Ang Lee directs Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal and Michelle Williams in this decade spanning love story between two cowboys.

Rodrigo Prieto’s beautiful capturing of the American west; creeks, trailers, warm looking work coats. Gustavo Santaolalla’s mesmerising score whispering in your ear. Heath Ledger’s maturing before our eyes into one of the finest actors of the 21st century with his pent up, mumbling economically, manly turn as Ennis Del Mar. Ang Lee blends these fine contributors’ work, along with many other eye-catching bits of acting, to create one of most grown up and affecting romance films ever made. A true unflinching great of this genre. Still affecting 11 years on.

10

 

 

Stephen Hopkins directs Danny Glover, Gary Busey and Bill Paxton in this urban sequel to alien hunter in the jungle classic.

A poster in my bedroom throughout the early 90s, Predator 2 is often mistakenly sneered down on as a watered down cash-in for the standalone Arnie favourite. Sure, it misses the muscular adventure of its progenitor (but satisfies kinetically), the humour seems more forced (the kind of sledgehammer jokes Emmerich and Bay made their own that decade rear their stillborn heads prematurely here) and Danny Glover (he’s perfectly fine) lacks Schwarzeneger’s star mega wattage… But it all works. The action is aggressively full on, the nudity and gore brush provocatively right against the limits of a mainstream studio R rated sensibilities. Proper grind on that barrier. Entertainingly right on the nasty edge. Compelling OTT performances from B movie greats like Bill Paxton, Robert Davi, Calvin Lockhart and, especially, Gary Busey make it buzz with energy. You feel the heat and sweat and chaos of the urban near future imagined. So it is not as tight nor as magical as its beloved starting point. This is still just about as good as a genre sequel gets and that ending is a mind blowing extension of the franchise’s mythology and still untapped potential.

9

 

 

Jaume Collet-Serra dircects Blake Lively, Oscar Jaenada and a seagull in this surfer versus shark survival actioner.

Whenever this is a pure hottie versus shark potboiler (see also hottie versus coral, hottie versus jellyfish) The Shallows rocks – simple pleasures bombastically delivered. Collet-Sera isn’t a subtle director and this is all the better for it. The establishing  chilling with the locals, surfing footage, and obligatory “get em out of the way early doors” bikini shots are handled with zim, while the threat out in the water is teased away at. Problem is the multi strand empowerment story bolted on… leaving Lively chatting with a seagull about her dead mum, her abandoned career choice as a doctor and whether she should spend more time with her family a little too often – cringe. It hobbles the non-shark attack and non-swim for your life sequences down to a halt. This should be B movie heaven but whenever it stretches for self importance it thrashes wildly out of it’s depth. Shame as in the set piece stakes The Shallows genuinely is the most proficient shark flick since Jaws.

6

 

Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman direct Emma Roberts, Dave Franco and Emily Meade in this teen thriller about an online dare game that turns nasty.

Now this I really liked. An unusually engrossing mixture of The Game and Adventures in Babysitting, Nerve has so much going for it. The aesthetic owes a lot to Danny Boyle; all neon colours, shimmer and inventive angles and POV. The set pieces escalate nicely too; here’s an experience that captures the varying rushes of kissing a stranger, shoplifting and riding blindfolded through midtown traffic by keeping the characters involved equal parts believable, motivated and appealing. Emma Roberts and Emily Meade both stand out with charismatic turns, though like everyone here (much of the cast play adults in Orange is the New Black) they now possibly are all a little too old and established to be playing high school seniors. Only the dismount lets itself down; too neat and too preachy. The conclusion it reaches might work as a powerful point in a YA novel but visualised onscreen it lands flat. The Famous Five hackers, passive mom and baying mob’s eventual reaction all ring false in a way that really grates against the intense fun we had in acts 1 and 2. Still as Bubblegum Thrillers go (Nerve may be the first) there a hella lotta great in the 80 minutes before to outweigh that stumbling exit on the quality scales.

7

 

Jake Szymanski directs Zac Efron, Adam Devine and Anna Kendrick in this bright and breezy update on Wedding Crashers.

5 minutes before I had low expectation, 50 minutes in I had been completely won over, then an hour later this throwaway chuckler had really, really, really outstayed its welcome. Efron and Devine have great comic chemistry together and they are constantly foot on the gas, hitting jokes whether the script has gifted them or not. The girls lack the same energy with only little sister bride Sugar Lyn Beard staying in the memory a fortnight down the line. The problem is everyone (EVVVVEEERRRYYYYYYOOONNNEEE!) is given an arc of self realisation then failed redemption then actual redemption. Like half a dozen characters worth of this shit. The jokes dry up, the goodwill shrivels… then two musical numbers and an outtakes reel!? A surprisingly fun night out seems to have moved in and is squatting in your living room. Just end. Shame as the foundation was colourful and strong.

