Alexander Payne directs Paul Giamatti, Da’Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa in this comedy about an unloved prep school classics teacher who must look after a troubled student over the Christmas break.
Seventies vibe recreated right down to the film stock, crash zooms and folk songs. A funny first hour gives way to a hymn about compassion. A hard movie not to fall in love with, a gentle movie full of intelligence and wit.
David Fincher directs Daniel Craig, Rooney Mara and Christopher Plummer in this remake of the Swedish mystery bestseller.
Fair to say this suffered coming out so soon after the Noomi Rapace trilogy. With a bit of distance this epic but slick adaptation proves just what a master Fincher is. The casting of the relatively unknown Mara is devastatingly effective, Craig plays a crumpled, wimpish anti-Bond efficiently, this is the role you wish he got further entries in. Their convergent storylines build well until the third act where they start working together… with horny benefits. All the serial killings, predatory sex beasts and revenge have that trademark Se7en nastiness to them. Yet they land differently when glimpsed as short sudden shocks between all this austere, polished prestige. The colour has been faded out – snow, grey, admin. I think Fincher took this one on to try and tell a ridiculously dense mystery as visually as possible. Dial back the exposition, fetishise the evidence, cum to the method. As we watch analogue materials be digitised we piece together a multi strand enigma, watch the past become reanimated. Oh yeah, you can tell what hooked Fincher in here and it wasn’t Sony’s unlimited budget or Craig’s immaculate winter wardrobe. That 007 inspired hard R credit sequence of an oil and cables orgy to the Yeah Yeah Yeahs doing Led Zep… well, that’s cinema, kids! Cover versions can be a blast.
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin direct Annette Bening, Jodie Foster and Rhys Ifans in this biographical sports drama about aging swimmer Diana Nyad’s multiple attempts in the 2010s to swim from Cuba to Florida, with flashbacks to her early life.
Very much the Jodie and Annette show but that is the reason we bought our tickets.
7
Perfect Double Bill: The World’s Fastest Indian (2005)
Federico Fellini directs Giulietta Masina, François Périer and Franca Marzi in this Italian character study following a prostitute who begins to question her way of life.
Giulietta Masina. One of those full fat central performances that pulls you in and is so mannered, funny, nuanced and heartfelt that you can’t do anything but be attracted deeply towards it. Like Cage in Leaving Las Vegas or Huppert in anything. I’m starting to dig Fellini’s form. Less a three-act structure and more a series of short stories collected together as they happen to share the same character. As you view the omnibus you start to see the shift in that lead character’s heart, their world going askew. In Cabiria’s case you’d kill for her to have that happy ending when a possible one is in sight. Yet it somehow still feels impossible. Technically, this is a perfectly crafted piece of visual art.
James Mangold directs Joaquin Phoenix, Reese Witherspoon and Robert Patrick in this biopic of Johnny Cash.
Cards on the table time. Live At Folsom Prison is the greatest live album ever and Johnny Cash is the recording artist whose songs I sing away absent minded to whenever I’m doing my chores. So even though this often feels as rote and shopworn as many a musician life story, I have a real affinity for the material and the man. What punts it up a notch or five are a pair of megawatt lead performances from Phoenix and Witherspoon. Their enticing central stop-start romance means Walk The Line bucks it formulaic nature and becomes a movie in its own right.
Sam Esmail directs Julia Roberts, Mahershala Ali and Ethan Hawke in this apocalyptic drama where two families uncomfortably share a secluded dream home as America shuts down.
Many scenes in this feel like a play filmed by a new director who wants to try every camera trick in the toy box. And while it drifts to oblivion very slowly it does often work. Stealthily battering away at your paranoia until you relent and can allow the low key nightmare scenario to grip you.
Juel Taylor directs John Boyega, Teyonah Parris, and Jamie Foxx in this sci-fi satire where a local hood discovers his blaxploitation spoof ‘hood and his body are part of an insidious experiment.
The reason I’ve grouped these Netflix releases together is they share so much DNA despite being projects with very different aims. Tick box exercises. The Netflix algorithm dictates what makes an optimum “original” to the point where the recipe has become very obvious. A movie that weighs in at well over two hours plus, consisting of moments rather than momentum. That almost feels like both an extended trailer AND a condensed supercut of a TV series. Race (in America) is the focus but dealt with glibly to reflect social media opinions rather than difficult realities. There’s a dance sequence for TikTok. A cult B-Lister appearing for an extended cameo. The movie does more to inspire talking points for columnists and pundits than engage fully with the viewer… making you feel like you’ve signed up for a Netflix Movie discussion group. After a strong first act little seems to gain narrative traction. There feels like no conclusion. Is this it? Cloning? AI? C’mon Netflix you are part of the same problem. The slow creep.
Nathan Greno and Byron Howard directs Mandy Moore, Zachary Levi and Donna Murphy in this Disney animated respin of the Rapunzel fairy tale.
To my mind the first time CGI animation felt mainly unobtrusive and natural to the storytelling. It is neither a selling point nor a handicap here. The comedy, romance and action are well balanced though Tangled probably could do with a couple more show tunes. Donna Murphy puts in a big, memorable voice acting turn as the villainous witch. The most interesting thing about this is it starts out like something very ‘turn of the millennium’ and flip (Shrek or Enchanted) and actually resets back to something more traditional by the third act. Begone sarcasm.
Álex de la Iglesia directs Álex Angulo, Armando De Razza and Santiago Segura in this Spanish supernatural comedy where a priest goes to Madrid to stop the birth of the antichrist.
An opening sequence where a priest commits loads of street sins to attract Satanists. A high wire spectacle where the three unlikely wisemen dangle off a famous landmark to escape capture. A monstrous SFX finale. Works best as an inverted Christmas black comedy. Just that smidge too random, too jerkily paced and too of its time to chime as a suspense piece. Some wonderfully whacked characters are introduced for minimal screentime but the central three have a nice ricochet to them once together.
Phil Traill directs Felicity Jones, Ed Westwick and Bill Bailey in this romantic comedy sports film set around snowboarding at an expensive ski resort.
Originality and unpredictability be damned, this gets the job done. Chicken Cottage receives some serious airtime but deserving future star Jones is the main product ultimately being marketed. Sold!
David Lean directs John Mills, Valerie Hobson and Alec Guinness in this Charles Dickens adaptation where an orphan boy comes into the good life from a mysterious benefactor.
Possibly the definitive Dickens adaptation. Maximum story, minimal fat. Lean understands what the big set pieces are (Magwitch in the graveyard, falling for Estella, Joe’s visit, smuggling the benefactor to the packet ship, Havisham’s fiery demise) and races through the revelations and coincidences so as to allow enough room to realise them perfectly. Feels really cinematic but never relents on the prestige. Australian cinematographer Robert Krasker makes the opening sequence an indelible expressionistic nightmare of guilt and threat. Finlay Currie is perfectly cast as Magwitch and both actresses who play Estella are uncommonly beautiful… as they need to be.
Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary 