Juho Kuosmanen directs Seidi Haarla, Yuri Borisov and Dinara Drukarova in this Finnish drama where two ill-suited strangers share a journey that will change their perspective on life, as a train weaves its way up to the arctic circle.
A negative Before Sunrise. Or an arthouse Planes, Trains and Automobiles. Cute in a grimy way. The acting is pleasingly natural.
6
Perfect Double Bill: On the Beach at Night Alone (2017)
Kelly Marcel directs Tom Hardy, Juno Temple and Rhys Ifans in this superhero adventure where Eddie and his brain eating symbiote face their greatest foe.
You might have noticed I’m watching less and less comic book movies over the past two years. It is proving harder to get much appetite for sequels to films that I only half heartedly enjoyed and soft reboots with no name recasting. The Venom series, while never stellar, always delivered one thing. Tom Hardy in Jekyll & Hyde dual roles untethered from any sense of reality. And this has that in spades. Yes… the story and the sets feel very Nineties B-Movie. Yes, the credited cast is distractingly British. And, yes, the final section is as meh as most recent superhero flicks. Transparent carnage. But I had fast food fun, as I always do with this quirky horror-tinged comedy branch off. As IP sluice goes I have an affection for these ones that might stand the test of time. Chuckle, chuckle, chuckle.
6
Perfect Double Bill: Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)
I write regular features about live comedy for British Comedy Guide here https://www.comedy.co.uk/people/bobby_carroll/features/ and my own Substack https://substack.com/@edinburghlaughterbulletin
Pedro Almodóvar directs Tilda Swinton, Julianne Moore and John Turturro in this arthouse drama where a dying woman asks an estranged old friend to be with her as she kills herself.
Almodóvar’s English language debut isn’t his finest hour. The settings are lush and the concept solid. Yet he grabs around at lots of disparate ideas and the experience is anchored by an unusually clunky performance from Swinton. Something is lost in translation here, too many moments feel like notebook musings that could not find a home in another story.
5
Perfect Double Bill: Broken Embraces (2009)
Aki Kaurismäki directs Markku Peltola, Kati Outinen and Juhani Niemelä in this Finnish drama where an amnesiac builds a new life with the helps of the docklands homeless community.
More blank faced grimness and eventual redemption. This one seems to have less under the hood than previous funnier entries.
6
Perfect Double Bill: Lights In The Dusk (2006)
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Richard Donner directs Bruce Willis, Mos Def and David Morse in this action thriller where a bum detective is assigned transporting a witness to the courthouse on time and finds himself having to outsmart every corrupt cop in the NYPD.
The action is small scale but I think most Die Hard fans would have preferred things if this compelling B movie was tweaked to be John McClane’s last adventure. Willis is back in underdog mode, has to use his brain as much as his brawn, he gets an unlikely unwanted partner to bounce off of and the eventual redemption has particularly cynical Big Apple bitter aftertaste. It even gels with the downward spiral we witnessed back in 1995. 16 Blocks is grittier and smarter than the bombastic Die Hard 4.0 and the atrocious fifth franchise killer. The first two acts see Willis’ alcoholic schlub get his legs back and have to play 3D chess around Manhattan. The movie is essential 16 narrow escapes. Morse is a complex villain and Mos Def moves past his initially grating characterisation. The ending is a little trite but hey… that’s Hollywood / Donner. A mid range movie it is hard not to like, that now plays like the last flight of a rare bird. Willis in his prime, location shoot, fallible heroes.
7
Perfect Double Bill: Copshop (2021)
Alfred Hitchcock directs Joel McCrea, Laraine Day and George Sanders in this thriller where a crime reporter is assigned covering Europe at the brink of war and gets caught up in a conspiracy he cannot fathom.
Takes a good half hour to get going but once it does we get prime Hitch set piece after prime Hitch set piece. Assassinations in Amsterdam, car chase, windmill cat and mouse, penthouse hotel escapes, the bodyguard hired to kill you, the fake kidnapping bluff and a plane-crash-at-sea-mega finale. The artificial sets are a little clunky but this tastes very much how a 1940s Mission: Impossible might have been cooked. A lesser Hitch thanks to its B list cast but one that still puts you through the ringer. George Sanders is oily and self serving as the good egg you can never truly trust. You kinda wish he was the lead.
8
Perfect Double Bill: Saboteur (1942)
I write regular features about live comedy for British Comedy Guide here https://www.comedy.co.uk/people/bobby_carroll/features/ and my own Substack https://substack.com/@edinburghlaughterbulletin
Mira Nair directs Reese Witherspoon, Romola Garai and Gabriel Byrne in this period drama where ambitious Becky Sharpe navigates high society in 19th century England.
I have never read William Makepeace Thackeray’s 800 page plus tome so I couldn’t say whether this is a good condensing of the source. I will say that it moves at a fair clip, was always engaging and I was never lost within the expansive ensemble. Nair soaks her take in colour, probably leans into the East India Company references a little too heavily (they stick out like sour thumbs by the end). It feels like a movie. Her only real failing is Witherspoon’s Becky Sharpe remains a bit of enigma by close of play. We have been through too much with her for her to still be a plucky cypher.
6
Perfect Double Bill: Pride And Prejudice (2005)
Robert Mandel directs Tom Berenger, Ernie Hudson and Marc Anthony in this action thriller where a military trained killer poses as a substitute teacher to get revenge on the gang bangers who kneecapped his girlfriend.
Dangerous Minds Meets Death Wish with lurches at the Willem Dafoe subplot from Clear And Present Danger. The narrative erupts wildly. Instead of Berenger’s mercenary taking down a gang of youths, he actually uncovers a drug running conspiracy that goes all the way to the top. Steroid camp. The action is dumb, there are way too many characters and William Forsythe isn’t in it as often as he needs to be. But when he is… boy oh boy… he is unpredictable. Keeps ripping off the score from The Fugitive. Squirrely enough to be watchable.
5
Perfect Double Bill: 187 (1997)
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Strait-Jacket (1964)
William Castle directs Joan Crawford, Diane Baker and Leif Erickson in this hagsploitation shocker where an axe murdering lady is released into her daughter’s care twenty years after she chopped her husband’s head off.
The twist is obvious and the shocks now taste tame. Crawford and Baker both give hypnotising performances. Castle’s tabloid style of black and white filming lacks consistency from scene to scene but certain runs (the intro / the makeover) are simultaneously thrilling and camp.
5
Bride Of Frankenstein (1935)
James Whale directs Boris Karloff, Elsa Lanchester and Colin Clive in this gothic horror sequel where the monster survives and seeks a companion.
I prefer the first one. This feels like a lot of good ideas jumbled together, shook up and then flung at a brick wall abruptly. Karloff is impressive, given more to do, the monster begins to grow self aware. The chesty Mary Shelley prologue, the little creations in jars, the visit to the hermit, the Bride’s revulsion… all juicy stuff.
7
Touch Of Death (1988)
Lucio Fulci directs Brett Halsey, Ria De Simone and Al Cliver in this dark Italian comedy where a paranoid gigolo kills and eats his boring lovers.
Absolute cobbled together cheap dross. Brett Halsey, however, is a whole passel of pleasures as the vain, paranoid serial killer. We really get into his head, sharing his disgust at the comical grotesques he beds and butchers. A sleazy, wobbly, sunburnt first draft of Bret Easton Ellis’ American Psycho. If it catches you in the right mood there is intentional and unintentional laughs a plenty.
5
John Carpenter’s Village Of The Damned (1995)
John Carpenter directs Christopher Reeve, Kirstie Alley and Linda Kozlowski in this relatively faithful American update of the classic sci-fi horror chiller The Midwich Cuckoos.
Very flat. Even Carpenter’s classy compositions come across as a bad way to frame kids with Liberace hair. The body count is increased but the deaths lack tension. The casting of multiple name actors who were the leads in mega hits (but cannot carry a movie beyond that) must mean something. Surely?
4
The Sect (1991)
Michele Soavi directs Kelly Curtis, Herbert Lom and Maria Angela Giordano in this Italian / German demonic mystery where creepy people keep trying to enter the secret basement to a kindergarten teacher’s secluded house.
At its best when you have no idea where all this hysteria is going. I’m not sure Soavi justifies all his nutty motifs. Rabbits, blue water parasites, feathers, nose bugs, boxes tied up with string. But the opening twenty minutes are pretty awesome, especially a barely connected chase around Frankfurt. The rest of the movie might try your patience on a second viewing.
6
Day Of The Dead (1985)
George A Romero directs Lori Cardille, Terry Alexander and Joe Pilato in this third entry in the zombie horror series where survivors in an underground military bunker find themselves more dangerous than the undead that besiege them.
Not my favourite of the Dead trilogy. The last remnants of living society fall apart. Plenty of gun totin’ civics, just not enough zombie action. Savini’s gore FX are remarkable and stomach churning. Bub the smart zombie is cute.
6
Sofia Coppola directs Kirsten Dunst, Jason Schwartzman and Asia Argento in this sugar rush biopic of the iconic but ill-fated queen of France.
A one-of-a-kind. History as a mood, decadence as a cage. The sensory maximalism make this a masterpiece of visual design. A work of beauty, completely in harmony with itself. Perfect.
10
Perfect Double Bill: The Affair Of The Necklace (2001)
I write regular features about live comedy for British Comedy Guide here https://www.comedy.co.uk/people/bobby_carroll/features/ and my own Substack https://substack.com/@edinburghlaughterbulletin
Bobby Carroll's Movie Diary 