6

John Carpenter directs Austin Stoker, Darwin Joston and Laurie Zimmer in this classic thriller about a police station under siege.

John Carpenter recently sued Luc Besson saying the French filmmaker’s Lockout was too close a rip off of his own Escape From New York… And was awarded a million bucks by the courts. I’m not saying he was wrong to point out the homage. You just have to wonder what Howard Hawks and George Romero made of this utterly winning but not all that original blend of Rio Bravo and Night of the Living Dead? This is a pared down sprint of claustrophobia, cool interactions and hardcore (for ’76)  violence. The killer gangs that lay siege are the fine line between those zombie hordes and later B movie classic The Warriors (an excellent double bill pair up with this). In the station there are great performances from actors who never broke out. Stoker is human and dignified as the different kinda sherrif in charge, Joston an absolute hoot as the smart and deadly sociopath more heroic than anyone ever gave him credit for and Laurie Zimmer as the secretary with more pluck and cold calm than anyone just absolutely tears up the screen. In an alternative universe this would be all of their first leap into continued beloved stardom. Carpenter proves his raw ability to say a thousand things in a silence and energise you with a single but aggressive shot. This is simple but overwhelming action movie mastery before the genre even took solid shape. And then we have that unrelentingly iconic synth score – ratcheting up the menace, making even the mundane seem epic. Pure brilliance.

10

Jack Kinney, Clyde Geronimi and James Algar direct Basil Rathbone, Bing Crosby and Eric Blore in this animated package presentation of The Wind in the Willows and Sleepy Hollow from Walt Disney.

A fun little double with surprisingly modern animation, a 1940s hip yet faithful adaptation of the sources and captivating central characters in manic Toad and gangly Ichabod. The scarier chases in both tales are truly impressive but on the whole this is a lot of easy, relaxed fun.

7

David Ayer directs Margot Robbie, Will Smith and Jared Leto in this DC villains on a mission, anti hero action flick.

Mixed emotions. If you thought the underrated Batman Vs Superman was flawed / an interesting mess / just plain awful then back away from the ticket counter now –  this actually is all those slurs, and often. But not a total SNAFU… as while it fails fundamentally in terms of plot, humour and set pieces (fucking hell!), Suicide Squad has a strange energy and some mesmerising star turns that keep you glued to the screen. So the good first; and it’s the great, really. Robbie’s Harley Quinn just walks away with the movie, raises it under a new name and mind washes it to kill its own parents. Sexy, devious, naive and stroppy. She just rocks, turning bad lines into laugh raisers and repetitive action into a slapstick ballet. The movie flags whenever she is off screen. Smith is daftly street as Deadshot too, pleasingly so. Although he could have worn the mask a little more, even Stallone wore Dredd’s helmet for more scenes than this. Mr Jiggy With It hasn’t had this much on brand fun, Fresh Prince with an assault rifle persuasiveness since Bad Boys 2. In fact all the cast do better than expected; Jai Courtney’s Captain Boomerang, Viola Davis’ Waller and Cara Delevigne all have effective moments commensurate to their varying acting talents. Leto’s Joker is fine in performance but the 00’s gangsta rap LP cover makeover is a shortsighted and unnecessary update. He works best as a romantic interest for Harley Quinn than a villian in his own right. But that worthwhile stuff is surrounded, almost overwhelmed,  by a desperately muddled and uncertain movie. Scenes of the exact same plot content are repeated in succession due to reshoots, the soundtrack achingly obvious and noticeably there to cover up gaping chasms in tone after butchering edits and re-edits, the action is unengaging and unshifting in stakes. Intangible threats; a score of blackberry headed mutants we’ve survived once already are defeated in an office and through the next door we get exactly the same amount of blackberry headed mutants, the CGI mega freak can crash scores of helicopters from the air with whiplash accuracy yet merely  knocks anyone whose name is on the poster down to their butts in close quarter combat. You get the feeling the core idea has been lost after constantly trying to tinker with everything. There are easy wrinkles I’d personally have introduced that could have saved the whole schizophrenic endeavour but it feels like a project where too many cooks are already involved. Here’s what I would change. Have very few of Suicide Squad survive the mission. If Harley and Deadshot solely emerged from the dust then you’d feel like the mission truly was a challenge rather than an excuse to give the team something to team about. Sure OneScene and Never Heard Of Him Man didn’t make the finish line but wouldn’t Suicide Squad be a more powerful franchise if everyone but the tentpoles were palpably expendable… Like… Ahem… key inspiration The Dirty Doxen. Likewise actually write an end of game boss that requires them to use their varying powers in unison to defuse the threat – that’s a basic requirement, no? And even more likewise… let them be villains, not mere reluctant, naughty heroes. The drone mutant soldiers that swarm on them in street after street used to be decent humans – maybe a scene where the regular troops sent in with our goodie-baddies can’t open fire on citizens no matter how warped… “Lucky for us, we have these psychopaths who have no such qualms and who’d relish the chance.” I’m basically suggesting go darker and embrace the power the premise naturally gives you to do that. As a DC fan I’m saddened we have a film that actually deserves the scorn it was bound to get anyway… I’m frustrated we’ve been fobbed off with a Joker who at best makes a nice Bill Pullman for a scorching Harley Quinn – the most potent villian in literature should never be second banana… Worst yet a cameoing Batman who hides behind an 11 year old girl from a gun… In an alley. Just wouldn’t happen, who signed off on that… There is no hand on the rudder with a consistent vision for the future. “Add more jokes. Add more Batman.” We end up with not just the wobbliest comic book movie in a long time but not even the best Suicide Squad movie made this year… The original cut cannot have been this shambolic.

