This is the latest film adaptation of one of Nicholas Sparks’ novels, which will justifiably see many self respecting men, and women, avoiding it like the plague. Like all his previous adaptations, this follows an identical template – the young lovers who could be together were it not for some exterior threat which gets in the way and leads to a confrontation at the end. Ever since ‘The Notebook’ (04), which was actually quite good, the stories have been going steadily downhill, but this isn’t too bad, with both leads, played by Josh Duhamel and Julianne Hough (‘Footloose’ {11}, ‘Rock of Ages’ {12}) proving likeable enough to at least hold some interest. Sparks now has his own production company which appears on the credits here, so we can look forward to seeing all of his stories turned into films with the same predictably nice locations, nice music, good looking actors and hollow drama for the perfection of his feel good, but largely flimsy, fare. Disappointingly, Lasse Hallstrom (‘What’s Eating Gilbert Grape’) directs – his work generally carries a lot of respect, but since this is his second Sparks adaptation (the other being ‘Dear John’{10}) one can’t help but feel they function as mere potboilers between his other projects. A sudden plot twist at the end also reveals Sparks has largely been taking the piss all the way through.
‘To The Wonder’ is the latest film from highly acclaimed director Terrence Malick, and of all his work to date it is closest to his last piece, ‘The Tree of Life’, in that it is for the most part a series of beautiful shots of nature and people, as part of the natural world, and the narrative, such that it is, is told via the character’s thoughts in poetic voice over. The pivotal character is played by Ben Affleck, Olga Kurylenko and Rachel McAdams play two of the women in his life, and Javier Bardem acts in support as the local priest with issues regarding his waning faith.
The story really focuses on the fidelity of Affleck’s relationship with girlfriend Kurylenko, and there is a sense of each character here suffering from sensory deprivation – the diligent priest who never stops working but gets no physical satisfaction, the wandering eye of Affleck, his bouncy joie de vivre girlfriend stuck with him in a dead end town, the oppressive weight of society’s expectations and limits contrasted with the wonderful landscape images of rolling hills and running streams. It is a reflective piece, and so interpretation is of course open, but there is an interesting sermon from the priest which mentions how a person can make a mistake and regret it, but hesitating and not acting is much worse. In a sense it’s a redemption for the darker moments of the film but I can’t help but wonder if perhaps Malick has not been thinking along the same lines himself, as the famously selective director, whose films to date are ‘Badlands’ (73), ‘Days of Heaven’ (78), ‘The Thin Red Line’ (98), ‘The New World’ (05) and ‘The Tree of Life’ (11), has suddenly gone into colossal creative overdrive with three full feature films currently in post production, one of which, ‘Voyage of Time’, is all about cosmology, and with his expertise in photography that really should be something special.
This is not going to be for everyone (about one third of the audience left before the end, and there were audible cries of delight when it did finish) and you have to be prepared for the majority of the film focusing on natural visuals – there is almost no character to character dialogue. It is in danger of being labelled pretentious, certainly it’s debatable whether or not he crosses the line here, where probably some of the earlier parts come off worse as we are introduced to the young lovers and it feels like we’re watching a twenty minute condom commercial. However, I think Malick is a director who takes his work very seriously and very personally (‘The Tree of Life’ for example is about a young family that very much mirrors his own upbringing) and over his films you can see his style evolving, and perhaps his confidence growing to the point where now he feels he can do a poetic film and not feel constrained by mainstream notions of story and dialogue. Feeding into this he has a very curious casting taste, usually casting the most beautiful people of both sexes that he can, indeed going for looks over acting quality – Brad Pitt, Colin Farrell, Ben Affleck, all known as male heart throbs but at times perhaps a little hit or miss on the acting front. Has he chosen them to try and match the perfection of his photography? Or for the bigger box office draw for what will be termed an art house film? There is almost a sense that the director is intensely shy and wants to be as far away from us as possible, and this film does suffer from a slight feeling of alienation that never quite goes away.
In the case of Affleck here, Malick very wisely gives him almost nothing to say for the entire film, he just sort of struts around looking brutish, and is rewarded for good behaviour by being allowed to break a wing mirror. He does have I think two, possibly three voice over bits of brief poetry, but then it really does sound hopelessly pretentious, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there were a lot more left lying on the cutting room floor. His lady friend speaks in French a lot of the time, and it’s fairly plain to see from the look on Affleck’s face he has no idea what she is saying. The one time he replies in French we know very well it has been dubbed with someone else’s voice, partly from him having his back to us and omitting a small shout a second later with a different audio quality, and partly because there is no way he would be able to produce such a convincing French accent. Interestingly, one of the love scenes in the film, often the most difficult thing to do and usually completely pointless in terms of the story or visual experience for the audience, was superbly done, brief, but showcasing the bodies of the protagonists in a way they will never have any reason to be shy about.
Having said that, the camera does seem to have a constant gravitation toward the breasts of the various females who feature in the film, which begins to feel a little perverse, unless of course Malick is saying they are a part of the wonderful, beautiful landscape of nature which, you know, I wouldn’t necessarily disagree with, or perhaps he intends the viewer to almost see through the eyes of Ben Affleck’s character. Art house film can justify almost anything. There is a trend generally in modern film with the fairly ubiquitous use of shaky or hand held cam, to various degrees, to have a sneaky extra dip with the camera – even yesterday whilst rewatching Les Mis there was a noticeable perv on Samantha Barks when she’s in the rain singing against the wall.
The film’s title is mentioned as the main couple visit Mont Saint-Michel in France (also reputedly one of the inspirations behind Minis Tirith’s design in Peter Jackson’s ‘The Lord of the Rings’ trilogy). I thought at one point there was something about the film that reminded me of ‘There Will be Blood’, which has a similar feel in terms of the landscape acting as a character for the first act of the movie, and sure enough the head of the art department on that film, Jack Fisk (also husband to Sissy Spacek), reprises that role here, being a long time colleague of Malick. With ‘Blood’ the technique worked really well because it was used in collaboration with the actions, if not initially the words, of an intense character played by Daniel Day Lewis, but here the characters are too flimsy and don’t really get interesting until later on, which is ultimately why this isn’t as good as his previous work. There does remain some very beautiful imagery throughout the film that it will be a pleasure to have endure in my memory, and overall I’d say I liked it despite its overly indulgent tendencies, though it would be interesting to know where exactly the division here exists between Malick, Fisk and the cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki. Not for the first time in his career, Malick has axed footage of other famous actors from the movie entirely, amongst them Jessica Chastain and Rachel Weisz. Perhaps Affleck’s character was getting too much action. Christian Bale was originally slated for the role that Affleck plays but he pulled out and will feature in Malick’s next two films instead.
One can imagine the casting…
MALICK : Ok, Olga, love your limited work so far by the way, so we’d like to cast you so we can have you frolic around sensually showing off your body, and then have you lie down on some manky wet marshland, how does that sound, exciting yes? OLGA : Em, why? MALICK : There is no why …. Only beauty… B.AFFLECK : Hey Malick can I be your movie and then have it released around the time of the Oscars so I can say I was in an art house Terence Malick flick, and am therefore a SERIOUS GUY, and my torrid history bashopic ‘Argo’ can have better odds of winning best film? MALICK : Yes. But you may not open your mouth again for the entirety of the film. Unless it is in wonder at the beauty…. B.AFFLECK : Well can I least take my shirt off? MALICK : Let me have a look. Beautiful, yes we can work together.
Nice little film. Cancer patient Marion (Vanessa Redgrave) cajoles her moody husband Arthur (Terence Stamp) to allow her to indulge in a local singing group for retirees, taught by buoyant girl next door Elizabeth (Gemma Arterton). It starts off shakily, especially with the direction, but when the group performs outdoors and we hear the obviously pre-recorded sound of the backing choir play, suddenly Vanessa Redgrave takes the mike and performs a heart felt solo, live, and with no accompaniment. It’s a very brave move, and it lifts the tone of the whole film, with the two central performances (and good support from Arterton and Christopher Eccleston as their son) moulding what could have been humdrum into something more meaningful. Stamp has such an expressive face, he can go from growling thunder in one second to playful innocence in the next, it’s a shame that here more originality wasn’t put into the screenplay as, good performances aside, there’s nothing we haven’t seen many times before.
‘Amour’ deals with elderly couple Georges and Anne, played by Jean-Louis Trintignant and Emannuel Riva respectively, as they both deal with the anguish incurred when Anne suddenly suffers a stroke. It is the latest French language film from Austrian auteur Michael Haneke (‘The White Ribbon’, ‘Funny Games’, ‘Hidden’) and although a lot of thought has gone into each scene and line of dialogue, and the film is both thought provoking and well acted, and indeed successful at showing what the impact of a serious stroke can be, The Red Dragon found it nevertheless to be suffering from a certain design flaw. If you are familiar with Haneke’s work, then you can tell not only what will happen in the end by the first ten – fifteen minutes of the film, but also the manner in which it will develop. Through this lens it takes on the guise of an artificial construct, an example of what The Red Dragon likes to call dehumanised cinema, where the script is written to a sort of signature template, no matter how involved, and the characters have little to no, or in this case inverted and anaesthetised, positive human connection, and instead function as cogs in a large artistic wheel. In effect, we watch a play of smoke and mirrors, rather than one full of human characters.
It is a subtle distinction in this case, so much so I decided to watch it twice, and whilst I found it difficult to change my initial reaction to the piece, I certainly came to appreciate its attention to detail a lot more. The film opens with the discovery of the body of Anne, and with regards to her husband we are presented with a duality as to his character, given in uncertain but equal measure until a very clear distinction is arrived at and quickly followed by a trademark Haneke flourish. Therein, however, it is trying to be too clever for its own good, with a lot of the story and direction designed to keep us guessing rather than invest in the two octogenarians as people, and the flourish is vile in its predictability and austere anti-reason character skewering. Haneke also fits in a bit of art house indulgence in the form of a pigeon that mysteriously flies in through an open window twice, and each time proceeds to devour the food crumbs that have very obviously been put down to keep it there long enough for the shot.
Riva is up for Oscar glory thanks to her performance in this, which is merited, and she is the oldest actress to receive the honour, especially nice since the ceremony will be taking place on her birthday (she will be turning 86). It’s one of three high profile French films this year to focus on serious physical impairments, the others being ‘Rust and Bone’ and ‘Untouchable’, the latter of which is by far the most rewarding and deserving of the three. Similarly, the American film ‘The Sessions’ fits into that category, also an award contender and a bit more positive in its outlook, but with something of a forced sense of comedy. ‘Amour’ is also nominated for best film, director, and original screenplay at Sunday’s Academy Awards, and although it is a film I wanted to like more than I did, there remains a certain beauty to the performances, and a certain icy warmth in their relationship to the title.
The latest offering in the teen fantasy romance genre focuses on witches rather than vampires or werewolves, but retains many familiar elements; such as a young attractive female soon to be the centre of everyone’s attention, and pretty much bad news for everyone else in the middle of nowhere dead-end town where she is the newcomer, cue polarised clashes of good versus evil. It’s not too bad though, despite featuring nothing terribly original, and the leads played by Alice Englert (daughter of ‘The Piano’ 93 director Jane Campion) as Lena Duchannes, and Alden Ehrenreich as Ethan Wate are good enough to hold interest until the end, with Emma Thompson, Viola Davis, Jeremy Irons, and Emmy Rossum in support for extra gravitas and sex appeal.
It’s based on the 2009 book by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, and in their universe curiously the female witches, unlike their male counterparts, do not get to choose whether or not they take the path of good or evil, but rather fate (represented here by the moon) chooses for them on their sixteenth birthday. An odd, pseudo sexist, splicing of age of consent and menstrual cycle, implying teenage girls are creatures of sanguine whimsy rather than will, although the main character is at least projected as vague counterpoint to that notion.
A classic tale of undead zombie falls in love with young pretty lass, but still has to win over her father (John Malkovich) before they’ll have peace. The problem is, it’s very much a one trick pony, and once the slight amusement of the premise has passed there is nothing particularly funny or interesting left in the rest of the film. It’s mainly the fault of the director and screenwriter (the same person in this case – Jonathan Levine) and less so of the actors who do OK with what they have. The would-be Romeo and Juliet (who can’t resist aping the star-crossed lovers’ balcony scene) are played by zombie Nicholas Hoult (‘A Single Man’ 09) and not-zombie Teresa Palmer (‘I am number four’ 11), who almost looks and sounds like someone has mashed together bits of Amanda Seyfried and Kristen Stewart, an interesting combination …
The film also has an inherent problem in that the leading male character can’t speak properly. It does, though, at least have a pretty good soundtrack, but it even repeatedly succeeds in garbling that, cutting off songs like ‘Rock You Like a Hurricane’ by Scorpions before they’ve even started – if you’re going to sacrifice a decent story and script for good music AT LEAST PLAY THE SONG! If you really want to see a zombie romcom then forget this and watch ‘Shaun of the Dead’ (04) instead. SPOILER ALERT (though I’m sure you will see it coming a mile off anyway) to make matters worse, their cross-species love saves all of zombiekind who start to become more human again. Bleurggghhh.
A romcom that is as obvious and two dimensional as it is largely humourless. As usual with such fare, things like adultery are made light of in order for the story to resolve itself perfectly, as if by magic, which might be OK if it were pure comedy and, well, really funny, but not if you’re trying to semi-ground the characters in reality. A few scenes do work reasonably well, but another major flaw is that the central character, played by Rafe Spall, is too unrealistically lame for surely anyone to be attracted to, never mind his classically beautiful wife (Rose Byrne) as the film details the implosion of the newly weds expected marital bliss. Anna Faris and Simon Baker round out the main cast, with support from Minnie Driver, Olivia Colman, Jane Asher, Jason Flemyng, who cheekily references his former gig as Dr Jekyll in ‘The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen’ (03), and Stephen Merchant featuring his now overexposed sense of lewd comedy shtick. Look out for the somewhat uncomfortably amusing scene with live doves and Rose Byrne, and what looks very much like real fear on her face as they flap around her, almost as if someone were just out of shot tossing them in her direction….
A tremendous rendition of the stage musical that achieved that rarest of things in the cinema – a rapturous round of applause, a perhaps even more impressive feat given the viewing in question was a matinée. A lot of the music has been echoing with increasing vigour around the scaly skull of The Red Dragon since that viewing and, with no sign of this abating any time soon, I feel somewhat mysteriously compelled to go and invest further in the onscreen majesty of the ensemble cast.
It opens boldly, in France 1815 with the imprisoned Jean ValJean (Hugh Jackman) and his fellow members of a chain gang hauling a huge ship in to dock, all under the watchful eye of Javert (Russel Crowe). These two begin as the protagonists: one a desperate and unjustly punished man looking to begin again, the other a relentless hunter serving a law that is above questioning. They mirror divides in French society at the time, and the story fleshes out around the conflict between the two of them and, eventually, the other characters that come into their lives – leading ultimately to a youthful band of would-be revolutionaries and the fates that befall them in their struggle to uphold the ideals of liberty.
It is, of course, the film adaptation of the enormously popular and successful stage show first shown in Paris in 1980, with music from Claude-Michel Schönberg, itself based on Victor Hugo’s 1862 novel of the same name. Schonberg composed an entirely new song for the film, ‘Suddenly’, and the whole shoot was done with live performances from the cast rather than lip synching to a pre-recording, which no doubt adds to the fresh and emotional feel of the film and is extremely rare in a made for cinema musical, a decision which has been unanimously praised by the cast.
The quality of the singing is high generally, with Hugh Jackman and Anne Hathaway (who plays Fantine, a young mother out of luck, rather like all of the characters which can be somewhat inferred from the title) both garnering themselves Oscar nods for their performances. Just as she did with ‘The Dark Knight Rises’, Hathaway proves her detractors wrong by becoming one of the best things about the film, indeed the movie is now a hot contender to take the best film Oscar in February just as she is to take best supporting actress. The role sees her real hair cut off during one scene, and scenes with actresses having their hair removed are generally pretty memorable for the raw emotion they evoke (Natalie Portman in ‘V for Vendetta’ 05, as another example).
Russel Crowe might surprise a few given the overwhelmingly negative reception of his singing, as although he doesn’t have the range of some of the others, and I think at least twice in the film doesn’t reach, nor carry very well, the note he’s going for, and it is noticeable, he uses the range he does have to good effect, and it matches his character perfectly. After all, most of the cast, including Jackman, have their comically off moments, but the whole film gels together nicely, and is it really necessary to have your rugged, bloodhound lawman singing perfectly like an angelic canary? Before appearing in TV and film, he began his performing career on the stage in musicals such as ‘The Rocky Horror Picture Show’ and ‘Blood Brothers’, even fronting his own band ‘Russ Le Roq’, and here he gives a solid, commanding performance, so good on director Tom Hooper and co. for not casting someone who may have demoted Javert to the detestable, and yet popular, realms of a dilettante boy band/X factor contestant, although casting someone who had played the role successfully onstage would probably have been a better idea.
Some of the actors from the West End production, though, have happily made it into the film, one of the most impressive of whom is Samantha Barks, who plays Eponine the daughter of local crooks, and not only has a wonderful singing voice, and is drop-dead gorgeous, but appears to be able to act too. Also worthy of note is Aaron Tveit playing Enjolras, friend and comrade in arms to love interest Marius, played by Eddie Redmayne. Tveit seems to be a very natural singer, and would have been much better cast as Marius as, although Redmayne’s singing is pretty skilful, he at times looks like he’s going to explode with the effort it exacts from him, compared to the completely relaxed Tveit beside him.
This leads to the film’s biggest downfall, Redmayne himself, who was entirely the wrong person for the role athough he definitely puts his whole heart into it, and the introduction of the love story arc between Marius and Cosette. There is a large presumption on the part of the narrative, in that Marius and Cosette glimpse one another briefly on the street and instantly fall head over heels for each other, and we are expected to invest in this relationship as the light of hope in an otherwise bleak and ‘miserable’ landscape. We don’t, of course, as it’s nonsense. It needed one, or a few more scenes outwith the normal musical to make it more believable onscreen and perhaps to dramatise a little more of the politics going on; eg. Marius is brought to his lowest point, whether through despair or violence in his fight against the oppressive state, whereupon, as if heaven sent, Cosette appears to help him out, and she should physically do something not just bat her eyelashes at him, and thus, spirit rekindled and perhaps life saved, when he now fights he fights for her. Something along those lines.
The set design suffers slightly here too, as the film leads towards a fight on the streets of Paris the stage is set for a bloody climax and yet it looks just like that – a stage. From the grandeur and vision shown so far, we suddenly feel like we are in a theatre watching the stage production. Although they use the set well for what it is, I wonder if a further injection of artistic largesse would not have gone amiss, though the street set with the purpose built elephant that opens and closes the final act is perfect.
The young rebels do a very good job, especially so for young Daniel Huttlestone playing Gavroche, but when it comes to Redmaynne, well, the camera doesn’t exactly love him in this, but my goodness does it try to. I’ve seen the movie three times now, and each time I am determined to try and change my mind about his performance, and each time I get a little further in before I finally can’t take anymore. It is perhaps the occasion or inexperience showing, but he is massively not helped here by Hooper, who favours having the camera close to his cast throughout but with Redmayne he practically has the lens strapped to his face throughout several scenes. I’ve never seen anything quite like it, and unless you have a particular hankering for Redmayne flesh you may find yourself being forced to avert your eyes, especially if you are sitting near the front of the auditorium.
This could, and should, have been an absolute powerhouse of a movie. As it is, it’s still very good. Make sure you sit in the sweet spot in the cinema for the best of the sound system (especially important for this film, as is the quality of the system the cinema screen is using {it sometimes varies between screens}) and be aware it’s one of those films where everyone will have a different opinion about performances and casting choices, especially so with Tom Hooper’s style of fairly up-close and personal filming, whereby if you’re not taken with one of the cast you’re about to get a fairly severe eyeful of them for the better part of three hours. It will be a major upset if Anne Hathaway doesn’t win for best supporting actress at the Oscars – victory isn’t quite so assured for Jackman. With powerful music that will bury itself deep into your grey matter, this is, in general, a superbly stylish and heartfelt interpretation that will rekindle fond memories for fans, and deservedly make some new ones along the way.
“I’d never been on a film like this where we were doing something that had never been done before, there’s so much expectation, and a hell of a lot of fear, that really bonds people. We had nine weeks of rehearsals so by the first day of shooting we all knew each other really well, and it was the closest I’ve ever had to the feeling of the theatre, and the ensemble you get with the theatre, in a film experience. We were very together.” Hugh Jackman on shooting ‘Les Misrables’ taken from an interview with ‘Facebook Chat’
The clip below shows how some of the cast warmed up before shooting – look out for the rather unique (and cute) technique from Samantha Barks…
A romantic comedy that sees over-the-hill Scottish professional football player George Dryer (Gerard Butler) move to Virginia to spend time with his son and hopefully rekindle something with the kid’s mother, played by Jessica Biel. The film’s biggest problem is it seems entirely confused as to what it is trying to say, and ends up as both completely formulaic and hackneyed, but also spurious and unbelievable in its delivery of the wayward-man-come-good-guy and responsible father routine. Dryer takes on a role as the football coach for his son’s team, and becomes a hit with the desperate housewives and single moms that watch the game. It would have been far better to have simply made this a comedy and had Dryer remain a complete louse shagging his way through the best the town has to offer and still winning the girl in the end somehow. It would have worked well with the pretty impressive cast they have – including Uma Thurman, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Judy Greer, and Dennis Quaid. As it is, they toyed with something interesting but then played it safe and ended up with nothing of much value at all. Not as completely dire as its critical drubbing would suggest though, and it also suffered from opening in the holiday season with all the big Oscar contenders going head to head around it.
“This is me with Celtic, 2003, played against Porto in the final of the UEFA Cup. Liverpool, AC Milan, 2005. I mean, what do you think? Pretty good stuff when you put it all together, four medals as well. And then these were the boots I wore when I scored against England when I played with Scotland. Best moment of my life.” Gerard Butler/George Dryer
Surprisingly good. It doesn’t take itself too seriously and isn’t afraid to make jokes at its own expense. The Red Dragon despises X factor and the many similarly styled heads of the same monster and considers them, and crazy teenage girls, to be responsible for the continued decline in the quality of the music industry in Britain, and indeed further afield. So to enjoy this, a comedy about an all girl singing group entering competition as the unlikely contenders, was unexpected. Excellent singing quality and a good selection of music, including The Proclaimers ‘I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)’ mixed with David Guetta’s ‘Titanium’, ensures an enjoyable couple of hours of light relief.
