Francesco Rosi directs Frank Wolff, Salvo Randone and Pietro Cammarata in this Italian true crime movie where a bandit becomes a resistance leader, his death creating a court case where the Mafia, the government and the military find themselves judged.
A biopic where we never properly see the subject once. And therefore understand his historical impact on Sicily even more.
6
Perfect Double Bill: Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979)
Lo Wei and Wu Chia Hsiang direct Bruce Lee, Maria Ye and James Tien in this martial arts movie where an immigrant worker at an ice factory in Thailand tries to keep his vow not to fight despite plenty of bullying and crime.
Teases us for the first half with Bruce resisting the urge to get his top off and kick ass. When he finally cracks it is a lot of fun, though pretty tame by Jackie or Jet Li standards. This feels more competently made than its cult reputation requires and it always seems to get me in the right mood, in spite of its meat and potatoes ambitions.
David Blue Garcia directs Elsie Fisher, Sarah Yarkin and Moe Dunford in the legacy sequel to the gory horror classic where a group of annoying influencers buy up the town Leatherface has been hiding out in.
You’d think there be some entertainment value in seeing such a repugnant bunch of youths chopped to bits but the scares don’t land and the cast is a bit too soft and pleasing to deserve their characters’ fates. Not that I’d want to watch a movie where any more of this lot survive. It just all feels out of sync, whenever the visuals are good the pace drops, whenever the kills get giddy, you question the set-up. Pass.
Obviously I prefer the 1987 original, which despite being PG is still virulent with Waters and Divine’s inherent immaculate bad taste. This is slickly done with a popping cast. Bravely, and somewhat surprisingly, it never betrays the progenitors’ more abrasive, transgressive nature even if it is always aiming the be more mass market in its big budget, A-Lister take. The drag, segregation and fat shaming have all survived the studio process. Man prefer Ricki Lake… but that’s the only real criticism you can level at this sly, playful update. Pleasantly plump. “I wish every day were Negro Day!”
Andreas Fontana directs Fabrizio Rongione, Stéphanie Cléau and Carmen Iriondo in this mystery drama where a Swiss banker travels to 1980s Argentina after his shady partner disappears, hoping to keep their corrupt clients on board.
Very dry. Very talky. Not without its merits. A constant sinister air of unease permeates each meeting. The absent partner Keyes becomes a Harry Lime style figure – an enigma but also representative of just how corrupting and furtive this regime is. Certainly no crowd pleaser, this is the Heart Of Darkness over business brunches and portfolio renegotiations… but I’m now curious as to what Fontana does next. There’s patience and control here that is tantalising.
Eric Blakeney directs Liam Neeson, Oliver Platt and Sandra Bullock in this crime comedy where an undercover Fed begins group therapy, a relationship with his cute colon cleaner and a friendship with a mafia psycho.
Can definitely see why this got greenlit at the peak of Analyse This / Mickey Blue Eyes fever. Yet it is simultaneously criminally ornate and under baked. The opening sequence is important to many of the later relationships and gags, yet it is very choppily edited. We rush through a violent fantasia with names like Taylor Negron appearing for just one distracting shot. You assume we’ll get the full picture at the second act turning point… a flashback that fills in the elusive blanks… Nah. It is never revisited. This cavalier, distracted manner of storytelling is endemic throughout. You’ll struggle to care, never laugh. Not enough Sandy Bullock – she’s in her perky wheelhouse but its a small role that should have went to newcomer rather than an A-Lister. A cameo would have made sense, but tenth billed?? Maybe she owed somebody a few days’ work?
Michael Mann directs William Petersen, Tom Noonan and Joan Allen in this definitive serial killer thriller where a sensitive FBI profiler tracks a human monster called The Tooth Fairy.
Flawless.
You think I’m gonna see him standing in the street and say “there he is”? That’s Houdini you’re thinking of.
We tried sodium amytal on him three years ago to find where he buried a Princeton student; he gave ’em a recipe for potato chip dip.
You owe me awe!
It’s just you and me now, sport.
Because everything with you is seeing, isn’t it? Your primary sensory intake that makes your dream live is seeing… Reflections… Mirrors… Images…
Baz Luhrmann directs Austin Butler, Tom Hanks and Olivia DeJonge in this rock’n’roll biopic following The King and his symbiotic relationship with oily Svengali, Colonel Tom Parker.
