Review Category: Movie

MOVIE REVIEW: KURT COBAIN: MONTAGE OF HECK / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: BRETT MORGEN / SCREENPLAY: BRETT MORGEN / STARRING: KURT COBAIN, COURTNEY LOVE, KRIST NOVOSELIC / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

“Punk is musical freedom. It’s saying, doing and playing what you want.” – Kurt Cobain

In the same way that Cobain felt that punk music was freedom, here director Brett Morgen provides a punk aesthetic in order to cast aside the shackles of the Nirvana myth and everything that comes with the name Kurt Cobain. Courtney Love first approached Morgen in 2007 with the idea for the project which would eventually become Montage of Heck. It is the first documentary film about Cobain to be made with the cooperation of his family (Kurt’s daughter Frances Bean Cobain is an executive producer).

Those expecting a music documentary will be left disappointed; it isn’t a reflection on the band and while the music is featured heavily it is often simply in the background. There are no real revelations about the music, though some beautiful alternate and live versions of songs permeate the film. It is a documentary about a man and the relationships that defined him, from his parents to his girlfriends to his daughter. You could argue that the lack of exploration of his musical side is a glaring omission, though it has been featured elsewhere. There are several things missing, such as bandmate Dave Grohl not being interviewed. The ending will also likely cause frustration for many as it ends just after the MTV Unplugged performance. There is nothing about his death and the legacy that came shortly after. The way the film explores his life, it could explore his death and legacy with such intricacy. The fact it doesn’t feels like an anti-climax.

Here was an artist that hated media intrusion in his life. Yet here we are, voyeurs of his life in this documentary many years later, free to watch reel after reel of home video footage of Cobain. In the early ‘90s Cobain was defined as a figurehead of a disaffected generation for kids; people were quick to portray a message with him, to define him by whatever people were feeling because of his music. He wasn’t a person, he was a message. Newspapers and television intruded on his life daily with ruminations of his drug use and how he treated his daughter. It’s hard not to feel like we are doing the same here no matter the intentions of the documentary.

In home video footage we see Cobain play with his daughter. It makes for incredibly emotional moments (arguably the best of the film), though such intimacy and intrusion is exactly what Kurt rallied against. It’s a strange juxtaposition for the viewer. Montage of Heck seeks to explore the man, his addiction, pain, suffering, music, art and family. At this it succeeds. We see a complete person, not a guy on a TV shirt. Not a myth, but a funny, lonely, artistic, loving, messed-up human being. Montage of Heck blends journal entries, music, home videos, interviews and animations all seamlessly together for an inventive and poetic documentary. It is determined to find everything beyond the myth, legacy and culture surrounding Cobain.

It isn’t a perfect film, but Montage of Heck‘s portrayal of Kurt Cobain should be commended for its honesty. It is an intense, harrowing portrayal of a man and the struggle between honesty and art and the price of fame which often comes with it. Like Cobain himself in the interviews featured within the film, Montage of Heck is frank, honest, conflicted and certainly far from perfect. Though, you can’t take your eyes off it.

Expected Rating: 6 out of 10

Actual Rating:
 

SHORT REVIEW: A TRICKY TREAT / CERT: TBC / DIRECTOR: PATRICIA CHICA / SCREENPLAY: KAMAL JOHN ISKANDER / STARRING: ANDREA FLETCHER, KEIRA MCCARTHY, LEONARD WALDNER, STEVE BREWSTER / RELEASE DATE: MAY (DATE TBC)

Directed, produced and edited by provocateur Patricia Chica, A Tricky Treat is a deliciously ghoulish, morbid comedy that asserts her weird wit, technical prowess and slick editing. If this three-minute short is a mission statement, then the genre better watch out. Given the success of The Babadook and the brilliant Soska sisters, women in horror are having their say, and it’s long overdue.

The plot sees a man kidnapped on Halloween by an oddball family, where his fate ends up in the hands of two children. From its torture porn opening to its subsequent head carving, complete with shopping channel muzak and overacting, A Tricky Treat subverts suburbia better in three minutes that any hackneyed Tim Burton feature.

The practical effects are deliriously wonderful, harking back to a more hands on approach. Whether it’s the eye popping or tongue pulling, it proves that while everyone else was tinkering with MacBooks’, practical effects underwent a renaissance.

With the hilarious twist, it’s like something dreamt up by Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton for their Inside No. 9 series. Indeed, writer Kamal John Iskander understands the often fine line between comedy and horror, and how to blur and blend the two. Coming up to summer, it’s an odd watch, but like most horror fans who regularly dig out Carpenter’s ’78 slasher, it’s Halloween all year long.
 

MOVIE REVIEW: LOST RIVER / CERT: 15 / DIRECTOR: RYAN GOSLING / SCREENPLAY:  RYAN GOSLING / STARRING: CHRISTINA HENDRICKS, IAIN DE CAESTACKER, SOAIRSE RONAN, MATT SMITH, EVE MENDES, BEN MENDEHLSON / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

No-one likes a pretentious smart-arse. This was aptly demonstrated last May at the Cannes Film Festival when much-admired actor Ryan Gosling’s first attempt in the director’s chair, Lost River, was largely greeted with hoots of derision and catcalling as its end credits rolled. Rotten fruit and bricks may have been thrown at the screen too; we weren’t there so we can’t say for sure. Presumably chastened by the critical mauling his movie firstborn received, Gosling slunk away to lick his wounds and carry out some judicious rescue work on his savaged cinematic child. Ten months later and Lost River is back, a good ten minutes shorter and, we might hope, with some of its flaws ironed out and its narrative tightened. Not quite. Gosling should have saved himself the bother; this is pretty unsalvageable stuff. Lost River is an unholy mess.

The film’s main problem – and God knows it’s got more than its fair share – is that Gosling has allowed himself to get too wound up by the simple fact that he’s directing a movie. He’s clearly so focussed on creating something striking and artistic and visionary (and inspired by heroes such as Terence Malik and David Lynch) that he’s instead made something derivative and clumsy and concerned himself more with imagery and ideas rather than character and story. Lost River is studded with striking sequences depicting burning buildings, urban decay, an eerie submerged underwater landscape and scenes full of unpleasant people doing unspeakable things, but none of it amounts to anything because the film’s story, like the sunken town which obsesses de Caestacker’s Bones, is drowned under the weight of Gosling’s desire to impress us with his stylishness and his singular vision for the warped world he’s conjured up. But, as we might have mentioned, no-one loves a pretentious smart arse…

Yet for all its faults Lost River remains a movie it’s hard to walk away from. Filmed in and around the crustier suburbs of Detroit, it’s set in the titular town of Lost River where Billy (Hendricks), struggling to make ends meet and to keep her family together, takes a job in a sleazy burlesque nightclub where theatrical torture porn is top of the bill. Her son Bones scavenges metal and copper from crumbling buildings – much to the annoyance of the local hard guy Bully (Smith) – and whose best friend Rat (Ronan) owns a pet rat. Obviously. As Bully terrorises the neighbourhood, Bones sets off to explore one of the drowned communities in the local reservoir. In fairness, Gosling captures the stark bleakness of a rundown American community but he doesn’t seem to know what to do with it or what point he’s trying to make with it. His characters are too cold and extreme to sympathise or engage with and whilst Smith’s Bully is a nasty piece of work, much given to cutting off the lips of people who cross him and beheading small rodents, his cause as the bad boy of the piece isn’t helped by the fact that he spends much of the film wearing a sparkly gold top which last saw service on one of the Three Degrees in a mid-70s edition of Seaside Special. The increasingly-impressive de Caestacker does his best in a fairly monosyllabic lead role and only Christina Hendricks really excites our interest as the desperate, driven Billy.

It’s quite possible that Ryan Gosling will mature into a confident, assured writer/director but Lost River, for all its visual flare (which is pretty much all it’s got going for it) is a monstrous and ugly misfire which suggests that Gosling’s got a long way to go and needs to learn how to distance himself from his movie-making heroes if he really hopes to establish himself as a bold and distinctive voice in contemporary cinema. Lost River is sadly, for all the remedial work carried out on it, a real lost cause.

Expected Rating: 5 out of 10

Actual Rating:
 

MOVIE REVIEW: SECOND COMING / CERT: TBC / DIRECTOR: DEBBIE TUCKER GREEN / SCREENPLAY: DEBBIE TUCKER GREEN / STARRING: NADINE MARSHALL, IDRIS ELBA, KAI FRANCIS LEWIS, SHARLENE WHYTE / RELEASE DATE: MAY 15TH

Second Coming is the directorial debut of debbie tucker green (she spells her name in lower case and so shall we), award-winning playwright and screenwriter, and given her résumé you would probably expect a female-centric drama full of gritty realism. These elements are present, but there is something else going on that separates this film from the multitude of others claiming to show a true slice of modern British life and culture.

Jax (Marshall) is a working mother with a normal, albeit fairly routine, life. Comfortable and surrounded by friends and family, everything changes when she discovers she’s pregnant. Unable to talk to an increasingly frustrated best friend and drifting apart from her husband, Jax begins to suffer from strange visions as her mental stability slowly crumbles.

green’s film is a masterclass in subtlety, harnessing performances from her cast that convey more from what’s not said than what is, and adopting an observational, almost documentary style in her direction. Marshall exudes a quiet power as Jax, giving little away to those around her while indulging the viewer with her most intimate moments. The stress of her unplanned situation seems to etch itself on her face as the film progresses, as if the strain of her fatigue and worry is leaving some tangible clue to her predicament that is clear and yet at the same time hidden. It is a role that while empathetic never becomes pitiful, due in some part to Jax’s apparently prickly persona. As for Idris Elba, he dominates scenes with his usual charisma but manages to avoid slipping into stereotype as the “bad husband”. Instead Mark is patient, supportive and diplomatic, only exploding with pent-up emotion when pushed as far as he can go in the best scene of the film; excruciatingly drawn out minutes as Mark releases his anger while the camera observes awkwardly from the corner of the room, seemingly unsure whether it should leave or continue to watch.

This directing technique is one drawn from green’s natural home in the theatre. Everything that happens in Second Coming is played out on screen, good or bad, laid bare for the audience to see. This generates both an unavoidable intimacy with the characters but also leads to some languorous and occasionally plodding scenes that become a little cloying.

This brings us to the problem; the title. It is impossible not to draw conclusions very early on as to how the story might play out. The narrative so intricately woven and the truth so slowly revealed that it feels clumsy to name the film Second Coming. That and something in what is almost the final shot of the film feels a little forced, as if the intrigue and mystery that has surrounded Jax and her development needs to be hammered home bluntly. There is also a coldness to her character, a sense of being unapproachable that at times makes it difficult to support her.

Those criticisms aside, this is an excellent debut film from someone with a clear understanding of how to not only write great characters and dialogue, but also how to film them. This is an involving, engaging drama and green’s ability to place the audience right in the centre of it should not be underplayed. It is a rare talent reminiscent of Shame and 12 Years a Slave director Steve McQueen, and for that she is definitely one to watch.
 

MOVIE REVIEW: INSURGENT / CERT: 12A / DIRECTOR: ROBERT SCHWENTKE / SCREENPLAY: VARIOUS / STARRING: SHAILENE WOODLEY, THEO JAMES, KATE WINSLET, JAI COURTNEY, ANSEL ELGORT, MILES TELLER / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

The second of the Divergent series is here, continuing the tale of Tris Prior (Woodley, aka the Mary Jane that never was) as she battles to get by and find her true calling in a world segmented into varying “factions” and on the brink of war. Yep, this is standard Young Adult affair at its most Young Adult and with a large dollop of sci-fi obviously thrown in.

As introduced in the previous film, this “dystopian future” (as in generic cinematic lingo for any future world that has gone to shit) finds people allotted to one of five different factions. Well, apart from those who cannot be pinpointed into one particular pot and who end up ticking various boxes, with those people being known as Divergent. Of course, there’s always bad guys at play in these type of situations, with Jeanine (Winslet) leading the Erudite group in a quest for complete control of all and sundry, not to mention hunting down Tris for her gifts. As such, Tris is involved in a brewing war as she has to come to terms with who she is, what she can do, and to essentially thwart the corruption and political power plays of the day whilst forming/breaking bonds and relationships (which happens far too frequently) as she goes.

Insurgent is a strange beast in how the story is massively bland yet a lot of the performances are surprisingly good. Sure, Kate Winslet feels majorly underused in her Bond villain-lite role, but the main leads of Shailene Woodley and Theo James actually do far better than you’d think in such an action-heavy sci-fi effort. To look at, one would never pin Woodley down as somebody who can grab your attention as the focal point of an explosive actioner, yet she does, and she has to receive huge credit for being able to do so. James is decent enough as  Four, Tris’ partner in crime, and then there’s also Jai Courtney as a wonderfully menacing presence as part of Jeanine’s muscle on the hunt for Tris and Co. Miles Teller’s rogue Peter and Ansel Elgort’s Caleb (brother of Tris) are so-so at best, mind, with both characters feeling just a little clichéd.

And that’s part of the problem of Divergent; it all seems far too familiar. The basic plot points of the story have been seen a thousand times before, only maybe not quite as stylised. The look of the film is actually rather mesmerising at points, with the SFX work far better than what many may expect. Still, a glossy sheen and a strong central performance cannot make up for the cold, played out, shell of a story that the film is trying to tell.

Fans of generic YA fodder may get tight in the pants in excitement at Divergent, but for the rest of us who’ve seen these stories more times than we’d like to admit, it’s all just a tad bland, predictable and yawn-inducing. Still, the film does again mark out Shailene Woodley as a talent to keep your eye on. It’s just a shame that her performance is wasted on such a below-par effort.

Expected Rating: 6 out of 10

Actual Rating:
 
 

MOVIE REVIEW: FROM THE DARK / CERT: TBC / DIRECTOR: CONOR MCMAHON / SCREENPLAY: CONOR MCMAHON / STARRING: NIAMH ALGAR, STEPHEN CROMWELL, GED MURRAY, GERRY O’BRIEN / RELEASE DATE: TBC

Conor McMahon’s follow-up to his off-beat comedy-horror killer clown 2012 feature Stitches might well be the best British horror movie since Dominic Brunt’s peerless Before Dawn. In fact, there’s a little bit of Before Dawn’s DNA in From the Dark, as well as a liberal dose of 2013’s underrated In Fear. Each film shares a common theme – a young couple holidaying in a remote location isolated from civilization and facing a terrible and unfathomable threat…

But the mechanics of From the Dark are much more straightforward than either of its erstwhile conceptual cousins. The ‘teaser’ shows us a lone Irish farmer digging in a peat bog and uncovering something monstrous (and presumably hungry) which drags him below the muddy waters. Meanwhile Mark and his girlfriend Sarah are driving across Ireland and bickering good-naturedly when – inevitably – they find themselves lost in the middle of nowhere, their car stuck fast in the mud. With night starting to fall, Mark ungallantly leaves Sarah alone in the dark as he sets off to find a house so they can call for help. He quickly finds a ramshackle, semi-derelict farmhouse and its occupant; it’s our farmer friend but he’s not quite the man he was. Concerned by the bloody injury on the man’s neck, Mark heads back to the car and takes Sarah to the farmhouse where they’re immediately attacked by the semi-delirious farmer… and then something much worse which is lurking out in the darkness.

It’s a blindingly simple scenario; Mark and Sarah are trapped indoors and a gruesome vampire is outside trying to get in. Job done. But this is tense and gripping stuff, Sarah taking centre-stage after Mark is savagely attacked and almost catatonic from shock – or worse. Sarah has to use all her ingenuity – and any and every available light source – to keep out the stalking monster which is susceptible to bright light. From the Dark becomes a nerve-wracking game of cat-and-mouse as the creature outside circles the house and Sarah battles to find a way to keep herself and her boyfriend alive until the morning.

Massively, monstrously enjoyable, From the Dark is what it is and nothing more. Mark and Sarah are pretty thinly-sketched; their in-car banter amounts to not much more than Mark making it quite clear he doesn’t believe in getting married. Beyond this, we know nothing about the two save the fact that Mark’s quite happy to abandon his girlfriend and wander off into the dark on his own. There are other plot contrivances in a story which ultimate revolves around the creature breaking into the house only to be chased away again by Sarah brandishing a lamp, a torch or even a lit match. The creature itself is wisely kept largely in shadow; it’s a raging, inhuman Nosferatu-like monstrosity and it’s at its best glimpsed out in the darkness, prowling around the house or on one occasion when its clawed hand looms out of the night as Sarah waits by the stricken car.

Despite the simplicity of its one-note, linear storyline, From the Dark, unhindered by its doubtless tiny budget, goes for the jugular again and again and McMahon’s sparse script dispenses with any flab and just gets on with the business of pitting two unwitting kids against a terrible monster at dead of night. Familiar territory, admittedly, but it’s still edge-of-the-seat exciting, visceral and at times uncomfortably tense. Where Stitches had its tongue firmly in its cheek, From the Dark is determinedly no laughing matter and it’s all the better for its uncompromising, gritty bleakness and refreshing simplicity. It’s a little gem well worth keeping an eye out for.

Expected Rating: 6 out of 10

Actual Rating:
  

MOVIE REVIEW: THE TOWN THAT DREADED SUNDOWN / CERT: 18 / DIRECTOR: ALFONSO GOMEZ-REJON / SCREENPLAY: ROBERTO AGUIRRE-SACASA / STARRING: ADDISON TIMLIN, TRAVIS TOPE, VERONICA CARTWRIGHT, ANTHONY ANDERSON / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

The newsreel’s a-flowing, the kids’re near on kissin’ and a seri’l killer stalks the highroad. Folks of a certain age might just recall the name, The Town That Dreaded Sundown, from a flick of some years since. Based ‘round the story of a man who walked the rows in Texarkana, this picture follows the thoughts and actions of a young lady named Jami as she finds herself supplicant to a sadist’s crime while trying to find herself some peace.

So far, so hokey. Director Alfonso Gomez-Rejon’s film is of a certain taste. On the one hand, the feature follows the anguish of real crime; its lingering camera stalks silent moments like nightmare voices hiding in the victim’s woes from the otherwise sun-kissed daylight. On the other hand, the feature ups the ante with quick cuts, arcing cams and pounding beats that’d make the most determined bogeyman dizzy all the while occasional in-scene music emphasises the fundamental reasons why good men do ridiculous, damaging things. This cinematic schizophrenia gets frustrating as it often feels as though the story is interrupted for the sake of checklist-ready set pieces. On the other hand, it does provide an effective window into a world where small-town mentality means people are just dying to be noticed.

Addison Timlin, as Jami, is the film’s core (and no, no Halloween candy for noticing the name). She’s oddly cast as the ‘weird’ girl because of her naturalistic beauty, hidden here under dark tresses. That said, it’s impossible not to empathise with her confusion, and while her dialogue is sometimes a little ‘last paper of term’, the inclusion of additional effects such as Michael Goi’s intense cinematography make it largely believable. It also helps that Travis Tope’s Nick brings up the rear as a befuddled beau who is more than he seems, and their scenes together contain an interesting connection that is a slight departure from genre norm.

As the title suggests, this is a film about a time out of time. It shows a fascination with true crime narratives and tries to be sensationalist and super-clever while also being understanding. As such, it masquerades as a slasher flick when it’s actually more like a drama. It repeats some tropes and yet challenges others in a heartbeat and may come out as a slightly non-committal political point-scoring exercise that ultimately doesn’t defend some of the characters it eulogises; a pretty and well-meaning but muddled, modernised half-homage by someone who may have watched too much MTV. Indeed, some of the more caricatured performances are emphasised repeatedly by shots so knowing you’d think it’d understand when to quit rather than throwing up yet another suspense-killing straw man.

The Town That Dreaded Sundown critiques the cult of the serial killer movie and gleefully enjoys their exploits. Its impressive detail will stand a lot of rewatching, both as vision and as context. The problem is with meta, that (while it can be better) sometimes it jus’ repeats.

 

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MOVIE REVIEW: SPRING / CERT: TBC / DIRECTOR: JUSTIN BENSON, AARON MOORHEAD / SCREENPLAY: JUSTIN BENSON / STARRING: LOU TAYLOR PUCCI, NADIA HILKER, VANESSA BEDNAR, FRANCESCO CARNELUTTI, SHANE BRADY / RELEASE DATE:  APRIL 17TH

Evan (Pucci) is in turmoil. His life seems to be falling apart following the death of his mother, so he takes the advice of his friends and takes himself off to Italy. After a few boozy days with some fellow travellers, he meets a beautiful young girl, Louise (Hilker), who entrances him. Not put off by her off-the-cuff and hard-to-get manner, he decides to stick around after his drinking buddies move on. Taking a bed-and-work job on an olive farm (the wizened Carnelutti adding to the Mediterranean flavour), he begins seeing Louise, but despite seemingly getting along, remains strangely at arm’s length emotionally.

Things are not quite what they seem with Louise, as we find out she’s harbouring a secret. One which requires regular injections otherwise things get terribly ugly.

Although there’s a very real palpable sense of dread built, it would be a mistake to call Spring a horror film. The first act is mainly well-acted drama, then it moves gradually to mysterious romance, before the revelation, and then the there’s almost a presiding feel of a mythical history lesson. Under the dual direction of Moorhead and Benson (from the latter’s script), the different tones blend beautifully together. The former’s sumptuous cinematography makes the most of the glorious locations, with some stunning shots and fluid camera movements through the moody Italian street

The leads manage admirably with the dense, often complex material, and have a genuine chemistry together, which makes their emotional plight even more captivating. An appearance early on from The Battery’s Jeremy Gardner provides a light edge, but for the most part it’s a cerebral journey through a relationship that where commitment could come at too high a price.

It’s perhaps only when it comes to the somewhat suspect CGI that the film shows any flaws. Had it stuck to practical effects, it may well have got away with it. Thankfully, these digital flourishes are used sparingly and for the most part it’s icky, sticky and very gnarly.

It’s a film that requires a little patience and no preconceptions. Go in with an open mind, expecting nothing, and it will reward you with a wonderfully offbeat romantic drama, with just the right amount of elements to keep it with the ‘genre’. There’s an ethereal quality which is engrossing, rich in atmosphere and rather splendid. At times, it feels as though it could be heading into Cat People territory, but instead, the truth about Louise conjures a more intense ethical and personal dilemma. At its core, Spring is essentially about the choices we make for love. With added tentacles.

Expected Rating 6 out of 10
Actual Rating