Review: Spectre

After the colossal success of Skyfall director Sam Mendes and Daniel Craig return to bring Bond's origin story to completion. It... is a bumpy ride.

Bond is on the ropes once again at the MI6, M has him grounded after he causes chaos in Mexico City while hunting down a man the previous M had secretly instructed him to find. This leads Bond down a path to further discover his past, and a conspiracy that links all his previous missions. Meanwhile, MI6 faces a merger with MI5 to become a new intelligence agency without need of double-oh agents...

If Skyfall was The Dark Knight, Spectre is The Dark Knight Rises. With its previous instalment being such a huge success as well as being incredibly unique in the now twenty-four entries of the franchise, Spectre is completely up against it. Unfortunately what appears to be a more traditional Bond film from the outset, is exactly that.
Spectre (or correctly spelt: S.P.E.C.T.R.E) relies on a lot of mystery and a lot of setup in its task of tying up the underlying plot of the last three films. But avid fans have already called it out; much as with the "twist" of JJ Abrams' Star Trek Into Darkness, Spectre's title isn't the only problem undermining the film's attempts at mystique. It feels like an conspicuous attempt to remake the series.

The film is surprisingly slow and sporadically paced (a bit like Sam Smith's whining, warbling theme The Writing's on the Wall, which has not improved with time) especially for a Bond film. We leap from location to location at the drop of an editor's hat. Most of the story is expositional and setup for a payoff most people already know is coming. The dissolving of MI6 is positively dull, Ralph Fiennes as M working with an unimaginative script, a battle of wits with Andrew Scott (Moriarty from BBC's Sherlock... totally not playing a villain...)
Action scenes are haphazard and quite baffling. Compared to Skyfall's train-top earthmover stunt, or the fight in Shanghai, Spectre has you more likely scratching your head asking Bond what exactly he hopes to achieve. A lot of stock is put into Dave Bautista (Guardians of the Galaxy) as Spectre's silent lead muscleman (who has apparently watched too much Game of Thrones) but apart from an excellent punch up in a train, his scenes feel more like the completion of a checklist than anything relevant.

It isn't all bad though. It earns respect for thematically tying the last decade worth of Bond films together, heck it even references the often reviled Quantum of Solace more than once! The film is in line with a more traditional Bond experience: a globe-trotting plot; a larger than life villain henchman who hounds Bond at every turn; a romantic train journey; isolated super villain hideouts; a comedic edge to proceedings. Indeed, if one thing saves the film it is actually the comedy. Bond and Q have a great chemistry still. Christoph Waltz as the villain of course is good, although he is playing the character he has always played.
If Daniel Craig's Bond films are the first films you are watching, this works as a decent segway into more from the franchise, even if it is a clear sign that the future will be either more derivative or remakes.

It has none of its predecessor's smarts or uniqueness, and while it is perhaps the most fun of Daniel Craig's films it is laboriously slow at getting to the point. Skyfall was a peak that Bond perhaps will never attain again, and bringing back a reluctant director and lead actor to capture that lightning once again was likely a mistake. While the predecessor was a celebration, this is more of an homage.

Lower your expectations and you will enjoy it for its action and its quick wit, its more classic Bond call backs and Daniel Craig still delivers Bond's more severe personality well. But I found it a slog to get through, with too much setup for a reveal that was completely expected.

Tribute Review: Horror of Dracula

Back in June this year cinema lost one of its most iconic actors, Sir Christopher Lee, so I opted to watch one of his most classic films; his first role as Dracula.

Based upon Bram Stoker's classic novel, this 1958 movie is produced by Hammer Studios and compared to the 1931 Bela Lugosi Dracula, this is a far bloodier and darker affair. When Jonathan Harker visits Castle Dracula he forces the inhuman count to flee to the city, bringing the threat to those he cared about.

When you have a novel so regularly recreated in film form it often becomes a matter of which version you saw first is the version you enjoy the most. Or you can compare them all even closer to the text to decide which is best, which can be unfair. 

The Horror of Dracula is only eighty minutes long, and at first I was very concerned they had twisted the novel's narrative too greatly; when Jonathan first arrives at Castle Dracula he already knows what The Count is, and what has to be done to defeat him. 
Certainly the film takes a few minutes to get going; we are waiting for Peter Cushing (Star Wars, for non-horror fans) as Van Helsing to arrive. Cushing is great as the knowledgeable vampire hunter. As someone who grew up with Francis Ford Coppola's Dracula, I never really accepted Anthony Hopkins as Helsing, here Cushing looks like the intelligent hunter that can match wits with the monster.

Once Dracula leaves the castle, the film follows beats of the book closer than I expected. There are exceptions however, for example the character of Renfield is completely missing and none of that plot exists. The story follows specifically the seduction of Lucy, her late night visitations from the tall, shadowy creature and the duo of Helsing and Arthur (played by a youthful Michael Gough - Batman) trying to save her.
The film has great atmosphere and set work; Lucy's room is very exact to how I saw it in the book. Sir Christopher Lee has a great presence as Count Dracula, although I wish there was more of him; as the Count and as the monster he was very convincing! I can see why he came back to the character over half-a-dozen times.

But, the film does feel a bit clunky at times. Asides from the opening with Jonathan (can no one get this part right?) there's a laughable scene where the all knowledgeable Doctor Van Helsing is listening to a recording of himself explaining what vampires are and how they can be defeated. Yes, it is as ridiculously heavy-handed as exposition can get!

I enjoyed it, and I should look into the other Hammer Dracula films with Sir Christopher Lee. A very theatrical, short but gory interpretation of the novel.

Review: Sicario

From the creator of 2013's Prisoners, and getting ridiculously high critical acclaim, but Sicario is no Prisoners.

An FBI agent who stumbles upon the dealings of a drug cartel is roped into a special Government taskforce to aid in the neutralisation of the drug trade on the US and Mexican borders.

I don't get the massive critical success of Sicario. I really don't. While director Denis Villeneuve really has his stamp upon it stylistically; it has the same perpetually moody, grim and intense atmosphere, as a story and as a film it really doesn't do anything.
Emily Blunt leads the cast as Kate Macer, an FBI agent who we see in the film's opening stumble across a house where the walls are lined with corpses. This opening is, frankly, the best and most interesting part of this entire film. There's a real sense of dread, a sense of putridity and cruelty that is amplified by the film's score. The film grabs you instantly, but it slowly loosens its grip.

Kate Macer quickly becomes a non-character. She has vague motives at best to help this taskforce, and they (led by Josh Brolin) do not tell her anything; everything is deliberately kept secret from her. Why? That would be the film's anchor, the meat of the story is how this unit alienates and treats her like a ghost. It would be, had the film actually led to anything worthwhile.
On top of this, Emily Blunt can play a strong female protagonist, yet here her character is made to be virtually useless; she even nearly accidentally sleeps with a villain. The mystery of why she is even in this brutal, dangerous place becomes more of a nuisance than a compelling reason to watch.
The film's perspective moves gradually away from Macer completely, and towards Benicio Del Toro's character Alejandro, who is a quiet, seemingly unassuming man within the taskforce who when asked refuses to say who he works for. There's an uncomfortably long stint where we are following a woman we know nothing about, following a man she knows nothing about, for reasons we don't know. And like I said, the film ends with very little pay off for all this mystery.

The film's opening is fantastic. It really, really is. The score, Blunt and Del Toro are also all incredible with the roles they play in the film. The music is unsettling and make the omnipresence of threat from all directions palpable; the film's sense of dread is incredible and does test your wits and drains your resolve.

But it drags itself down with a over reliance on mystery and it loses the audience. Fans of Prisoners might be expecting a twist or two that never come, or audiences are put out by characters we don't especially care about.

I criminally underrated Prisoners, and I would rather watch that again than Sicario.

Review: Crimson Peak

My favourite director Guillermo Del Toro returns to give his horror stylised spin on a gothic romance.
Edith, a naïve American girl who dreams of becoming a writer, is swept away from her father’s protective surroundings when a stranger from Britain arrives with a business proposition. But Edith has been receiving warnings, warnings from her dead mother…
I can be very, very biased towards Del Toro’s work (how can you go wrong with a back catalogue including such films as Cronos, Devil’s Backbone, Blade 2, Pan’s Labyrinth, Hellboy 1 and 2 and Pacific Rim?) and Crimson Peak certainly delivers a lot of his visual flair and style. The titular mountainside mansion is a gorgeously detailed and designed set, a treat of gothic shapes and colours, the fact that it is slowly collapsing is the least of someone’s concerns living there. Our characters’ costumes are beautiful too, making our actors Tom Hiddleston, Jessica Chastain and Mia Wasikowska disappear into this period drama.
The film even has subtle themes, not dissimilar to Pan’s Labyrinth, including Wasikowska’s character of Edith being the only one who can see the ghouls and ghosts that also live in our world. This is a regular character trope of Del Toro’s work, as well as the contrast between real and fantastical worlds and which one may be more horrific. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
But, the film didn’t exactly grab me. I chalk this down to a somewhat excessively drawn out setup, exploring Edith’s safe environment within her father’s business world in America and her growing affections for Hiddleston’s Thomas. While the film opens with a peek at the horrors we will see, there is a significant drought of horrors and the mansion is a long way away from appearing. It feels like you are waiting, and I didn’t appreciate how little of the film was actually in the house.
I think I was hoping for something more like The Woman in Black; a lot of establishment of the house to give you a sense of the space and the build of tension.
Del Toro also goes for practical effects for his monsters, at least as often as he can, and while these are ghosts and therefore incorporeal, I was quite disappointed in the overuse of CGI creations. I liked their designs, but I didn’t believe they were there… I wasn't especially scared of them, and the scares are generally quite predictable.

I really don't like railing against a Del Toro creation, but I felt there was a lot of room for improvement with Crimson Peak, including the scare factor. Certainly there is awesome cinematography, awesome colours, set and costume design, really gory moments that shock after the long stretches of period drama.
If you enjoy gothic romances and ghost stories, you should definitely check out Crimson Peak. My review only sounds negative because I have such high hopes for Del Toro films!

Additional Marshmallows: No matter how in love you are with someone, surely when they take you to their place and the roof has caved in to snow and the walls are literally bleeding, naturally, you really should reconsider your options immediately.

Review: The Martian (2D)

Director Ripley Scott delivers stunning visuals to accompany this space survivalist flick.

Matt Damon plays Mark Watney, an astronaut botanist who takes part in a space mission to the planet Mars, but when their mission is cut drastically short due to a storm, the team lose him and presume him dead. With the crew returning back to Earth, Mark wakes alone on the red planet with what little supplies the team had left in their hurried exodus. Now survival is his number one priority, with the dizzying prospect of years of waiting for Earth to send help.

The film opens with a bang (after a moody title sequence very reminiscent of Scott’s Alien classic) with our Mars team settled on the planet only to be ripped away from it in their escape from the storm, all within ten minutes maximum. This opening is far too rushed; we have a half dozen characters and virtually no chemistry or personality to accompany the dangers they are faced. None until the meat of the story commences: Damon’s Mark Watney wakes up and makes the NASA base his home.
Luckily for us, Matt Damon delivers an intensely likable performance that balances the long scenes of dialogue-free survivalist drama as he builds a crop from scratch and retro-fits various space mission tech together to communicate with Earth. His wit and personal thoughts are translated through video logs he records during his long stay on the planet. This to and fro, from survivalist kit-bashing and video logs, is much of the film’s setup.

Things get more intense as NASA (alive and progressive in this film’s future) become aware of Watney’s presence on the planet (via satellite images) and struggle with the logistics of mounting a rescue. What proceeds is something akin to mashing Castaway, Apollo 13 and Gravity together, with the ever increasingly vulnerability of our hero, the unorthodox methods NASA use to help him survive with little to no supplies, and a dizzying rescue plan. You can see that Damon has physically trained himself for the role and the challenge of making the premise believable.It is a very beautifully shot film, reminding me of Interstellar but with a more grounded, more human experience at its core. It is often jargon heavy, much like Interstellar and Apollo 13, preferring to suggest realism rather than comfortable layman’s terms which tends to wash over you as something you should just accept and move on with.

On top of this are the occasional indulgence in deux ex machina devices that feel far too convenient in what is an otherwise “realistic” experience. As realistic as a man stuck on Mars can be anyway.
With the aforementioned hurried opening, I'd say secondary characters aren't quite given enough screentime, the film heavily weighted to Damon's character. I never got to know these people and so didn't especially worry about them when things got dire. Also, Sean Bean was in this? I didn't understand his character either, apart from being "the sympathetic voice" I had no idea who or what he was.

At its worse it has some conveniences (probably due to compressing Andy Weir's book to film length) and a lot of characters are left at the wayside, but at its best it has a charm and an excellent visual flare that cannot be ignored. I enjoyed it.

Review: Legend

This black comedy thriller follows the exploits of the Kray Twins, notorious London gangsters during the 1960s. It feels quite long, but Tom Hardy has a dynamite performance as both twins.

Ronald and Reginald Kray are living the comfortable life as gangsters on London’s east side, they are seemingly impervious to the police while running clubs and battling with rival gangs. But when Reginald Kray meets a young girl, his relationship with his psychotic brother Ronald becomes incredibly tense, risking to break their lives, and everything they’ve built, apart forever.

The Krays were notorious in their day so watching Legend can feel difficult; it does its best to glamourise their lifestyle and make the audience feel sympathy for them as characters. Reginald Kray is portrayed as a decent man in an indecent world, while his brother (though truly psychotic) is described by Reginald at one point as  having “a heart of gold”. It is a black comedy at its heart, its dialogue is harsh and aggressive with English gangland humour mixing with bursts of bloody aggression.

I just described to you Reginald and Ronald as two different people. Which they are. Only in Legend the twins are both played by Tom Hardy. This is surely the meat of the experience; whether you approve of the subject matter or not, Hardy is exceptional here as both twins through clever use of camerawork, body-doubles, split-screen and surely some CG work. It isn’t what I would call a gimmick either; Hardy really does become both characters superbly well, similar and yet extremely different with Ronald’s dour, dead-eyed simplicity and occasional spouting of prose, to Reginald’s well-rounded gangster and part-time romantic. Both are very complex characters, and Hardy delivers both and interacts with himself so well that you believe there are two of him!

The heart of the film, outside of its darkness, is Reginald’s lover Frances (played by Emily Browning) who delivers occasional narration and is the audience surrogate as an innocent quickly trapped in this world. But she does bring out the best, and worst, in the Krays, especially with Ron and as a result she is in the centre of a lot of the film's best scenes.
The film's secondary characters are also very well defined, making the 1960's British gangland feel all the more richer.

I will say against the film is that it feels slightly too long. Finishing at 130 minutes, it could have been just two hours or even less; the film takes its time getting to the point, padding the runtime with a lot of familiar scenes that borderline repetition. Even with Hardy's double performance carrying through these scenes, it ultimately feels drawn out. It is also something of a classic story: a man battling between his loyalty to a girl or his brother.

I would definitely recommend it for Tom Hardy's performances alone, this is some exceptional work from him and elevates it far above what would have been a well styled but average film. 

    

Review: Everest (3D)

Following true events of two teams of mountaineers making the climb up to the peak only for events to go terribly wrong, Everest is a great visual and emotional spectacle.

Since the first few teams conquered the life-or-death climb to the peak of Everest, modern climbers have established tours to train up adventurous spirits so they too can experience the thrill. But when several teams are jockeying for the safest time to climb, the time between fierce storms striking the mountain narrows too far, and the teams risk getting caught in the maelstrom.

First of all it has to be said that this film, directed by Baltasar Kormakur (director of such action thrillers as 2 Guns and Contraband) has a powerful cast at its behest: Jason Clarke, Josh Brolin, Jake Gyllenhaal, Kiera Knightley and Emily Watson, even the secondary characters deliver excellent work throughout.
And for Everest's advantage, the first half of the film is dedicated to establishing as many of these people's character as possible, their lives and their reasons for going on the adventure. Jason Clarke is centre stage as Rob; the expedition leader for his company "Adventure Consultants", Jake Gyllenhaal is a competitive team leader, and Josh Brolin is a man determined to climb the mountain. There are many characters in need of backstory, some with more to lose than others.
Yes, while this is a true story of course (and criticising it feels undesirable) there are the typical foreshadowing points as: He has a baby on the way and he's excited to come home or; he's tried many times to climb the mountain and has everything to prove. But while cynics will see this as a disadvantage, I felt the film was honest enough to be still thrilling. Perhaps even more backstory for other characters would have blurred the foreshadowing even further.

Visually Everest is stunning. I watched it on a regular 3D cinema screen but I can imagine an IMAX 3D showing would have been extraordinary. There are several shots early on that deliberately show off the dizzying heights involved with the characters' journey; watching people walk over extraordinarily high bridges, or traversing rickety makeshift walkways over icy chasms. These moments alone are worthy of admission. The sense of cold and horrendous freezing temperatures become unbearable towards the end, some moments feeling morbidly graphic and brutally real. 

There isn't much else to say about Everest. It is a straight-forward experience: men climb icy mountain and struggle to find their way down again. But I often say less is more, and the film enjoys setting up its characters, at least the ones that are deemed important enough (Sam Worthington's character Guy arrives too little too late) the rest of them do tend to blur into one another when the storm hits and identifying them becomes a struggle.

It is a visual spectacle with a decent human story behind it. I enjoyed it on the big screen (and in 3D!), though I'm unsure if I need to watch it again.

    
Additional Marshmallows: I was entertained to discover that Josh Brolin's character Beck's wife Peach was played by Robin Wright. I recognised her, but I didn't realise I recognised her from the 1987 classic The Princess Bride! 

Review: The Philadelphia Story

This comedy from 1940 still holds a lot of good chuckles today thanks to a great witty script and acting talent.

Katherine Hepburn leads this comedy as a rich woman on the eve of her wedding when her ex-husband arrives at her mansion with two reporters in tow looking for a potentially scandalous story for their demanding editor. What follows is probably the last thing she expected.

I am often proud that a film's age seldom bothers me, but it has happened before, and even with a 1940s film (A Brief Encounter, terribly stiff and un-relatable experience) but I am happy to say that The Philadelphia Story is not one of those exceptions! I very much enjoyed it.

A colossal cast for its time, Katherine Hepburn, Cary Grant and James Stewart (despite being before some of their biggest movies, African Queen, North by Northwest and It's a Wonderful Life respectively, they still each had a long list of films to their name by 1940s) it is probably a guarantee that this film would be a success in the acting front! Hepburn plays Tracy Lord, at the centre of the story she is an aloof Lady of the house, a huge mansion that our outsiders are promptly terrified of, yet she is hopelessly insecure. She's marrying George, a man who wants for nothing but to please her.
James Stewart plays Macaulay Connor, one of the two reporters who are quickly overwhelmed by Tracy's guile and cunning; spinning a false pretence to prevent them from scooping a story about her father. He steals the show by the end of the film, being at first coy and awkward to becoming one of the key players in the story.

I don't want to tell you too much of what happens.

As you can imagine, the story is fairly involved for what is a romantic comedy, with conflicts of passions and motivations playing against a ticking clock as the wedding looms. But unlike modern romantic comedies, The Philadelphia Story has a slick wit about its comedy, a constant state of inward chuckling that is personified by Cary Grant's Dexter, Tracy's ex-husband, who enjoys watching others fall over her whims while quietly holding all of the secrets for himself. Not in a devious way, just as an amused spectator.

So with Grant, Hepburn and Stewart delivering the crisp, witty dialogue without fault (another comparison with today's comedy: this film's lack of edits and cuts!) means once you get involved with these characters and their relations are all setup by the thirty minute mark, it is just an enjoyable afternoon watching them verbally scratch each other with intelligent retorts or terrific tirades. The comedy and the language is still relatable today and doesn't feel too dated, making it extremely accessible still! Plus, there's some great drunken acting. It isn't overblown and ridiculous like today's standards, it is honest and tipsy-drunk, very well written and acted!

Perhaps the only thing I could find nit-pick worthy was the character of George, played by John Howard; he felt side-lined, mostly used as a device to stir up the others more interesting developments. He doesn't have a chance to prove why he and Tracy are together; there is very little setup between the two, making it quite unbelievable and making the finale not terribly surprising (in some regards, at least). I suppose with such a powerhouse cast, one can stand out.

I definitely enjoyed it more than I thought I would, going into it more or less blind. It took a few minutes to become invested, but once I was on board with the characters I was happily sitting with my eyes glued to the screen. It was all in the script.

Additional Marshmallows: This film was suggested for review by Cinema Cocoa follower Isobel, who guessed my film related picture question correctly over Facebook and Twitter!

I will be holding more of these little challenges, posting through those channels, and the prize is always to have your say as to what gets reviewed next!
So please, follow Cinema Cocoa and see if you can guess the next challenge first!

Review: The Visit

Director M. Night Shyamalan funded this small and unique film himself to regain "creative control". Honestly, it isn't half bad!

To help their mother cope with a divorce and have fun with her life, two siblings go to spend a week living with their grandparents, the daughter attempting to film their experience to give their troubled mother some closure. But when they arrive, they find that their grandparents are... strange.

M. Night Shyamalan has perhaps the biggest career implosion in recent memory. His first major debut The Sixth Sense was a massive success, follow-ups Unbreakable, Signs and The Village are mostly successful, he was considered "The Next Spielberg".
But public and critics alike started to bore of his screenplays relying on twist gimmicks, and Lady in the Water and The Happening virtually destroyed his career; people began to view him as a egotistical hack.
He went onto more traditional genre films and even franchise movies with The Last Airbender and After Earth... Yeah, no one wanted to watch a film with Shyamalan's name attached after those.

The Visit feels like not so much a return-to-form for Shyamalan but in fact it is completely unique in his filmography. It is shot as a found-footage style film as the daughter Becca (something of a wannabe director) starts to make a documentary about her grandparents, but don't misunderstand, this isn't "A Shyamalan found-footage movie" in the bad sense, which would probably put most people off. It is probably the most legitimate found-footage film I've seen since REC or Paranormal Activity, due to its dedication to the genre; there's no music and things are filmed only within reason.
The choice of doing a found-footage film even offsets it from the director's other movies; there's no stiff, slow pans or tracking shots, no weirdly out of place monologues. It feels refreshing.
Plus, the acting is good. Most found-footage movies suffer from being cheap productions with a lack of talent in front of the screen, but somehow Shyamalan has got a good set of actors for this movie. All of whom are relative newcomers, though their grandfather, Pop Pop, is played by Peter McRobbie who featured prominently in the recent Marvel Daredevil Netflix show. All do exceptional jobs as excitable kids and strangely homely grandparents.

It is by far a perfect movie though. There's a moment when it strays too far into the sub-genre's well established cliches, the young boy's rapping is a little... unbearable (but I can totally see this as what a kid like him would do) and it is a terribly simple experience; it is only ninety minutes long. 
But it definitely benefits from its sly self-awareness and surprisingly good setup (again, a rare thing in the sub-genre) it has a good sense of humour throughout that really makes your question if there is actually anything wrong. After all, the film is from the perspective of children, they don't rightly know what they are experiencing. That said, there are some creepy moments and at least two scares that did actually get me.

But, you have to be in the mood for it. People will either like it or hate it, and others will dismiss it outright because of Shyamalan's body of work, unfairly. The Visit isn't setting the world on fire, but I had fun with it mostly because I got the humour, and it is nice to see Shyamalan rise above the crippling weight of past mistakes.

Review: Gone with the Wind

First time watching this.
Now I shall wait for you to stop hurling abuse at me, please begin reading the review when you have recovered your composure.

Set in the 1800s at the beginning of the American Civil War, Gone with the Wind follows the young, selfish daughter of a plantation owner in the South and her turmoil love interest in two men: a married man and a handsome rogue.

So there's one reason and one reason only that I hadn't actually seen this film before. It is four hours long. I know, I know: "Cinema Cocoa you've surely watched the Lord of the Rings Extended cuts multiple times by now!" but actually you'd be wrong, I've only watched each of them once.
It is also a romance epic, generally not a genre I tend to watch in my free time, especially when it requires a third of my day.

Apparently this is a troubled time to watch Gone with the Wind. Despite it making $1.6 billion in ticket sales (adjusted for inflation) upon release and being regarded as one of cinema's most crowning achievements, winning eight Academy Awards, there has been some recent dispute about the film, to the point of it needing to be banned. This came about the same time as recent debates over the representation of the Confederate flag...
There are some extreme views against Gone with the Wind as pro-slavery, what with its point of view glamorising and even (at times) humourising the upper class society found on the plantations.
Indeed, watching Gone with the Wind after the production of such films as 12 Years a Slave or even Django Unchained. It can feel quite... uncomfortable.

But I don't want to read too far into it; this controversy is completely unnecessary in my eyes. Audiences should appreciate that regardless of which side of a war, there are still people; and the film represents people suffering in events outside of their control.
Plus, I gotta say, if the character of Scarlett (Vivien Leigh) is supposed to be our heroine... let's just say the film isn't being kind in its representation of our "protagonists". Scarlett is completely insufferable!
The first act of Gone with the Wind (a film that is edited as a theatre production, with intermissions, an Overture and Exit Music) is aggravating and painful to sympathise with. Scarlett is prancing around, flirting with every man in the myriad of parties ignorant of other women's feelings, being a complete egomaniac born from luxury and riches. But as this act went on, I realised that I was supposed to feel this way towards her, and during the second act when the war begins and her life is broken, it was fully realised.

Perhaps my favourite aspect of this film was Clark Gable as Rhett Butler, the outsider who is completely aware of how lost and selfish Scarlett is, more than she knows herself, and who slowly becomes obsessed with her. He has this quizzical expression for every situation that befalls Scarlett, a shoulder-shrugging amusement at her inner plight that sarcastically screams: "Well, you deserve it".
It is a wonderfully shot and acted film with almost every scene in four hours of footage being beautifully composed and lit. It is sometimes hard to fathom the scale of it, such as when you see a massive wooden building burn to the ground, or a near endless field of dying men. No smoke or mirrors, no effects, just real film-making of the time.

Like a lot of drama epics, I found myself floundering towards the end. I guess after so much carnage and loss I felt beaten over the head by it all, and yet one character (yes, I am trying to not spoil a film that is seventy-five years old) apparently not feeling the same, and not learning anything! It was hard to comprehend and quite infuriating.
But again, perhaps that was the point.

It is hard to generalise such a huge film, and I am sorry that I must. It did not feel as laborious as I was dreading it would be; it is a packed film and keeps its pacing well, it never feels too much or too little in terms of content or drive. It has great performances, great music and great visuals and remains a classic piece of cinema regardless of (or perhaps more so with) its mildly controversial perspective.

The important thing is, I do feel bad having not watched it until now. It may not be my "type" of film, but I appreciate it now more than ever.

Review: Maggie

You'd have never thought a film with Arnold versus zombies would play out as a grieving father watching his daughter die.

Wade Vogel (Arnold Schwarzenegger) tracks down his daughter who had fled their home after becoming infected by a virus that slowly turns the victim into a mindless cannibal. He refuses to accept her fate, and wants only for her to live the rest of her days as a normal girl.

Maggie is a hard and bleak experience, and I must admit straight away that I was not in the frame of mind to watch it. While I of course knew this was strictly a drama rather than an Arnold action movie, I still wasn't ready for how depressing the experience really is.

It is sad that Maggie received so little praise from the public as well as a fatally limited release, making a film that actually stands out in Schwarzenegger's career as an acting role get a public 33% rating on RottenTomatoes.com while the travesty of creativity Terminator Genisys gets a depressing 61%. How exactly can Arnold prove he can do other things, if when he does just that the film isn't distributed anywhere so people can watch it?

Anyway, enough about numbers.
As a "zombie" film, Maggie is quite unique. Somewhere between The Walking Dead (season 2, specifically) and a cancer story-line, it is not your traditional zombie fare. There are no burning cities, no hordes of brain-chewing monsters, no chases, no invasions, no isolation, no chemical warfare, no military. Arnold doesn't even quip one liners or shoot any zombies. This is a very morose, sad story about what a family could go through if a "zombie" virus were to become a reality.
The film's cinematography makes everything look worn and drab, rustic brown and mellow grey, I don't think there was any vibrant colour throughout the story. We see a world suffering a long winter of famine; Wade and his family live in American farmland but crops have had to be burned to perhaps reduce the spread of infection. 
Arnold looks tired, an incredible transformation from him, to think there are brief moments here that the giant Austrian could vanish into a character. Although the economical script did feel like it was deliberately stopping him from speaking to any great extent, but it wasn't overly damaging; the film is a quiet, atmospheric piece already.

Genre fans will argue that these aren't in fact zombies Wade and his family are dealing with; that zombies are monsters that are born once someone dies. I don't remember the film ever mentioning the disease as "zombification", and really, when a zombie film has a maximum of two zombies on the screen at any one time (and only one time) and plays more like the genre's answer to My Sister's Keeper then you may want to refrain from nitpicking.

I cannot say I enjoyed the film, but I don't know if I was expected to... This is about as real and uncompromisingly human a story as zombie movies have ever been, and for that it is exceptional. Did it hold my interest throughout? No. It isn't a perfect movie by any stretch and characters feel a little too muted for how severe in tone the film attempts to be. 

But I can appreciate what it was trying to do with such a tired genre, and I can appreciate Arnold's huge step into dramatic acting. This is about as far removed from his typical roles as you can get!

Yes, it is better than Terminator Genisys.

Additional Marshmallows: This is director Henry Hobson's first film, having previously worked exclusively in art and graphic design department roles, for films such as Snow White and the Huntsman, video games including The Last of Us, and even the Academy Award Ceremonies for the last four years.

Review: Ex Machina

Wow, I am struggling to think of problems with this intelligent sci-fi thriller.

Caleb, a young computer specialist, is hired by a recluse multi-millionaire programmer to test groundbreaking artificial intelligence within a secret, isolated laboratory.

Ex Machina is the directorial debut of Alex Garland, writer of incredible science fiction screenplays such as Sunshine, Dredd and 28 Days Later. Three films I own and consider to be high class in their respective genres. Why then has it taken me over eight months to watch Ex Machina? The trailer and the promotional material.
Ex Machina is an awesome thriller, a very quiet and very subdued experience that speaks volumes without resorting to any action set pieces or Hollywood cliche. It is an intelligent, thinking-man's science fiction and unfortunately that is hard to market for wider audiences; I found the trailer to be very confused in tone, it wanted to make it look like an action thriller when it is certainly not.

It is hard to explain the film without spoiling it, but I will commend it for its narrow scope and intense focus on its three main characters. It is an analytical story, Oscar Issac's Nathan is a brilliant but recluse and socially weird genius who has created "true" AI, Domhnall Gleeson as Caleb, a young outsider who is asked to give a "Turing Test" to Nathan's creation and is oblivious to anything else that may or may not be going on. Alicia Vikander is our final piece of the triad as Ava, the seemingly flawless artificial intelligence.
It is a talking film, we get to see the logistics of the creation and the morality played off by all three characters in great depth and using this to slowly expose what is a very dark and repressed secret beneath. While the discussion of artificial intelligence is cliche nowadays (and the representation of said AI being a beautiful young woman) these characters and how they affiliate and treat one another is far from cliche.

There's a very modern take on the advent of artificial intelligence at work beneath Ex Machina. It isn't some military funded science division, or some laboratory accident or even a metaphysical internet conception of life. It is constructed by a man who understands how to ignore conventions and use all of the tools modern living gives us to harness what it is to be human. How people use the internet and cellphones for example.
There are no wars between man and machine, but rather a debate between two men about the machine. This film isn't so much about the bells and whistles of a CGI robot so much as it is about Humanity and how we are fundamentally flawed yet strive to create life.

Of course, like Sunshine and others of Garland's written work, things get dark, and while I may have spotted a few of the film's twists and turns early, others did catch me off guard. The characters are set up so well that you can never quite tell who is doing what to whom...

I honestly cannot say what I disliked about this film, except maybe the unavoidable cliches already mentioned and some leaps in the storytelling. Extremely minor things. As a science fiction fan Ex Machina delivered on so many levels and rose above my unfairly lowered expectations. A moody, intense thriller that makes you wonder and think about what will happen next.

Additional Marshmallows: Somebody get Alicia Vikander to school Kristanna Loken on how to act like a robot, good lord; Ava is incredibly well realised compared to the travesty that is the Terminatrix.





   

Remake Rumble Review: Hitman

The Hitman franchise always seemed like an odd choice to be turned into a film franchise; a dark, moody third-person stealth assassin game where you play as an unstoppable killer. The game came to be from Eidos Interactive, a British games company which later became part of Square Enix Europe after the software giant purchased the company. But Hitman was one of their most successful game franchises with eight titles in the last fifteen years.

Anyone outside of the games industry would still find making not one film but also a remake of that film with this franchise a strange choice, especially when video game franchises like Max Payne and Prince of Persia only get one entry so far.

What is interesting is that both the 2007 entry and the 2015 are both directed by relative newcomers and written by the same writer.

It is a perfect opportunity for a Cinema Cocoa Remake Rumble Review!

Hitman (2007)

Hitman in 2007 is director Xavier Gens' only notable feature film, and while half of this film gives plenty of evidence why, the other half isn't that bad.

A covert group known as The Organisation trains an army of lethal assassins known as Agents, but when Agent 47 discovers one of his targets, a powerful Russian politician, survived his attack he becomes a target. With Interpol tracking him down, 47 has to finish the job he started.

This film is a conflict of emotions for me. On the one hand, it has a terrible plot, ambiguous backstory spontaneous action sequences, but on the other hand it is a decent video game movie adaptation with good action and is impressively gory. For every good moment there's another bad one to balance the film's overall neutrality.

Perhaps the most glaringly annoying aspects include lead star Timothy Olyphant as Agent 47, and the script given to him. He just doesn't look like a stone-cold killer; he appears to soft and bright eyed throughout the film, you cannot believe this guy has been raised to be the ultimate killer. He's more like someone pretending to be Agent 47. The other major issue with this film is its opening: a flashback style sequence while Ave Maria plays showing us the orphan kids in training to become Agents, only for some of them to attempt escape.
This isn't referenced again, and 47's relationship with The Organisation seems ambiguous at best in context with this opening, and add to that how the Agents in the video game weren't orphans but in fact clones. I couldn't shake the feeling I had seen this opening before... From the last time I watched this film, right?
Nope. It is footage from James Cameron's television show Dark Angel (2000). They even cite their use of the footage at the end of the film's credits.

Wow. Wow... Not only is your film's protagonist's backstory incorrect to the source material, but the backstory you decided to give is just ripped from something else?

I should condemn this film just for that.

So what could possibly balance this out? Well, it is actually refreshing to watch an action film (an action film based off a video game, no less) that actually has gore and blood squibs used in it! This film includes an action sequence that almost equals some RoboCop (1987) in terms of number of squibs used, its insanely violent. It was wisely rated R and a 15 in the United Kingdom.
Plus there's some nice nods to the game. Agent 47 walking through corridors while the director has the camera tracking behind and above him, like a game's third-person perspective, or Agent 47 breaking into a house to find people playing the Hitman game. Existential crisis there.

It is a bit of a mess. The film feels uninterested in its own plot, focusing on Agent 47 and his lack of heart for female lead Nika (played by Olga Kurylenko) who is quite annoying, reminding me of Transporter 3's female "lead". She didn't seem necessary, as if she could have been written out of the plot.

It is an incredibly throw-away action movie, but in terms of video game adaptations, it wasn't awful.

Hitman: Agent 47 (2015)

This is a remake nobody asked for, and will likely be forgotten about like its predecessor, but honestly they did alright with this remake of the popular video game.

After his project of manufacturing perfect assassins is destroyed, a scientist goes on the run and now only his daughter could possibly know where he is. She is tracked and hunted down by a mysterious, ruthless assassin known only as Agent 47, a product of her father’s work, and a new organisation called The Syndicate.
The main issue I always had with the original Hitman movie was the script and portrayal of Agent 47; Timothy Olyphant didn’t look like a genuinely ruthless and methodical killer. In this film, Rupert Friend (of Homeland fame) takes up the role of 47 and he gives a far more genuine performance, even channelling some of The Terminator earlier on; walking, not running, and forever on the heels of our heroine, Katia (Hannah Ware) and her initial protector John (Zachary Quinto) combined with the slick surroundings and Agent 47’s impeccable suit.

It is rewarding to see the assassin be a threat, and while the video game has him as the protagonist I feel a film needs to establish this man as a cold, emotionless killer, and the film opens with this perfectly. Also Katia's character is a fair few steps ahead of Nika from the original film, in that she is actually integral to the story and she progresses the plot! Agent 47 is more like a means to an end in this film, and other characters supply the story, which is how it should be.

The story progresses neatly enough, hitting all the traditional marks of an action, chase thriller with some neat little twists in there to keep you intrigued. Although there are some moments that defy belief: the police officer interrogating Agent 47 while having a sniper rifle and ammunition in the room… or some quite incredible technology that is only experimental today that will raise some eyebrows.
But these are small issues compared to the general lack of tone from the original film.

I will say though, contradicting the sleek styling the film has, the combat sequences were fairly messy with an abundance of shaky-cam. I thought we were through with this? Hitman would have benefitted more paced, methodical combat instead of frenetic chaos. On the plus side there was still buckets of gore, Hitman incredibly maintaining its 15 certificate and R rating!

While the film is a fairly by the numbers chase film, and it loses a little bit of traction towards the end with its mysterious antagonist, I enjoyed it a fair bit! It had decent acting for a video game movie, the action was decent and the character felt well portrayed.

Additional Marshmallows: Incredibly Hitman: Agent 47 is director Aleksander Bach's debut and also solo career entry on IMDB! Whether he has done more and the site has not been updated, I cannot say, but for a debut director, Agent 47 is something to be proud of!

Review: Sinister 2

James Ransone returns from the original film for this follow up story detailing more of the horror film's lore and villain; the Ghoul.

The police deputy who was aware of the horrors that befell the Oswalt family years before has become dedicated to stopping the malicious spirit that destroys whole families. His search leads to a woman on the run from her abusive husband, who hides out in an abandoned country house with her two young boys. Unfortunately, this house was once a site of one of the spirit's killing sprees...

I enjoyed the original Sinister, it did what it well; creating a grungy, visually dilapidated experience with plenty of scares and a creepy, original monster. But a sequel does feel unnecessary and it could never live up to the predecessor.

I will attempt to not spoil either film, but I recommend them both for horror fans. Sinister 2 (for those who have watched the first film, can read between the lines) follows the same sort of story line only we are viewing from the children's perspective. This makes the sequel lean far heavier towards the supernatural and attempts to explain the mystery of the Ghoul (aka the demon Bhughul, a sort of bogeyman). 
As far as the implementation of this, the film more or less succeeds; it is suitably scary and the film's final chase sequence actually explained a lot of the Sinister films' main issue.

The film itself, I enjoyed it, and I actually found myself taken by surprise by more than a few of the jump scares; something very few horrors manage nowadays because horror cinematography has become predictable over the years. So Sinister 2 actually had me jumping in my seat a couple of times, and like its predecessor when it does tension it does it well, several times I felt some distress for the characters.

Some, at least. Sinister 2 isn't without its flaws and upon inspection it really isn't a patch on the first film. I thoroughly enjoyed Sinister's investigative nature; a writer driven by his career putting his family in paranormal danger, giving a need to watch the series of murders captured on super-8 camera film. It was simple.
But Sinister 2 requires more conveniences to drive its plot along, its second act is mired with subplots that don't feel genuine but more as a means to an end. Especially when mother of two Courtney's husband returns to the film. I'd even say that the super-8 films here are not as terrifying as in the first film; they are gory yes, but somewhat more structured than the grungy aesthetic would suggest. 
The characters feel quite distanced too, I didn't feel much for any of them, although lead star James Ransone takes a comic relief character and turns it into a sort of Bruce Campbell's Ash from Evil Dead competency, which was quite fun.

I was suitably scared during Sinister 2, but I would say it feels unnecessary despite its best attempts to feel relevant. Sinister works as a perfect standalone film.

Additional Marshmallows: James Ransone's character had the name of "Deputy" in the first film, and even on Sinister 2's IMDB he is called "Ex-Deputy So-and-So".

Additional, additional marshmallows: At least the Deputy knows how to use a torch in the dark unlike Ethan Hawke's Ellison Oswalt.

Review: Apollo 13

From expert director Ron Howard comes perhaps the defining space exploration film; rooted by true events Apollo 13 still stands as a testimony to what humanity could be.

Shortly after the amazing success of the Apollo 11 lunar landing that saw Neil Armstrong walk on The Moon, Apollo 13's mission was to repeat the performance. But with public opinion apparently disinterested already, and misfortunes plaguing them even before the launch... Apollo 13's mission might be the most dangerous and fatal space flight the world has ever seen.

Add to that, "the world might ever see".
I get quite passionate when it comes to space travel; I find it intensely disappointing when people are more excited about upgrading their phone so its one millimeter thinner than the prospect of man venturing further into a world of discovery. So understand that watching Apollo 13 again, twenty years on, still has a lasting effect.

This is mostly due to director Ron Howard's excellent style of film-making that grounds everything in reality and really focuses on the time period, something he would be perfecting over his career with Frost/Nixon, Rush and others. Set in 1970 the film acquires, much like his other films, a timeless quality, making the pioneering human spirit all the more prevalent. Nearly fifty years ago we achieved this!? It is incredible.

The film itself is a solid, rewarding experience. While 2013's flashy affair Gravity is the same concept, and I was reminded of it, it was a rollercoaster experience heavily influenced by suspension of disbelief. Apollo 13 is based on reality, real events in a science that many of us do not understand and/or has been revised over the years to become antiquated. As such, the script does descend into a mire of tech talk with a room of lab coats arguing intensely. I had no idea what was being said, but I would rather have that in my moments of intensity than "movie script cliche 101".
The acting across the board is very good, America's golden boy Tom Hanks filling the role of Astronaut commander Jim Lovell (the film being based off his book) well, Kevin Bacon and Bill Paxton as his crew mates, and Gary Sinise in perhaps the most interesting role; their original crewmate who was deemed unhealthy to go on the mission. Sinise's character Ken goes through an interesting arc, and I always remember it after seeing the film.

Ed Harris completes the cast as Houston's controller Gene Kranz, who looks like he is enjoying the role's intensity. Indeed, regardless of the severity and intensity that the film implements with integrity, there's a good streak of humour that rises up when it is needed. The sort of honest levity that we need in times of crisis.

Regardless of the realistic script and focus on the technology, you would need a heart of stone to not feel something still when the film concludes, such is the nature of the story, the truth behind it and the film-making at hand. Given our recent departure from space travel, the film's ending is actually more poignant now than ever...

Apollo 13 is an important film. It shows not just the indomitable human spirit but also our need to venture out beyond what we know, because when we do it is possible for us to band together for a common cause.