5

Jonathan Glazer directs Ray Winstone, Ben Kingsley and Ian McShane in this retired safe cracker is persuaded to do one last job after the most terrifyingly pschopathic persuader turns up at his Costa Del Crime villa. 

Cor! This is a scorcher. You can feel the sweat, heat and wrinkly old erections. Beautifully shot and soundtracked by Glazer embracing and amping up the Cockney gangster movie cliche so it becomes deafening background noise for a farce of frustration and threat. The sexuality of all the characters have a treacly liquid quality, our hero Gal wants to reject his old lawless life to embrace a heavenly and monogamous relationship with his ex porn star wife. Yet all these forceful old men keep grabbing at him to pull him away from that and into their orgy of threat, destruction and risk. None more so than Kingsley’s horrifyingly belligerent Don Logan, a man who not doesn’t take “No” for answer but kicks “No” to floor, stomps it to death, spits in its face and calls “No” a cunt. The interplay between him and Winstone’s ostensible hero is captivating, like watching a hostage negotiater trapped in a cage with a tiger. The movie loses something when Don gets his way and Gal performs the heist (still thrilling). Glazer marked himself out here as a future Kubrick or Roeg with his control of genre, jarring rhythm and stark imagery. His later works Birth and Under the Skin are equally artful and impressive, but this is the only one you can watch with your Dad and both walk away both satisfied and entertained.

9

Franklin J. Schaffner directs Steve McQueen, Dustin Hoffman and Don Gordon in this thrilling “true” tale of a  French thief and a white collar criminal’s growing friendship as they try to escape the horrors of French Guiana penal colony.

Two of my favourite movie stars pair up, with their grinding acting styles just emphasising the unlikely loyalty and respect that grows between them over the years trying to eke out a little freedom. McQueen in particular lowers the bucket into his acting well deep, no longer relying on his movie star cool to enthrall you. When the brutal system of the penal colony,  and Darwinian tropical nature that dominates it, wears him down it is like the free spirit of the sixties is being eradicated. Schaffner is a fine director of men unwilling to submit to the bars that enslave them. His is such an interesting and underrated output. And he has never directed a better film than here, one that beautifully captures the absurdity of the horrors inflicted on the poor souls oppressed and punished by perverse imprisonment. A prisoner carries a corpse to get extra rations, dream sequences sprung on us are as nightmarish as anything Jodorowsky magics up, McQueen’s rapid ageing as he is put through the deprivation of solitary is shockingly surreal. That attention to the cruel ecosystem surrounding the prisoners; there are so many shots of fighting crabs, snapping crocodiles, netted birds and stray dogs that you can feel like your are in a tougher, grittier Terrence Malick’s film. But whereas Malick’s concerns are of man’s insignificance to nature, here Schaffner is juxtaposing the inhuman with the inhumane. Only a moment of solace occurs between McQueen and some natives who share no language – and it feels like Malick’s ripped this sequence off wholesale for the start of The Thin Red Line. Pretentious symbolism aside, it is entertaining in it buddy movie dynamic, in its action. Each of the escapes are thrilling set pieces. An epic adventure, perfectly executed and with a strong message of hope for all. You can feel Papillon’s distinct thematic echoes in more highly regarded modern films such as Shawshank, Point Break and Schindler’s List. That’s a completely varied bunch of quality influencees. This key work should not be lost to time but rather be held up as a true great of mid 20th century cinema.

10