Over the top, grating, messy, disorientating, cheesy. And I loved it far more often than I hated it. The first 90 minutes really thumped along to its own crazy beat, the second half does hunker down and try to be an ounce more traditional. But this is a rare biopic with a well formed “villain of this here piece”, which grants us more tangible shape than most musicians’ life stories – where the crisis are more existential. The metric it works towards is Forman’s Amadeus and it is an apt lift. And even though the unashamed blockbuster is a heartfelt celebration of Presley, it never feels like the “authorised version.” There’s no Bohemian Rhapsody style hamstringing, axe grinding and concessions to the surviving band members’ take on history don’t stink the room out. This just wants to lionise with flair and rhinestone sparkle The King in its own frenetic, fucked up way. Elvis is inarguably pure Luhrmann, his finest since William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet. Special shout out should go to Catherine Martin’s glorious recreations of all the fashions and costumes. And it is a folly, but one that always grips, keeps you hooked, tapping your toe, struggling to focus. Butler is grand casting, the spit, a star is born. Hanks is doing his own thing, the only work similar in his back catalogue is his deep fried turn in the Coen Brothers’ The Ladykillers. If you like what he does here then more power to you, I’m not sure I can condone it, but at least his scratching, clawing take makes for a hissable antagonist. In a movie full of big mad swings, his interpretation on Colonel Parker is the wildest. The whole thing is as bonkers as hippos on a bouncy castle, neon fried gold. This energy makes Elvis easily the most watchable rock icon biopic since Walk The Line. In an era when even the best big releases feel like product, here is some art, a personal vision. Sure, that personal vision is gaudy and eccentric, the art is more likely to appear in a tat shop than the Tate, but it is bloody nice to witness a multiplex crowd enjoy something so naff and idiosyncratic.
Ninja Thyberg directs Sofia Kappel, Zelda Morrison and Evelyn Claire in this character study where a Swedish teen moves to LA hoping to make it big in the porn industry.
A well researched but often flat and dour look at the current adult entertainment market. Much rings true but the film feels like a Rorschach Test that the viewer brings their own politics and views to and finds whatever they like or disagree with laid out like a buffet for them to pick from. If you go in thinking porn is ultimately an abuse on the naive sex workers who sign up to be in it, then you’ll see plenty of soulless, callous exploitation. And if you are sex positive and think what a women chooses to do with her body is her own business then you’ll also enjoy plenty of… exploitation. The film tries to play to both markets, and everyone curious in between. You’d have to be pretty gauche in your understanding of the long existent billion dollar industry to not know most of the grim realities already – the coercion, the pain, the prejudices. There is nudity but it becomes background noise after the first set piece, there’s very little titillation for a plot with so many sex acts hardwired into it. The film is less interested in jiggling flesh, more in choices that might be seen as a moral fall or gynaecological compromise. It doesn’t help that game, first time actress, Sofia Kappel as Bella Cherry, is often such a blank slate (again specifically enigmatic so the viewer can pour their own juice into her empty cup). It is hard to see her much more than avatar for us to run over the rights and wrongs, positives and negatives, of each job she finds herself on. Sometimes even she is the manipulator and exploiter. Yet you don’t massively invest in her faltering march to stardom. You fear in five years time the non-professional actress might come out and say she felt pressured into taking on such an explicit and challenging role, uncomfortable with what ended up on screen, abandoned by how underwritten it was beyond the physical demands. Should Ninja Thyberg have found an established talent from the mainstream or porn industry to take on the lead? The rest of the ensemble are plucked from this world like the cast a neo-realist drama? These are thoughts, not accusations. It is a striking and promising debut, just a little obvious in its intentions and methods. It can be ugly to experience and watch. There are even times when the filmmaking transcends its purposeful digital flatness, has moments of almost Lynchian metaphor, like when Bella’s head leaves a set and gets smothered in the blue sky outside of the bedroom where the action is taking place. But there, pointedly, ain’t a lot of Pleasure here and the best porn is when the performers at least look like they are enjoying themselves.
Jean Vigo directs Jean Dasté, Dita Parlo and Michel Simon in this classic French romance where newlyweds on a boat begin to question their life choices as reality settles in.
Has some beautiful moments. Mainly involving the barge full of stray cats and Simon, as the seasoned tough who coddles them.
Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary 