Dankly lush! Every frame a visual masterpiece. The dread is constant, each short scene building to a nasty crescendo yet never releasing the tension. Robin Carolan’s scratchy impatient score does tremendous work matching the relentless pace of the first hour. It is also surprisingly erotic with Lily-Rose Depp nailing her possessions and near pornographic convulsions. Sideburned cuck to hell, Nicholas Hoult is having a great year. Lacking the kitchen sink camp of Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula and the stage bound creak of Bela Lugosi’s oldest version I’m going to bet the house and say this is not just the best take on Nosferatu but also the finest big screen Bram Stoker adaptation. Eggers previous endeavours have always felt a little overly composed… precious show-off projects… This is a living breathing, fully entertaining classic horror flick in its own right. His first movie where the storytelling and perverse emotion tower over the artistic intent. A fascinating talent comes of age.
Justin Kurzel directs Jude Law, Nicholas Hoult and Tye Sheridan in this crime thriller based on the true story of a FBI agent chasing a white supremacist gang that plans to overthrow the U.S. government.
Very much the same Eighties true story as Joe Eszterhas exploited back in the day as Betrayed. Only here the vibe is more aiming for a pared down Heat or Point Break than a Neo-Nazi Jagged Edge. Kurzel tries to avoid too much hand wringing judgment over the far-right splinter group. There is no cartoon villainy here. They are evil but undemonised and in a way that makes their existence even more terrifying. The matter of fact brutality holds the flick in good stead whether you consume it as a testosterone fulled drama or a high minded B-Movie thriller. Was the unpopulated emptiness of the streets where the action thunders about in a choice or a budgetary necessity? I had no idea The Order even existed until a week before it’s limited cinema release and it ended up being one of my multiplex going highlights of 2024. Haunting and pulse raising in equal measure.
Jon M. Chu directs Cynthia Erivo, Ariana Grande and Jeff Goldblum in this musical fantasy prequel where the future Wicked Witch Of The West and Glinda The Good become university roommates in the land of Oz.
Ariana Grande’s delightfully off key performance made this for me. Camp, self absorbed and knowingly unaware she really injects fun into every scene she’s in. What if Jim Carrey played an all singing, all dancing, all pink wearing Mean Girl? Impressive production design and a fealty to cinematic Ozs of past eras meant Wicked really hit the spot.
Luca Guadagnino directs Daniel Craig, Drew Starkey and Jason Schwartzman in this period romantic drama based on William S. Burroughs novel set in South America.
You couldn’t imagine a Roger Moore flick with this much simulated semen. Hmmm… Craig stretches his acting muscles here. The sex scenes are strong with the former Bond grabbing crack and nuzzling schlong. There are ebbs at surrealism. I liked the miniature FX work. We all lust for youth, infatuated with what we have lost to time. There is beauty and ugliness in obsession. As an entertainment it is quite boring and one note. Lingering far too long on its points and beats, making them almost redundant. Frustrating, eventually exhausting.
Peter Bogdanovich directs Barbra Streisand, Ryan O’Neal and Madeline Kahn in this screwball comedy where four guests in a San Francisco hotel have the same identical plaid travelling bag and chaos ensues as they get mixed-up, stolen then chased.
I’m not a big fan of either lead but Madeline Kahn is superb as the nag. Just stay with her O’Neal… she’s worth the henpecking. This is often framed as some daring revival of a long lost genre but it is hard to ignore It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World happened less than a decade previously!? This has more sparkle, that had more gags. Both feel corny now.
There’s nothing new that can be written about the shockingly abrasive prequel episodes that almost derailed Star Wars for the generation that grew up with it. I’m not going to lay too heavily into child performances, or icky wooden romances, or even Jar-Jar Binks. Jar-Jar isn’t my cup of tea but he belongs in a family movie. Maybe not a family movie about trade embargoes, taxation, fascism and forbidden lust for teens. The Padme / Anakin crush is now far more awkward and disturbing than a slightly racist CGI comedy sidekick. Maybe the future Sith Lord is using his underage powers to influence the twenty-something regal honey. Maybe Jar-Jar is also a Sith. Now there’s a kickback online fan theory that actually makes his weird presence quite engaging in retrospect.
