Tag Archives: 59

The Odd life of Timothy Green  (2012)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                     105 Min        U

There is a wonderful heart to this film, in that it focuses on a young family who find out they will never be able to have children and so, in an evening of cathartic desperation, they decide to write out all the things they imagine their child would have been, kind, ‘honest to a fault’ etc. and then they bury the list in an old wooden box in the back garden. A mysterious rain falls and up springs Timothy Green, their fully fledged nine or so years old son from the back garden, replete with leaves genetically attached to his calves.

It’s a nice idea, and the film from there on deals with issues of early, and abrupt, parenthood, and family relations and expectations. Unfortunately, it does so in an all too breezy way, and for the most part the story doesn’t prove engaging. The final third does deliver more on the emotional side of things and it is a spirited performance from the family members – Joel Edgerton and Jennifer Garner as the parents, and CJ Adams as Green, with a host of other recognisable faces appearing throughout, including David Morse and Dianne Wiest. Overall a nice, simple film, if a little flimsy – fine for young family viewing.

The Host  (2013)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                     125 Min        12A

Based on ‘Twilight’ author Stephenie Meyer’s non twilight sci-fi novel, although one could possibly guess the connection by the premise and advertising poster shown above. Where ‘Twilight’ featured a horny and irresponsible young girl at the centre of a love triangle that managed to get most of the inhabitants of her town killed, here we have a teenage love quadrangle with one female INSIDE THE BODY of another. It takes Bella’s indecision over Jacob or Edward to a whole new level.

The premise is that Earth has largely been taken over by peace loving aliens who nevertheless use human bodies as hosts, dominating them completely. The main female character Melanie, played by Saoirse Ronan, is implanted but she is strong enough for her own identity to survive and communicate with her parasitic intruder. The alien shares the memories of Melanie and recalls a romantic affair with a young male in the human resistance. Driven mad with cock lust, the extraterrestrial agrees to help Melanie but, naturally, finds she gets hot flushes from someone else, cue lots of (self) bitch slapping all round.

Ronan does a really good job given her difficult task, and she really suits the bright blue contacts which denotes alien control. Similarly, William Hurt as the autocratic leader of the resistance cell is likeable, and if you get past the fact the film is trashy crap, it is not without a certain visual appeal. The brief appearance of Emily Browning towards the end suggests the possibility of a sequel, but this may be wishful thinking on the part of the producers (there are currently no other books, but since Meyer stated as far back as 2009 she sees the story as a trilogy, it seems very likely she decided to wait and see how this film performed. She could probably churn out the other two over breakfast anyway). The film is written and directed by Andrew Nicol which, following on from his atrocious ‘In Time’ (2011), quite possibly sounds the death knell on his career, and for acting support has Jake Abel (‘Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief’ 2010), Jeremy Irons’ son Max irons (‘Red Riding Hood’ 2011), and Diane Kruger as another alien hottie.

Of note, Saoirse Ronan is also rumoured to have been cast as Mary Queen of Scots in an upcoming biopic…

In the House / Dans la Maison  (2012)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                     105 Min        15

Arriving on the back of 2010’s ‘Potiche’, this is the latest French language film from director Francois Ozon, based on the play ‘The Boy in the Last Row’, by Juan Mayorga. It stars Fabrice Luchini as Germain, a slightly jaded failed novelist, now appropriately teaching English at the ‘Gustave Flaubert High School’, wherein he encounters a promising young student, Claude (Ernst Umhauer), whose potential gift reawakens a kind of hopeful excitement in his teacher, as he effectively takes him on as his protégé. The only problem is, his writing is a little subversive, and concerns the family of another pupil, creating a story within a story with the viewer not always sure what is real and what is fiction.

Unfortunately, the prose about this family, updates from which Claude continually hands to his teacher for feedback, which is supposed to draw the audience in, much as it is doing to the onscreen readers (Germain’s wife, played by Kristin Scott Thomas, also partakes), simply isn’t that interesting. The unfolding melodrama unconvincingly overstates both the skill of Claude, and the susceptibility of the adults around him so that, ultimately, it just becomes a little silly, a little hollow, and ironically, as Germain goes to greater and greater lengths to explain what makes a good story to his eager pupil, the characters onscreen become increasingly two dimensional.

Identity Thief  (2013)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                     111 Min        15

The latest film to revolve around a road trip and, therein, a forced scenario that sees two unlikely characters ‘buddy up’, in this case Jason Bateman’s financial services worker and the person who has stolen his identity and threatens to destroy his assets and credibility, played in a wonderful performance by Melissa McCarthy. In fact, if it were not for McCarthy this film would have almost absolutely nothing of value in it, the pace of the comedy is slow and often too obvious, as is the story generally, the use of violence for comedic effect is by turns funny and then way, way off, and Jason Bateman turns in another of his now much overused roles of the reluctant ‘strictly by the rules’ straight guy ‘forced’ into extremity, and his character is, even given the scenario, creepily mean to his new criminal friend. McCarthy manages to bring pathos and emotion to a below average production, and one can only wonder what she would have been able to do with a half decent script. Robert Patrick and John Cho appear in support.

Cloud Atlas  (2012)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                     172 Min        15

This isn’t actually all that bad. It is way too long at just under three hours, in fact I’m pretty sure an entire hour could have been axed from it somewhere in the middle. Half way through I couldn’t wait for it to end, but come the end I was actually quite enjoying it. The best way to think of this film is traditional adventure storytelling done in a multi-layered way, with each layer a different story in space and time over Earth’s history but each featuring the same actors playing multiple parts, ultimately trying to make the point that our actions, every crime or kind deed as the film puts it, can have repercussions for evermore, and forwarding the belief that life is both transient and ever renewing.

It features an ensemble cast including Jim Broadbent, Tom Hanks, Halle Berry (why does she always get all the worst lines? Does she improv them?), Ben Whishaw, Jim Sturgess and Hugh Grant to name some of the most familiar faces, all often wearing prosthetics and sporting different accents, to varying degrees of success. It’s adapted from the Booker prize nominated novel by David Mitchell and directed by the Wachowski brothers (or perhaps siblings is more correct since one of them has undergone a sex change, they are joined by Tom Tykwer {‘Run Lola Run’} on director duties) of ‘The Matrix’ fame, and just as in that series Hugo Weaving makes a marked appearance as the bad guy/assassin in most of the stories, and he clearly relishes being able to do so.

The script needed to be reworked as it’s pretty consistently terrible, featuring cartloads of cheese and an evolved future language that sounds altogether like gibberish, something made all the worse by the actors mumbling it as they attempt to deliver it to us. Some nice shots of Edinburgh, as well as a Scottish bar fight gag at the expense of some supposed English patrons, which went a long way toward warming the audience to the film….

Quotes

“You have to do what you can’t not do”   Halle Berry/Luisa Rey

The Sessions  (2012)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                       95 Min        15

The Red Dragon feels a little cheated by this film. The ending delivers a strong emotional punch, one that was felt throughout the audience and had a few in tears. The rest of the film, however, does not do a good job, especially when it tries to be humorous as it does too often and with too little effect. It tells the true story of poet Mark O’Brien, played by John Hawkes, who can move only his head and must spend most of each day in an ‘iron lung’ in order to stay alive, though he can still feel sensation throughout his entire body. He begins ‘sessions’ with a sex therapist, played by Helen Hunt, to explore that which has always been denied to him, and the film follows his sexual awakening and the emotional consequences that follow.

The performances are good, but perhaps the film’s biggest problem is a lack of connection with the main character. Sarcastic humour has too much of an emphasis from the start and it never really comes off well, creating the lack of a feeling of reality and seriousness from the onset, although for the character being upbeat is certainly to be applauded. Similarly, the transition from what is supposed to be a lot of comedy into more serious characterisation and emotional connection also seems loose and ungrounded. A shame because it is a good story. Hunt is up for an academy award for her performance and although it is perhaps merited, The Red Dragon has on occasion mooted a possible correlation between the bravery of actresses baring all onscreen and Oscar nominations.

Interestingly, if the connection between the characters seems a little unlikely, have a look at this recent scientific article on the possible side effects of male sperm on the female reproductive system.

The Impossible  (2012)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                    114 Min         12A

Juan Antonio Bayona’s second film after the hugely successful ‘The Orphanage’ (07) focuses on the true story of one family facing the full brunt of the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004. The real hotel and pool that the family were playing around when the waves hit were used for filming, with the ground floor residences rebuilt just for the shoot. It gives a very memorable impression of the terror and brutality of the event – not just of the initial impact and the subsequent powerful waves but also of the underwater, deadly collisions with all sorts of debris. In conveying this, and the general scope of the disaster within the confines of their geographical area, the film is very successful, just as it is in displaying a troubling sense of realism in the injuries incurred and the sicknesses that followed them.

However, rather than telling a gritty and accurate tale, ‘The Impossible’ has gone for a slightly more Hollywood style of story, despite the fact it’s a Spanish film. It is very much a case of ‘if this were in the movies, this would happen’, and even though we’re witnessing an interpretation of real events it’s filmed in such a way that it seems a little contrived and thus a little off given the tremendous death toll the tsunami took. Nor is there any mention of the geopolitical real life issues surrounding the catastrophe, such as the universal lack of any kind of warning for the poor souls that died during the event.

The older child in the family, played by Tom Holland, simply does not convince as someone experiencing the events as reality, rather he comes across as someone enjoying all the action and occasionally in need of a good slap. He is a central character and that together with the general feel of the whole, and the poor choice of title, hollows out the film. The two younger brothers are much more convincing, and both Ewan Mcgregor and Naomi Watts are very good as the parents. Watts is up for an Oscar for her role, perhaps aided by the fact she is terrified of water and yet was plucky enough to take on the challenges of being smashed around by torrents of the stuff. Not, I imagine, the most pleasant shoot she’s ever had.

End of Watch  (2012)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                     109 Min        15

From writer/director David Ayer, this is very much the opposite of his 2005 flick ‘Harsh Times’, and stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Pena as two LAPD patrol men buddying up and busting crime in downtown Los Angeles, ‘district 13′, and it opens with a pretty awesome rallying call in the form of a voice-over from Gyllenhaal as their squad car hones in on a couple of gangbangers. Initially, the whole film is shot as a largely handheld camera piece, with our view switching between pinhole cameras on the officers’ uniforms, Gyllenhall’s handheld, and the camera on their vehicle. This creates a major problem with the film, as with others in the genre, as the beginning quickly becomes ‘end of ability to watch’ with shaky cam taken to extremes and time wasted justifying and talking about the various cameras. It’s not necessary to contain the footage of these films within the confines of the characters’ own photography equipment, the viewer should be in mind at all times and there is no reason at all not to switch between the handhelds and more traditional views. Eventually, the director seems to come to the same conclusion and ditches some of the handheld footage, which actually makes all the shaky use from before fairly pointless.

As the action begins to ramp up things get much more interesting. It’s where this style of filmmaking can be really effective, as we experience first hand the thrills and horrors of their occupation from their own point of view, and we really root for them as they deal with all manner of undesirables. These events are interspersed with ‘chum time’ as we get more insights into their private lives and their camaraderie. It’s unfortunately a little obvious and hackneyed, and initially slightly awkward to boot, though the actors seem to settle more into it as the film progresses, possibly as they become more familiar with each other in their roles. Some wonderful tension is created, but the flaws continually diffuse what could have been a much more intense and acute thriller.

The handheld filmmaking style, which really began to filter into the mainstream after the success of ‘The Blair Witch Project’ in 99, seems almost to be allowing ‘Realism’ into Hollywood via the back door. It has largely been confined to horror, where it continues to be refined by the likes of ‘Paranormal Activity’ 07 (featuring security cameras rather than handheld ones), in which series numbers 2 & 3 were arguably the best, and the actually pretty darn scary ‘Insidious’ (10). It could be that with this style of horror movie it has run its course – ‘Paranormal Activity 4’ (12), and the very similarly styled ‘Sinister’ (12) with Ethan Hawke were both very predictable in terms of when the scare was coming and in what form it would take, as well as how everything would end up. However, as evinced at times by ‘End of Watch’, Hollywood filmmakers still have a lot of unexplored territory to put to good effect with the technique, so long as they don’t shoot themselves in the foot by obsessing over it unnecessarily. For a couple of good uses of handhelds see horror film ‘Quarantine’ (08 – itself a remake of the also very good Spanish film ‘Rec’ 07), ‘Project X’ (12) which was kind of a feel good film done in an unexpected way, and ‘Troll Hunter’ (10), a Norwegian film which was beautifully shot and put together.

Melinda and Melinda  (2004)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                       99 Min        12A

Woody Allen begins his picture with a discussion of whether or not life is essentially comedic or tragic. This occurs as a conversation between friends having drinks, and the point is made that it perhaps simply depends on one’s point of view. The director then illustrates this through the rest of the film by telling one story in two different ways, each with the central character of Melinda (played by Radha Mitchell).

It’s an interesting point. How often do we see in romantic comedies fairly tragic events being glossed over – perhaps using comedy to alleviate circumstance is a wonderful thing, thus the phrase ‘you have to laugh don’t you?’. Unfortunately for the sake of the film, the two stories have parallels but are actually quite different from each other, somewhat defeating the purpose of the exercise. The tragic storyline is most definitely more tragic than the comedic one. Some of the technical ploys stay true to the purpose, the use of music telling us to be in a good mood, the different cinematography to put a slightly glossier sheen on the comedic story etc. But the main flaw is too large, though the individual stories do hold the viewer’s attention for the most part.

That’s my Boy  (2012)    59/100

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Rating :   59/100                                                                     116 Min        15

Adam Sandler’s new film has all the hallmarks of most of his work. That feeling of ‘argh, how many times do we have to see the same thing over and over again, the same hammy characters, the same torrid toilet humour, the same douche bag protagonist that somehow wins everyone over by the end?’, and also ‘hmm, that bit was actually quite funny’. It’s a shame he can’t team up with someone who could shake out the detritus and just leave the good comedy. Which, incidentally, would have completely obliterated ‘Jack and Jill’ (11) from existence (his last effort, which won Razzies in every category). The film certainly deserves kudos for playing Meatloaf’s ‘Everything Louder than Everything Else’ at one point, its use of Vanilla Ice, and the casting of ever beautiful Leighton Meester along with Eva Amurri Martino. It does have some genuine good laughs in there, you just have to survive the eye gauging rest of the film to get to them.