Alex Ross Perry directs Jason Schwartzman, Elisabeth Moss and Jonathan Pryce in this indie comedy where an arrogant author starts a friendship with a prickly old writing legend that might foretell of his own impending loneliness and frustrations.
There are some neat observations here. The graphic design of a lifetime of novel covers feels spot on, the voice over narration from Eric Bogosian is a nice affectation and the always welcome Elisabeth Moss gets a lengthy interlude to herself as the ex rebuilding her life. But in the main this never really completes it first lap, feeling like sub Noah Baumbach musings rather than anything worth your time.
Jonathan Kaplan directs Madeleine Stowe, Drew Barrymore and Andie MacDowell in this western were four women go on the run and become embroiled with a gang of bandits.
Set up by a still very young Drew Barrymore to be a big budget feminist western. Three weeks into production and director Tamara Davis was fired, her footage scrapped, while a new screenplay was fashioned from the wreckage the ladies learnt to ride and shoot for a month and the black Bad Girl was cut out of the project. Bad Girls was never a release that was likely to shower itself in glory – working as neither a revisionist western nor as a gunslinging women’s picture. As an entertainment it fails. The story starts too quickly and struggles to settle, then it finally descends into a swirl of contrivances where each character gets caught and needs rescuing so that another can then be held captive until the credits come and there’s nobody left to have their turn tied up. The film is edited incredibly poorly. It often feels like the most important plot point of each sequence is missing from the mix or under emphasised. There is the occasional trace level hint at the lesbian longing between leads or at least bisexuality of certain characters but this is trampled on and ignored once a glut of men arrive. You’d say at least it was glossy but the narrative is so erratic and repetitive that it isn’t a particularly gentle watch. Madeleine Stowe is a proper movie star so she holds the centre of this with a steely efficiency. Drew Barrymore sparkles in a spiky sexpot role – enjoying wearing lacy scanties, leather waistcoats and a dusty derby with zero regrets. The other characters don’t really get enough meaningful screentime to solidify. Who knows if Tamara Davis’ original vision was any better? Strange that the actresses didn’t go to cowboy boot camp before the original start date? Kaplan isn’t in his element here but at least tries to reference The Wild Bunch when he can. Like that classic, we start with a temperance league and end with a Gatling gun. I suspect when moany middle aged men hear the words ‘female reboot’ and knee jerk kick off on the message boards this is the teenage disappointment they dread re-experiencing. Which is a nonsense, of course… but you can’t help but mourn just how hard this falls flat on its face…
George Armitage directs John Cusack, Minnie Driver and Dan Aykroyd in this romantic crime comedy where a hitman goes back to his high school reunion.
A personal favourite. A perfect star vehicle for the boyish but anxious Cusack even though all of the quality ensemble cuts deep into the credits. You fall in love with pretty much everyone in it, even one scene turns; from Barbara Harris’ institutionalised Mom to the monosyllabic kickboxing rival killer. None can compete though with Joan Cusack’s acerbic PA. You can tell the writers had a lot of fun digging out their Elmore Leonards and Ross MacDonalds. Mashing these up with Cusack’s early teen output. Vividly imagined about what these types would be like if they had to go back to their childhood hometown, gun in their waistband, price on their head. The soundtrack is littered with alternate 80s bangers, firing nostalgic wistful energy into every interaction. The violence comes in unpredictable collisions, pointedly full on. The romance rekindles the sweetness of the best John Hughes teen movies, the characters are just a decade more guarded and damaged. It is a movie that packs a breathless amount of entertainment into itself then somehow ups the tempo amazingly once we actually hit that reunion. That sequence is a whirlwind of succinct, perfectly composed cinema. Everyone involved should take a well deserved bow!
Zack Snyder directs Gal Gadot, Ben Affleck and Ray Fisher in this superhero epic where Batman and Wonder Woman try to assemble a team to face cosmic threats now that Superman is dead.
A vast improvement on the clearly bastardised version that was released in 2017. Having said that… a little boring at times and overly indulgent. The sincerity, bombast, length and excessive CGI will turn many off. Zack, you clearly love the comics as much as the fans but let’s not Slo Mo every siiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnngggggllllllleeeeeee action scene, hey? They don’t all have to be double page splashes brought to life. I’m also not entirely sure some of Whedon’s additions to The Flash should have been completely redacted. He now seems to get less meaningful screentime than boring old Cyborg. No amount of re-edits are going to make Ray Fisher charismatic, sadly. Still, it feels a far more organic, definitive adventure and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman shines in the centre. As for the pointless “what if” cliffhangers it offers up as an epilogue… I have zero doubt I’ll be reviewing one of these unfilmable, abandoned threads before I die. A decent afternoon killer and a spiritual win for those of us who love movies rather than love being sarcastic and hating on everything that isn’t baby food. We covered the original incarnation on our podcast if you are interested?
Damiano and Fabio D’Innocenzo direct Tommaso Di Cola, Giulia Melillo and Ileana D’Ambra in this Italian satirical drama about terrible parents and bored children living just outside Rome.
Mucho suburban nihilism but very little to hold the attention.
John Huston directs Katharine Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart and Robert Morley in this romance adventure where a missionary and a steamboat captain sail the Congo during the start of WWI.
Sometimes all you want from a movie is a bit of spectacle and a lot of flirtatious heat. Hepburn & Bogart aren’t the most obvious pairing of A-Listers but maybe that’s why this works so well. It set the mould for films as diverse and as pleasing as Two Mules For Sister Sara, Romancing the Stone and Jurassic World. The location work is magical and Bogart seems to enjoy not being the intense tough guy for once. Nice to see him play a good natured goof.
Neil Jordan directs Bob Hoskins, Cathy Tyson and Michael Caine in this British neo-noir where a just out of prison criminal becomes a driver for a high class prostitute with a hidden agenda.
Much like sleazy Eighties New York, this seedy and blatant variation of Soho and Kings Cross doesn’t really exist anymore. Brewer Street has been gentrified over the 21st century and the back of the mainline station has been completely redeveloped. You can only see echoes of the vice and destitution, the clip joints and pick up areas when you wander these streets now. The slightly camp, always sinister thriller Jordan sets in this lost milieu is full of sexual violence, great acting and meta commentary. Hoskins stands out as the garishly ridiculous pawn in a game too big for him to understand. The excellent Tyson has never found quite such a worthy role. The movie is like a nightmare, one that often at least tries to pretend to pass for neon fantasy. Every thread of this pulls at you – sometimes it is so grim it turns your stomach, other times so cheekily flamboyant you marvel at its audacity. Awesome.
Mario Bava directs Eva Bartok, Ariana Gorini and Cameron Mitchell in this Italian giallo where a faceless killer is picking off a fashion house’s models one by one.
Early giallo and proto slasher. Bursting with vivid colour and buxom beauties. It never actually settles on a protagonist so it can be a little hard to care about the mystery. It essentially is a series of lurid set pieces. But there’s that playfulness with form that makes Bava’s movies unique. The credit sequence where the players are introduced in bright, ominous tableaux starts the film on a high that the murder and mayhem never truly matches.
Peter Weir directs Harrison Ford, Kelly McGillis and Lukas Haas in this thriller where a cop must protect an Amish boy who has witnessed a murder.
Barn building. Peach jarring. Illicitly dancing to Sam Cooke. Doorway glimpses. It is fair to say in the middle hour of Witness, very little action occurs. Peter Weir is a director who immerses us in a new world or worldview, one that is often hypercritical of modern society by comparison. Here he plays the trick twice. First we experience the beauty and chaos, the overwhelming scale and danger of the city through the eyes of a pure child. Then when we think we will enjoy a fish out of water mode as Ford’s tough cop John Book must pretend to be Amish, he does something even riskier. Weir lets Book appreciate a life without technology or violence or crime. The film does begin and end with thrilling scenes of murder but in its calm centre, we are brought back to a state of innocence. If an action hero as dynamic as Han Solo or Indiana Jones can be seduced by the serenity of Amish life, why shouldn’t we? John Seale’s uncluttered vision and Maurice Jarre’s trembling synth score nurse us backwards in time. Though it is surprising how often the central mystery hook is reprioritised, the romance and drama that takes its place is handsome and enthralling. “You be careful out among them English!”
François Truffaut directs Jean-Pierre Léaud, Claude Jade and Marie-France Pisiern in this final chapter in the life of Antoine Doinel.
After being the first couple to finalise a modern divorce, Antoine & Christine go their separate ways but an old flame meets the young at heart fool by chance the very same day. Almost a third of this is recycled footage from previous films. Nostalgia abounds. While there’s something comforting about revisiting the past (and Truffaut re-examines Doinel’s relationships with his women in a way that feels self aware and some what progressive) it doesn’t really feel like the final chapter. More an interlude before further adventures and much needed growing that never came.
Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary 