything political in Egypt?
- The Time that Remains - are Palestinian Israelis frozen in time?
- The Ghost Writer - who pulled the strings?
- Agora - Christianity behaving badly.
- Lebanon - mummy I want to come home!
- Ajami - collision courses in Israel.
- White Material - can you be a white African?
- Russian Lessons - pawns in The Great Game.
Four Lions was the most irreverant, Russian Lessons was the most thought provoking, Kawasaki's Rose and Agora also made me think, while White Material, Ajami and Scherezade did a good job of presenting consequences of political conflicts.
Best Horror
Nominations:
- The Loved Ones - does for outback folk what Hitchcock did for shower curtains.
- Dream Home - an apartment to die for.
- The Human Centipede - mad doctor has it all sewn up.
- Wound - the angry by-product of being bored by the utterly predictable banality of our mainstream movies.
- Triangle - didn't I kill you five minutes ago?
- Splice - Picaso meets genetic engineering.
My pick is Triangle. Usually people take a cruise to escape, but these people want to escape from the cruise. Stylish Splice was my next pick, with The Loved Ones as the best of the splatter movies.
New Zealand Films
In order from best to worst:
- Predicament - what did you do in the school holidays?
- The Hopes & Dreams of Gazza Snell - come crashing down.
- Wound - love it or hate it.
The acting in the Kiwi films was often better than the films. In particlar Kate O’Rourke and William McInnes were outstanding and Jemaine Clement was delightfully spooky.
Disappointments
- Wound - too surreal for my poor brain
- The Myth of the American Sleepover - I'm not the target audience
Time Travel
This was a year where directors used non-traditional techniques jumping around in time.
- White Material - is it yesterday or tomorrow?
- Ajami - isn't he dead?
- Dream Home - 3 timelines, with subtle hints
- Triangle - its is meant to be tricky to understand
- Wound - surreal, 'nuff said
Superfluous Final Scenes
- The Housemaid - what's with that final birthday scene dubbed into English?
- The Loved Ones - should have stopped in reverse.
In addition Splice ran out of inspiration near end. The Time that Remains had superfluous scenes in 2nd half even though the final scene was great. While the final scene of The Killer Inside Me was full of problems.
Best Actors
In order
- Kate O’Rourke acts her heart out in Wound
- Luis Tosar was mesmerising as Malamadre in Cell 211
- Everyone knows a Gazza like William McInnes
- Casey Affleck was The Killer Inside Me
Eye-candy
Previously I have noted the unrealistic or unjustified use of a sexy actress. I didn't notice any blatant eye candy this year. Even Kim Cattrall and Rachel Weisz were looking restrained and aren't all female violin soloists beautiful?
But I have it on good authority that there were two pretty boys in The Hopes & Dreams of Gazza Snell.
One offs
Western: Once Upon a Time in the West - the best of the West?
Animation: In the Attic - junk having fun
Documentary: Russian Lessons - eye openning
Science Fiction: Splice - shock and humour
Surreal: Wound - amazing acting, pity about the film
Silent: Marvellous Corricks - weird and wonderful pre-1910 silent films
The Hopes & Dreams of Gazza Snell
Gazza is good Kiwi bloke, ambitiously in pursuit of his dreams and hopelessly optimistic to the point of being blind to risk and consequence. A man with a "can do" attitude and boundless energy. Not a good person to be married to if you are the worrying type (or even merely well adjusted). We all know a "Gazza" or two and William McInnes plays him perfectly.
The plot of The Hopes & Dreams of Gazza Snell is very simple, yet it is so dominated by Gazza that only his son Mark gets to share the limelight. Some of the interesting events (like the election campaign or Gail and Ron or Mark and Jee) are handled so abruptly that they seem contrived. I wonder if the story would seem more complete if either more had been made out of them or if they had been cut.
Gazza's passion is go-carting and he lives his passion through his sons and his desire to see them to top of the sport and dreams of Formula 1. He finances his dreams with proceeds of his cleaning business, and what ever schemes he can come up with, to the despair of his wife, Gail (Robyn Malcolm). His risk taking both financially and on the track are leading inevitably to disaster one way or the other only Gazza (and his sons) can't see it.
Overall it a nice simple story with a strong central character that we can all identify with, but the execution of the supporting characters and story elements lets it down a little bit. Still, I have it on good authority that the two boys are eye candy.
Ian's rating 2.5/5
Anne's rating 3/5
The plot of The Hopes & Dreams of Gazza Snell is very simple, yet it is so dominated by Gazza that only his son Mark gets to share the limelight. Some of the interesting events (like the election campaign or Gail and Ron or Mark and Jee) are handled so abruptly that they seem contrived. I wonder if the story would seem more complete if either more had been made out of them or if they had been cut.
Gazza's passion is go-carting and he lives his passion through his sons and his desire to see them to top of the sport and dreams of Formula 1. He finances his dreams with proceeds of his cleaning business, and what ever schemes he can come up with, to the despair of his wife, Gail (Robyn Malcolm). His risk taking both financially and on the track are leading inevitably to disaster one way or the other only Gazza (and his sons) can't see it.
Overall it a nice simple story with a strong central character that we can all identify with, but the execution of the supporting characters and story elements lets it down a little bit. Still, I have it on good authority that the two boys are eye candy.
Ian's rating 2.5/5
Anne's rating 3/5
The Red Shoes
Made in 1948, the Red Shoes is, apparently, THE great ballet movie of all time. The reason it features in the 2010 film festival is that is has recently been restored. (You can read all about the restoration here .) I read lots of English Ballet novels when I was a child (no TV, you understand) and while I can't remember references to The Red Shoes, Moira Shearer definitely featured. Sunday afternoon at the film festival seemed a good time to see what all the fuss was about. The story is all a bit melodramatic by twenty-first century standards but gripping nonetheless. Moira Shearer plays Vicky Page, a rising ballet star. Vicky is given her big break by the ballet company director (Boris) who offers her the leading role in The Red Shoes. The director has also given a big break to young conductor and composer Julian Craster, getting him to score the ballet music. In the process of rehearsing and performing the Red Shoes Julian and Vicky fall in love, much to Boris's disgust - he prefers his artistes to concentrate on their jobs and lavish any spare emotion on him. Poor old Vicky has to choose between love and dancing and this causes more turmoil than you'd expect - it turns into a tragedy on an epic scale, echoing the plot of the ballet itself.
There's definitely justification for the fuss - this is a beautiful film to look at on all sorts of levels. Moira Shearer is just gorgeous - wonderful red hair and big blue eyes and an hourglass waist and her party clothes are fabulous. It's fun to see Covent Garden when there was still a working market next door, and the scenery in Monte Carlo is suitably splendid. There's a big chunk of the ballet to watch which is great. There are 1940's hairstyles to admire and that clipped English delivery to marvel at - did people REALLY talk like that? The Red Shoes is escapism on a grand scale and you should take the opportunity to escape if it arises.
Anne's rating 4.5/5
Monday, August 02, 2010
Russian Lessons
Russian Lessons was the only documentary I saw in this year's Film Festival. A couple of years ago during the 2008 Beijing Olympic games Georgia attacked the city of Tskhinvali in the break away region of South Ossetia. The Russians claimed that 2000 civilians and some Russian peacekeepers had been killed in the bombardment, and that they were counter attacking to protect their peacekeepers and the South Ossetians. The Russians quickly took control ofSouth Ossetia and expanded the war into other parts of Georgia. The US, who had military advisors in Georgia, blustered that this was Russian aggression. The French tried to broker a ceasefire and a Russian withdrawal. The ceasefire took effect but the Russian withdrawal was much slower than they promised. There was talk of Russia being annoyed by a oil pipeline through Georgia that bypassed Russian controlled pipelines. Out of the mainstream there was sketchy information about the larger scale presence of Israeli military advisors and hardware in Georgia and the Georgian Minister of Defense with Israeli citizenship. The general consensus in the media seemed to be that Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili (emboldened by Dick Cheney et al) had tried to retake South Ossettia by force, while the world's media attention (and Russia) was focused on the Beijing Olympics and it had backfired.
At the start of this war Olga Konskaya and Andrei Nekrasov (documentary film makers based in St Petersburg, and connoisseurs of Georgian wine) decided to document the war. Andrei flew to Georgia to reach the front line from the south while his wife Olga went to North Ossetia (in Russia) to reach the front line from the north. Olga found the interesting information. At the Russian border she found people who saw the Russian army moving into South Ossetia before the war started. In Tskhinvali a city of about 25,000 where 2000 civilian were killed she couldn't find anyone who knows someone who died or were wounded, and only 50 new graves mostly of young men. People she talked to said that they had left the city before the war (about half the population left before the war started). Outside Tskhinvali amoung the Georgian villages she found plenty of people who's houses and businesses had been destroyed and evidence of deaths. Strangely most of the destroyed businesses were brand new, evidence of an ecconomic boom amoung Georgians in South Ossetia in recent years.
In Beslan, North Ossetia she finds witnesses from both inside the school and outside it who claim that the killing and destruction was caused by Russian soldiers and tanks attacking the school, rather than by the 7 gunmen inside the school. Turning the official story of this 2004 terrorist incident on its head. The Russian 58th Army was involved in Beslan, South Ossetia and the Second Chechen War.
In the second half of the film Olga and Andrei supplement their field work with uncovering TV footage played in the West and in Russia of Geogian victims in hospital mis-identified as South Ossetians, of Russian planes attacking Gori mis-identified as Georgian planes attacking Tskhinvali. They also look back at the earlier conflict in 1991 especially at the Russian involvement in atrocities in Abkhazia, with interviews of Georgian victims and corroborated by a Russian soldier.
The conclusions they draw are that the break up of the USSR was at least as brutal as Yugoslavia, that Russia is not to be trusted and its interest in Abkhazia is more about access to the Black Sea than the interests of Abkhazians and that western media is often too trusting or lazy about verifying facts. Even though they blame the entire 2008 war on Russia they don't explain Russia's motives. Though Putin made it clear in 2008 when the US recognised Kosovo that it would lead to Russia recognizing separtists in places like South Ossetia.
In my view the last 20 years has seen a ressurection of The Great Game between the UK and Russia in 19thC, but this time played out between the US and Russia with eastern Europe and the break away parts of the USSR as the chess board. While Russia is very short of pieces and is pinned in a corner, it is trying to play itself back into the game. Not a good time to be one of America's pawns.
Russian Lessons isn't neutral but it is a dramatic demonstration that even with today's technology the media (and through them the rest of us and our political leaders) can still be fooled.
Ian's rating 4/5
At the start of this war Olga Konskaya and Andrei Nekrasov (documentary film makers based in St Petersburg, and connoisseurs of Georgian wine) decided to document the war. Andrei flew to Georgia to reach the front line from the south while his wife Olga went to North Ossetia (in Russia) to reach the front line from the north. Olga found the interesting information. At the Russian border she found people who saw the Russian army moving into South Ossetia before the war started. In Tskhinvali a city of about 25,000 where 2000 civilian were killed she couldn't find anyone who knows someone who died or were wounded, and only 50 new graves mostly of young men. People she talked to said that they had left the city before the war (about half the population left before the war started). Outside Tskhinvali amoung the Georgian villages she found plenty of people who's houses and businesses had been destroyed and evidence of deaths. Strangely most of the destroyed businesses were brand new, evidence of an ecconomic boom amoung Georgians in South Ossetia in recent years.
In Beslan, North Ossetia she finds witnesses from both inside the school and outside it who claim that the killing and destruction was caused by Russian soldiers and tanks attacking the school, rather than by the 7 gunmen inside the school. Turning the official story of this 2004 terrorist incident on its head. The Russian 58th Army was involved in Beslan, South Ossetia and the Second Chechen War.
In the second half of the film Olga and Andrei supplement their field work with uncovering TV footage played in the West and in Russia of Geogian victims in hospital mis-identified as South Ossetians, of Russian planes attacking Gori mis-identified as Georgian planes attacking Tskhinvali. They also look back at the earlier conflict in 1991 especially at the Russian involvement in atrocities in Abkhazia, with interviews of Georgian victims and corroborated by a Russian soldier.
The conclusions they draw are that the break up of the USSR was at least as brutal as Yugoslavia, that Russia is not to be trusted and its interest in Abkhazia is more about access to the Black Sea than the interests of Abkhazians and that western media is often too trusting or lazy about verifying facts. Even though they blame the entire 2008 war on Russia they don't explain Russia's motives. Though Putin made it clear in 2008 when the US recognised Kosovo that it would lead to Russia recognizing separtists in places like South Ossetia.
In my view the last 20 years has seen a ressurection of The Great Game between the UK and Russia in 19thC, but this time played out between the US and Russia with eastern Europe and the break away parts of the USSR as the chess board. While Russia is very short of pieces and is pinned in a corner, it is trying to play itself back into the game. Not a good time to be one of America's pawns.
Russian Lessons isn't neutral but it is a dramatic demonstration that even with today's technology the media (and through them the rest of us and our political leaders) can still be fooled.
Ian's rating 4/5
Cyrus
Boy meets Girl and Girl's parents don't approve is a familiar romantic theme, all the way back to Romeo and Juliet. With Cyrus we have the theme reworked for the older, second-time-around crowd; divorced man meets solo mother and her son doesn't approve. Not only does he not approve, he regards his mother's new suitor as direct competition for her affections.
Cyrus is a fraught, funny and slightly painful story. John is our divorced man, a freelance editor who is overly dependent on his ex-wife for a sympathetic ear. He meets Molly, (the very attractive solo mother) at a party and they hit it off and end up in bed at his house. A relationship ensues, but John, who is not the best adjusted chap in the world, decides to follow her home one morning since he feels she may be hiding something from him. And so she is - her 21 year-old son, Cyrus. Cyrus and Molly have an unusually close relationship which seems to cross boundaries in the realms of personal space and propriety and watching John discovering this relationship is fun if slightly uncomfortable. Watching Cyrus attempt to sabotage the new romance is a similar combination of fun and discomfort.
Cyrus is played very straight (the acting is excellent) and you are left to make your own interpretation of the characters and their motivations - there are no Sex-and-the-City lunches with best mates where the characters explain what's going on in their heads. Despite the subject matter it's relatively light-hearted and ends on an up-beat note and was one of the festival's surprise pleasures
Anne's rating 3/5
Ian's rating 3/5
Cyrus is a fraught, funny and slightly painful story. John is our divorced man, a freelance editor who is overly dependent on his ex-wife for a sympathetic ear. He meets Molly, (the very attractive solo mother) at a party and they hit it off and end up in bed at his house. A relationship ensues, but John, who is not the best adjusted chap in the world, decides to follow her home one morning since he feels she may be hiding something from him. And so she is - her 21 year-old son, Cyrus. Cyrus and Molly have an unusually close relationship which seems to cross boundaries in the realms of personal space and propriety and watching John discovering this relationship is fun if slightly uncomfortable. Watching Cyrus attempt to sabotage the new romance is a similar combination of fun and discomfort.
Cyrus is played very straight (the acting is excellent) and you are left to make your own interpretation of the characters and their motivations - there are no Sex-and-the-City lunches with best mates where the characters explain what's going on in their heads. Despite the subject matter it's relatively light-hearted and ends on an up-beat note and was one of the festival's surprise pleasures
Anne's rating 3/5
Ian's rating 3/5
After the Waterfall
I was disappointed in After the Waterfall even though my reasons for going (centred around seeing Antony Starr in something other than Outrageous Fortune and also trying to be support New Zealand movies in general) weren't that compelling in terms of guaranteeing a good watching experience.
In fact, Antony did an awesome acting job and the Waitakeres and West Auckland looked wonderful but the film's premise was too slim. It's the story of a man whose four-year-old daughter disappears while he's minding her and she isn't found. As is often the case, the loss of their child destroys his marriage and almost destroys his ability to relate to anyone else. Eventually he emerges from his dark night of the soul and recovery looks possible.
The director was at the screening and she explained that the film is based on a novel and what appealed to her about the story was the lack of closure; that sometimes (often, even) in life we don't know what happened or why it happened and she wanted to explore that. Now, in lots of ways I agree with her - I think the media is obsessed with who or what to blame for untimely deaths, and it's full of stories of grieving parents campaigning about something to prevent others having a similar experience, because that seems to help them deal with their grief. And one of the refreshing things about Antony's character was a complete lack of that campaigning spirit. However, it really wasn't much fun watching his personal struggle, nor was it especially uplifting or edifying. So why would you want to? I'm not sure that you would, unless you just wanted your mind removed from your own issues.
Anne's rating 2/5
In fact, Antony did an awesome acting job and the Waitakeres and West Auckland looked wonderful but the film's premise was too slim. It's the story of a man whose four-year-old daughter disappears while he's minding her and she isn't found. As is often the case, the loss of their child destroys his marriage and almost destroys his ability to relate to anyone else. Eventually he emerges from his dark night of the soul and recovery looks possible.
The director was at the screening and she explained that the film is based on a novel and what appealed to her about the story was the lack of closure; that sometimes (often, even) in life we don't know what happened or why it happened and she wanted to explore that. Now, in lots of ways I agree with her - I think the media is obsessed with who or what to blame for untimely deaths, and it's full of stories of grieving parents campaigning about something to prevent others having a similar experience, because that seems to help them deal with their grief. And one of the refreshing things about Antony's character was a complete lack of that campaigning spirit. However, it really wasn't much fun watching his personal struggle, nor was it especially uplifting or edifying. So why would you want to? I'm not sure that you would, unless you just wanted your mind removed from your own issues.
Anne's rating 2/5
Sunday, August 01, 2010
Triangle
Triangle starts off in suburban Florida with a solo mum (Jess) frustrated with her autistic son and trying while trying to make a sailing trip with a her boyfriend and four other people. The trip starts smoothly, though Jess seems inexplicably dazed and distracted. But the spooky stuff starts soon enough and Jess (Melissa George) is at the middle of it.
This is more of a mystery horror movie than a splatter one. The basic mystery is signaled in the title, but like an onion there are layers of mystery here and at the bottom it becomes a psychological thriller as the protagonists try to escape the trap they are caught in.
Triangle is carefully constructed, and it pays to keep your attention on the details, as the you try to decipher it faster than Jess. In fact at the end I felt like watching it again, to double check the revelations against the earlier events to see if it all makes sense or if I'd been taken for a ride by some cinematic slight of hand.
Ian's rating 4/5
In the Attic: Who Has a Birthday Today?
Every day Buttercup bakes a cake and her three friends toss a die with 5 blank sides and a birthday cake on the sixth side to determine whose birthday it is today.
Stop motion animation has been popularized by Wallace and Gromit, but tends to be the poor cousin to the output of Pixar et al. This Czech film is based on discarded toys and other rubbish left in a capacious attic. Buttercup is a doll and her three friends are a lazy teddy bear, a pompous, windbag marionette soldier and a frenetic plasticine man with a bottle top hat. In fact it is fascinating to try and identify the junk that appears and often re-purposed into machines by Curie (the engineer and radio announcer), or used by the baddies.
Like many good stories for children there are other themes aimed at accompanying adults. In this case the baddies have over tones of a Soviet style regime, led by a talking golden, glasses wearing bust. This authoritarian leader has hots for Buttercup and Soviet style persuasion techniques, but never fear her friends are coming to her rescue (if the cat doesn't get them).
Ian's rating 3/5
Anne's rating 4/5
Stop motion animation has been popularized by Wallace and Gromit, but tends to be the poor cousin to the output of Pixar et al. This Czech film is based on discarded toys and other rubbish left in a capacious attic. Buttercup is a doll and her three friends are a lazy teddy bear, a pompous, windbag marionette soldier and a frenetic plasticine man with a bottle top hat. In fact it is fascinating to try and identify the junk that appears and often re-purposed into machines by Curie (the engineer and radio announcer), or used by the baddies.
Like many good stories for children there are other themes aimed at accompanying adults. In this case the baddies have over tones of a Soviet style regime, led by a talking golden, glasses wearing bust. This authoritarian leader has hots for Buttercup and Soviet style persuasion techniques, but never fear her friends are coming to her rescue (if the cat doesn't get them).
Ian's rating 3/5
Anne's rating 4/5
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Splice
Made by the director of Cube but using a much bigger budget, Splice is sci-fi horror movie set in the near future when genetic engineering and in vitro gestation are a bit further advanced on current state of the art. Elsa Kast and Clive Nicoli are bio-engineers working at the Nucleic Exchange Research and Development lab (part of the research division of pharmaceutical company Newstead Pharma). N.E.R.D. focuses on gene splicing and protein production. Proteins that will have pharmacological uses. Their initial success is a slug like creature made from the DNA of 6 or 8 different species. Not satisfied with that they want to move onto using human DNA to create a creature that will produce proteins to be used in even more useful drugs.
Unfortunately their law suit averse and bottom line focused management want profits from the existing creature, rather than spend their money on a new creature. You should be able to see where this is going. Unlike Cube this is not a cerebral sci-fi thriller, rather an update on ideas from Frankenstein and The Fly. Aimed at sci-fi and horror fans, there is even a lab scene stolen straight from Alien. It is all quite stylishly done, even if the plot becomes extremely predictable and clichéd in the final few scenes, it still had alternating shock and humour that got the loudest audience reaction at this year's film festival.
The lead characters keep our sympathy in a way that most mad scientist characters don't, and the creature itself gradually acquires a personality. The only downside was the lack of inventiveness in the plot.
Ian's rating 4/5
Unfortunately their law suit averse and bottom line focused management want profits from the existing creature, rather than spend their money on a new creature. You should be able to see where this is going. Unlike Cube this is not a cerebral sci-fi thriller, rather an update on ideas from Frankenstein and The Fly. Aimed at sci-fi and horror fans, there is even a lab scene stolen straight from Alien. It is all quite stylishly done, even if the plot becomes extremely predictable and clichéd in the final few scenes, it still had alternating shock and humour that got the loudest audience reaction at this year's film festival.
The lead characters keep our sympathy in a way that most mad scientist characters don't, and the creature itself gradually acquires a personality. The only downside was the lack of inventiveness in the plot.
Ian's rating 4/5
The Killer Inside Me
It looks like no expense was spared in acquiring the props for The Killer in Me. They seem to have rounded up an endless supply of 1940s and 50s cars, set them among period buildings and populated the film with faces that look right for period. The clothes, furniture and even the way of talking seems right. The only cast member who looks out of place is Jessica Alba, and even she could be excused her exotic looks on the grounds that she is a prostitute from out of town. Though what a woman this good looking is doing working as a small town prostitute rather than making it big in Hollywood stretches credulity.
The script is based on a 1952 pulp novel of the same name. As the title indicates it is the story of murder told from the murderer's point of view. I haven't read the book so I don't know if the faults in the film lie with the book or its translation to film. Outwardly Lou Ford is a fine upstanding young man, living a house he inherited from his dead parent in Central City, Texas. Where he is now a Sheriff's depute. On the inside he is much darker, with an unhealthy attitude to women that up till now he has managed to hide from the girl friend that is more interested in him than he is in her. In fact it seems odd that Lou, who prefers to spend his off duty time sitting alone reading old books and listening to opera or playing the piano, even has a girlfriend. But I guess psychopaths have to keep up appearances.
I wanted to like this movie. I am a sucker for stylish movies. But the stylishness and polish of The Killer Inside Me casts its faults into sharp relief. Is it the difficulty of converting a novel into a film that accounts for all the loose plot threads? How and why does Joe Rothman (the union man) know and figure out so many of Lou's secrets before people closer to him? The initial scene between Lou and Joyce stretches credulity to point that I wonder if Lou is a reliable narrator. How does Lou so effortlessly find the masochistic women he craves? But the house doused in petrol through which a hoard of people can walk through without smelling it, and even safely smoke in, which later literally explodes in flame is the biggest fault.
The film highlights a strange American attitude that a film about murder and sex can show some simulate sex (with clothes on) and graphic and sustained violence (worse than in the splatter movie Dream Home) yet it can't show any nudity. (The film gets it's nudity rating from a brief shot of a woman's buttocks). May be I am a decadent European, but give me nudity over someone being slowly beaten into a pulp.
Casey Affleck is very effective as the outwardly charming psychopath Lou Ford, and Ned Beatty is effortless as the one dimensional but under estimated Chester Conway. But unfortunately the film follows the solitary Lou around so much that the other actors merely get walk on bit parts. (Literally the film consists of people turning up to say something to Lou and leaving or Lou arriving somewhere to say something and then leaving.) This may accurately reflect the self centred nature of Lou Ford and his inability to know anyone around him any better than the pigeon holed stereotype he labels them with, but it makes telling some of the story threads difficult.
Ian's rating 2.5/5
The script is based on a 1952 pulp novel of the same name. As the title indicates it is the story of murder told from the murderer's point of view. I haven't read the book so I don't know if the faults in the film lie with the book or its translation to film. Outwardly Lou Ford is a fine upstanding young man, living a house he inherited from his dead parent in Central City, Texas. Where he is now a Sheriff's depute. On the inside he is much darker, with an unhealthy attitude to women that up till now he has managed to hide from the girl friend that is more interested in him than he is in her. In fact it seems odd that Lou, who prefers to spend his off duty time sitting alone reading old books and listening to opera or playing the piano, even has a girlfriend. But I guess psychopaths have to keep up appearances.
I wanted to like this movie. I am a sucker for stylish movies. But the stylishness and polish of The Killer Inside Me casts its faults into sharp relief. Is it the difficulty of converting a novel into a film that accounts for all the loose plot threads? How and why does Joe Rothman (the union man) know and figure out so many of Lou's secrets before people closer to him? The initial scene between Lou and Joyce stretches credulity to point that I wonder if Lou is a reliable narrator. How does Lou so effortlessly find the masochistic women he craves? But the house doused in petrol through which a hoard of people can walk through without smelling it, and even safely smoke in, which later literally explodes in flame is the biggest fault.
The film highlights a strange American attitude that a film about murder and sex can show some simulate sex (with clothes on) and graphic and sustained violence (worse than in the splatter movie Dream Home) yet it can't show any nudity. (The film gets it's nudity rating from a brief shot of a woman's buttocks). May be I am a decadent European, but give me nudity over someone being slowly beaten into a pulp.
Casey Affleck is very effective as the outwardly charming psychopath Lou Ford, and Ned Beatty is effortless as the one dimensional but under estimated Chester Conway. But unfortunately the film follows the solitary Lou around so much that the other actors merely get walk on bit parts. (Literally the film consists of people turning up to say something to Lou and leaving or Lou arriving somewhere to say something and then leaving.) This may accurately reflect the self centred nature of Lou Ford and his inability to know anyone around him any better than the pigeon holed stereotype he labels them with, but it makes telling some of the story threads difficult.
Ian's rating 2.5/5
Friday, July 30, 2010
Sam Hunt: Purple Balloon and other Stories
Sam Hunt is a rarity - a New Zealander who has managed to make a living from poetry. He's a household name and he's close to the nation's heart, despite that incredibly upper-class voice. Even though Kiwis aren't very tolerant of difference, I guess we can forgive being a poet and sounding posh if the poet determinedly takes his poetry to every corner of the country and the poet doesn't look posh and is fond of a drink (or three). And I guess we like the consistency of the shaggy haircut, the aviator sunglasses, the stovepipe trousers and the way a Sam Hunt poem soundsPurple Balloon gives us a bit of a look at the man behind the image and it's fascinating stuff. He didn't talk til he was four. He's been writing poetry forever. His big brothers are apparently as unimpressed by his achievements as only older siblings can be. This national icon is actually very shy person. He struggles with alcohol.
The film gives us a mix of Sam talking to camera, a selection of other iconic Kiwis talking about Sam, Sam's family talking about Sam and a huge variety of archival footage including clips of poetry performances, old TV interviews, and even Jon Gadsby impersonating Sam. The New Zealand landscape features, particularly the Pauatahunui inlet.
I could happily watch this film again. The film-makers were at the screening and it seems they may make further films about Sam Hunt which would be something to look forward to.
Anne's rating: 4/5
Ajami
"I knew something bad was going to happen today" says Nasri, the young Muslim Arab-Israeli narrator of Ajami, which is the neighbourhood of Jaffa where the film is set. In fact it seems that something bad happens in Ajami every day and its just a matter of degree. The bad stuff isn't all what you expect - a number of Israeli or Palestinian films we've seen in recent years focus on how Israeli Government policy has made life difficult for Arabs, particularly in terms of restricting freedom of movement (and Ajami has its share of illegal labour coming in from the West Bank) but this film gives additional perspectives.
The first new perspective is on home-grown terrorism by Bedouin gangs who, mafia-style, demand protection money from local businesses and indulge in drive-by shootings and arson if they don't get what they want.
A second new perspective is the difficulties of inter-religious relationships - Nasri's older brother Omar has a Christian girlfriend (his boss's daughter)and one of his fellow employees has a Jewish girlfriend - which just goes to complicate what's already a complicated existence.
Thirdly we have the local drug trade and the local police force thrown in for extra excitement.
Ajami is a circular story which follows Omar for a few days and shows how all the factors I've described impinge on his life and the lives of those around him. The credits roll with Omar running for his life , and you can see his life isn't going to get any less complicated anytime soon.
Anne's rating 3/5
Ian's rating 4/5
The first new perspective is on home-grown terrorism by Bedouin gangs who, mafia-style, demand protection money from local businesses and indulge in drive-by shootings and arson if they don't get what they want.
A second new perspective is the difficulties of inter-religious relationships - Nasri's older brother Omar has a Christian girlfriend (his boss's daughter)and one of his fellow employees has a Jewish girlfriend - which just goes to complicate what's already a complicated existence.
Thirdly we have the local drug trade and the local police force thrown in for extra excitement.
Ajami is a circular story which follows Omar for a few days and shows how all the factors I've described impinge on his life and the lives of those around him. The credits roll with Omar running for his life , and you can see his life isn't going to get any less complicated anytime soon.
Anne's rating 3/5
Ian's rating 4/5
White Material
The last of Claire Denis's films I saw was the beautiful but confusing Beau Travail. Whereas White Material is less about the beauty and more about the story.
The story is of Maria Vial the white French manager of a coffee plantation owned by her sick ex-father in law, who is trying to harvest the coffee crop as the country disintegrates around her. Her staff flee, so she heads off with a wallet full of money to hire more. She hurries round cajoling them, her son and her ex-husband (who looks disturbingly like a stoned Robert Redford) to help her with the harvest all the time denying and turning a blind eye to evidence that the rebels have the upper hand and she should leave for her own safety.
The theme is that white people may own land in Africa, may be destitute if they are forced out of Africa, may even be born in Africa but are they really African? A secondary theme is the fragility of civilisation.
You could possibly read a feminist sub-text into this film too, as Maria is surrounded by unreliable men: her plotting ex-husband, their lazy son, her sick ex-father in law, her deserting staff, the retreating French army, the devious mayor, her son's gym teacher - now extorting money at a rebel road block etc. It is the men who are destroying things and betraying her, and the target of her bottled anger.
To add to the feeling of chaos, it is ambiguous as to which side the men with guns are on and the story telling is some what abbreviated. A local radio DJ plays the role of providing expository information. At the end I talked with the people seated either side of me and we couldn't agree on exactly who was who and what happened.
There are a couple of odd events, the son's unexplained metamorphosis and the final scene. The presence of English speaking child soldiers in Francophone country is also not explained.
Ian's rating 3/5
The story is of Maria Vial the white French manager of a coffee plantation owned by her sick ex-father in law, who is trying to harvest the coffee crop as the country disintegrates around her. Her staff flee, so she heads off with a wallet full of money to hire more. She hurries round cajoling them, her son and her ex-husband (who looks disturbingly like a stoned Robert Redford) to help her with the harvest all the time denying and turning a blind eye to evidence that the rebels have the upper hand and she should leave for her own safety.
The theme is that white people may own land in Africa, may be destitute if they are forced out of Africa, may even be born in Africa but are they really African? A secondary theme is the fragility of civilisation.
You could possibly read a feminist sub-text into this film too, as Maria is surrounded by unreliable men: her plotting ex-husband, their lazy son, her sick ex-father in law, her deserting staff, the retreating French army, the devious mayor, her son's gym teacher - now extorting money at a rebel road block etc. It is the men who are destroying things and betraying her, and the target of her bottled anger.
To add to the feeling of chaos, it is ambiguous as to which side the men with guns are on and the story telling is some what abbreviated. A local radio DJ plays the role of providing expository information. At the end I talked with the people seated either side of me and we couldn't agree on exactly who was who and what happened.
There are a couple of odd events, the son's unexplained metamorphosis and the final scene. The presence of English speaking child soldiers in Francophone country is also not explained.
Ian's rating 3/5
How I Ended This Summer
How I Ended This Summer isn't a film about the Arctic or the Russian Meteorological Service. It is a film with a generation gap, a technology gap, an experience gap and a trust gap between two men working at a met hut on the Russian north coast towards the end of summer. An older man wed to a 75 year tradition of manual met reading and regular radio transmissions and a young one threatening that way of life with computer telemetry. One mistake leads too quickly to another and things spiral rapidly out of control in a confined environment (ironically, thousands of square kilometers of arctic landscape). It brings into sharp focus how we rely on social norms, the interventions of other people or at least on being able to get away from people to avoid screwing things up even more than we already have.
Sergei Puskepalis plays the older Sergei Gulybin with a threatening combination of aloofness and superior competence, but it is Grigory Dobrygin who steals the show playing the younger Pavel Danilov displaying just the right combination of diffidence, fear and bravado.
Ian's rating 2.5/5
Sergei Puskepalis plays the older Sergei Gulybin with a threatening combination of aloofness and superior competence, but it is Grigory Dobrygin who steals the show playing the younger Pavel Danilov displaying just the right combination of diffidence, fear and bravado.
Ian's rating 2.5/5
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