The epic pod race is exciting. Iconic new villain Darth Maul got a good duel and a memorable “death”. John William’s Duel Of The Fates orchestral music is premium. All the Jedis turning up to fight droids in the gladiator arena has its moments. Neeson is well cast in the first one, McGregor comes into his own in Clones. Gifted with his own little detective quest that allows him room to breathe. I always want to rehabilitate these idiosyncratic entries but I confess I am clutching at Star Straws. Stay off those Death Sticks kids if you think Batman V Superman or Prometheus are anywhere near as iffy. It is hard to love two things this continually disappointing and wholly inexplicable.
When compared to what came before these two are almost irredeemable. The unreliable green screen FX works is leant into too foolishly. Every moment of excitement is hobbled by glaring fakery. A CGI stunt person who contorts like a polygon marionette. A constant pixel ugliness. Someone needed to be hired who could say “No” to George Lucas. “No” to using tech that wasn’t up to task. “No” to his screenwriting choices. “No” to his dreck dialogue. “No” to his humour. “No” to the yippees inserted in in post. If that producer existed we would have tighter, more action orientated movies, ones where the limitations might have created beauty and elegance. Instead we have four and half hours where you really have to sift through muck to find entertainment, to find that old magic. Garish enigmas yet still Star Wars.
Steve Cohen directs Rose McGowan, Alex McArthur and Peg Shirley in this erotic thriller where a bad seed teen lands in a new town ready to seduce a teacher, battle her evangelical grandmother and kill anyone else in her way.
The Crush or Poison Ivy but done real cheap and on random settings. Rose McGowan overcomes a very bland obsession interest (he really isn’t worth it) and the fact the producers literally create a character just to inject some occasional nudity into the proceedings. No nudity necessary as McGowan’s tight revealing fits and unhinged behaviour are spicy enough. Terrible film almost saved by its star = The Rose McGowan Story.
4
Perfect Double Bill: Lewis and Clark and George (1997)
Ang Lee directs Tobey Maguire, Jeffrey Wright and Jewel in this epic drama following the farm boys who join the South in the American Civil War but begin to question the values they are fighting for.
Ang Lee’s forgotten good ‘un. Doesn’t sit comfortably with either his indisputable masterpieces or his admirable follies. When it rages and roars with big on-location battles it is very magnetic. The skirmishes are brutish and tactile. The character arcs that scaffold the adventure though are quite brittle. These aren’t the brightest bulbs in the box and their change of heart over the years is not as interesting as anyone who made this clearly thought they should be. There’s a lot of potent talent here so it is somewhat ironic that the two most memorable performances are from the weakest links. Cute, helium voiced pop star Jewel never truly made another proper movie. And Jonathan Rhys Meyer’s baddie, with his unwavering evil and long sleek hair, comes straight from the school of Japanese manga villainy. Everyone else feels a little dampened by the mud and sideburns. Flawed but worth an afternoon.
A spot-on proper acting turn from Jim Carrey preserves this. He treads the line between sincerity and fakeness, naivety and irritating wonderfully. His commitment to “the bit” is a heartfelt tribute to Kaufman himself. Being massively into live comedy personally, there’s a seductive appeal in seeing the birth of the modern comedy boom from the perspective of someone inarguably at its experimental vanguard. This is legend being regurgitated as fact. Appropriately so. I have Bob Zmuda’s biography of his friend and partner in crime AND I’m hyped for Jason Reitman’s Saturday Night. I couldn’t be more part of the target audience for Man On The Moon. Forman’s movie does have an inbuilt problem though. Kaufman nose dived his career by doing repetitive abrasive stunts that soured audiences to him, the man and the prankster were inseparable. Which means after an hour of him gleefully finding a spotlight, you see him push the same self destructive buttons over and over, again and again. And this isn’t presented as tragedy. Framing his final years with this bent makes for an exasperating second half.
Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary 