Film Review: A Hidden LifeFan The Fire Recommends

Posted in Film, Recommended, Reviews
By Martin Roberts on 17 Jan 2020

Fans of filmmaker Terrence Malick have been divided in the past decade over how to respond to his output. On the one hand, we now get regular Malick films (which for a director who once took 20 years to make a film, is impressive going), but those films have been moving increasingly into a more experimental space that some viewers have found difficult to warm to. As somebody who last felt properly connected to a Malick film when Tree of Life came out, I watched A Hidden Life with a mild sense of trepidation which, I’m happy to report, evaporated pretty quickly. Show the rest of this post…

In the story of real-life Austrian conscientious objector Franz Jägerstätter, who refused to swear allegiance to Hitler during the Second World War, Malick has found a welcoming canvas upon which to paint his characteristic style. I’ve always felt that Malick’s naturalistic, earnest approach fits well with weighty subject matter (as it did perhaps most notably in The Thin Red Line), and that is true with A Hidden Life, which Malick has been working on for years under its previous title Radegund.

This is Malick’s best film in many years because it is more rigorous in its narrative structure, and establishes its characters more concisely, than his recent works, which despite their intermittent beauty have tended to feel like overextended indulgences. A Hidden Life is also indulgent and could do with a tighter edit (it runs the best part of three hours) but this film features an alliance of style and substance that hasn’t always been present in Malick’s recent work.

The subject matter – Catholic farmers whose idyllic lifestyle is interrupted by war – is fertile ground for Malick, who has always been concerned with humankind’s relationship to the natural world, and to religion. Those themes are explored at length here, but at the heart of the film lies the fundamental question of the value of conscience, and the value of a moral choice even if it may not be the most practical one. Our protagonist (August Diehl) simply cannot betray his own morality, even if it means putting others at risk, including his beloved wife (Valerie Pachner). The film’s exploration of this theme felt both deep and rather timely, considering we live in a time when values are regularly eschewed in favour of quick wins or chest-beating populism.

It’s perhaps a result of the film’s length, and its habit of dropping into and out of its more taut narrative movements, that some sections work better than others. A tighter edit may have kept the emotional drive of the narrative working on more consistent basis, and I actually found the first third of the film to be the most moving, although there is a beautiful tracking shot right at the end that closed a loop around the narrative in a very cathartic way, as though it were enclosing the hidden life at the centre of the film. It is also worth mentioning, while discussing the emotional impact of the film, the wonderful score by James Newton Howard, which is sparingly used, but which really accentuates the drama. There is one repeated refrain, in particular, which tugged at my heart strings whenever it crept onto the soundtrack. It’s not the most subtle of scores, but Malick’s filmmaking is earnest and heartfelt, and for me it worked.

A Hidden Life is very recognisably a Terrence Malick film, and those who have previously found his elegiac, ponderous tone to be off-putting may still find that to be the case here. I do think the film could have been edited more stringently, and that there are moments in the dialogue that are needlessly overt, but in general I was pleased to see  Malick make a film like this again. When he is working with a subject he cares deeply about, and a narrative foundation upon which to express himself, his works can carry real power.

4/5

Film Review: Knives Out

Posted in Film, Reviews
By Martin Roberts on 28 Nov 2019

The key to a good ‘whodunnit’ – the word being most commonly associated with Knives Out, the new film written and direct by Rian Johnson – is plotting and structure. There must be a central event – in this case a murder in a countryside mansion – around which the plot can revolve, but it must be constructed in such a way as to a) be compelling and mysterious; and, more importantly, b) make sense when the revelations come. Knives Out achieves these essentials and, crucially, has a great deal of fun doing so. Show the rest of this post…

Agatha Christie’s name has been mentioned time and again in relation to this film, and it’s not hard to see why, not least because Christie was a great proponent of the kind of tight structure and mystery plotting exemplified in Knives Out. But also, I think, because Christie revelled in economy of character and plot, something which Johnson has clearly enjoyed doing here.

The basic setup of the plot is as follows: Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer), a wealthy author of crime novels, invites his family to his mansion to celebrate his 85th birthday, but is found dead the following morning, throwing doubt and suspicion among squabbling siblings and other questionable characters. The police are on the scene quickly, but the real investigative work is carried out by Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig), a private investigator and “the last of the great detectives” who has been hired by a mysterious hidden figure.

In the character of Blanc, a charismatic rogue with a drawling deep south accent, Johnson has dared to try to emulate, and lightly play with, the idea of the ‘great detective’ popular in so much crime fiction. Craig, clearly relishing the accent, does a really good job of making Blanc a believable character, even if he is a fairly one-note creation, and the film is daring enough to constantly encourage us to doubt both Blanc, and indeed the film’s, intellectual faculties. One speech about donuts, in particular, resonates as a piece of terrifically well-delivered soliloquy. Ludicrous, yes, but funny and compelling.

The latter point sums up Knives Out quite well, because while the film takes itself seriously as a detective story, it’s also not afraid to have fun with the genre, and to court laughs on a fairly regular basis. It helps that the ensemble cast are universally having fun, from Toni Collette as a vapid, poseurish lifestyle guru, to Michael Shannon, who has his eyes on his father’s publishing business.

But the film’s star turn, even taking into account Craig’s good work as Blanc, comes from Ana de Armas as Marta, Harlan’s nurse. She gets the film’s best and most dynamic role, and much of the success of the plot revolves around her performance. To say more would be to spoil the fun, but the way the film plays with her character, and the way she interacts with others, is the heart of the piece, and its most enjoyable element.

The film indulges in red herrings and playful misdirection, as the genre demands, but crucially not in a way that later comes back to damage the effectiveness of its revelatory final movement, which conjures that wonderfully cathartic feeling of joining all the pieces together, in a way which is satisfying and stands up to scrutiny.

It may be a symptom of the film’s tone that it doesn’t consistently summon a sense of real jeopardy, and that as a result the final movement isn’t quite as hard hitting as it could’ve been. It could also be argued that there are also some characters that initially seem intriguing who, perhaps unavoidably, fall somewhat into the background. But these are minor quibble s when viewed in light of the whole, which is a thoroughly enjoyable, modern take on what is a well-worn genre, which dares to poke fun at its heritage while revelling in its quirks.

4/5

Film Review: Red Joan

Posted in Film, Reviews
By Martin Roberts on 19 Apr 2019

The story of Melita Norwood – a British civil servant who was arrested while in her eighties for providing state secrets to the KGB over a roughly 40-year period following 1937 – should have been a compelling one for director Trevor Nunn to tell. The trailer for Red Joan suggested it might well have been the right film to tell that story. Show the rest of this post…

But Red Joan, which is inspired by Melita’s story, and reimagines the character as Joan Stanley, is a textbook example of how structural choices can derail a film’s intentions. Judy Dench stars as octogenarian Joan during the time of her arrest, while Sophie Cookson (Kingsman) plays Joan in her youth. Across both time periods, although primarily the latter, the film ruminates upon whether Joan ever actually ‘turned’ to the ‘other side’, and what her motives might have been. Was she, in fact, a traitor?

These questions unfortunately are far more interesting in theory than in the practice of this film, which for all its good intentions is rather disjointed and repetitive. The way the flip-flopping structure is used, while undoubtedly designed to provide linkages for the emotional and political motivations of the main character, actually serves to dilute the effect of both timelines, pulling us out of events whenever they begin to get interesting. It doesn’t help that the chopped-up sections are themselves internally repetitive: in the present, we mostly get scenes of Joan being questioned in oddly anodyne circumstances until the script summons her into a memory; in the past, we get a series of meetings between Joan and various supporting characters, many of which are rather similar. The structure makes the project feel a little bland and, occasionally, televisual.

It’s a shame, because when the film relaxes into one of its arcs (like, for example, a subplot involving Stephen Campbell Moore), there are individually effective scenes to enjoy. Sophie Cookson gives a likeable performance in the scenes set in the past, even if the relationships the character forms are not always as interesting as they feel they ought to be, and Judy Dench is effective, if criminally underused, as the older Joan. Dench has what should be the more emotionally interesting part of the script – the haunted, emotionally torn octogenarian who has been keeping secrets all her life – but has so little screen time the scenes don’t land as they ought to, while the character of her son, played by Ben Miles, comes across as hollow, and is saddled with some of the film’s most on-the-nose, slightly risible dialogue.

Meanwhile, George Fenton’s score is generally good, although at times it feels like it’s doing the work that the drama ought to be doing, and the detail in the sets and costumes is captured confidently enough that the film convinces  as a period piece. Unfortunately, the film is let down by its structure, and I was left wishing I’d seen a film about either of the two Joans portrayed, as opposed to both of them.

2/5

SXSW Film Review: Pet Sematary

Posted in Film, Reviews, SXSW
By Sam Bathe on 17 Mar 2019

The closing night film of SXSW Film 2019, Pet Sematary is an adaptation of the classic 1983 novel from Stephen King (and the first film since the 1989 Mary Lambert film), a jumpy horror about creepy cats, creepy burial grounds, and making desperate decisions against your better judgement. Show the rest of this post…

Moving to rural Maine from their city life in Boston, Louis Creed (Jason Clarke), wife Rachel (Amy Seimetz) and two children Ellie (Jeté Laurence) and Gage (Hugo & Lucas Lavoie) struggle to adapt to the quiet life. After discovering a mysterious burial ground deep in the woods on their land, when neighbour Jud (John Lithgow) tells the Creeds about old folklore in the town, Louis attempts to right a few wrongs with a series of decisions that are only ever heading for disaster.

With directors Kevin Kölsch and Dennis Widmyer making a few clever deviations from the book, the filmmakers do make the film their own with regard to the source material, but it can’t stop Pet Sematary falling in amongst the crowd as a high concept horror that struggles to scratch beneath the surface.

Though the film still creates a nervy tone – and you’ll definitely be on the edge of your seat – Pet Sematary is all too reliant on jump scares. Rather than exploring some of the more interesting subjects of death and loss, its hard to see the deeper themes as anything but under-baked.

While the actors (especially the young cast) are superb, Rachel is given a backstory that only ever feels inconsequential. John Lithgow as the friendly yet mysterious neighbour is excellent but on the whole the film is missing something to elevate it from the crowd, which isdisappointing considering the ripe material from which it was create.

As a horror Pet Sematary is e ffective, but it should have been more affecting. It’s something of a missed opportunity that will still entertain for 101 minutes; it is a rush, just don’t expect too much more.

2/5

SXSW Film Review: Jezebel

Posted in Film, Reviews, SXSW
By Sam Bathe on 15 Mar 2019

A semi-autobiographical film from writer/director/star Numa Perrier, Jezebel tells the down-to-earth story of a young woman who gets into sex work to support herself and her family who are living on the poverty line. Show the rest of this post…

Shot in the exact same apartment where Perrier herself lived while working as a webcam girl in her late adolescence, she plays older sister Sabrina, who struggles to keep the family in check. All crammed into a 1-bed with her boyfriend and brother blowing more money on gambling than they make back, Sabrina’s younger sister Tiffany feels the pressure to go out and earn some money to contribute.

On Sabrina’s tip, Tiffany shows up at a webcam girl studio not totally knowing what it will entail or what she’s meant to do, but thrown straight in front of the camera, she finally starts to grow more confident in herself and her ability, just as live back home starts to unravel.

A frank and wholely unglamorous look at the life of a sex worker, in Jezebel there’s no titilation, voyeurism or shame, just a woman going to the office, doing a job, going home, it just happens that her job is being a webcam girl.

It’s a film that feels honest and authentic, with Numa Perrier translating her own experiences with real care and nuance. This is a film about how the characters are feeling, about their struggle, about terrible boyfriends, and just doing what you can, and the superb performance from Tiffany Tenille in the lead role is integral to the film’s success, selling Numa’s story at every step and growing in the role as the film goes on.

Jezebel isn’t your average coming-of-age tale, and as such doesn’t hit all the beats you might expect. That’s good, in the sense that Jezebel feels fresh and original, but might not be quite as rounded or satisfying as other films in the g enre. But this is a film that wants to break the mould, break expectations, and is a real stick in the sand that signifies Numa Perrier as a real name to watch over the coming years.

3/5

SXSW Film Review: Yes, God, Yes

Posted in Film, Reviews, SXSW
By Natasha Peach on 15 Mar 2019

Writer/director Karen Maine continues her rise with smart and witty comedy, Yes, God, Yes, adapting her excellent short of the same name. Starring Stranger Things’ Natalia Dyer who reprises the lead role as Alice, a 16-year-old Catholic who lives a very innocent life in the Midwest. But one night when an AOL chat gets a little racy and she discovers masturbation, quickly Alice start to struggle to resist her new urges in the face of eternal damnation. Show the rest of this post…

With her sense of shame spiraling out of control, Alice attends a religious camp to try and suppress her urges, but when one of the camp mentors starts to flirt with her, quickly she becomes more intrigued by sex than ever as the retreat only has the opposite effect.

With an excellent first act setting up the church camp section, Dyer is excellent at skirting the line of an innocent church girl that wants to find herself and experiment. Dotting between her camp mates, the mentors and the camp leaders, Dyer and the various relationship machinations are superbly played out and it’s the best thing about the film.

With a bombshell that pays off 2, 3, even 4 times, while this isn’t the sort of film that’s going to give you 20 belly laughs, it’s consistently amusing, with clever dialogue, strong situational comedy and superb pacing throughout. Writer/director Karen Maine is a filmmaker showing a lot of promise between this and her work on Obvious Child, exploring each story in a very interesting way. And while perhaps  you could accuse Yes, God, Yes of lacking a little bit of bite but this is a good-natured film that doesn’t necessarily need to push the boundary too far to be effective.

3/5

SXSW Film Review: Stuber

Posted in Film, Reviews, SXSW
By Sam Bathe on 14 Mar 2019

Shown as a work-in-progress, Stuber is a police action comedy set up in the classic fashion. Flashing back to a fight with local drug lord Teijo (The Raid’s Iko Uwais), when man mountain cop Vic (Dave Bautista) misses his shot, his partner Morris (Karen Gillan) is killed in the aftermath as Teijo gets away. Show the rest of this post…

A few weeks on and the case seemingly has gone cold, so Vic books himself in for laser eye surgery so he never misses a shot again. Only that’s when they get a tip, Teijo has resurfaced and unless Vic picks up the chase right away, who knows when they might be able track him down again.

But Vic is barely able to see, never mind race around down. So he calls for an Uber, and unwitting driver Stu (Kumail Najiani) is thrown into the action whether he likes it or not, as the unlikely double act are soon embroiled in firefights with gangsters, the kidknapping of a drug dealer in the back of Stu’s Prius, and more heart-pumping action in one night than mild-mannered Stu has seen his whole life.

Following quite a tried and tested formula, it doesn’t take Stuber long to kick into gear, with contrasting lives of cop Vic – wanting to avenge the death of his partner – and Stu – wanting to get back up to a 5-star rating on Uber – thrown together with explosive effect.

Stuber is a full-bodied action comedy, with the firefights ringing in your ears, feeling every punch, every kick; the emphatic action is one of the better things in director Michael Dowse’s latest picture. However the film struggled a lot more on the comedy side.

While the chalk and cheese double act are charismatic in their own right, unfortunately they don’t really gel as a pair as the chemistry never quite feels right. Jumping from set-piece to set-piece, the actors aren’t helped out by a lacklustre script and Nanjiani and Bautista don’t have great moments to shine on-screen. Also while the plot points aren’t forecasted, Stuber doesn’t do anything new in the genre and you can guess where it’s headed every step along the way.

Bautista is forced to squint for most of the picture, with his character recovering from laser eye surgery, but its a gimmick that grows old before too long. He turns in a solid performance but his character is very unlikeable so it’s hard to ever be on his side. Opposite him, Nanjiana is his usual quirky self, though he does hold his own in an action setting for the first time. The effortless Karen Gillan and villain Iko Uwais are the best things about the film but they’re on-screen for such a short amount of time, Stuber doesn’t give look the main double act.

Hopefully director Michael Dowse can fix some of the problems by the time the final release comes around, though adding the necessary depth for such a flat film might be too much of an ask. I’d love to see more of Nanjia ni in an action setting, while Bautista also has a lot to offer outside of the MCU, but Stuber is a lacklustre effort that doesn’t make the most of an interesting concept.

2/5

SXSW Film Review: Adopt A HighwayFan The Fire Recommends

Posted in Film, Recommended, Reviews, SXSW
By Sam Bathe on 14 Mar 2019

The story of a man coming out of prison after 30 years because of the three-strike rule, Adopt A Highway is one of the surprise delights of the festival so far, not because Ethan Hawke is brilliant in the lead role – no surprises there – but because such a mature, assured and accomplished effort is the first time film from actor, now-turned writer/director, Logan Marshall-Green. Show the rest of this post…

Without family or a support network and straight off the bus from prison, Russell Millings (Hawke) struggles to adapt to normal life but somehow finds a job cleaning dishes at a fast food restaurant. Earning his manager’s trust to lock-up, late one night his life is about to change again, as he hears something when taking the night’s trash out to the dumpsters out back, discovering an abandoned baby in a sports bag.

Overwhelmed by the situation, Millings gives in to his desire to experience something he missed out on while behind bars. He doesn’t call the cops and instead tries to care for the baby himself, but still needing to hold down his job, and keep up meetings with his parole officer, it’s not long before he starts to regret the situation he’s put himself in.

Adopt A Highway the film quite excellently depicts the struggle to adapt back to normal life for ex-cons, showing how the recently released are just thrown back into society with little to no support. Social norms have changed, in the film Millings doesn’t know what email or the internet is, never mind how to use it, and the film does a great job of portraying this as such a steep learning curve.

Of course Adopt A Highway is helped out by Ethan Hawke who is a tour-de-force. It’s such a subtle yet deeply affecting performance, playing a man that quite quickly becomes out of his depth, but is never flustered. Going with the flow when the film takes a change of course for an excellent third act, absolutely not going where you expecting yet it still draws to a very satisfying close.

His first time behind the camera, Adopt A Highway is a hugely impressive debut from actor-turned-filmmaker Logan Marshall-Green. It is a film told with measure, with confidence, and another type of feature from the normally horror-focused Blumhouse Productions. To say they took a chance on Logan Marshall-Green doesn’t give the filmmaker enough credit, but they deserve praise for backing this sort of film when the box office is otherwise dominated by franchises, and original stories often struggle to find a home. Hopefull y the Blumhouse name, the powerhouse Ethan Hawke, and old OC-fans wanting to see what Trey is up to now he’s grown up, mean Adopt A Highway finds the audience it deserves.

4/5

SXSW Film Review: Them That FollowFan The Fire Recommends

Posted in Film, Recommended, Reviews, SXSW
By Natasha Peach on 14 Mar 2019

A busy SXSW for Kaitlyn Dever, here she returns in a more low-key role after another star-making turn in festival headliner, Booksmart. Show the rest of this post…

Them That Follow is set deep in the wilds of Appalachia, within a community of Pentecostal Christians. Proving themselves before God by handling deadly snakes, the film tells the story of the pastor’s daughter who holds a secret that would tear the community apart. When a non-believer is bitten and his family refuse medical aid – believing prayer will fight off the poison, not medicine – the film challenges its subjects, and audience, to pit what you believe against what you might be seeing before you.

Giving a striking window into a world great stretches of the audience will know so very little about, Them That Follow pitches a classic filmic story of forbidden love in a new setting. Gradually layering different elements of the story until the whole picture starts to come together, this is a dark, brooding and hugely confident film that knows its own pace and won’t budge in how it tells it tale, much like its protagonists.

With co-directors/co-writers Britt Poulton and Dan Madison Savage growing up in similar Christian communities, the window into another world that Them That Follow creates isn’t judgmental but instead invites the audience to interpret the actions on-screen, pitting them against your own religious or spiritual beliefs.

It was a very fine balance, but the film does so well in presenting the characters’ internal struggles when it’s clear their faith could be getting in the way, even harming those they love. Alongside the filmmakers, the cast also deserve great credit too.

In the lead role, Kaitlyn Dever as Dilly gives a naunced performance that sways between power and vulnerability. Opposite her, Lewis Pullman (cast just one day before principal photography began) and Thomas Mann fulfil much more than simple a love triangle, and Walton Goggins gives a masterclass in authority as pastor Lemuel. The ever-brilliant Olivia Colman and Jim Gaffigan in a more serious turn round off a truly superb cast.

All in all this is a thoughtful, and though-provoking film about religion, for all its rights and wrongs . Rich in tone with an amazing soundtrack, Them That Follow is a remarkable feature debut from its co-filmmakers, who show real poise far beyond their relative inexperience.

4/5

SXSW Film Review: Teen Spirit

Posted in Film, Reviews, SXSW
By Sam Bathe on 13 Mar 2019

Following his father’s footsteps into directing, actor Max Minghella’s debut behind the camera is a bright and engaging foray music competition film sub-genre, but with enough originality in this well trodden class, Teen Spirit elevates itself thanks to a magnificent central performance from Elle Fanning. Show the rest of this post…

Set in a small town on the Isle of Whyte where Violet and mother are outcasts having immigrated from Poland, she dreams of escape and pursues her dream to sing by entering a local competition, practicing at an open mic night at a seedy working men’s club on the edge of town. Of course her mother doesn’t know any of this, instead thinking Violet is pulling double shifts at her part-time job, things take an even stranger turn when an unlikely mentor steps forward to guide Violet through the latter stages of the competition, though as the strain all starts to become a bit too much, the real challenge is if Violet can hold it all together when the goal is just a hair’s breadth away.

Driven by a pop-fuelled soundtrack, Teen Spirit does its utmost to avert the cliches of the genre and is a hugely accomplished, visceral and stylish debut from Max Minghella. Really though this is Elle Fanning’s film. Recording every magnificent song and on-stage performance herself, you wouldn’t be the slightest bit surprised to be told she was a professional musician. This is an electrifying yet nuanced performance, spending just as much time away from the stage, interacting with her overbearing mother or ex-opera singer mentor.

The music montages are always integral to the success of this sort of film, and Minghella handles them with panache and originality. One shot of Violet performing typifies on stage why she should be excited about this charismatic actor’s move behind the camera; a close-up, framing Fanning with big lights at either side of face, when the song ends, the lights die down and the camera pulls back. We’re in a dinghy club, with barely 5 people in the audience, and only one set of hands clapping somewhere close to the back. But we know in her world this is how she sees it, that it means so much, and it’s an exciting journey we’re about to embark on.

This is a film perfect for SXSW, but it’s certainly deserving of life away from the festival circuit too. While the final final scene is a little on the nose, in general Teen Spirit handles the completion sequences really well . This is a feel-good film that goes full throttle, the soundtrack drives it along really wells and despite being a story we know really well, Teen Spirit still feels fresh.

3/5

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